Alright, I’m getting started now on La Petite Mort games! Up first…
1 | LPM | FOREVERMORE: A GAME OF WRITING HORROR
1 | LPM | FOREVERMORE: A GAME OF WRITING HORROR
by: Stewart C. Baker
Progress:
- I played for about 20 minutes, eventually reaching all five endings in this order: (“A Successful Draft,” “Revenge of the Worms,” “The Ravening,” “A Pleasant Day,” and “Too Far Gone.”) To get to the end for the first playthrough took about 6 minutes.
Engagement with Horror Genre:
- This is a kind of meta comedy piece skewering writers who are overly self-involved about the darkness of their work. In a kind of amusing way, the more seriously your character takes trying to write something dark, the more ridiculous the poem seems to come across. So overall, this is a piece about the process of trying to write horror, from the perspective of someone who is too concerned with the melodrama of performing the role of “tortured poet” to actually write with convincing gravitas.
Things I Appreciated:
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The thing I found most engaging here is the attention to the class status of the writer and how that relates to his work. For the most part, Allen is living a kind of charmed life. It’s a beautiful day, he’s living in a nice neighborhood, and he’s also apparently wealthy enough to have hired a servant who thoughtfully brings him tea and a scone while he’s writing, which he has plenty of time to do. (If you eat the scone, he even admits that he was hungry without realizing it, proving what a thoughtful gesture that was). What you’re left with is a portrait of a character who lacks self-awareness about his situation, and as depicted, his insistence upon writing about dark things feel inauthentic. As I played, my default instinct was to pick choices that (1) advanced the character’s goal of writing something dark and brooding, but (2) behave in a way that was kind and empathetic, which in my view do not have to be mutually exclusive (regardless of the character’s belief). However, this character can’t be corralled into social grace forever—I was forced to either shout at, or slam the window upon seeing a child, so I thought this was an interesting case where the character’s personality eventually overrode my approach as a player.
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I loved the choice to include the “brooding/distraction” meter at the top of the screen. It was utterly campy. (Honestly what it most reminded me of was the absurd dating-sim parody in the game Undertale when you “date” the character Papyrus and get a UI with ludicrous charts and meters). Since the visual presentation was mostly default Twine here, I liked that flourish (along with the page that gradually gets populated with the stanzas you are writing) to make the piece feel more crafted and lived-in. A good use of the four hours, I think.
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I thought the multiple endings were a good way to encourage replays. I originally stopped after three endings and wrote most of this response, but I was curious enough to go back and try to figure out the endings that I missed.
Miscellaneous Comments/Recommendations:
- There was a visual technical error when printing the final poem where two of the lines overlapped each other. So if a post-comp edit is planned, that’s a minor thing that could be touched up.
What I learned about IF writing/game design:
- I was impressed by the meter at the top of the screen and how it actually turned out to be functional/have mechanical value in the game rather than just being a comedy device. It worked pretty well considering the limited development time. The thing that stands out to me about it, beyond the humor, is how a meter like this gives a player feedback as to how their choices are affecting the narrative beyond just cues in the text itself, and how that has potential to shape decisions when you are aware your choices are being measured like that.
Memorable Moment:
- For sure, I was not expecting what happened when I poured the scalding hot tea out the window. (Not to mention the consequences of making that choice…)