Choice of Robots

Choice of Robots
by Kevin Gold

Science Fiction
2014

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5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
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Number of Ratings: 41
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- Nemorah , February 2, 2024

- Arioch, October 30, 2023

- Edo, September 20, 2023

- Dmitri Kubasov, August 30, 2023

- bertilak (UK), July 19, 2023

- gravityfrog, March 15, 2023

- EJ, January 11, 2023

- taski897, December 27, 2022

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

A sweeping sci-fi tale with emotional resonance, October 18, 2022

by ccpost (Greensboro, North Carolina)

I absolutely love this game. I've been exploring more and more Choice of Games as I really like their balance of game-like elements (navigating characters through difficult situations to 'unlock' achievements and build up stats) and rich storytelling. Choice of Robots is a perfect example of an incredibly engaging story that you feel like you're playing through and shaping with your choices.

That story, of a disgruntled graduate student who invents a sentient robot and proceeds to alter the world forever, is finely crafted. Gold presents a thought-provoking sci-fi parable in which the reader gets to play out various scenarios (grand but plausible, in the way of a good sci-fi novel) starting from the premise of the invention of a truly sentient robot. The player can seek fame, fortune, power, etc. but can also be more insular and develop the robot as a thing of beauty and a companion. Even a single playthrough of the game presents a sweeping narrative that spans decades and sees seismic transformations in global society. The game carries the player through many poignant and troubling situations that ask us to consider the implications of many trajectories that we're currently on in society. The fact that this is but one branch of a many-branched story adds to the grandeur. Just scrolling through the achievements gives the player a sense of the many, many different possibilities to explore.

I died relatively early on in my first play through -- (Spoiler - click to show)Tammy got me!. The risk of death was surprising as all the other Choice of Games that I've played have not featured those dead ends, or at least not that I've found. But I actually appreciated the risk that that introduced -- and the subsequent gravity this lent to my choices as I played through the game a second time. For the titles that Choice of Games publishes, there may be some company style guidelines that prohibit too many dead ends like this, but I'd be interested to see more ChoiceScript games explore more game-like structures that have dead ends or less optimal game ending states.

The non-player characters also seem well developed, though I didn't choose to invest much in personal relationships -- aside from remembering to call my Mom every so often! Rather, I focused more on the relationship with the robot, as this was the most intriguing to delve into, given the nature and theme of the game. The game does reward this probing of the inventor-robot relationship and presents it in full complexity and complication. Do you position yourself as a godlike creator, the inventor of a tool (or weapon), an artist, a parent, a friend? All of these shades and nuances are explored in the game, and I imagine that an understanding of this relationship would be deepened even further on replays.

Overall, this game is a wonderful expression of the possibilities of choice-based interactive fiction. The story is foregrounded -- and players are rewarded for engaging with the story at the level of narrative, structure, and style -- but this story is driven by gameplay.

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- rivergrace21 (East Coast USA), September 9, 2022

- SherwoodForbes, June 21, 2022

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

A masterclass in science fiction, April 27, 2021

by Chin Kee Yong (Singapore)

Choice of Robots is an excellent, highly replayable SF story about the impact of automation and artificial intelligence on modern society. It's so good that I would buy it again twice over if I could.

At its heart, science fiction is about "what if" questions: what if you could travel back in time? What if androids were indistinguishable from humans? The best SF stories take an intriguing "what if" question and spin it into a gripping vision of a world that could be. The genius of Choice of Robots is that it lets you ask the "what if" question yourself -- through your actions and choices, you write the SF prompt that you find most personally appealing, and the game presents you with the future defined by your choices. The result is a riveting story structure that makes perfect sense for a science-fiction CYOA, full of player agency, surprises, and replayability.

The prose and narrative design of Choice of Robots are consistently excellent. Character and story arcs are vividly elaborated in sharp, elegant paragraphs. The game clearly foreshadows decision points and the results of your choices, resulting in a game that feels responsive and fair. And all the way through the game, those choices are remembered and referenced with staggering fidelity: your robot may develop a lifelong love of computer games or TV programming, depending on the corpus you train it with in the very first chapter.

An abundance of science fiction, IF, and computer science references betray the author's dedication and passion for his work. Turn-of-the-millennium American culture is lovingly illustrated, explored, and lampooned. Perhaps most importantly, the philosophical themes of the work are imbued in every chapter -- the ethics of artificial life, the balance between inquiry and humanity -- resulting in a cohesive authorial voice that resonates from every page.

But enough gushing. The point is that Choice of Robots is a damn good work, worthy of its pedestal in the IF canon; in my opinion, it could even be ranked among the all-time science fiction classics. This is a bona fide interactive fiction masterpiece: thoughtful, funny, heartwarming, solemn, and yet full of joy.

5/5 game, would conquer Alaska with killer robots again.