Ratings and Reviews by lagran-G-an
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Good, but should have been great., August 8, 2010Hoosegow is a well written and fun escape the room game. Unfortunately the flow of the experience is ruined by bugs, parser problems, and some annoying 'guess the verb' situations. All of these give the game an Unpolished feel.
The writers of this game did a very good job of implementing the setting of the game, A western comedy, and giving the game a "living" feel. The writing for the descriptions, and the PC are all very good. A simple but effective example comes the great replacement of IF default responses. "You reckon violence usually is the answer, but maybe not just now.", or "That ain’t no verb I got knowledge of.".One place the game did come short is the NPC side-kick, Muddy, which seemed kind of lifeless and lacked some responses.
The puzzles were easy-medium and well designed ((Spoiler - click to show)I thought the last puzzle with the marshal was redundant ). The problem with the game is that I encountered a few annoying bugs and a few nouns/actions were not well implemented, leaving some the puzzles a bitter taste of 'guess the verb'. (Spoiler - click to show)For a bug example: in some parts of the game, for some reason the 'it' verb does not work well (after hitting the wall, touch it gives the response for the gate.) An example of poor implementation: When you need to take the feather from the vulture pulling the tale does not do the trick, instead you have to "take feather" which doesn't seem to make too much sense. Another example, is when you try to climb the window after muddy gets tired, the response makes no sense.
In conclusion, hoosegow is a good game, that just isn't polished enough.
It's strengths over come it's flaws, by far., July 20, 2010I enjoyed this game a lot, It had good puzzles and great writing. Although it is not without it's flaws. It's strengths easily over come, making To Hell In A Hamper, in my opinion a very enjoyable game.
The first thing that shines for the game is it's great setting. 10,000 feet in the air, flying over the Andes in a hot air-balloon. Trying to gain altitude and save your life. The writing has a light fun tone combined with the feeling of a 19th century explorers novel.
The puzzles were all very nice, and mostly well hinted. Some were very easy, and some a bit harder.
I have a few complaints. There are some places were the item or its interaction could be implemented better, in my opinion. (Spoiler - click to show)The vase's description says that it rattles when I turn it over. most naturally I wanted to turn it over to see what happens (hear the sound), but the game did not implement "turn over". Also, as I could shout into the trumpet, I expected to be able to shout into the dog's ear without the trumpet.
I also read the review, by puzzler, that said that there are ways to make the game unsolvable, and I read the authors reply. I still agree with the puzzler. I still believe it is possible to get stuck in the game, I understand that these are not on purpose, but are bugs. still I had to replay the game 4 times, and at one spot I found myself very stuck for a while because the game gave me the feeling it will save me from unsolvable situations. (Spoiler - click to show) You can throw the mallet before discovering the vase, but I suspect there is an alternative way to solve this puzzle. But I also managed somehow to throw the smudge stick, before throwing out the mummy. I doubt there is an alternative way to solving this puzzle. It got me stuck for a while, for I kept on going back to a saved game that was saved after I had already thrown the stick.
All and all, this is a very good game, and a fun experience. I definitely recommend it.
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