{"id":227,"date":"2007-10-15T14:54:26","date_gmt":"2007-10-15T19:54:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/archives\/227"},"modified":"2016-07-12T11:39:59","modified_gmt":"2016-07-12T18:39:59","slug":"ifcomp-2007-jealousy-duel-x","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/archives\/227","title":{"rendered":"IFComp 2007: Jealousy Duel X"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Another perennial comp tradition: the token graphical game.  This one is in Flash, and uses a simple button-menu interface rather than a text parser.  Spoilers follow the break.<br \/>\n<!--more--><br \/>\nFirst impression: Dating sim lite.  <span class=\"footnote_referrer\"><a role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" onclick=\"footnote_moveToReference_227_1('footnote_plugin_reference_227_1_1');\" onkeypress=\"footnote_moveToReference_227_1('footnote_plugin_reference_227_1_1');\" ><sup id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_227_1_1\" class=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text\">1<\/sup><\/a><span id=\"footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_227_1_1\" class=\"footnote_tooltip\"> For those who have never read <a href=\"http:\/\/www.megatokyo.com\/\">Megatokyo<\/a>: Dating sims are a kind of romance-themed game popular in Japan, typically focussed on interacting with multiple different anime-styled girls, any of whom the player character can wind up paired off with depending on your actions.  It&#8217;s a genre with well-established tropes, and exists in both smutty and non-smutty forms. <\/span><\/span><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_227_1_1').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_227_1_1', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top right', relative: true, offset: [10, 10], });<\/script>  It&#8217;s got vaguely dating-sim-like subject matter and user interface, but instead of doing any actual dating, your goal is simply to accumulate as many <em>potential<\/em> dates, in the form of telephone numbers, as you can.  Why?  To taunt your ex-girlfriend, who&#8217;s doing the same.<\/p>\n<p>This is the kind of premise that makes me go &#8220;Whuh? People don&#8217;t actually do this, do they?&#8221;  Somewhat reassuringly, many of the other things that the player character does in this game are things that people don&#8217;t actually do &#8212; for example, studying anatomy by examining skeletons in an abandoned mine, or altering the social dynamic of a study group by feigning death.  The technical term for this sort of game is &#8220;wacky&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>So, it turns out it&#8217;s not a dating sim at all.  It&#8217;s an adventure game with wacky puzzles and constrained commands &#8212; at any juncture, you have a choice of four or five situation-dependent commands (often including conversation options), plus the ability to use items in your inventory.  Constraints of this sort tend to make a game easier, but here it&#8217;s countered somewhat by the unpredictability of the effects of what you do.  Any given action might bring you a step closer to a phone number, or scare someone away permanently.  And that &#8220;permanently&#8221; part is quite a problem in a game that offers no way to save your progress.  I found I was starting over repeatedly and clicking through the same sequences of commands often enough that it wasn&#8217;t fun.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Rating: 3<\/strong><\/p>\n<div class=\"speaker-mute footnotes_reference_container\"> <div class=\"footnote_container_prepare\"><p><span role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" class=\"footnote_reference_container_label pointer\" onclick=\"footnote_expand_collapse_reference_container_227_1();\">&#x202F;<\/span><span role=\"button\" tabindex=\"0\" class=\"footnote_reference_container_collapse_button\" style=\"display: none;\" onclick=\"footnote_expand_collapse_reference_container_227_1();\">[<a id=\"footnote_reference_container_collapse_button_227_1\">+<\/a>]<\/span><\/p><\/div> <div id=\"footnote_references_container_227_1\" style=\"\"><table class=\"footnotes_table footnote-reference-container\"><caption class=\"accessibility\">References<\/caption> <tbody> \r\n\r\n<tr class=\"footnotes_plugin_reference_row\"> <th scope=\"row\" class=\"footnote_plugin_index_combi pointer\"  onclick=\"footnote_moveToAnchor_227_1('footnote_plugin_tooltip_227_1_1');\"><a id=\"footnote_plugin_reference_227_1_1\" class=\"footnote_backlink\"><span class=\"footnote_index_arrow\">&#8593;<\/span>1<\/a><\/th> <td class=\"footnote_plugin_text\"> For those who have never read <a href=\"http:\/\/www.megatokyo.com\/\">Megatokyo<\/a>: Dating sims are a kind of romance-themed game popular in Japan, typically focussed on interacting with multiple different anime-styled girls, any of whom the player character can wind up paired off with depending on your actions.  It&#8217;s a genre with well-established tropes, and exists in both smutty and non-smutty forms. <\/td><\/tr>\r\n\r\n <\/tbody> <\/table> <\/div><\/div><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> function footnote_expand_reference_container_227_1() { jQuery('#footnote_references_container_227_1').show(); jQuery('#footnote_reference_container_collapse_button_227_1').text('\u2212'); } function footnote_collapse_reference_container_227_1() { jQuery('#footnote_references_container_227_1').hide(); jQuery('#footnote_reference_container_collapse_button_227_1').text('+'); } function footnote_expand_collapse_reference_container_227_1() { if (jQuery('#footnote_references_container_227_1').is(':hidden')) { footnote_expand_reference_container_227_1(); } else { footnote_collapse_reference_container_227_1(); } } function footnote_moveToReference_227_1(p_str_TargetID) { footnote_expand_reference_container_227_1(); var l_obj_Target = jQuery('#' + p_str_TargetID); if (l_obj_Target.length) { jQuery( 'html, body' ).delay( 0 ); jQuery('html, body').animate({ scrollTop: l_obj_Target.offset().top - window.innerHeight * 0.2 }, 380); } } function footnote_moveToAnchor_227_1(p_str_TargetID) { footnote_expand_reference_container_227_1(); var l_obj_Target = jQuery('#' + p_str_TargetID); if (l_obj_Target.length) { jQuery( 'html, body' ).delay( 0 ); jQuery('html, body').animate({ scrollTop: l_obj_Target.offset().top - window.innerHeight * 0.2 }, 380); } }<\/script>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Another perennial comp tradition: the token graphical game. This one is in Flash, and uses a simple button-menu interface rather than a text parser. Spoilers follow the break.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[84,53,182],"class_list":["post-227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-if","tag-if","tag-ifcomp","tag-ifcomp-2007"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=227"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3637,"href":"https:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/227\/revisions\/3637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wurb.com\/stack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}