24 | THE DRAGON OF SILVERTON MINE
24 | THE DRAGON OF SILVERTON MINE
by: Vukašin Davić
Progress:
- I was able to complete this game in about 31 minutes, reaching the end without the use of hints.
Things I Appreciated:
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One of the elements I really appreciated in this game was the intuitive inventory-combining system that allows you to combine items with each other, or use them on environmental elements in the location you currently occupy. While there are few enough options that I suppose one could brute-force solutions by systematically testing every combination, I never felt the need to do that as most of the time, if I thought of a potential solution, the tools came together in a logical way given the situation. This felt pretty intuitive and natural almost all the times I used it.
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I enjoyed the tonal shifts over the course of the game. The front matter sets you up with the expectation that you might be facing a dragon lurking in the depths, which combined with the claustrophobic caved-in space, is ominous. However, the game subverts this in a fun way with what actually happens. I liked that the game had this humorous element.
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The writing does a good job creating an environment that seems lived in/worked in. You can study the evidence of the cave in, and encounter elements that end up foreshadowing what comes up later.
Feedback/Recommendations/Questions:
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The main issue I have involves the timed text. (Not in the way you might think.) I didn’t mind the timed text itself too much, though it could’ve certainly moved faster. The issue I had is that the action hyperlink to move on to the next page spoils the content of the timed text that is still in the process of revealing itself. The most notable example of this is when the hyperlink “Deal with Doug” appears long before the narration has officially revealed that Doug is present and causing the issues that you are facing. So I think if you are going to require the reader to read at the pace dictated by the timed text, you should include the hyperlink reveal in that text as well so that it doesn’t preempt the scene it is a reaction to.
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At a few points throughout the game, I found that I had pre-solved puzzles before arriving at them. The biggest example of this was the ring. Because of the order I chose to explore things, I had fully crafted and worn the ring before encountering the place that I needed to use it. This makes the puzzle solving feel a bit backwards: I was just making the ring because these were items to interact with in a signposted way, rather than crafting a ring intentionally to help someone who needed it. Overall, I think the puzzles could’ve been a bit more challenging (but I’ve had a rough last few days of IF Comp gameplay as documented extensively in above posts, so honestly it was nice in some ways to breeze through a game without frustration).
What I learned about IF writing/game design:
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I think this game is a great example (as discussed above) as a tonal bait and switch. The cover art by Mina Davić is especially evocative, setting a grim/moody tone that set my expectations for the game. The writing unfolds in such a way that you gradually realize the dragon is not exactly the threat it was made out to be, and the text goes out of its way to playfully skewer the self-aggrandizing dead paladin (who is arguably a reflection of who the player thinks they are going to end up being—a dragonslayer—at the start of the game). So this was a good example of how to structure a tonal shift in a natural seeming way.
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I thought this was another good example of how to bridge choice-link-based and parser-like gameplay together. This directs the player’s focus toward the puzzles themselves more than the meta-labor of guessing how to phrase potential solutions. In a parser game, for example, I may have wasted several turns trying to do wacky things with two objects that might go together, as opposed to just instantly learning that those two things don’t combine and to move on to another thread of potential solutions. This approach has its pros and cons, but I thought it was effective here. It illustrates how the format you choose to structure your game directs the player’s attention to different cognitive levels of a puzzle, so it’s important to be conscious of that when deciding on a format.
Quote:
- (Significant spoiler) “A fat eyeless tube with two massive chompers both up and down, waddles into the chamber and squeaks thunderously, then belches a short burst of flame.”
Lasting Memorable Moment:
- The moment all the pieces came together and I realized the “dragon” was actually a mole rat that got into some tomb and drank enough dragon blood to morph into a hybrid entity. That was what the whole game seemed to be building toward, and was an amusing twist.