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bmch.zip
Contains BMCH.GAM
For all systems. To play, you'll need a TADS 2 Interpreter - visit tads.org for interpreter downloads. (Compressed with ZIP. Free Unzip tools are available for most systems at www.info-zip.org.)

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Bad Machine

by Dan Shiovitz profile

Science Fiction
1998

(based on 4 ratings)
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Game Details

Language: English (en)
Current Version: 1.2
License: Freeware
Development System: TADS 2
Baf's Guide ID: 304
IFID: TADS2-91EE51CC6B59D363F7F33CDB9219E4D5
TUID: 3a9rb059miw9fc9h

Awards

Nominee, Best Individual PC; Nominee, Best Use of Medium - 1998 XYZZY Awards

Editorial Reviews

Baf's Guide


This is one of those games that you just have to see to understand. There's nothing else quite like it, although Michael Berlyn's Suspended bears some similarities. In a vast, hivelike robotic factory, a malfunctioning machine struggles to avoid being being captured and reprogrammed. All text is in a pseudo-computery style, heavy on punctuation and mixed with error messages and line noise, and the main challenge is to figure out how to interpret the information you're given. (People using text-to-speech software might find this insurmounable.) Warehouse IV is full of activity even when you just wander around, so figuring out how things work and how to interact with them is your second challenge. Even when you have that knowledge, logistics can be sticky. Multiple paths lead to very different conclusions, all of which are somewhat anticlimactic. I'd recommend this one especially for techies, particularly if they're into Lego Mindstorms.

-- Carl Muckenhoupt

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This is version 5 of this page, edited by David Welbourn on 25 December 2008 at 6:31pm. - View Update History - Edit This Page - Add a News Item