Ass in the Woods by Alice Vartevanian
I haven’t read Midsummer Night’s Dream. My high school teachers all preferred to teach the tragedies, my one college Shakespeare run-in was–gasp–a history, and I have never really felt compelled to read Shakespeare on my own. The only comedy I ever got to read was my advanced 8th grade literature class, and we did Much Ado About Nothing. I guess I would go see Midsummer live if the opportunity presented itself, as it seems like one of the more fun plays and in person performance is how it was meant to be consumed anyway, but seeing as I’m posting reviews of interactive fiction online, you can probably guess I’m not a big going-out-of-the-house person.
Anyway…Given my lack of context, waking up in the middle of the woods was realistically confusing in Ass in the Woods. It took a little while for my brain to hook into the story. It was an interesting setting, the premise was weird in a fun way, the character of Bottom was engaging, but I admit, I never really got into it. It didn’t feel like I had anything to do, any effect on the world around me, or give me any strong feeling in the end. It makes me think that being familiar with the source material is a strong prerequisite to enjoyment of this game. I did like the shaking/wobbling text for atmosphere, I did not like waiting for text to appear to proceed.