Live and Get Pie, Demonstration, and Galilee Bones and the Juggernaut of Jordan all open with the player jumping out of a plane, and all involve spies and feature some variation of gun violence in the content warning.
12 Likes
Both Ryan Veeder’s Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express and Necromanceers feature military men named Eustace.
10 Likes
It’s not as specific as some of these others, but given that there are only five games tagged “New Zealand” on IFDB, I did think it was a bit of a notable coincidence that two of them are from this year’s IFComp.
10 Likes
There are manor houses with plant collections in both Tableaux Vivants and Necromanceers, and The Rat and Ruined Temple both involve managing a team of PCs. There’s also a clawfoot bathtub in Necromanceers.
7 Likes
Both Two Seasons and Ruined Temple are parser games where you play as multiple protagonists, exploring a mostly-empty structure, using magic to defeat a traditional fantasy enemy, and opening a church altar.
9 Likes
This year’s comp has two of only four games tagged “pithos” … but that one is possibly less of a coincidence.
7 Likes
Both Tableaux Vivants and The Last Voyage of the Warsaw Queen have rooms with William Morris wallpaper!
12 Likes
The Last Voyage of the Warsaw Queen also has a clawfoot bathtub!
7 Likes
I just played those two in a row and came here to say this. Very funny coincidence!
4 Likes
Well, I referenced William Morris wallpaper in my IFComp game before it was cool!
… Okay, it wasn’t by name, and also wasn’t really described in enough detail that it was obvious that was what it was. But I was thinking about the William Morris wallpaper museum exhibit I saw when writing about the wallpaper exhibit in the last act of Case of Clephan, which totally counts.
(Seriously though, Morris’s work is lovely and I’m always happy to see it referenced!)
12 Likes
Another coincidence:
Both Demons of Terminology and the Flourishing are graphical games including train rides and involve surreal jumping from scene to scene while conversing with reddish devils that are somehow part of yourself but have a separate existence, while the people you meet and places explore help connect you with childhood memories of your parents, and the whole thing is based off centuries-old Italian poetry.
10 Likes
I always test “X me” and “XYZZY” whenever I boot up a new parser game (even though I know the XYZZY reference is now about as dated as a vaudeville banana peel gag). This year I only found five XYZZY responses in parser games. The cleverest of these (in my opinion) is from “Ruined Temple”. There may also be at least one hidden reference in a non-parser game.
Editing myself, I know of at least two non parser games with xyzzy references.
8 Likes
Both Dear Anna and Demon Game For Sophie are primarily audio focused games featuring a male narrator reflecting on a platonic but maybe-wanted-more relationship with a complicated woman.
9 Likes
Necromanceers and Murder on the Orient Express both have large collections of named people and a different ending based on each named person, something I don’t know if I’ve ever seen before.
9 Likes
Does A Death in Hyperspace count for “seen before”?
3 Likes
Just so long as we remember that the real ending in A Death in Hyperspace is the friends we accused of murder made along the way. 
4 Likes
Tales of Nivea: Grip, Pegasus Crew, and SCAVS are all nicely-presented games with audio tracks thatare set in dystopian speculative fiction societies where most of the choices are between complying with the draconic, emotion-stifling government/corporation or showing compassion and pity to others, with choices at the end or almost end where you decide whether to sacrifice the people in your care to the government or not.
6 Likes
Both Necromanceers and Triangle for Two feature characters where two souls/people inhabit a single body (sorry if someone already mentioned this!)
8 Likes
All but one game are written in English.
6 Likes
WITHOUT Corporation and Demon Game for Sophie both feature a game within the game and include meta commentary on that game.
4 Likes