External Links


Bonehead.zip
Contains Bonehead.gblorb
Post-competition bug fix release
Requires a Glulx interpreter. Visit IFWiki for download links. (Compressed with ZIP. Free Unzip tools are available for most systems at www.info-zip.org.)

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Bonehead

by Sean M. Shore profile

Historical
2011

About the Story

September 23, 1908. Win this game, and your Giants will have the National League pennant almost within reach. You've done your part. You've just made a base hit, putting McCormick on third with the winning run in the ninth inning. It's all up to Bridwell now. Or perhaps not.

Your name is Fred Merkle. You're about to become famous.


Game Details

Off-Site Reviews

NotGraphs
Which leads us to our subject: three weeks ago saw the release of the first narrative baseball game. Bonehead is written by Sean M. Shore, and tells the story of New York Giants first baseman and teenager Fred Merkle, whose baserunning gaffe in the final week of 1908 helped cost his team the pennant and dogged him the rest of his life. Your goal is to re-enact that day, beginning with standing in line at the train station on the way to the stadium.
See the full review

Play This Thing!
It's a structure that promotes sympathy rather than identification. You the player are not Fred. You know things Fred doesn't know, you don't know things he does (like the ins and outs of swinging at various pitch types). Your goal, to see the story through and find out what happened, is very much to Fred's disadvantage, as he would have had a happier life if things had gone differently in that game.
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The Digital Antiquarian

Bonehead is the true story of the “most infamous play in baseball history,” one which demoralized the 1908 New York Giants in their battle against the Chicago Cubs for the pennant and earned for Fred Merkle, your avatar and the star of the game, the sobriquet of the title. I’m always happy to play any IF that is not set aboard a spaceship or in a fantasy kingdom, and this setting feels particularly fresh, with its occasional period photographs and some very nice descriptive writing. It doesn’t hurt that I quite enjoy the game of baseball, and, while I don’t really know that much about its history, never object to learning more. And Shore is well up to the task, writing always with a light, usually slightly comic touch. Interestingly, his narrator breaks the fourth wall frequently to speak directly to us / Merkle, an unusual approach that works very well.
See the full review

Page Update History

  v.11: 17-Apr-2021 03:25 - Zape (Current Version) - Edit Page - Normal View
Changed download links
v.10: 30-Apr-2012 08:59 - Mr. Patient
Changed external review links
v.9: 05-Mar-2012 15:52 - Mr. Patient
Changed download links
v.8: 05-Mar-2012 15:51 - Mr. Patient
Changed version number, genre, download links
v.7: 05-Mar-2012 14:37 - Mr. Patient
Changed download links
v.6: 29-Feb-2012 21:44 - Mr. Patient
Changed download links
v.5: 19-Jul-2011 08:42 - Emily Short
Changed external review links
v.4: 17-May-2011 09:30 - Mr. Patient
Changed author
v.3: 05-Apr-2011 09:47 - Mr. Patient
Changed description
v.2: 05-Apr-2011 07:56 - David Welbourn
Changed cover art, license type
v.1: 05-Apr-2011 07:25 - David Welbourn
Created page