TADS GAMES
All
Hope Abandon by Eric Eve [This review was previously published on Dan Shiovitz' web site. Reprinted with permission.] All Hope Abandon is an interesting game — I think it's the first IF game I've played that starts off with the PC in a boring lecture and then being transported to a magical fantasy land, but *the lecture is actually relevant to the rest of the game*. And what a lecture it is. It starts off with "minimal time for critical assessment", passes through "religionsgeschichtlichen", and plunges right on into extensive discussion of the Q Parallel. But luckily we're all experienced theological scholars, and so any explanation of — what? no? Well, yeah, it's a good thing Eve provided copious background info so that you can piece together some of what the lecture is talking about, if you're so inclined. And you probably should be, because shortly thereafter you find a lot of the theological issues having direct relevance to your experience. At least, directly relevant in an IFfy sort of way: there's this church you explore with a symbolic mural or two you can look at, there's this woman named Hope and she's stuck in a swamp, there are a couple empty tombs which are not as empty as all that and require you to solve puzzles to get out of, and so on. If this sounds a little confused, well, yeah, I think so. All Hope Abandon can't always seem to make up its mind whether it's an afterlife parody a la Perdition's Flames, whether it's a straight exploration-and-puzzles adventure, or whether it's literary journey filled with subtext. Not that it has to choose just one, of course, but whatever the game picks, it should be clear about what it's doing all the time, and it isn't really. The ending, in particular, is too weak to be fully satisfying story-wise, but it's not exactly a puzzly ending and doesn't quite satisfy on that account either. Overall All Hope Abandon has quite a lot of good bits, and it's quite well done in a technical sense, but it left me wishing for more overall coherence. Finding
Martin by Gayla Wennstrom [This is an abridgment of a review previously published in IF-Review. Read the full-length review in IF-Review. Reprinted with permission.] Finding Martin comes as a bit of a surprise -- who's still writing large puzzle games these days? But it's by no means an unwelcome surprise. On the contrary, it turns out that a large puzzle game is just the sort of thing I've been looking for. Standards have slipped in these degenerate modern days, so let me clarify that we are talking a standard walkthrough of two thousand moves. That isn't *my* turn count -- I had closer to six thousand moves by the end of the game -- that's the no-wasted-moves walkthrough written by the author herself (albeit with a number of detours to see the hidden corners of the game). This is not a particularly large game room-wise, but it's crammed full of puzzles. These are of wildly varying size -- some are short and require just manipulating a single object, while others are elaborate and require bits from literally a dozen rooms (I am thinking here in particular of a time-travel puzzle that puts the chute in Sorcerer to shame). They're also of varying quality -- many of the puzzles range between fun and delightful to solve, but there are also many others that are either too trivial or require extensively reading the author's mind/walkthrough. The writing is bouncy and fun to read, especially if you're a fan of any of the various sources (Douglas Adams, Tolkien, Monty Python, Lewis Carroll) the author references extensively, and the plot is good enough to hold the puzzles together and that's all I really care about for this kind of game. There are only a few areas where the game falls down a bit. There are too many places where the game requires non-standard phrasing (eg, PRESS "3" instead of PRESS 3, or SAY "X" TO NPC instead of ASK NPC ABOUT X), too many areas where the game gives error messages like "You must pick up the book first" instead of just doing it for me, and for a game this large, having an inventory limit and no sack object is really painful. There are also too many areas when there's no guidance whatsoever for what the player should work on next -- I don't mind exploring some on my own, but given that the game can definitely be made unwinnable, I'm reluctant to try too much. Finding Martin is not a minor commitment, but if you haven't played a game this size in a while, and you have a few weeks (and ideally a friend to play it with), I definitely suggest picking it up. There's a whole lot of game here, and all the effort it calls for won't go unrewarded. Meine
Dalix by Alice Merridew Meine Dalix seems like fanfiction from the start. The game contains inexplicable violence, bad poetry, ambiguous sexuality, straightforward sexuality, characters with godlike powers and more poor spelling and punctuation errors than a third-grade "What I Did On My Summer Vacation" essay. A quick session with Google clarified things a bit; not fanfiction but written for a very small audience, Meine Dalix is linked to an obscure and not-terribly-active roleplaying forum. The plot of the game, such as it is, revolves around Dalix finding a good Valentine's day present for his lover, Poppet. An early room description (?) informs you that since Dalix could simply create anything, there's something special about actually buying a present—although, when it comes time for it, Dalix steals all the presents in any case. Still, something interesting could have been made from this, given good, imaginative writing or implementation of a few fun open-ended puzzles revolving around stealing or otherwise making away with a few items for presents. The game lets down on both counts. There are quite a few bizarre implementations (including a photograph you must 'check' to see what it is of—'examine' or 'look at' generate a different response), and only two puzzles. The first puzzle revolves around a box you must open. The action you must take could be performed in most of the rooms in the game, but you must do it in the room you find the box in. The second puzzle revolves around killing a shopkeeper who has locked you in his store—never mind that you've already shoplifted the item you want, and could use your godlike powers to get out of the store in any one of a number of imaginative ways. (Dalix's online profile even says he can break through the walls between dimensions and universes, so a shop door should be no problem, right?) Other strange things include dialog menus that are just slightly broken and more than slightly pointless, an unintended homage to Detective ("a glass bowl made of rosey glass"), a very small world, exits that aren't listed in the exit listing, strangely-named NPCs, a backpack that breaks scoping, a very snarky walkthrough, and an obscure and possibly unimplemented final action that left me unable to actually finish the game. I felt okay about that, though. I'd seen enough. PTBAD5
by Jonathan Berman as "Xorax" Intentionally bad. Not recommended. A
Sugared Pill by Colin Borland [This review was previously published in SPAG #43. Reprinted with permission.] Although A Sugared Pill has a few flaws, its story and its puzzles were interesting enough to keep me feeling involved all the way until the end of the game. It's worth a play. As the game opens, you are walking out of a social club, when suddenly a hit man tries to kill you. This is rather unexpected, since you are more or less an everyman character (or maybe an "everywoman" character, considering your character's taste for Whitney Houston). Anyway, your first job is to prevent yourself from being killed by the hit man. After that, you will naturally want to uncover the reason for your attempted assassination. By the time you solve this mystery, you will have gone through both the upper crust and the shady underworld of modern-day Scotland, and you will be in a position to stop the plans of your would-be killer. Certain elements of this game are rather impressive. At the bottom of the game window, there is an attractive, custom-built set of icons, telling you where the exits are, and giving you shortcuts for driving, walking around, and talking to people. Also favorable is the fact that many of the puzzles are well designed and satisfying to solve, and the story is likely to hold the attention of anybody who likes mysteries. There's also quite a bit of humor in the game, poking fun at bureaucrats, executives, security guards, and other components of modern-day society. For instance:
Unfortunately, the game also has quite a number of bugs. For instance, "open car" and "close car" doesn't work, while "close car door" actually produces an error message in some cases. There are also annoying aspects of game play, such as the fact that, in more than one case, you have to look behind objects in order to win the game, even though examining those objects gives you no hint that there is anything behind them. The worst aspects of the game involve puzzles that are harder than necessary due to flawed game design. A couple of such problems are created by the game's conversation system, which is not implemented in a consistent manner, thus making things harder than they should be. You can talk to characters using a number of methods, including (1) the traditional system of "ask," "tell," and "character, command"; and (2) the command "talk to character," which sometimes brings up a list of options and sometimes doesn't. The problem is, these two systems are not interchangeable. There is a case where you need to tell a character about something, but if you use the "tell" verb, you will never accomplish this. You must instead use the "talk to" verb. Then, after you've gotten used to the idea that "talk to character" is the primary format for conversation, it later turns out that there is a puzzle you cannot solve without using the "character, command" format; the ability to give the corresponding command is not available in the "talk to" conversation menu. Due to these problems, A Sugared Pill can be quite a frustrating game, and I probably wouldn't have solved it if I hadn't emailed the author more than once. On the other hand, most of the puzzles are satisfying to solve, and the game has plenty of funny moments. What's more, the game's story may well appeal not only to mystery lovers, but also to those who are interested in the author's ideas about a few things that are wrong with modern society. As far as I'm concerned, that makes A Sugared Pill well worth playing. Die
Vollkommene Masse by Alice
Merridew [Editor's note: This game was originally released in IF Comp 2004, but was withdrawn because the author accidentally submitted the wrong version to the comp. A better version was then re-released in 2005; hence the game's appearance in this review collection. I originally wanted to get a new review of the new 2005 version, but this turned out to be impractical, so I have reprinted this review, which is based on the 2004 version.] [This review was previously published in SPAG #39. Reprinted with permission.] The premise of this game: you are a teenage female drow who has been captured by four warlords. You are now a prisoner in the castle, but, if you "please" (author's wording, not mine!) all of the warlords, you will be allowed to go free. This sounds significantly more pornographic than it actually is. In her introduction, the author notes, "Interactive fiction was just a stone’s throw for me, being an author by nature." As upbeat as this approach may be, it is simply not enough. I, too, have written my share of fiction, but the requirements of good interactive fiction are significantly different than the requirements of good writing. I cannot speak to the author's regular fiction, but this was simply not sufficient. At this point, what "Die Vollkommene Masse" actually needed was a massive round of NPC-fleshing followed by a lot of beta-testing. I didn't mind the menu-based conversation system except when it exploded. Time after time, I found myself stuck with only one option for conversation and able to enter that option over and over and over ad infinitum. The major NPCs were all quite active when I was in the room with them, which I appreciated -- it gave me a very good sense of their general personalities -- and having one travel from place to place was a nice touch. However, the NPCs were quite unresponsive when offered objects, giving me the same response over and over, which left me failing to offer them the correct objects for the plot because I had no reason to believe that they would react in any different way than the default. Others will doubtlessly disagree with me, but I liked the feature of listing the exits to the rooms -- it kept me from getting lost. While realism obviously took a step to the wayside in organizing the layout of the castle, I didn't mind that, either. I object to getting lost, and I didn't get lost; I dislike mapping, and I didn't have to map (even without checking the maps that she rather graciously included.) That was good. Some of the rooms had very nice descriptions, too; I particularly liked one line about how moonlight cast a milky glow around the room. Some of them had virtually no descriptions, or else had no actual substance save a list of objects (a dresser, a desk, a bed, etc.) That was annoying. Red herring objects: there were tons of them. I like the idea of lots of objects in a game, as it helps deflect the traditional adventurer's kleptomaniac tendencies, and I don't mind if they don't have an apparent purpose. However, this only holds true if they are adequately fleshed and implemented. These were not. As a general rule, the NPCs didn't care about them, and I couldn't do anything with them. (Why hand me a sword if you don't want me to kill people with it? At least let me try!) Serious bugs existed in this game, mostly related to differentiating one object from another. I wound up carrying around two copies of an object at one point without any ability whatsoever to affect either one because the game kept asking me which one I meant and they were identically named. I also discovered a number of mystery objects when the game asked me which one I meant in a peculiar fashion -- for example, ">examine window" led to "Which window do you mean, the window, or the ?" Argh. There were also a number of serious plot issues, all of which were heavily linked to the questionable morality and attitudes of the PC. The premise wasn't bad, but the implementation made me scream. My best (and least spoileresque) example is this: Very early in the game, I wandered outside the castle. Although the window of my fifth-story bedroom had been barred to prevent my escape, there were no guards in sight here. Super! Let's go! --but, I couldn't leave, because I didn't feel ready. This made and still makes no sense to me... in fact, the PC's ambivalence toward her captors bugged the heck out of me through the entire game. As far as I could tell, this wasn't a horrible prison for her, but a secret wish fulfillment fantasy in which she was the happy star as long as she could pretend that she didn't like it. The game warns in its beginning that it involves mature themes, but it doesn't. It involves an immature approach to potentially mature themes, which was quite disappointing. The introductory document promises that the game is mind-numbingly difficult. I will agree, but only because the author did not fully implement and flesh out her game. Given adequate incentive to explore and experiment with the NPCs, I could have finished this game quite swiftly and experienced minimal difficulty with the puzzles, as many of them were of a fetch-and-carry variety. As it was... no, I could not have solved it without a walkthrough... because I had no incentive to do so. The errors in spelling and grammar may not have been obtrusive to other people, but I found them annoying ("inticing", "There's nothing behind the Mbizi's bed"). The references to Mbizi's "shrunk" left me wondering if English was the author's native language -- the appropriate word seemed to be "trunk", but "shrunk" was the word repeatedly used instead by the author. If English isn't her native language, she did cover it quite well through 97% of the game, but the "shrunk" issue was bizarre. Partway through the game, I got tired and fell asleep. (The PC, not me.) Why? It was apparently night in the game, and I had been playing for quite some time, so I was willing to believe that the PC would fall asleep... but there seemed to be no point to it. This interlude could have been used in a very interesting fashion for a dream sequence or something similar, but she fell asleep, then woke up. There was no point to it. In closing, does anyone understand the meaning of the title? I am at a perfect loss as to how "The Perfect Mass" (as the author translates "Die Volkommene Masse") has anything at all to do with the game. |