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6 of
8 people found the following review helpful:
 This game is nothing but a puzzle..., April 24, 2012by Rymbeld (Greensboro, NC) ...which makes me reticent to call it "interactive fiction" at all. What I liked: the writing, the exploration, the fox. What I didn't like: the fact that it really is nothing but a puzzle, one whose logic doesn't necessarily conform to the real world. I like thinking about real-world experience to help me solve puzzles. Example: (Spoiler - click to show) the very first bit about getting the shovel. It doesn't make sense to me that you would need to soften the mud to pull it out...we're talking dirt, not stone. Also, the fox. If you break the shaft accidentally from pulling the shovel from the hard mud, then the fox won't play fetch. He will look at the shaft with interest, but not fetch it if you throw it. But when you break it from prying the boulder, suddenly he wants to play. I see how that makes sense in the logic of the game, but it reduces the real-world plausibility of the game, which I dislike. . I agree with the other reviewers when it comes to a lack of any sense of goal. The game starts off just feeling like an exploratory quest, but you are supposed to do something to win and have no idea what that is. This game rewards tedious screwing around. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Remove vote | Add a comment
1 of
2 people found the following review helpful:
Leaves an impression, March 7, 2012by Mailer Excellent prose, vivid environment, and a cute npc. The puzzles are maybe a little to obscure. I wasn't always sure what I was supposed to be doing. I don't think I could have solved this without a walk through. None of that really matters though because the writing alone makes this worth a look. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Remove vote | Add a comment
7 of
8 people found the following review helpful:
Well written prose, poorly designed, almost unplayable., August 22, 2011While the game features a winning non-human NPC and lovely descriptions of the scenery, the actual gameplay is awful. The goal of the game is unguessable, and many of the puzzles are time sensitive -- time-sensitive meaning four or five turns, sometimes -- so that you will find yourself dying and reloading, dying and reloading. I found the beginning of the game relatively do-able, finding items and using them. However, after a fair amount of game play, I discovered that in the first couple of turns I had done something which made the game unwinnable; I would never have known if I hadn't looked it up. I later used a found item on something to solve a problem, and it didn't work -- (Spoiler - click to show)I tried to move the boulder with the spade by placing it beneath the boulder and "moving boulder with spade", which did not work. The solution is to "pry boulder with spade". simply because I failed to use on specific word, even though I was clearly using language to perform the operation that was the solution to the puzzle. The game is simply too unforgiving and rather pointless. The ending makes no sense whatsoever, and the one relationship in the game -- with the NPC -- is developed and then, for no reason, completely abandoned without explanation. Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Remove vote | View comments (2) - Add comment
11 of
12 people found the following review helpful:
Almost a Very Good Game, September 15, 2010by Xervosh (San Jose, Northern California) Much in this game is very good, but it has some really serious flaws that prevent me from rating it higher than three stars. Most obviously, the game is just too damn hard. I'm sure some people have solved it without any assistance, but those people must be veritable IF wizards. I got perhaps a third of the way through the game (Spoiler - click to show)(I managed to find the key, and take a nap in the Cave after I grew tired), but pretty much had to use a walk-thru for everything after that...and even with a walk-thru, I STILL found it somewhat difficult to solve! At no time is it even remotely apparent what the goal of the game is supposed to be, and thus to suggest that the later puzzles are under-clued is to be generous. You basically just have to do stuff that makes no sense, until it adds up to something that kinda does. But even then, the ending is very confusing. (Spoiler - click to show)Apparently, the goal was to save the bridge. And yet after accomplishing that goal, one gets the impression one's friends have located you, and are crossing the bridge...only to suddenly find one's self back in the Cave..WTF? And your friends are still there the next morning? I guess its a campsite? Was this review helpful to you? Yes No Remove vote | Add a comment
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