IFComp 2008 - Trein
11 Nov 2008 22:45![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cobaltnineI'm getting game burn-out, guys. I have ten left, which means I need to start gaming a little harder to finish up before the 15th...but I open up comp08.z5 with dread each evening.
It's been a good exercise in discipline.
I groan when I see the opening tl;dr. Oh, goody, more fantasy crap. And some shitty coding, such that random Objects and Rooms are capitalized. Underimplementation abounds.
"He puts several items in your inventory."
Um. I mean, I know, my birthday comes around and I tell people, "Hey, thank you for putting things in my inventory." I guess I'm not the only one. My boss hands me a stack of papers, I'm sure to tell her "Thank you for giving me more inventory! Maybe now I can solve the maze of the twisty little passages that are the Empire Blue Cross phone tree."*
Now, about this note:
So this drunkard was just waiting for someone to come along? Because why else would he have a note with explicit instructions? Does he update it as events occur? He always carries this hank of rope, too? At least make his house something along the road you can enter - even something like 'Hey, my dung-wagon out back might have something useful in it," would be preferable to having stuff 'put in your inventory.'
"Following thie trail of deciet, I learned that this was a false name, and there was a big chance that this man was raised by the Vikings..."
YES! Those smooth-talking Vikings! Exactly who I'd pin-point as grand viziers! Not that I'm one to be stereotypical, and I'd like a depiction of a non-warlike Viking, but, um, it doesn't fit. If you're a Viking going to take over a (hilly?) kingdom, you're going to kill people with killin', not by imprisoning infiltrators.
Rating: Another 4. My rating histogram looks like a pear on its side, point at 9, big bulge at 4. I suppose maybe this has a 5, and I should reserve 4s for broken games. This one is just tired. It needs a lot more work to be interesting, and I don't think it's worth salvaging. Maybe the core of the story...is there magic? Why are these creepy Vikings, instead of warlike ones? Come on...give me something other than 'beat the spooky and not-appearing-in-this-story vizier'.
--
*This is not actually a solvable maze. Whoever invented it should have his liver pecked out hourly, and not find the billing code for it.
It's been a good exercise in discipline.
I groan when I see the opening tl;dr. Oh, goody, more fantasy crap. And some shitty coding, such that random Objects and Rooms are capitalized. Underimplementation abounds.
"He puts several items in your inventory."
Um. I mean, I know, my birthday comes around and I tell people, "Hey, thank you for putting things in my inventory." I guess I'm not the only one. My boss hands me a stack of papers, I'm sure to tell her "Thank you for giving me more inventory! Maybe now I can solve the maze of the twisty little passages that are the Empire Blue Cross phone tree."*
Now, about this note:
So this drunkard was just waiting for someone to come along? Because why else would he have a note with explicit instructions? Does he update it as events occur? He always carries this hank of rope, too? At least make his house something along the road you can enter - even something like 'Hey, my dung-wagon out back might have something useful in it," would be preferable to having stuff 'put in your inventory.'
"Following thie trail of deciet, I learned that this was a false name, and there was a big chance that this man was raised by the Vikings..."
YES! Those smooth-talking Vikings! Exactly who I'd pin-point as grand viziers! Not that I'm one to be stereotypical, and I'd like a depiction of a non-warlike Viking, but, um, it doesn't fit. If you're a Viking going to take over a (hilly?) kingdom, you're going to kill people with killin', not by imprisoning infiltrators.
Rating: Another 4. My rating histogram looks like a pear on its side, point at 9, big bulge at 4. I suppose maybe this has a 5, and I should reserve 4s for broken games. This one is just tired. It needs a lot more work to be interesting, and I don't think it's worth salvaging. Maybe the core of the story...is there magic? Why are these creepy Vikings, instead of warlike ones? Come on...give me something other than 'beat the spooky and not-appearing-in-this-story vizier'.
--
*This is not actually a solvable maze. Whoever invented it should have his liver pecked out hourly, and not find the billing code for it.
