- Stygian Dreams
Hypnos, king of Gods, and men of mortal birth, sov’reign of all sustain’d by mother Earth;
For thy dominion is supreme alone, o’er all extended, and by all things known.
'Tis thine all bodies with benignant mind in other bands than those of brass to bind:
Tamer of cares, to weary toil repose, from whom sweet solace in affliction flows.
Thy pleasing, gentle chains preserve the soul, and e’en the dreadful cares of death controul;
For Thanatos and Lethe with oblivious stream, mankind thy genuine brothers justly deem.
With fav’ring aspect to my pray’r incline, and save thy mystics in their works divine.
Orphic Hymn LXXXIV; translated by Thomas Taylor ( ORPHIC HYMNS 41-86 - Theoi Classical Texts Library)
In a willing act of sacrifice, you plunge yourself into the cold water, and in so doing, into the Underworld itself. Though the shady misty haze of death threatens to smother your resolve, unravel your memories of love and self, you cling to your one purpose: find her.
This is a work in beta (hence the Back Garden entry), so I will not dwell on errors and bugs that will be (more or less) easily fixed in an upcoming official release. I recorded a transcript but that seems to have gotten lost. (Anyone who can help: Where did my transcript for Stygian Dreams go? (intfiction.org))
The writing in Stygian Dreams is powerful, elaborate, grand, in line with its direct inspiration: Ancient Greek mythology. Vivid images in the text are emphasised by emotionally impactful pictures. While the static descriptions and the recounting of past experiences are strong, delicate and captivating, the conversations are a weak spot. Especially near the end, it felt like the topics were quickly rushed through while there was still interesting stuff to be said. This was particularly so in the most important of all, the redeeming heart-to-heart with Ismene. When she’s summing up her regrets and flaws, she sounds like she’s crossing off items on a grocery list. The meaning of the scene is clear, the language to convey its deep significance to the reader is not (yet).
This could be the result of lack of time before the deadline of course. I mention it because it’s far more important than a typo, and deserves meticulous attention in the finished version.
The funniest, most interesting, and most satisfying talks are those with your tag-along companion. It’s an upbeat wisp who will pick you up when you are down. The interactions with this side character are always a treat. I wish there were more topics and more reasons to engage it in conversation.
The protagonist of the story is shrouded and unknown at the start of the game. Only slowly and gradually does his identity emerge through the information we get about his family relations and his association with known mythological heroes. (Mentions of the voyages and crew of the Argo help put the character in the right company…)
Stygian Dreams is very much a narrative-focused piece. It mirrors and repeatedly mentions the descent into Hades of those two heroes, the mighty warior Heracles and the sweet-voiced poet Orpheus. The core of the story is the metaphoric descent into oneself, confronting regrets and perceived sins, hopefully leading to catharsis in the end.
As such, this work contains few puzzles. Sadly, the puzzles it does contain were stumbling blocks for me. This is not a result of a bad puzzle-concept. It is first and foremost a problem with the ambitious interface the game employs.
It’s a parser-game with in-text links. Usually in such a setup, the links provide ease-of-use shortcuts to examining objects in the room or performing obvious actions, in effect supporting the parser. Here, the links serve the same function in the biggest portion of the game, but they totally overrule the parser when dealing with the two puzzles I encountered. When I gave up parser-wrestling and clicked the link (in one case scrolling back up five or six screens because I saw no way to get back to the piece of text that contained the link), not only did it solve the puzzle for me without needing any thinking from me, it did so with a command (which appeared by the prompt upon clicking) so out there that I would never have gotten it right. To add insult to injury, I had typed various simpler variations of the command into the parser while I was trying to solve the puzzle myself. (Narcissus puzzle: POUR LETHE WATER IN NARCISSUS’ REFLECTION. a) “reflection” nor “water” nor “river/styx” were separately implemented. b) I had tried POUR WATER IN STYX/RIVER and EMPTY WATERSKIN IN RIVER/STYX.) In this case, the inconsistent implementation directly impacted an important part of the story and of my experience, instead of being just a mild annoyance.
Nevertheless, as a story about a journey of self-discovery, cleansing and purification of one’s (perceived) shortcomings and inadequacies, coming to terms with one’s past, this piece works very well.
The atmosphere is rendered very effectively, the story beats organically divide the journey into smaller chapterlets, the tension of the inevitable final confrontation is nicely handled.
A strong piece.
Or whoever elses here, when I come to think of it:) A really nice piece of reading. Thanks again.