The IFComp 2006
Initial thoughts before playing any of the games…
There are more games this year than in the previous few years. Quite a few more in fact. 44 in all. 2005 had 36, as did 2004; 2003 had just 30; 2002 had 38; it's way back in 2001 (before I started following the IFComp) that there were more games. So the total of 44 for 2006 is positive in one way. Of course, as three of those entries are by the guy widely regarded as the worst IF writer of all time, it's not quite as positive as it may at first seem. And then there's the fact that half the games are Inform games. Who's going to bet that a good number of them are written with Inform 7 by people 'learning the language'?
Very few TADS games this year, just two in TADS 2 and three in TADS 3, compared to a whopping 22 in Inform! The Inform 6 and Inform 7 games were all lumped together but even so, either seemed a lot more appealing to the IFComp entrants than TADS. It seems the ease of use of Inform 7, even in beta format, is seen a better thing than the overly complex TADS. It'll be interesting to see if Inform 7 continues to dominate the Comp in future years or if its newness is the main reason for its success.
…and after playing a few of them…
Only one ALAN game, one Hugo game and one Quest game. While Hugo is considered to be on a par with Inform and TADS (couldn't say myself as I haven't used it), it still seems surprisingly unpopular. ALAN is now up to version 3 but not proving very popular either. Then again, I had problems getting last year's sole ALAN entry to run (constant crashes) and this year's entry's colours settings and fonts seem to be non-customisable, so maybe people are reluctant to use it when more stable alternatives exist. As for Quest…? Well, I suppose it's nice to see a Quest game in the IFComp as there was once a time when I considered Quest (with a huge amount of improvements and a completely redesigned GUI) to be a viable alternative to ADRIFT, but based on the latest Quest game and its general lack of polish, not to mention the flaws in the system itself, I don't think Quest's reputation is going to increase in leaps and bounds as a result. There's apparently a new version of Quest out shortly and not a moment too soon.
ADRIFT? Five entries. Equal to last year's, although again we've had the pleasure of Slan Xorox releasing his bugfest with ADRIFT. Gee, we drifters sure are blessed to have such a persona using our system to create his 'masterpieces'. Still, I suppose I should look on the positive side of things. Whatever faults my own game has, by comparison with Xorox's game I've written a masterpiece.
I see three (count 'em! Three!) games by none other than Paul "I've quit IF 'cos you're all a bunch of losers" Panks. He's achieved the rather remarkable distinction of coming last place in both of the last two IFComps (last and third last in last year's), and this time he looks set to outdo himself. While it was tempting to play his games and write lots of derogatory things about them, I decided to resist the urge this year. No doubt every other reviewer will give them a slating anyway so I thought I'd save myself some time.
Of course, even Panks isn't guaranteed last place this year. One of the game's I tried wouldn't work at all; one was in some horrible Java program that made my eyes ache just looking at it (seriously, a font that small is never a wise move); another was in a foreign language which probably isn't a very clever idea considering most of the judges are likely to be English speaking and not able to read it. But hey, it didn't work for me anyway so the fact that it's written in a language I don't understand is kind of irrelevant.
...and after playing them all…
Was the IFComp better this year than the previous years? Did the extra games make this a more memorable year than 2002, 2003, 2004 or 2005? Hard to say.
Overall, I enjoyed the games I played more this year than for the previous few years. But note the phrase "I enjoyed the games I played". This year, I was a little more harsh in disqualifying the games I wasn't going to play, thus leaving me with the games that, initially at least, seemed playable. The unplayable messes, the bugfests, the games written by a certain someone who I shan't name here… all these got abandoned after the first few minutes due to their sheer naffness. So what I was left with in the end was just the cream of the crop.
Not an especially impressive cream, though. No game scored a 9 this year; there was just a single 8; two 7's; six 6's; four 5's… so just 13 games out of a possible 44 got a score of higher than 4 this year. Not exactly anything to write home about.
Games I didn't play for whatever reason
As there were more games this year than the previous few years, and I didn't manage to get through all of the games in the last three IFComps, I decided to be a little harsher in disqualifying the games I wasn't going to play and review this year. Most of them I quit within five minutes of starting them (some I didn't even play at all), long enough, I felt, to sort the bugfests from the proper games. I think most of the reasons I've given for not playing any further into the games are valid, but if you're writer of one of them I'll understand if you disagree.
"Another Goddamn Escape The Locked Room Game" by Riff Conner - Not a joke game as I'd guessed from the title, but… sigh… a satire. You're in a locked room and you have to escape. I tried to find enthusiasm for playing it but couldn't.
"Enter The Dark" by Peter Shushmaruk - First thing I noticed: it doesn't understand X for EXAMINE. I'm sure the last Alan game I played (the sole Alan entry in the IFComp 2005) understood X so why this one doesn't is a bit of a mystery. Next thing: the colour settings don't seem to work. There's an option to change the defaults (I like white text on a black background) but for some reason they don't have any effect. The colours stay black text on a glaring white background. Final thing: the font overrides *do* work, but as soon as you exit out of the game and go back in, they've reset themselves to the defaults. Seems Alan 3 still has a few teething problems. Oh, and there doesn't seem to be a VERBOSE command meaning I need to type LOOK every time I return to a location so I can see what's there. All in all, more trouble than it's worth.
"Fetter's Grim" by Paul Panks - Because it's Paul Panks. He's written the worse games in both of the last two IFComps (heck, the worst *two* games in last year's Comp) and I haven't the patience for his efforts any longer. As every game he writes is essentially the same anyway, feel free to read my reviews of "Nina" or "Ninja II" and just substitute this game's title for one of them.
"Green Falls" by Paul Panks - See reason for "Fetter's Grim".
"Initial State" by Matt Barton - It's a Windows game. Sorry. But if people are going to persist in writing their games in this way, they need to get used to people not playing them. Oh, and it doesn't understand the X command for EXAMINE. Explain to me one way a system like this is better than any of the proper interpreters out there and I'll consider reconsidering.
"Labyrinth" by Sami Preuninger - I've never been fond of puzzlefests and this was one. The first puzzle involved playing a randomised game of counters with a fellow called Ray which put me right off playing the rest of the game. Maybe if there had been an option to skip the game of counters, I'd have tried the rest of the game but as I didn't see one, I didn't play any further.
"Legion" by Ian Anderson - For some reason which probably seemed like a really good one to the author, this game overrides the default colour settings and won't let me change them back to what I want. Bad move. Off to the recycle bin with you.
"PTGOOD" by Sartre Malvolio - Funnily enough, there are people who enter deliberately bad games in the IFComp every year. Sartre Malvolio, aka Slan Zorax, aka Zorax (or Patient 1151 of the local lunatic asylum as he's probably more commonly known) is one such person. Why do they do it? Beats me.
"Requiem" by David Whyld - My own game. Strictly speaking, I *could* still review it but I suspect my review might be a tad biased…
"Simple Adventure" by Paul Panks - See reason for "Fetter's Grim".
"Tentellian Island" by Zack Wood - Miniscule font. Absolutely tiny. I was literally leaning forward in my seat and squinting at the screen in order to be able to read it. As there's no option to change it that I could find, and the game is written in, of all things, Java, I decided to push it to one side.
"Visocica" by Thorben Burgel - Wouldn't work. I double clicked the icon, something flashed on screen, then it shut down. Normally I'd have posted a message on a forum or newsgroup asking for a solution to this, but as the walkthrough for the game was in a foreign language and the game itself some horrible Windows things instead of a proper interpreter, I decided not to bother.
"Yasmina's Quest" by jalbam - 1) It was in a foreign language which I don't understand so couldn't play. 2) I couldn't figure out how to get it to run. Double clicking on each of the icons didn't do a thing and there were no instructions.
And for the games I *did* play, the scores:
1) "The Elysium Enigma" by Eric Eve 8.0
2) "Floatpoint" by Emily Short 7.1
3) "The Primrose Path" by Nolan Bonvouloir 7.0
4) "Aunts & Butlers" by Robin Johnson 6.6
5) "Tower Of The Elephant" by Tor Andersson 6.5
6) "Tales Of The Travelling Swordsman" by Anonymous 6.4
7) "Moon-Shaped" by Jason Ermer 6.3
8) "Unauthorised Termination" by Richard Otter 6.2
9) "Game Producer!" by Jason Bergman 6.1
10) "The Sisters" by Revgivlet 6.0
11) "Delightful Wallpaper" by Edgar O. Weyrd 5.3
12) "Madam Spider" by Sara Dee 5.1
13) "The Bible Retold" by Celestianpower & Justin Morgan 5.0
14) "Star City" by Mark Sachs 4.2
15) "Carmen Devine: Supernatural Troubleshooter" by Rob Myall 4.1
16) "Fight Or Flight" by geelpete 4.0
17) "Man Alive: Part 1" by Bill Powell 3.7
18) "Man Alive: Part 2" by Bill Powell 3.6
19) "Strange Geometries" by Phillip Chambers 3.5
20) "Lawn Of Love" by The Santoonie Corporation 3.4
21) "Pathfinder" by Tony Woods 3.3
22) "A Broken Man" by Geoff FortyTwo 3.2
23) "Mobius" by J. D. Clemens 3.1
24) "Polendina" by Christopher Lewis 3.0
25) "Hedge" by Stephen Richards 2.3
26) "The Wumpus Run" by Cheryl Howard 2.2
27) "Ballymun Adventure" by Brendan Cribb 2.1
28) "Beam" by Madrone Eddy 2.0
29) "Sysyphus" by Theo Koutz 1.1
30) "The Apocalypse Clock" by GlorbWare 1.0
The number before the decimal point is my actual score; the number after a way of determining which I felt was the better game if there were games with the same score. So a 2.5 is better than a 2.4, and a 2.4 is better than a 2.3 and so on.
A quick note on my scoring:
10 = Masterpiece, best damn game I've ever played. Never awarded a 10 yet because no matter how good a game is, there's always the chance that a better one will come along one day.
9 = Brilliant.
8 = Very good.
7 = Good.
6 = Above average.
5 = Average. (Strictly speaking, on a score of 1-10, 5 and 6 are both 'average', but I consider 5 to be 'average average' and 6 to be 'above average.)
4 = Below average.
3 = Poor.
2 = Very poor but got a few redeeming qualities (though only a few).
1 = Terrible, terrible game. Poorly written, buggy, prone to crashes, uninspiring storyline, etc, etc. Avoid at all costs.
Played but not reviewed
(Mainly because I ran out of time…)
"The Bible Retold" by Celestianpower and Justin Morgan - A biblical epic? Hmmm… Can't say I really care for the subject matter but I suppose at least Jesus doesn't have hit points :) . Seemed okay but, well, biblical games just aren't my thing.
"Fight Or Flight" by geelpete - Started off with one scene and then switched to another. Neither were very interesting. As I was running out of time when I came to this game, I didn't go any further with it.
"Xen: The Hunt" by Ian Shlasko - I played the previous Xen game from last year's IFComp but never really cared for it. This one I started playing but after reading the recap of the first game - bizarre just doesn't describe it - I didn't play it for much longer.
And a few random awards doled out to authors who really should have known better:
The visually challenged PC
… for "The Ballymun Adventure" which features a hall full of students but EXAMINE STUDENTS reveals I DON'T SEE ANY STUDENTS HERE.
And how was I supposed to figure *that* out?
… for "A Broken Man" which requires me to wear a tutu in order to steal a key off a little girl (yes, really) and then glue a man's bottom to the toilet seat in order to kill him (yes, really).
Nice writing but what the heck was it all about?
… for "Man Alive 1" which… well, didn't seem to make any sense. At all. Not one bit. Definitely not.
Not very nice writing and what the heck was it all about?
… for "Hedge" which… well, didn't seem to make any sense. At all. Not one bit. Definitely not.
Nice title, shame about the game
… for "Carmen Devine: Supernatural Troubleshooter" whose author impressed me with his willingness to enter a game with such a cringe worthy title in the Comp, but didn't impress me with anything else about the game.
Shot itself in the foot
… for "Aunts & Butlers". One of the best games in the IFComp… if it had been written in a proper IF system and not a custom one.
Er… this doesn't work
… for "Visocica" and "Yasmina's Quest" (later disqualified from the IFComp because it had been previously released) which didn't even work at all as far as I could tell. Could well be the finest games in the Comp, but as they don't work I guess we'll never know.
Why disabling UNDO is never a good idea
… for "The Wumpus Run". Seriously, why?
Why including a maze is never a good idea
… for "The Wumpus Run". Seriously, why?
Why it isn't a good idea to remake retro games and enter them in the Comp
… for "The Wumpus Run". Seriously, why?
There are proper systems out there, so why are you still writing your games in this godawful way?
… for Paul Panks. Just because.
A few teething problems?
… for "Enter The Dark" which didn't have a verbose command, understand X for EXAMINE and whose default colours couldn't be changed. Despite being written in Alan 3. A proper programming language. What gives?
Leave the defaults alone! (part 1)
… for "Legion" which changed the default colours and wouldn't let me change them back.
Leave the defaults alone! (part 2)
… for "The Travelling Swordsman" which changed the default colours but, thankfully, let me change them back.