[Reviews] IntroComp 2004
Dan Shiovitz
reviews. This particular set is of the recent IntroComp entries, so
they're archived at http://www.drizzle.com/~dans/if/introcomp.html
instead of the usual place, but, like usual, if you're reading this
post after a few days there may be a more updated version there.
Before I get started with the actual reviews, I feel like I ought to
say a few words about writing introcomp games in general, since it
seemed like a number of the games this year missed the point. The idea
of an introcomp game is to be a teaser for your game. As you recall,
the judging criterion is "how much do you want to play more of this
entry?"
Given that, good introcomp games should do the following:
- Let the player know what kind of game it's going to be -- mystery,
horror, fantasy, comedy, serious, NPC-heavy, puzzle-centric,
whatever. If I can't tell what I'm getting into, it's hard to know
if I should bother.
- Don't get the player stuck! The first moves of a game are critical
for building the player's interest -- 'building' and not
'keeping', since you don't have anything when you start out -- and
the easiest way to make somebody lose interest is to keep them
from being able to do anything. And, related to that:
- Give the player something to do. Ideally this means actually
giving them a puzzle to solve, if this is going to be a puzzly
game, but at minimum there should be a path for the player to
wander along with some plot progression. If it doesn't seem like
the game is going anywhere, that doesn't encourage me to continue.
- Don't suck. This seems like an obvious one, but introcomp games
are also IF games and get judged like that: if there's spelling
errors, grammar errors, guess-the-verbs, or bugs in the code, I'm
going to assume the rest of the game is like that too.
- End at an interesting place! Once the player's had a chance to
get a feel for the game, mess around with the setup a bit, solve a
puzzle or two, and is just thinking "ok, hey, this is pretty
interesting", throw in one last twist, and then *stop*. Don't say
"ok, and here's what you're going to see in the rest of the game."
If you tell me that, why do I need to play it? Don't say "ok, you
finished the first part, hooray." I know I finished the first
part-- what you're trying to sell me on now is the second part.
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Jabberwocky
by Gregory Weir (Z-Machine)
The best game of this introcomp by a wide margin, Jabberwocky has an
inventive fantasy world, decent (and grammatical) writing, and actually
interesting, if simple, puzzles. There's a clear goal right from the
start of the game, a way to track your progress and get nudges as to
what to work on, in-game hints, >ABOUT, some nice extra touches (the
various tools to play with, >XYZZY, >X BOROGROVES), and generally
everything I am looking for in a game. Aside from the minor quibble of
Weir's descriptions not really getting anywhere close to my mental
image of the stuff (and, I am pretty sure, not to Carroll's -- for one
thing, he says what a wabe is and it's not this), my only real gripe
with the game is that it has a lousy ending. C'mon, this is an
introcomp game, it's supposed to hook me, right? So how about ending
with a cliffhanger, or a surprise, or something cool, instead of just a
boring comment on the things I'm going to see in the rest of the game?
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Auden's Eden
by Tommy Herbert (Z-Machine)
The author clearly has a unique idea for a game here, but I'm not sure
it's actually an interesting idea. There is a certain amount of
suspense in the intro, but it's ultimately not particularly satisfying,
and there's not really much to do. On the plus side, the implementation
is good, and the playthrough I had was nice and smooth. I have no idea
if I'd want to play the complete version of Auden's Eden or not -- this
intro didn't show enough to tell me if it's a whimsical tour through
wackyland, a cutting social satire, or just a detailed sartorial
experience.
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A Bet's a Bet
by Santa's Helper (TADS)
A Bet's a Bet has a reasonably good idea for a game that I haven't
exactly seen before, although I'm a little sad not to be the other
red-suited guy. There are a few bumps in the execution (most notably,
the first time you examine the vehicle, it doesn't reveal its only
important feature), but the game is short enough that it doesn't really
matter, since it's good about giving you some direction from the
beginning. There's not really enough here for me to tell how fun the
full version would be, but I'm willing to give it the benefit of the
doubt based on what I see here.
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Passenger
by Niall Richard Murphy (Z-Machine)
Passenger offers a decent concept but a little weak execution, and ends
too early to get a feel for what the game is going to be like. It has a
slightly original riff on what looks to be a hackneyed fantasy setting
(and if it's not, Murphy should have shown it off better), but there
are numerous small irritations (it not being clear when you stop being
frozen in place, a number of obvious actions not having a response,
inconsistent line-spacing). Anyway, this might be good in a full
version, or it might not be. There's not enough here to tell.
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The Homework of Little Carl Gauss
by Stefano Gaburri (Glulx)
The Homework of Little Carl Gauss plays like, well, what it is -- a
sort of old-school game hacked together by an author over a couple
years. These sort of games tend to have no real clarity of vision or
compactness of design, but they can still be cute and fun. Actually,
the subtitle of the game is probably its best summary: "A
dimension-traveling adventure with sound, no mazes, no darkness, and a
bagful of cats!" The sound didn't play on my interpreter*, but I agree I
didn't encounter any mazes or darkness. Unfortunately, since there was
really nothing implemented except for a few empty rooms I didn't
encounter the bagful of cats either, although Gaburri did helpfully
indicate where they'll be. Because the intro is so small gameplay-wise
it's not at all clear what the final game will play like, so it's hard
to know if I'm interested.
*Although this turned out to just be my speaker cables. On a replay I
agree there was a fair amount of roaring. Possibly even an excessive
amount of roaring.
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On The Cross
by Ian Kaleb (Z-Machine)
The main good thing about On The Cross is it seems to be one of those
"ex-hitman gets done wrong and goes back for revenge" stories that I'm
fond of. Unfortunately the actual implementation is pretty lousy:
there's a ridiculously long introductory text, some guess-the-verbs, a
"a guess what to do oops you're dead" bit, no real character identity
or motivation, and there seems to be a bug making the game impossible
to complete (actually, I am informed that it's possible to complete,
it's just another guess-the-verb: try (rot13'ed) >NFX QEVIRE SBE YVSG).
Oh, and the author didn't change the response to >X ME. I hate that.
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Runes
by Deane Saunders (Z-Machine)
This is really too unfinished even to have been entered in the
introcomp. Many of the rooms don't have descriptions, and the only real
gameplay consists of wandering around picking up the many herb objects,
with which you can do nothing. The map is either mis- or
confusingly-linked in many places, and often directions aren't
reversible. There is no motivation or explanation as to what the PC is
doing here (beyond that I fell from someplace) and the writing could
use a grammatical brush-up. I would like to play a game with cool
alchemy stuff but I guess this isn't it. Oh, and the author didn't
change the response to >X ME. I hate that.
--
Dan Shiovitz :: d...@cs.wisc.edu :: http://www.drizzle.com/~dans
"He settled down to dictate a letter to the Consolidated Nailfile and
Eyebrow Tweezer Corporation of Scranton, Pa., which would make them
realize that life is stern and earnest and Nailfile and Eyebrow Tweezer
Corporations are not put in this world for pleasure alone." -PGW