Intrigue and romance at a fantastical royal court on the brink of astrological derangement. You play a capable young woman from a secret order, invited to the ball by a cloaked and masked stranger. It continues in that vein. Very good atmosphere, with timed events independent of the player. Heavily story-oriented, with a large cast for a relatively small game and lots of conversation, but contains puzzles as well. In fact, the whole story leads to a problem of detection that can be approached in multiple ways (including trial-and-error). Features an experimental conversation system (later used in Best of Three) that combines aspects of ASK/TELL and menu-based conversation in a fairly natural and inobtrusive manner, although it is pretty easy to run out of things to say to a person - not because there are few things to say, but because the system encourages one to talk a lot.

Rating: ****

Reviewed by Carl Muckenhoupt (08 Mar 2003)

pytho.blb (427.16 KB)

Glulx executable (version: 4)

pytho.z8 (286.50 KB)

Z-code 8 executable (version: 3)

smoochie.zip (568.46 KB)

Z-code 8 executable (version: 1)