I made a silly little thread about some of the ones that caught my eye and why, but I essentially scrolled through the list and sifted through what seemed appealing, made some brief notes as I went along, and then reordered my final list of games I do want to play in order of which was most sparkly seeming.
Interest was very biased towards my favourite genres (post-apocalypse, horror, gothic, romance). In terms of most to least important, it went: eye catching name → interesting tags (did I like the genre, tool used to make it, could I play on the web) → riveting blurb that made me want to play more → cover art → author. I will admit that my eyes glossed over entries without any cover art.
Top game of the list is January by litrouke for me- I love their work, and have thoroughly enjoyed previous post apocalyptic writing from them. It also hits it out of the ballpark in terms of a story I’d enjoy: morose, sombre, following a man in the aftermath of the apocalypse, and the promise of the sort of peculiar desolation you get with deep winter that I love so much in Canadian literature.
I will admit, it was originally lower down my ‘want to play’ list, (in large part because I felt like I was left wanting for a bit more substance than their very short blurb) but once I saw the author, it went straight up to the top of the list. Their writing’s delicious to sink your teeth into- atmospheric, haunting: pulling you into building dread with a deep undercurrent of unease percolating just beneath the surface of an already grim situation. I love it.
I always start by drawing up a list - handwritten with a fountain pen! - of the games that initially appeal to me most. That gives me a starting point, but I tend to go off piste later, eg if just fancying something short for a while, or another game has caught my attention from what other players have written about it.
I’ll be hand writing my list later tonight. But it isn’t a definitive list of what I might play. Just a starting point of things to choose from.
My play time and energy is incredibly limited from my neuro disease, so I prefer not to go full random, and rather start with things that intrigue me.
I’ll grudgingly accept the compliment, but honestly it’s mostly just because I have (I think fairly obvious) obsessively completionist tendencies and try to play everything – if I wasn’t playing via the randomizer that’d mean I’d have a bunch of less-appealing (or longer, or all custom-engine, or whatever) games clustered at the bottom and it’d be too painful to motivate myself to power through, even if I often wind up really enjoying those games and finding hidden gems once I get going. I’m also really looking forward to Arthur DiBianca’s game, but I think I’ve got it like 60th on my list, so that makes me excited to get there!
January sounds like my whole deal. Thanks for sharing your thoughts, that’s definitely going further up my sorta-kinda-not-really-but-maybe random list.
If I were able, I’d play them in random order. I did that for Spring Thing and ParserComp, and it felt right to me.
As it is, I feel nearly overwhelmed with other tasks—all IF-related, as luck would have it—that I either can’t or shouldn’t delay. As such, I’ll only be able to play a select few while IF Comp is active. The first on the list will be The Archivist and the Revolution, since I’ve enjoyed AC’s other games so much. I know that A Paradox Between Worlds was divisive, but I was crazy about it. I’ll undoubtedly slide over to EctoComp for Amanda’s game. I’ll find time for a few more, but not as many as I would like. At least I can be sure to enjoy what I do play very much!
Alphabetical order! I did that for Spring Thing (as that list of games was alphabetised as standard) and it provided a nice varied selection as I went through them.
Won’t be getting to them for a few more days, though - I’m so behind on the playing side that I’ve still got a few ParserComp games to finish off!
A short, puzzly Twine, and a little rough around the edges - but nonetheless entertaining and well thought out. Certainly not unworthy of your time. The end credits tell me that it was a school project and I’d be interested to know the context of that, and the age of the student(s) involved - perhaps if the author (Andrew Howe) pops up on the forum he’d be able to comment.
I’ve always done randomized order, but I realized last year that I was just ending up playing like twenty games I didn’t enjoy at all before I got to anything that I liked, and it was making me cranky and bitter about what was supposed to be a fun hobby, so this time I’m just going to go for whatever looks fun and interesting to me.
I try to go with randomized sorting, but if a game throws me for a loop, I have a list of stuff I’m pretty sure I’ll enjoy, so I’m in a good mood to tackle works I might not really mesh well with. I don’t mind pushing an entry to the back of my list.
It took me a while to feel bad about sort of ignoring authors, but
If it’s a choice between no judging/reviewing and cranky judging/reviewing I go with the first.
as The_Xenographer already noted, you can wear yourself out quickly feeling forced to play games you aren’t in the mood for.
it’s okay to note what other authors have to say about an entry that might confuse you, to help get your bearings.
So skip away if you need to. I say this as someone who writes stuff that many find skippable.
Ideally I play a horror game first out of genre loyalty. Otherwise I choose something short, easy and/or surprising (of any genre) that I feel will get my playing or reviewing ball rolling. And then I play what I’m in the mood for when I’m in the mood for it.
About the “judge’s guilt”-complex, it really helps to look at the review spreadsheet and notice that different people are filling in reviews for all the different niches. Short/long, horror/slice-of-life, they all get played and reactions to them keep trickling in.
So I don’t feel worried about starting off with games I feel sure I’m going to like. I just engage the list from my side of preference and then later begin branching out.
Between The Grown-Up Detective Agency, Headlights, Cannelé & Nomnom - Defective Agency, Who Shot Gum E. Bear, and According to Cain, this is a great year to be a mystery lover. Outside of that, I’m very intrigued by One Final Pitbull Song. But first a few randomly sorted games.
I am first working on January because @litrouke is my good friend and has provided endless support and advice for both me and my games. Plus he would not let me beta test as much as I hinted that I wanted to! His 10PM from a few Comps ago was extremely well written with a unique and novel interface.
I just started but had to put it down because my “what actually bothers me” stats have been recently re-rolled due to IRL issues and so far it’s extremely effective bleak apocalyptic plague survival horror.
I jumped right in to Jim Aiken’s Sprawling puzzler, “Only Prom Dress”. Great game. I may be ready to write a review, but this post isn’t the review
After that I alternate between games by authors I know, games by new authors with great blurbs, games that look short enough to play in one sitting, and games that are fed to me by the randomized.
