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Fate.z8
For all systems. To play, you'll need a Z-Machine Interpreter - visit Brass Lantern for download links.
Inform 7 source code
Contains story.ni
(Compressed with ZIP. Free Unzip tools are available for most systems at www.info-zip.org.)

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Fate

by Victor Gijsbers profile

Fantasy
2007

(based on 17 ratings)
3 member reviews

Game Details

Language: English (en)
Current Version: 1
License: GPL
Development System: Inform 7
Forgiveness Rating: Merciful
Baf's Guide ID: 3019
IFID: ED239114-64D5-4EE9-B7C8-E26BF6B9E57F
TUID: az8jb9bddngurwr7

Awards

Nominee, Best Game; Nominee, Best Story; Nominee, Best Use of Medium - 2007 XYZZY Awards

1st Place - Spring Thing 2007

Editorial Reviews

Play This Thing
Fate is a piece I come back to again and again in my thinking about the interactive potential of narrative, because it attempts something rarely done: It allows the player to craft a character who is not just "good" or "bad" or "aligned" to one or another ethical philosophy, but the representative of a more complex morality, one without labels. And there are a few strong moments where the player comes face-to-face with the cumulative implications of her choices, and they surprise a little.
See the full review

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Member Reviews

5 star:
(5)
4 star:
(6)
3 star:
(4)
2 star:
(2)
1 star:
(0)
Average Rating:
Number of Reviews: 3
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
Grappling with age-old questions of ends and means, April 4, 2008
by Jimmy Maher (Aalborg, Denmark)
Fate initially appears to be a somewhat typical text adventure. As you play, though, more layers begin to appear as you decide just what you are willing to do to protect yourself, your unborn child, and your country. Your first couple of choices are quite morally unambiguous, but later choices are not so easy at all. Are you willing to sacrifice an innocent life to save a country? Does a man who committed a murder decades ago and sincerely repented still deserve to be punished for it? These are the sorts of questions you find yourself grappling with. You always have the choice to say no, to say that the end does not justify the means. However, the stakes are high for you and yours as well.

One might argue that the game is a bit manipulative. At several points when faced with what the game obviously wanted me to regard as a stark binary decision I thought of a more morally acceptable third way, but was refused the freedom to act on my idea. Nevertheless, Fate dares to ask the sort of big questions that conventional IF seldom gets near. A must-play for everyone.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
Fate and Decision, October 17, 2007
Fate is an exploration of player choice and moral dilemma in interactive fiction, and as pioneering work, it's worth a play.

I’m not sure how much “Fate”’s moral dilemmas worked for me, though. The central question always comes down to balancing suffering — are you willing to hurt X in order to save Y? — and while there are many permutations and many outcomes possible in the game, the choice often felt essentially arbitrary. Gijsbers does attempt to sketch in story, to provide weight and characterization to some of the characters, but I felt there was not enough meat here to make the major decision points really powerful.

So I enjoyed the game, and I thought it was an interesting essay in designing IF. I also thought it did not quite accomplish what it could have if it had framed its dilemmas a little differently (pitting different principles against one another) or else developed its characters more deeply (to make more interesting the choice of who has to suffer).

0 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
Bad tagging?, July 27, 2008
by jwbjerk (Mid-West USA)
This is tagged as "I7 Source Available", but there is no link to a source file.

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Recommended Lists

Fate appears in the following Recommended Lists:

Tragedy in interactive fiction by lobespear
The following games that play with the medium were used as examples of approaches to tragedy in interactive fiction at a Cambridge University lecture in 2007.

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Polls

The following polls include votes for Fate:

Artistic Games by WriterBob
I'm interested in games that take the fiction of IF to new levels. These are not straightforward, plot driven games. Think instead of games that play like poetry, or games that focus on a character's revelation.

Games where you can't screw up by Pinstripe
Sometimes, when I'm playing a game, I spend more time juggling my save files than I do reading the text. I don't want to have to restart because I picked up the green rod instead of the clay jug (with apologies to Zarf). So I'm looking...

Fate vs Free Will Games by loocas
I imagine that the interactive nature of IF would allow themes of fate and free will to be used powerfully. Perhaps the PC is given a glimpse of his or her future and the player tries to avoid it. Are there games in which this is done?...

See all polls with votes for this game




This is version 8 of this page, edited by Eriorg on 27 July 2008 at 7:34pm. - View Update History - Edit This Page - Add a News Item