Okay, I said I wanted to get more comfortable with reviewing, so I’m holding myself to it. I’m taking a page out of @DeusIrae’s book and doing a combined thread to take the pressure off a bit, especially because I’m crunching on a project of my own. I’d already played a chunk of the RAT games anyway; hopefully that will help a bit, though I’ve still been replaying to refresh my memory.
Review links will be added below as I post them.
Review-a-thon 2025:
Heaven Alive
machina caerulea
Resurrection Gate
ParserComp 2025:
(to be added)
5 Likes
Resurrection Gate by Grim Baccaris
I originally played this during Ectocomp, and I faced the same mental roadblock trying to review it then as I do now: it’s a demo. It’s not the only one in RAT 2025, granted, but a review for a demo is going to look very different from those for both currently finished games and its own future self. Sure, you can get a sense of the game’s quality, gameplay, tone, aesthetic, and so on, but it still feels a bit like counting the chickens before they’ve hatched. What if the developers take early feedback and end up fixing notable issues? What if a frustrating new mechanic turns up later in the game? What if an appealing story goes off the rails in the third act, or a story that seems shallow reveals something much more interesting later on? (There’s a reason movie reviewers don’t go off the first twenty minutes, and why at least one reviewer regretted basing a rating on solely the first half of BoJack Horseman’s first season.) Sure, an IFDB review can be edited as the full game is added to the listing, but are you fundamentally reviewing the same game at that point?
So, what DO I know enough to talk about?
- The design and interface are beautifully polished, as is a foregone conclusion for a Grim Baccaris game. Art, music, and other aesthetic elements are appealing. I noticed some minor bugs in the “mirror” frame (Yasha having objectives both listed and crossed out before the relevant event happened in-story; Laurence’s Mirror loading with Yasha’s Traits and a stray HTML closing tag), but everything worked smoothly otherwise.
- The character creation is streamlined, with only one stat-altering choice to be made per character, affecting 2-3 stats. This affects the actions available at key junctures, though there was one point where I found myself wondering if the listed stat wasn’t the only thing in play. When Yasha confronts Besarion, even with “Very High” (i.e. max) vigilance, he’s still unable to spot their wounds. Too anxious for eye contact? I relate, buddy.
- The story feels like it opens in medias res, which is a bit of a double-edged sword for a demo; you gain player investment through immersion, but may lose it through disorientation with so much being dropped on them at once. I remember finding the number of introduced characters and backstory elements, as well as the multiple POVs, a bit jarring for such a short demo when I first played this, though on a replay it holds together better. More importantly, it manages to stay on the right side of “I am engaged with these characters and the threats they face” vs. “too much is happening and I don’t care about any of it as a result.”
- I enjoyed the writing and felt like it mostly nailed a “fantastic but not overwrought” tone, though a couple turns of phrase hit weirdly (at one point a character “lifts his face to his hands,” which made me pause for a moment trying to visualize it before concluding it probably should have been the other way around).
I think the core question for a demo review is: does this make me curious enough to play more? In that sense, Resurrection Gate succeeds. It’s a shiny game that gets a few good plot hooks in and builds enough stakes for the characters that I want to see what happens next, and I’m looking forward to writing a full review once I do.
3 Likes
Heaven Alive by Grim Baccaris
As with Naarel, the Wheel o’ Reviews has dished up two Baccaris games in a row. I guess it’s not THAT statistically improbable for the most prolific submitter in a fairly small RAT pack, but a running gag is born anyway.
This is a tiny game from last year’s Neo-Twiny, and my review will be similarly tiny, both to match the source material and because it’s late and I’m tired after the last one.
It’s not easy to fit three substantially different endings, each with its own emotional impact, into a game of this size. The fact that Heaven Alive achieves it while also managing to establish the dynamic between its two characters in just a few conversational strokes is impressive. Add to that a stylish execution that adds to the sense of setting and genre, and this is a really strong example of what tiny IF can be.
I do wonder what a narrower and longer choice tree would look like or if it could even be accomplished within the wordcount, but that’s rooted in curiosity about the game’s context and the interactions between the characters, not criticism.
4 Likes
machina caerulea by manonamora
Another Neo-Twiny Jam 2024 game that makes the most of its 500 words. The narration unfolds mostly in fragments, which works both diegetically (the player character is disoriented after being roused from some sort of stasis in a pod) and non-diegetically. The brevity allows for an introductory scene, a fully fleshed out room-exploration scene with plenty of item descriptions that add context, and a haunting denouement with several possible endings.
This piece was part of the Bluebeard Jam, among others, so it’s not hard to guess why you’ve been admonished not to go through the red door. However, machina caerulea takes a route that adds some texture to the familiar story: the PC and most of her predecessors are robotic clones of our Bluebeard’s first wife, who we learn from records in the lab died from a terminal illness, and whose emaciated and clearly human body we find right before the final confrontation. Instead of the original story’s villain who controls and murders seemingly for its own sake, we have a grieving widower lashing out at his “imperfect” replicas. Not sympathetic, exactly, but more nuanced and interesting for sure. The dynamic of the “wives” being not just found, but created for the “Bluebeard” in question also adds some layers to the power imbalance and the PC’s predicament. Though they’re very different stories, I was reminded a bit of (ROT13 for spoilers within spoilers) Pbzsbeg Zr Jvgu Nccyrf ol Pngurelaar Z. Inyragr, gubhtu Nqnz cynlf n zber pbagevohgbel guna qverpg ebyr va gur jvirf’ perngvba.
All in all, machina caerulea feels deceptively spacious for a game of its size. It’s also cleanly styled and seamless to play, aside from some quirky timed text that doesn’t cause problems but can feel a little disjointed from the narrative. (Don’t get mad at that long opening sequence, though; it’s there for a reason…) A fantastic example of doing more with less.
4 Likes