At least the competition version of this game is afflicted by some implementation problems, including an object in the starting room that is critical to winning the game, which is not named anywhere by the name the parser recognizes. (The critical word is 'armoire'.) The substance of the game would have to be fairly stunning to overcome these issues; unfortunately, it's not.

Rating: ***

Reviewed by Emily Short (01 Jan 2004)

bio-v1.gam (83.25 KB)

TADS executable (competition release)

walkthru.txt (679 bytes)

walkthrough

Set in a fairly cliche post-apocalyptic environment, but with very solid game-play and a decent story. You are a scavenger seeking to recover some valuable items from before the holocaust, and are allowed to take your choice of equipment. (Each choice, as far as I was able to tell, will make one puzzle easier to solve; none is wrong.) That option, combined with multiple puzzle solutions and branching endings, adds a fair amount of replay value. There are a couple of good scenes with NPCs, as well. Overall, a strong work, not exactly experimental but making good use of existing techniques and ideas, with some old-school puzzles.

Rating: ****

Reviewed by Emily Short (01 Jan 2004)

license.txt (1.51 KB)

license

readme.txt (2.51 KB)

documentation

scavenger.gam (444.91 KB)

TADS executable (version: 1.0)

walkthrough.txt (2.77 KB)

walkthrough

scavenger.zip (1.05 MB)

Windows executable (version: 1.2)

scavenger.zip (251.66 KB)

TADS executable (version: 1.2)

The fearsome Black Wanderer threatens the land with darkness and sorrow, only an elf with the gift of Silent Song can stop him, yadda yadda. Old-school generic fantasy, with occasional misused words ("...it has no handle and no keyhole. How to open it, you surmise?") Starts in a sparse and reasonably explorable outdoors section, then drops into a linear series of locked doors and guardians where progress often depends on having poked at the right bit of random scenery in a location that you can't get back to. Difficult puzzles, some syntax-guessing; in one place, "examine room" is necessary.

Rating: **

Reviewed by Carl Muckenhoupt (10 Jan 2004)

Wanderer1.zip (69.94 KB)

AGT executable (version: 1.0a)

zenobi48k.zip (7.11 MB)

Spectrum executable

A short, uninteresting story of teenage metalhead love in very bad English. A look at the source code suggests that it was meant to play sound files at certain points, but these are not included.

Rating: **

Reviewed by Carl Muckenhoupt (11 Jan 2004)

lovesong.asl (40.30 KB)

Quest source code (version: 1.0, runs under Quest 3.02 only - see the comp01 "WinInterpreters.exe" file)

walkthru.doc (13.00 KB)

solution

Mostly conversation with an NPC in a dreamlike environment. There are multiple possible outcomes; what is frustrating is that it is never quite clear what any of these outcomes means, or why you are making this choice in the first place. If the conversation had revealed a background that was somewhat less vague, this would be a much more compelling piece.

Rating: ***

Reviewed by Emily Short (25 Jan 2004)

gate.gam (66.69 KB)

A parody on the RPG genre, with the set of verbs understood limited, for the player's convenience, to two commands - "slay" and "lay". You definitely should have a look at it - while it isn't really a game, the joke is great (although, judging by the results of the IF-competition, it didn't come across very well).

Rating: Not rated

Reviewed by Valentine Kopteltsev (28 Jan 2004)

pig-rpg.dat (48.19 KB)

data for pig-rpg.exe

pig-rpg.exe (8.42 KB)

MS-DOS executable (also need pig-rpg.dat)

pig-rpg.txt (1.11 KB)

documentation