Ratings by Karlok
IMMORTALITY
Case of the Golden Idol, The
Catie in MeowmeowLand
Milo and the Magpies
Twelve Minutes
Mutropolis
Papetura
Overboard!
unmemory
ENCODYA
There Is No Game: Wrong Dimension
Void Breach
Outer Wilds
Longing, The
Stonewall Penitentiary
Agent A: A puzzle in disguise
Jenny LeClue – Detectivú
ZED
Chook & Sosig: Walk the Plank
Irony Curtain: From Matryoshka with Love
Draugen
Return of the Obra Dinn
Cube Escape: Paradox
Game + short movie = fantastic combination
I love the bizarre, surreal world of the free Cube Escape series. It’s all about atmosphere and mystery. Inspired by Twin Peaks. A cubelike room or set of rooms. Psychological horror. Dark humor. Strange creatures. An overarching story about a mysterious murder (or was it suicide…) First-person, but the protagonist is not always the same character. Inventory objects + stand-alone puzzles. Recurring themes, characters, objects. Changing the past and/or the future. Every game adds new elements to the Rusty Lake universe.
Paradox is the tenth game in the series and this time the developers added a short 18-minute movie. Scenes from the film are integrated in the game and vice versa. It also contains hints for extra achievements and secret endings. Very well done.
The surrealistic world of Cube Escape allows you to jump right in, although you will of course miss references to previous games. Highly recommended. The first chapter and the movie are both free; the second chapter is only a few dollars.
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Time Played: 5-10 hours
Difficulty: Just Right
Technobabylon
Painscreek Killings, The
CHUCHEL
House of Da Vinci, The
Death Gate
Bunker, The
QTEs :(
I liked the old interactive movies, for instance TLC, but this one is not for me. I read the other reviews and I’m relieved that I’m not the only one who couldn’t make it past the last series of QTEs. Had to watch the ending at Youtube. The story is okay, I guess. The acting is a bit over the top at times.
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Time Played: Under 1 hour
Firewatch
Gorogoa
Rise of the Dragon
Tacoma
St Christopher's School Lockdown, The
Inner World: The Last Wind Monk, The
Challenging and entertaining
Highly recommended, I had great fun with it. But I agree with the AG review that the atmosphere is a little darker than the first Inner World game.
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Time Played: 10-20 hours
Difficulty: Hard
XING: The Land Beyond
Darkside Detective, The
Thaumistry: In Charm's Way
Modern "old-school" text adventure with excellent parser
Thaumistry is a modern “old-school” text adventure. There’s a background story, but the focus is on solving puzzles, casting spells and interacting with NPCs. The puzzles are easy for the most part. I was stuck a few times though, and used the excellent context-sensitive hint system. I loved casting spells on everybody and everything to see the various effects. No dying, no deadends.
The parser is very userfriendly. So many unique responses to my input. Modern parsers are of course infinitely better than in the old days of Infocom and Magnetic Scrolls, but this one really shines. I would go so far as to call it forgiving: It even recognizes some common typos. New abbreviations like “a” and “t” are welcome additions and saved me a lot of typing. Another one is the command “recap” or “review”, which gives you a summary of current objectives and recent achievements. Very useful when you continue playing the next day and can’t remember exactly what you were doing when you left off.
Bob Bates’ TimeQuest, where you go back in time and witness/change important moments in history, is one of my all-time favorite text adventures. So it was a nice surprise that Thaumistry also refers to historical events, some of which I’d never heard of, and adds footnotes with links to relevant sites. Lots of nice references to his previous games too.
I enjoyed Thaumistry very much. Recommended for both newbies to text adventures and to older players with fond memories of the old Infocom and Legend Entertainment days.
Con: I wish the developer had done more with the story and the interesting concept of “Bodgers”.
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Time Played: 10-20 hours
Difficulty: Just Right
Oxenfree
Silence
Orwell
Shadow in the Cathedral, The
Tales from the Borderlands: Episode One - Zer0 Sum
Tales from the Borderlands: Episode Two - Atlas Mugged
Tales from the Borderlands: Episode Three - Catch a Ride
Tales from the Borderlands: Episode Four - Escape Plan Bravo
Tales from the Borderlands: Episode Five - The Vault of the Traveler
Dream Machine: Chapter 1, The
Dream Machine: Chapter 2, The
Dream Machine: Chapter 3, The
Dream Machine: Chapter 4, The
Dream Machine: Chapter 5, The
Dream Machine: Chapter 6, The
What Remains of Edith Finch
Day of the Tentacle Remastered
Stories Untold
Awesome storytelling
This game is filled with suspense from the very first. Mysterious, creepy, mesmerizing. It’s not a real horror game, although there are moments it certainly feels like one. It features a unique combination of keyboard input and mouse clicking. The player uses his keyboard to type commands (as in a text adventure) and to solve puzzles. A must-play for every adventure gamer, if only to see how far the genre has come. I don’t often rate a game 5 stars, but this one deserves it IMO. Everything about it is good, music, sound effects, graphics, voices, but in particular the novel way the 4 intertwined stories are told. Loved the 4-5 hours I spent with it.
For people who are unfamiliar with text adventures: Don’t be alarmed, there’s much more to do than just thinking of commands to type, which is not hard in this game anyway.
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Time Played: 2-5 hours
