Rude awakening

Barely awake from suspended animation, you sense the ship is about to crash. Your other companion isn’t as lucky; you find him slumped down on the floor, lifeless. Inside the cockpit, the pilot, who also happens to be your captain, is skewered to his seat with a long steel rod, unable to move. The console for steering the ship is blown. Still a bit groggy, you work your way to the other console and try to lift the ship – but it will not cooperate. What do you do?

That is how Morningstar begins.

There’s a lot to like in Morningstar that it seems the better question would be “What’s there not to like?” The game’s graphics were very well-made and polished. There’s enough detail in each location for those who like to explore objects. Some details were also put in to keep the game realistic, which is a nice touch. For instance, most of the game is seen from inside the helmet of the remaining functional member of the team, and to this end the artists incorporated barely noticeable scratches on the helmet’s lens, as well as crosshair lines on the sides.

The introductory and ending animation scenes were spectacular. I found myself watching it over and over while I was checking out different places in the game. There is very minimal animation within the game itself, however. Apart from probably a couple of places, most of the game features static images, which is fine, since the protagonist’s goal isn’t here to fight with hordes of unknown aliens. He’s looking to get the hell out.

Most of Morningstar’s puzzles are quite easy, but it helps sometimes to be patient especially as there are instances where one needs to figure out which item can be used with another. For those uninitiated to point-and-click games, Morningstar offers a lot of helpful clues in the form of witty dialogues between you and your captain. Of course, if you find yourself stuck somewhere along the game, the game includes a handy link to a walkthrough. It also allows the player to save and load their game from three available save slots, which can be accessed through a menu in the corner.

The music is solid, and it lends a haunting atmosphere to the game. It helped keep me on edge looking for clues what to do while I was playing the game. The voice parts for both the protagonist and the captain were decent and well-acted, but my thinking was, anything that provides clues to what you need to accomplish next has to be heard and read as well.

So what is there not to like, then? A minor bug: at the time that I played, I reached a point where, to avoid spoilers, I had to get over to another part of the land. Setting up the means to reach that part of the land triggered one of my default response soundbites to the captain to be looped over and over, which was a little irritating. When I reached that part where I needed to go, the soundbite stopped, and the problem never recurred. Still, this is a minor bug, and most likely by the time you have played the game, this might already be fixed.

Overall, Morningstar is one of those Flash games that deserve to be played. It contains most, if not all, the merits of a solid adventure game. If you like a good science fiction adventure with puzzles that are challenging enough, and with great visuals to boot, I suggest heading over to Bubblebox and play this game.

Toeing the party line

Beyond Exile is Doug Shanahan’s adaptation of author Lawrence Johns’ epic poem, written in Quest. During most of the game, the player dons the role of Frank Glendover, continuing his philosophical and personal journey during the 1970’s which is said to have started out in Johns’ previous work Love and Hate. However, the game also puts the player into the shoes of such real-life characters such as convicted revolutionary Ilich Sanchez (“Carlos the Jackal“) as well as acclaimed poet/professor Billy Collins.

Beyond Exile screenshot

Beyond Exile is primarily a mouse-driven game, with most of the places’ and objects’ names and the required actions listed out in a neat little window on the right of the game window. The game’s text appears to have been copied directly from the book – the conversations between NPCs, the rather generalized object descriptions, even some of the game responses are rendered in double-spaced lines of free verse. The game is also quite puzzle-less, as there’s hardly a part where the player is required to solve out anything.

But then there’s puzzleless, and there’s nearly puzzleless, and then there’s this.

Crying Uncle

I recently spotted an IF game on the Artsy Games Incubator website called My Uncle George, written by Filipe Salgado (download page here; web version here). It’s a one-room piece written using Inform 7, which casts the player as 17-year-old Matt, trying to kill some time before school, having a “criminally awkward” breakfast chat with his uncle George, a former convict on parole.

The game on Gargoyle

Considering this was the only IF piece among the six games produced in Round 4 of AGI, I thought I’d try this and see.

Two of a Kind

One of the things I generally look for in games is how well-meshed the gameplay is with the narrative. Inform author Graham Nelson himself wrote about it in his introduction to his essay The Craft of Adventure, where he refers to adventure games as “a crossword at war with a narrative.”

Fortunately, Ben Chandler’s games Shifter’s Box – Outside In and Heed did not disappoint.

Editor Releases Game, Gets Interviewed

Jimmy Maher, editor of the online magazine SPAG (Society for the Promotion of Adventure Games) and recognized IF historian, recently released his new game The King of Shreds and Patches.