Viv Dunstan’s IFComp 2021 Reviews

Competitions IFComp
14

Walking Into It by Andrew Schultz

Ah the Python one! Ok I frequently play the original releases, but I know this had some problems re Python installations. So just downloading the fixed version of the game to try. For the record I am running Python 2.7.16 on my Mac running MacOS 10.15.5. To run the game I have also whacked up the font size in the Terminal window I am using, to give a closer approximation to the very large fonts I prefer to play with in both web and parser games.

In the game you end up playing Tic Tac Toe (or Noughts and Crosses as we call it in the UK) with a young kid. The aim of the game is to try to help them learn the game, and win in a way that’s satisfying. An obvious loss doesn’t make them happy, but the satisfaction of winning in a new or unexpected way does.

Obviously how much or how effectively you can do this can depend on your skills with the game. Mine are pretty low! But I managed to play quite a lot of games, which gave the other player good outcomes, which they were pleased with. It was also nice when the other kids gathered around, wowed by how well the youngster was doing. These emotional responses meant that what in many ways is quite a mechanical implementation of Tic Tac Toe took on more emotional resonance, and became a more satisfying piece of interactive fiction.

However I ran into a big problem when I retried the game with descriptions on for screen readers (selecting the F option). When I then tried to play the centre square first (position 5) this happened:

A new game. Who moves first? 1 = you, 2 = Ollie.1
Nobody has moved yet.
Which square? 1 is upper left, 2 is upper side, to 9 which is lower right.5
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “wii.py”, line 1020, in
my_games.next_move()
File “wii.py”, line 735, in next_move
self.player_move()
File “wii.py”, line 705, in player_move
self.place_move(x)
File “wii.py”, line 727, in place_move
self.show_board()
File “wii.py”, line 491, in show_board
self.describe_squares(1)
File “wii.py”, line 476, in describe_squares
print("{} took {}, square {}.".format(player_string, ', '.join(temp_ary), x + starting_number))
NameError: global name ‘starting_number’ is not defined

And the game crashed out. I looked briefly at the Python source code to try to see the problem, but it’s not obvious to me. But maybe Andrew can fix it. It doesn’t happen if I select N for descriptions, but always happens if I select Y or F. This was me playing the November 4th fixed version of the game.

So a rather unfortunate outcome, but there was much that I enjoyed. I don’t think I’m as good or as enthusiastic a Noughts and Crosses player to enjoy this more though. I was pleased to manage to get an ending where I quit, but it said I thought I’d done enough to make the other player happy, which was a nice outcome. Probably more by accident than design though!

4 Likes
15

Hi Viv,

Thanks for the time and the review!

Sorry to hear about that bug (will take a look at it), but the password works like any password would do on a computer. It differences between upper and lowercase letters.

About that ending: If you spare the restrictor’s life at the bar, and later on at the offices, you stop on the two floors where the evaluation is not taken, that restrictor gets there before you. You just have to go directly to the correct floor.

Once again thanks for the time! And hope you had fun playing it!

17

Thanks! Yes I’m happy with the case sensitive password. When I said both should work I meant in the sense of the game not crashing/running into a bug with either :crazy_face:

I enjoyed what I played very much. Thank you! And thanks for explaining the reason for my ending. Yes I was slowly making my way up the building from ground floor to top!

1 Like
18

How it was then and how it is now by Pseudavid

This is a very curious piece, a fantastical experience revolving around geometric and spatial puzzles, while at the same time a musing on relationships and personalities.

On the downside it would not be suited for play for someone blind or with significant visual disabilities. It’s also likely to frustrate anyone who wants to know exactly what is going on. Because much is unclear, even after playing through the whole thing.

However I found playing it an evocative experience. And while in the walkthrough the author says it is not intended for repeated play I replayed a couple of times, quite happily. And I’m still pondering on it now. So thanks to the author.

6 Likes
19

Thanks for the review bug report! I have updated the game to fix a bug specific to Python 2.

I should really have had a checklist of things to check 2 days before release, because Python 2 worked, until I undid what seemed to be a useless bit of overprotective code – except of course it wasn’t.

3 Likes
21

Great! I made sure I was running the November 4th version of the game, because I knew you’d issued a vital fix to get it working on more Pythons. The bug I spotted was in that version of the game.

I have a family reconstitution program I’ve written and am using in Python 2, so am reluctant to update my Mac Python installation to Python 3 and potentially break my program! I could get it working again, but can just do without the hassle :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

22

Oh, thanks for following up, and thanks for playing the updated version!

I didn’t pay enough attention to the error message at first (I’ve let my focus drift elsewhere, to finding bugs for final releases of other stuff I’d written.) If I had, I’d have found the culprit was pretty clearly the “just one more harmless fix” which turned out not to be so harmless.

I’d even waited to submit the update in case I missed anything, but now you pointed the bug out, it’s obvious what I should have looked at.

The bug you found turned up a few aesthetic things in the code with the error, so I’m grateful for that. I want to sit on the fix and make sure I’ve tested the relevant code before submitting it.

1 Like
23

Happy to help! I was going slightly round in circles just now, trying to figure out exactly which version I’d played, and if I’d missed a fix! But it was definitely the 4th Nov one. I was curious to see what the descriptions (non ASCII) version of the game looked like, which is why I’d gone back and tried to play with that on.

1 Like
24

A Paradox Between Worlds by Autumn Chen

Venturing into this next, which is a choice-based game about Internet fandoms. I know going in that it’s based around Tumblr, which I’ve little experience of, but I have been a part of other online fandoms since the very early 1990s. Including in LiveJournal and more recently DreamWidth, and in online forums.

First point on accessibility. There’s a lot of text to read in this game. So I really appreciated the options you can access from the start to adjust the game’s appearance, including font size. Of course many similar effects can be achieved through browser settings, but it was extremely thoughtful that the author provided their own mechanism.

The story is split into essentially a number of chapters, and flits to and fro between the real world, the story world, and the social media network of fandom. For the latter you read blogs and interact with them. I guess this is based on the Tumblr interface, but I was slightly disappointed that I couldn’t comment more directly on some of the posts. How much you interact with the blog posts affects some of your scoring, but I wasn’t paying too much attention to this. At the start of the game you are asked if you want notifications of how your story choices affect things. I turned that off, and only looked at in game stats (though interesting) very occasionally.

As the game plays out there becomes a crisis between the author of the world you are a fan of and the fandom. This is well handled, and it is fascinating to see how the story plays out, both through in story sections (which are very meta textual a lot of the time) and in the blogs, messages and other interactions between you and the other fans. It is also highly timely, given the real life situation of another well-known fandom that I guess may have inspired this.

There are a number of endings - as detailed in the quite fascinating walkthrough that is best read afterwards - and I was happy with the ending I got to. I also admired how this was a powerful piece in support of trans rights. The interface took a little getting used to, but I was wowed by the world building, and the creativity of the author. Superb work. Thank you. I think that’s my first 10 score of the competition! I played for about 70 minutes in total.

4 Likes
25

What remains of me by Jovial Ron

Had a few issues getting this to run on my Mac, but all good now. It’s a home brewed retro styled parser game that runs in the browser. It’s based on the author’s old home, with a goal of getting on a train, but then that’s just for starters …

First comment is that the retro styled font is quite tricky to read, but it’s only a short game, and I adapted pretty ok. The user interface is a mix of text appearing on screen and a web based GUI where you can click on verbs at the bottom of the screens. I found this pretty intuitive to use, although there was one puzzle where I had to click on USE when other things might have been more obvious to me.

On the downside the implementation is extremely sparse. As you move between rooms the rooms are referred to by numbers, e.g. “You moved from room 5 to room 4”. Likewise in the bathroom when you try to use the soap you get "You don’t know how to use the soap here.” Mmmm. State changes are also not handled well, e.g. when you take something away it can still be referred to in the room description. Or even where you totally change something it’s still described in its original sense after.

However there was much I liked. The game is a simple puzzle game based around using the right objects in the right places in the right ways. And the effects are quite charming. I found it a very mellow experience playing through, and I was smiling throughout, and very happy with the ultimate ending I achieved. I also liked the end message a lot.

The under implementation is an issue still, but given its retro style approach I’m prepared to cut it quite a lot of slack. It is evoking a particular old style of adventure game. And I like much that it does other than this. Thanks to the author!

26

Sting by Mike Russo

Really intrigued by the blurb for this, especially "Six bees. Five bags of groceries. A four-pound dumbbell. Three sailboats. One twin.” It’s a puzzleless parser game. Looking forward to this, not least because I don’t feel up to puzzles right this moment!

The game is an episodic piece, moving through memories. It’s true that there aren’t strictly puzzles, but you can interact with the world. One chapter benefits from you taking a more active role. I found that chapter, the sailing section, tricky at first, being unfamiliar with all the sailing terms and techniques. The walkthrough gives clues, but I also greatly appreciated the very helpful response to me panickedly typing HELP then!

Generally though the piece is a mix of light puzzleless action and conversation, moving forward in time through memories (which are shifting, in an extremely evocative way), rich in nostalgia, towards an end point. I’m not going to reveal big spoilers here, but I found it to be a highly emotive and powerful piece. Thank you to the author.

6 Likes
27

The Library by Leonardo Boselli

This is a really curious web-based piece set in a dreamlike world of linked works from classic fiction, where you can step into the book worlds, and interact with characters, and try to achieve goals.

On the downside I found it confusing navigating my way between the literary worlds. Eg I’m in book world X and really want to get to Y or Z next, but the left / right / back movement options weren’t taking me there. Though to be fair that type of exasperation and certain amount of lack of geographic control does mirror the world conjured up. However I found where I was engrossing, and did eventually get to where I wanted to.

The walkthrough is very detailed, which I appreciated, though the order in which you tackle things and need help may vary from play to play. It is necessary to make connections between the different fictional worlds e.g. an object you get in one may help in another.

I don’t think this piece would be accessible for blind people because it requires you at times to literally drag one word over onto another. Physically that can also be tricky with manual dexterity problems as I have from neurological illness.

However it’s an imaginative and well realised piece, and I enjoyed playing it. I also greatly appreciated being able to play in small portions of two of my most favourite literary works, The Count of Monte Cristo and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

4 Likes
28

Thank you very much for the review! You pointed out a weakness of the point and click (and drag) interface that I completely missed. Accessibility is one of the strong points of interactive fiction. Removing completely the parser is not a great idea. Thank you again.

1 Like
29

I enjoyed the physicality of the ‘drag and drop’ method, so I hope you can make an accessible and non-accessible version.

30

–So, you know, I downloaded the non-accessible version of this really cool game, but when I wanted to play it, I couldn’t get it to open…

trrrdoem-dzziinngg

2 Likes
31

I cannot in good conscience press ‘like’ on that comment.

I tried.

1 Like
32

Thanks folks!

I’ll be here all week…

33

Thanks so much for the review, and glad the game worked for you and the help got you through the rougher parts of the sailing section! I also really sweated over the blurb so I’m happy that was engaging for you. Cheers!

2 Likes
34

In case I don’t manage to play any more games tomorrow I just want to say thanks very much to all the entrants this year, as well as thanks to fellow judges and the competition organisers.

I’m sad I couldn’t play more games in time, especially some of the longer ones. But being so ill neurologically, including losing over two weeks of time during October, I’m relieved I managed to play as many as I did.

I’ve enjoyed aspects of every entry I played, and all have given me ideas for my own interactive fiction writing. Reviewing has been great fun again, and I’d also like to thank my fellow reviewers, whose reviews I found very interesting to read throughout.

Thanks all! It’s been another great IFComp year :star_struck:

13 Likes
35

This is late but thank you so much for the review! Just fyi, the accessibility features are built in to choicescript and should be available in every choicescript game. Credit doesn’t go to me but rather to Dan Fabulich (I think).

3 Likes