Rabbit's IFComp 2024 reviews

Right, I started a new medication on Saturday and the side effects are making me tired and loopy, so bear with me if these reviews aren’t very good.

The Apothecary’s Assistant (Allyson Gray)

Played on: 2nd Sept – 6th Sept, and then one more on 25th Sept
How I played it: Downloaded and played through Firefox
How long I spent: About 45mins total

I went out of my way to play this one when I spotted that it was supposed to be played over multiple sessions. The idea behind The Apothecary’s Assistant is that you stumble into a job running errands at a magical shop. Once a day, you log in and spend a few minutes solving a mild puzzle and a handful of cryptic crossword clues. There is a real-time aspect which determines whether you’re tending to a customer or doing some stocktaking, according to the business hours listed in the IFComp blurb. The currency you’re paid can be used to purchase beads which will correspond to donations to charities once everything is tallied up.

I’m struggling to write a substantial review, but that’s for positive reasons – I think this is pretty solid! It feels like it’s following in the tradition of “wholesome games,” by which I mean life-sim-ish games focused on peaceful tasks and interactions, like Animal Crossing and Stardew Valley – I don’t know how well-explored that territory is in interactive fiction, outside of Ryan Veeder’s Ryan Veeder’s Authentic Fly Fishing. In that respect, it hits the mark. I was having a bad week when I was judging this game, and it was nice to play something calm and gentle with a low time-commitment. It slotted in alongside keeping up with the daily Puzzmo puzzles.

(I’m hesitating a bit with “wholesome” because I’ve seen a growing wave of cynicism directed at the “wholesome games” movement, generally along the lines of “how come all these games have you running a small business?” Don’t think you can level that kind of criticism at The Apothecary’s Assistant in good faith, though. Also, the charity beads aspect is a really cool initiative. )

There is a storyline running in the background – unfortunately I’ve done The Apothecary’s Assistant a disservice by writing this review three weeks after I played most of it and not writing down any notes about the plot. Whoops! Sorry. The real-time aspect of the game comes into play here – the apothecary’s proprietor Aïssatou is trying to get affairs in order before the Hunter’s Moon which is set to occur about 17th October, right around the end of the IFComp judging period. Better get a move on, judges.

I enjoyed the setting. Little drips of setting detail suggest we’re in a magical realist pocket of Earth. In an optional conversation, Aïssatou says she’s Senegalese, but from “beneath the hills there” so maybe not the parts of Senegal that we know. Mostly, I just liked all the animals and the stocktaking rat.

There’s also a sub-plot about Aïssatou’s past, and this is where those cryptic clues come in. You’ll get three a day, up to 15 clues, and if you solve enough of them, you’ll trigger an extra scene. Now, me, I love cryptic crosswords. I’m no expert, but I’ve devoted a lot of time over the past few years to learning them and setting my own. So this little sub-game was right up my alley, and I really enjoyed solving a few clues a day. The grammar on some of these clues is a little loose in a way that I can’t really explain without spending a lot of time taking a clue apart and looking like a nitpicky asshole while doing it, but they’re good enough that you know when you’ve got the right answer before you enter it, which is the important bit. (Favourite clue was “Mental confusion leads to loud sorrow (6)” – that’s an excellent surface reading.)

Sorry, not a really substantial or insightful review, but I just wanted to let people know I had a good time with this. Sometimes games are nice!

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