Lock & Key

IF-Review
Death Becomes You
After a while, the requirement to match the PC's knowledge with the player's can begin to feel like a bit of a cage, and the most common contortions an IF game goes through to live inside it (such as amnesia) have long since lost their appeal. Even the freshest ones can still feel a bit tired and gimmicky unless done exactly right. The accretive PC is one key to this cage -- it's wonderfully refreshing to play a character who's really good at something, and even better to become good at it yourself. Of all the jail-breaks that happen in Lock & Key, this one is the most satisfying.
See the full review

Play This Thing!
While the constraints and challenges are theoretically similar to the ones you'll find in traditional tower defense games, the feel is entirely different. Each kind of trap can be placed only once, and the sequence matters. There's a graphical component to the interface, so that you have some visual feedback when laying out the dungeon, but most of the interaction is through text commands, because Lock & Key is primarily a text adventure in form. And much of the game's entertainment value comes not from figuring out where to place traps -- though that makes a solid and rewarding puzzle -- but from the characters and their reactions.
See the full review