First off, I’d like to say that I have no idea what a perfect game is, or how much a 7 game is better than a 3 game. So, I use categories with few distinct scores, and then just add the whole shebang together. My categories are:
Story (0-4); Writing (0-2); Technical (0-2); Puzzles (0-2).
Obviously, then, I place emphasis on story. Here I include things like plot, PC motivation, etc, etc. I should note that non-story games, such as jokes, gags, puns, etc, might get rated as high as a 2 in this category if they are well implemented. 0 is reserved for works where the sequence of events, or indeed, the whole point of the thing escapes me utterly. Stories that are just bad will get a 1. Also, a 4 is reserved for very strong, powerful stories with a drive to them, like in Tapestry or Photopia. A story that is simply good will get a 3.
Writing is what it is. 0 is reserved for blatant abuse of the language, such as when more paragraphs have spelling errors that not, or spelling errors in the introduction, or things like that. 2 is reserved for powerful and effective writing, good imagery, strong humor, stuff like that. 1 is everything else.
Technical is more difficult. It relates to how well I was able to see that the author has mastered his selected authorship platform (or lack thereof). Things like verb implementation, object detail, alternative responses (not solutions), dynamic NPCs, etc, all score high in this category. Blatant bugs almost always mandate a 0.
Puzzles refers to how well each obstacle is described, how well its solution is clued, and how well failures contribute to an understanding of the situation and to eventual success. The telepathy thing will most likely earn a 0. Puzzles based on deductive reasoning will likely get a 2. Puzzles based on creative induction are likely to get a 1. By the way, if your game has puzzles, I'm likely to need hints. That's ok. But ultimately, if I have to turn to the walkthrough, you're not likely to get a 2 from me.
Unfortunately, I did run across a piece of work that was so bad as to get a 0 from my system. Now, seeing as I didn’t give out any 10’s, I pondered the idea of simply adding 1 to everyone’s scores. Alas, the judging deadline fell upon me before I had time to decide, so I didn’t… Oh, and as per my previous post, I did ponder whether to beat the author upside the head with a soft club for entering the game, and I did ponder whether to beat the organizer upside the head with a soft club for not allowing a vote of 0. Again, not being of a violent nature, I doubt that the object such ponderings will ever be carried out. But I did ponder them nonetheless.
Finally, I guess it had to do with random ordering, but a lot of the games I played early on had the PC waking up either lost or disoriented. Os, I decided to track that in a little category on its own, which doesn’t really influence the score directly (although it might have an influence in the Story category).
Wake Up: Normal; Disoriented; Lost; N/A
Lost only applies to games where the PC really doesn't know where he is, or doesn't realize it within the first few turns. Disoriented applies if any initial descriptions claim that the PC doesn't remember the recent past with clarity.
Lastly, at the end of this file, there are some interesting statistics on my voting.
Enough of this. On with the reviews!
|
Game |
Story |
Writing |
Technical |
Puzzles |
Rating |
Wake Up |
|
2 |
1 |
0 |
1 |
4 |
Disoriented |
|
|
2 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
6 |
|
|
|
Not Rated |
||||||
|
3 |
2 |
1 |
2 |
8 |
|
|
|
1 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
Disoriented |
|
|
2 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
6 |
N/A |
|
|
1 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
Disoriented |
|
|
3 |
2 |
2 |
0 |
7 |
Disoriented |
|
|
2 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
7 |
N/A |
|
|
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
6 |
N/A |
|
|
0 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
1 |
|
|
|
2 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
5 |
N/A |
|
|
2 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
5 |
Disoriented |
|
|
0 |
1 |
2 |
0 |
3 |
|
|
|
1 |
1 |
1 |
0 |
3 |
|
|
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 (1) |
N/A |
|
|
1 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
4 |
Lost |
|
|
1 |
1 |
0 |
1 |
3 |
N/A |
|
|
Not Rated |
||||||
|
2 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
3 |
N/A |
|
|
1 |
2 |
0 |
0 |
3 |
N/A |
|
|
4 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
9 |
N/A |
|
|
2 |
1 |
0 |
1 |
4 |
N/A |
|
|
1 |
2 |
2 |
0 |
5 |
N/A |
|
|
2 |
1 |
2 |
1 |
6 |
|
|
|
3 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
9 |
N/A |
|
|
1 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
N/A |
|
|
2 |
1 |
1 |
0 |
4 |
|
|
|
2 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
7 |
N/A |
|
|
3 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
6 |
Disoriented |
|
|
0 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
N/A |
|
|
Not Rated |
||||||
|
4 |
2 |
2 |
0 |
8 |
Lost |
|
|
Not Rated |
||||||
|
1 |
1 |
1 |
0 |
3 |
Normal |
|
|
1 |
2 |
2 |
0 |
5 |
N/A |
|
|
2 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
5 |
|
|
|
Not Rated |
||||||
|
Game |
Rating |
Comp
Rating |
Placing |
Comp
Placing |
|
9 |
7,22 |
1 |
2 |
|
|
9 |
6,32 |
1 |
9 |
|
|
8 |
7,01 |
3 |
5 |
|
|
8 |
6,67 |
3 |
6 |
|
|
7 |
7,12 |
5 |
3 |
|
|
7 |
7,07 |
5 |
4 |
|
|
7 |
5,51 |
5 |
16 |
|
|
6 |
6,62 |
8 |
7 |
|
|
6 |
5,69 |
8 |
12 |
|
|
6 |
5,68 |
8 |
13 |
|
|
6 |
5,32 |
8 |
17 |
|
|
6 |
4,30 |
8 |
23 |
|
|
5 |
7,39 |
13 |
1 |
|
|
5 |
6,55 |
13 |
8 |
|
|
5 |
6,05 |
13 |
10 |
|
|
5 |
5,62 |
13 |
14 |
|
|
5 |
4,54 |
13 |
22 |
|
|
4 |
4,73 |
18 |
21 |
|
|
4 |
3,96 |
18 |
25 |
|
|
4 |
3,50 |
18 |
27 |
|
|
4 |
3,38 |
18 |
28 |
|
|
3 |
6,00 |
22 |
11 |
|
|
3 |
5,52 |
22 |
15 |
|
|
3 |
5,27 |
22 |
18 |
|
|
3 |
4,99 |
22 |
19 |
|
|
3 |
4,94 |
22 |
20 |
|
|
3 |
3,71 |
22 |
26 |
|
|
2 |
4,20 |
28 |
24 |
|
|
2 |
3,19 |
28 |
30 |
|
|
1 |
3,23 |
30 |
29 |
|
|
1 |
2,77 |
30 |
31 |
|
|
1 |
1,83 |
30 |
33 |
|
|
0 (1) |
2,02 |
33 |
32 |
|
|
Not Rated |
||||
|
Not Rated |
||||
|
Not Rated |
||||
|
Not Rated |
||||
|
Not Rated |
||||
Wake Up: Disoriented
A rather short and simple story. As the game blurb says, you start off as a simple carpet salesman, and then get yourself into all sorts of trouble, of a criminal sort, and it's up to you to clear yourself. Nothing new, but not a hideously bad take on it. For some reason, the pacing failed to impress me.
Although the info command states that there are multiple puzzles to solve, I didn't find the game very puzzley. I did hesitate at a point or two along the way, but only because I am not the type of player that grabs everything in sight and searches everywhere. Eventually, I got through it, but was not overly impressed. On the bright side, I wasn't particularly thrown off, either.
The writing seemed about average. Lots of errors of the your/you're and its/it's variety, but I've gotten used to those by now. It wasn't all bad, though. I liked the tone of the intro screen, and there were some jokes. Ok, they were bad jokes, but that was clearly intentional, and it just worked well for me.
The technical aspect is the game's poorest facet. About three-quarters of the way through, the game starts to complain that I am a bit peckish, and this then escalates to a dire need for food, lest I shall pass out. I'm thinking to myself, oh no, not a hunger puzzle, but then the game ends. As in, victory. Generally, there is a poor implementation of details throughout all of the locations, and there is poor implementation of command wording. Also, some odd points:
>bartender, hello
lost mind.
Just like that. Odd response, that... Things like these tend to be spotted when authors ask their beta testers for command transcripts, by the way. Other examples:
>get cup
You already have the plastic cup!
>i
You are empty-handed.
Where exactly is the cup, then?
>x photo
It's a photograph taken 5 years ago of you and your wife, Jenny, during your honeymoon at the Gold Coast.
>x jenny
I don't know the word "jenny".
Pity... This would have been a good chance.
Really, apart from the fake hunger puzzle (which is what I think threw me off the pacing of the story) and the 'lost mind' response, none of those are very serious, but taken together, they indicate a lack of care in fleshing out the details. And we all know the pain is in the details, don't we.
Lastly, one final note. The fonts and colors are cute, although they can get tiring. The black background, however, is _not_ cute. It forced me to go and specifically change the color of the input font on my interpreter, which means I'll have to go back and reset it for other games. This did not affect my judging, but I thought I'd point it out anyway...
Story: 2 (it's ok, but been there done that)
Writing: 1 (average, all around)
Technical: 0 (pretty bad all around)
Puzzles: 1 (they're there, and they're easy enough once you get in "adventure" mode)
Final rating: 4
Wake Up:
Not a new concept, but always a useful one. I'm a tourist
that missed the tour group. So now I have to find them. Which I do. But then I
loose them. Except I know where they went. Now I have to join them. Which I do,
but then I loose them again. So now I have to join them one more time. And
that's all there is to it. Simple, but effective nonetheless. Plus, we get to see
As for puzzles, really, if it weren't for the hints, I'd never have gotten there. I attribute that to two factors: one is my lack of knowledge of Central American / Spanish American culture; the other is my utter lack of capacity to come up with a creative solution. While the second one is my own fault, the first one, I feel, is a limitation of the game.
The writing is good. This is not a masterpiece of
literature, but it really doesn't have to be. That
Technically, the game works. To be fair, there isn't much there to go wrong with, but I didn't bump into any snags. The only exception is talking. Asking about stuff never seems to work, which is a pity, since it would have been a nice way to clue the player a bit about what is going on with all those sipas and llamas.
Story: 2 (the premise is ok, but it's not really a story)
Writing: 2 (not literature, but very nice and evocative nonetheless)
Technical: 1 (average, nothing fancy being tried, and needs more dialog)
Puzzles: 1 (at the very least, the game should have explained what a sipa is)
Final rating: 6
I'm not gonna play this. It's a sequel, and I don't like to play sequels out of sequence. I know the game says it's not necessary to play the previous episodes, but I do plan to play "Earth and Sky" and "Another Earth, Another Sky" some day, so I'm leaving this one till after that.
Final rating: NR
Wake Up:
A reenactment of a mystical tale about the origins of Tai Chi. Utterly charming. The whole story has a very oriental feeling to it, and is rather well supported by the impeccable writing, which creates rather vivid imagery. Also, I found no spelling or grammar errors of any kind.
The puzzles are all very accessible, well thought out and well clued. I found three different endings for the game, each with its little moral snippet, which just adds to the charm. Oddly enough, even though I only consider one of those endings an actual 'victory', there is one other ending where the game considers that I have won, which just feels wrong to me... I can't expand any further on this without being spoilery.
The lack of an 'undo last move' at endgame is inconvenient, although once you know everything, replaying it is rather fast, so I guess it's really not all that important. Also, I found a few technical flaws throughout the game. One minor disturbing detail is the game's odd choice of defaults.
Indeed, I had some difficulty with the final "puzzle" (well, it's really too obvious to call it a puzzle, but it's something you need to do in order to finish the game, so why not call it that), precisely because of a technical failure, which kind of spoiled the end game for me, actually making me go to the walkthrough. I'm not gonna quote the exact passage because, again, it would be spoilery.
Final note: The game notes that a font capable of displaying Chinese characters would be a plus-value, so I took some time trying to get this to work (which I didn't count against my two hours, by the way). Finally, I got it to work by changing the font to @Arial Unicode MS, which, I think, is the only Unicode font available to Windows Frotz 2002 on my XP box. The game was right; those characters add just the right touch to the atmosphere.
Story: 3 (rather original and well thought-out, too barebones for a full-fledged 4, though)
Writing: 2 (vivid imagery, good atmosphere, no errors)
Technical: 1 (it would have been a 2, but that technical glitch on the last puzzle was fatal)
Puzzles: 2 (well thought-out and well clued, good story support)
Final rating: 8
Wake Up: Disoriented
Well, what can I say? You start this one in your room, where a conspicuous lone letter claims that in order for you to "attain your knighthood you must carry out the following, randomly selected, task: Bring the head of a dragon to the King." Blah. Also, you have no equipment and must procure some. Again, blah. Quite a large number of NPCs, as befits any decent quest, but most of them are rather cardboard, performing either the function of arbitrarily swapping one object for another, or that of posing a static artificial barrier (i.e. puzzle) to your questing.