18 | LGG | FIREBOAT
18 | LGG | FIREBOAT
by: fos1
Progress:
- I reached the end of the game in around 25 minutes. I consulted the walkthrough in two cases, and also consulted Michael Behringer’s transcript found here when I was unable to figure out how to phrase the command I needed to do. (Thank you Michael!) The game is actually very direct and straightforward about what you need to be doing, rather, I struggled to find the right parser verbs to use to do the things I was trying to do at those two points.
Engagement with Horror Genre:
- This game has one supernatural element—you are guided in your mission by a ghost—but they are a very approachable and helpful ghost! The other main genre note here is thriller—your job is to stop a terrorist attack on New York City, so the threat of that violence is the main motivating factor here. All in all, I think this piece nodded at horror but wasn’t really meant to be taken as a horror piece.
Things I Appreciated:
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My favorite aspect of the game is navigating around on the boat. There aren’t a huge number of locations here, so it feels very manageable to get comfortable moving between those locations using commands like “forward,” “aft,” etc. I thought the directions were always signaled well in the location descriptions, with a sentence reminder of what direction the exits were.
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I also liked the ghost note system, because if at any point you are not quite sure what to do, re-visiting the galley gives you something that will put you right back on track. I thought this was a great way to keep the supernatural element woven into the otherwise very grounded narrative.
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In general, my thought is that this is a great proof-of-concept for a boat travel based game, and mainly I would just see it developed further given more time to flesh out the parser language, locations, etc. The idea of moving different people/objects from dock to dock amidst a crisis is a great premise for a game, and really, I just would’ve loved to see more done here!
Miscellaneous Comments:
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My number one issue with this piece is simply, the pickiness of the parser. You can see in my attached transcript that I struggled at two major bottlenecks: setting a dial for the first time, and then turning on the pump power switch. In both these cases, I made many guesses that seemed reasonable, but were not recognized as valid commands. It was like the correct command was a too-bright sun that I kept glancing around the edge of and not seeing even though it was right there and I couldn’t figure it out even with the walkthrough. I don’t necessarily mind a parser linguistic challenge, but it didn’t match the tone of the game—which was very direct in telling me what I should do next, so I thought more could be done here to anticipate the kinds of commands that people might guess when presented with the instructions. In other words, there is friction between the tone of the game and the implementation of the verbs.
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The protagonist of this game always knows what to do in this crisis situation. For instance, they know instantly that they need to transport the SWAT team to the bridge. This is good characterization in the sense that it is reasonable for an experienced captain to know how to proceed. But the calmness of the captain and the lack of obstacles (other than the out-of-universe parser issues) also kind of blunted the tension of the game for me. For instance, when arriving at the Statue of Liberty to check that location, I am told that I was allowed to dock freely without explaining myself, even though that’s an atypical situation. Having some kind of obstacle here—maybe someone who isn’t handling the crisis as well not believing why I need to dock, as an example—might add tension to the piece if I can’t just execute the plan that the character has in mind from start to finish. I think there are ways of keeping a hyper-competent protagonist like this and creating tension through other means, like forcing them to think of a new plan on the fly so the player feels more like they’ve earned the ending. The most exciting moment of the piece was definitely opening the truck and confronting the terrorist, so I think the narrative could benefit from peppering in more surprises like that here and there!
What I learned about IF writing/game design:
- What stands out to me here is the bottlenecking of players by requiring a very specific phrasing of a command when many options are plausible. It brings the pace of the game to a halt when the player has a very clear intention (of turning a dial, for instance) but is not able to convey that in a way the game will recognize. In many parts of the game, the game is very forward in directing the player which verbs to use, but at other times, I seemed not to be able to understand the cue that I was being given. I can only imagine the ungodly amount of coding that must be required to add alternate verbs, but unless you are going to cue every verb for the player, sometimes those alternate options are really needed to get a player through a section that isn’t really intended to be a puzzle.
Memorable Moment:
- When I revisited the galley and saw “an Eee” here. I was like wait, WTF is that? I thought that was a good, light spooky moment.
DemonApologist_Fireboat.txt (27.6 KB)
By process of elimination, this means that Nick Neat-Trick-Treat is the last remaining English language Grand Guignol game on my randomized list! I suspect that randomizers hate Andrew Schultz in particular. There was only a 1 in 1273 chance of getting his game assigned last in both IF Comp and Le Grand Guignol (English). Nevertheless, that’s what happened for me. 