The Hunter’s Journals - Tattered Sails
The interactive mechanics are not like other interactive fiction I’ve played. It is much more like a table top game. Combat is actually handled in rounds with randomly generated dice rolls. You can speed this up to just show the final result but it’s still a table top way of handling things and I didn’t like it.
In table top games you can build your character to weight the dice rolls through backgrounds, stats, gear, race, etc. This game’s character creation was so minimal that I felt that the outcome of combat was very random. This was a huge interruption to the story because poor results weren’t injuries or delays. Poor results (at least early on for me) meant death.
– Real player with 0.6 hrs in game
Read More: Best Action Interactive Fiction Games.
_keyboardkommander
Full play through once it uploads: https://youtu.be/u42NxOO8Kq8
9.5 out of 10 typing game due to some errors I’m gonna start with some things that are messed up in the game, but first I highly recommend this game if you love typing games it’s challenging the story is amazing and it’s ridiculously fun. Ragers are too OP I can type around 120 wpm, but when you can only see two words at a time and the creator has the most expansive vocabulary having these things run up and 3 shot you from full health is toxic. The ragers words will sometimes not stay on top of them either so they’ll get close and the letter to switch to them will be in some random location you have to guess at, also sometimes when you kill a zombie instead of going to the closest one to you like it normally does it won’t target a rager straight up punching you in the butt. One of the later levels repeats with the same journal entry and 430 something words is wayyyy too much for one level my dude I about had a stroke especially with your huge words you use throughout plus it’s so long it doesn’t fit on the whole journal entry screen when you scroll down loool. The good though this is actually a SUPER challenging typing game which is awesome they’re rare. The upgrades give you a chance to beat it on any difficulty besides the easiest I could only beat the second easiest game mode. The zombies ramp up so heavily if you don’t upgrade correctly you may be screwed. The story is amazingly interesting and well written the library of words is expansive and everything you type is leading up to the journal entry you get to read at the end. I’m sad it’s not complete yet, but I will most definitely check out the future chapters. Loved this game. Don’t be discouraged by the lack of reviews I’m assuming it’s because people can’t beat it outside of the easiest difficulty which may be a turn off to some people and the story is pretty lengthy but great.
– Real player with 7.5 hrs in game
Read More: Best Action Strategy Games.
Keyboard Kommander gets the fundamentals right of a typing action game, but then adds several innovations new to the genre. That game has the juicy sound effects and visual effects that make the simple action of typing feel awesome. Pressing space to shoot a zombie in the head never gets old.
Built on top of the excellent arcade typing action, there’s also tactical gameplay decisions you have to make. You can choose which zombie to target, so you can take down the most threatening ones first. You can strategically choose mortar gun to do splash damage to nearby zombies or laser gun to kill several zombies in a line. So it’s not down to just technical dexterity, there’s also tactical skill and longer term strategy with upgrades.
– Real player with 3.4 hrs in game
Monsterland
Don’t be fooled by the graphics: This isn’t a Roguelike, it’s a top-view Doom! I had a copy of this way back in the early 00s and loved it, and was thrilled to see it’s on Steam. It’s heavy on the atmosphere, despite being just ASCII graphics. It uses sound effects, story cues, and fading colors in a surprisingly moody way, and is a lot of fun to boot. I’ve got Doom 2016 in the other room, but have been playing this instead. Now, the bad points: I do think it’s a little too easy to kick the bucket sometimes– it would be improved if there were less need for level memorization. I also wish the enemies didn’t score damage when they are simply adjacent to you. They should have to be adjacent for a short period of time (like the pink demons in Doom)– otherwise they’ll score hits instantly when you open the door, even though you can minimize it by getting ready to back up fast. But despite the few issues it’s a compelling play and well worth the 99 cents. I hope they make another or maybe re-release the original version for fans (since it’s impossible to find now!).
– Real player with 5.1 hrs in game
Read More: Best Action Retro Games.
When I first saw that Monsterland, formerly Dead Colony in its lesser version (on Desura), was released a little over a month ago I was more than a little surprised. Don’t get me wrong I understand that there has been a revival of classic era-style gaming. Atari recently announced that they were bringing back 100 of their classic games in the spring with multiplayer support to Steam in the northern hemisphere Spring and Sanctuary RPG has been relatively successful on Steam as an ASCII adventure but a text shooter? How was that going to work? Surprisingly well and very playable as it turns out.
– Real player with 4.8 hrs in game
The Hostage
the hostage is a text-based choose your own adventure kinda thing, or in this case a choose somebody else’s adventure. you get a message from a guy who turns out to be a former hostage in africa, communicating with a bracelet of some kind he got from the rescuing soliders who turned into minced meat shortly after, and now he’s surrounded by a bunch of dead bodies and just wants to get out of dodge.
– Real player with 3.4 hrs in game
At first i was really interested in this game as it is very similar to Lifeline series which is available on android devieces. Unfortunately it is not as good as Lifeline, because of a lot of choices results in dead ends - killing protagonist and breaking immersion, creating the ilussion (or showing the true nature of the game, to be sure i would need to play it at least a second time, which I am not going to do, beacuse it dissapointed me) of linear progression. But the most immersion breaking thing are bugs. In what I think is half of the game, suddenly protagonist started talking about things that didn’t happend through my playthrough, meeting people that didn’t appeard before and behaving like he knows them. It is probably because game mismatched my story path with some alternative one. Generally I tend to be forgiving of bugs in games but not in games where the only thing that they offer is story and such bug destroys any investment that I had in it. If the developers fix this bug I will change my recommendation. As of now go and play some of the Lifeline games as they are way better.
– Real player with 2.3 hrs in game
Hero or Villain: Battle Royale
This is actually the author, so I will use this space to try to address some of the points raised so far in the reviews.
Please note that this game was only recently released, and there are some known bugs that should hopefully be ironed out soon (which appear to be blocking some of the paths through the game).
Note also that this is the 2nd in an expected 3 game story-arc. As such, the game does only take you so far in the story, which will be completed in the last part of the game.
You cannot save everybody in the story, though some characters can be saved, if you make the right decisions (or kill others yourself). Anyway, please feel free to discuss the game, here or in the discussion section! :)
– Real player with 22.7 hrs in game
I was really exited to read the sequel,but it turns out it was not what i expected:
First, you are treated like a slave and there is no good dialoge option to rebel, this is a major flaw with the game because it really ruins the whole cyoa thing going on.The only good thing i can comment on is that liked the side missions more then the main one.
Second, the deaths are just everywhere, this leads to just not wanting to get along with anyone, and in that same note the relatonship is also really bad, one day you can be friends then the next one she is a bitch with you (Im talking with you joo)
– Real player with 20.4 hrs in game
SpaceCorn
I have no idea why this piece of shit is even on steam.
First off it’s completely text based.
Normally i would not mind a text based game but this game is LINEAR as fuck whatever you do you can only progress if you jump through the game’s hoops.
Second off it’s so damn short you finish the game in 10 minutes or less.
further more the game makes it a habit of trying to insult the player for doing stupid things he/she gets forced to do.
The only reason i played this game is because one of my twitch viewers gave this game to me.
– Real player with 5.9 hrs in game
SpaceCorn is a text game that might have been cutting edge technology in the 1950s, except that computer programmers in the 1950s probably wouldn’t have made so many spelling mistakes, or used the humour of 12-year-old for a publicly-released game.
Be warned that this is a text-based game based upon you choosing from multiple choices being offered.
You would be forgiven for assuming that picking an option would be as simple as clicking with a mouse - but, no, your mouse can’t be used with this game. Or you might think that you could, at least, make a choice by typing in a number - but, no, when you are offered a choice, you have to type in the entire answer - again, and again, and again, ad nauseum.
– Real player with 4.6 hrs in game
The Vampire Regent
You know when you’re looking for that perfect Choice of Games story that really sucks you in with the story, the romance, suspense, and action but you just can’t seem to find it while sifting through the low tier stories?
Well this is one of the masterpieces! You are the regent of the vampires in a city and you feel it! Your choices matter immensely and the romance is top tier! There is also a ton of replayability. I HIGHLY recommend this to any Choice fan! I hope to see more stories in this universe!
– Real player with 41.3 hrs in game
I wasn’t expecting much from this one, but I was pleasantly surprised. I actually liked this book more than the official CoG WoD games: Night Road and Out for Blood. Granted, this is a stand alone IP and not constrained by the official licence and everything that comes with it, but not every author can utilize the creative freedom to its full potential. Morton Newberry & Lucas Zaper did a good job in this aspect.
Vampire Regent will feel familiar to fans of WoD as it’s very WoD-like world at it’s core, yet it’s not constrained by WoD lore, so the authors were able to take a few “creative freedoms” here and there. On one hand it made the novel accessible to new fans who are unfamiliar with WoD lore, on the other - some moments and confrontations were made more “spectacular” than it was possible in constraints of WoD system.
– Real player with 19.1 hrs in game
Trivia Vault Basketball Trivia
You get what you paid for, 5K achievements at minimum price. If you’re an achievement hunter looking to increase the number of achievements on your profile showcase, then I highly recommend buying this. Else don’t waste your money. This is not a game, it’s just a way of distributing achievements.
– Real player with 6.0 hrs in game
VAC = Valve Allow Cheating
– Real player with 0.9 hrs in game
Battlemage: Magic by Mail
Awful. The story felt both rushed and railroaded. You go from squire to mixing with nobles, but so quickly it strains credibility.
The same speed makes it so you can’t develop relationships effectively (particularly as choices you might be intrigued to befriend can be dead-set against your goals with no opportunity to win them over).
I tried to play to my strengths, developing stats I liked (in particular illusion and healing, class, and ambition). But I was punished for this. The game rewards you if you play as the author expects/intends you to play it. On most CoG you can find some kind of winning combination through a variety of means. I didn’t come away from my playthrough feeling that it was possible to win with the kind of play style I preferred.
– Real player with 38.7 hrs in game
I liked this game a lot, i like how magic could be developed by your feelings, not always having to cast spells. I will agree with the other review tho. It does seem really fast and rushed toward the end. I played a few times, and plan on playing again later, but i feel like after chapter 8, the rest of the game goes to fast, so i wish it was longer at that point. However i like the game, and characters and i would be more than willing to play this again. This is one i liked enough, to replay right after beating it, not something i do for all of them.
– Real player with 29.7 hrs in game
Kidnapped! A Royal Birthday
Delightfully written.
You will need to play through more than once to grok the mechanics, once you do shaping the story to your aims becomes much easier, especially once you see the author’s style of cause and effect.
I laugh every time I play.
I cried at the death of a monster. Sobbed honestly.
Artistically brilliant.
– Real player with 37.0 hrs in game
This is such a fun and entertaining game! The characters are lovable and author’s writing is easy to understand and to follow. In my opinion, it’s a very silly game with many jokes and ‘happy accidents’, not everyone might like that, but I found myself giggling continuously while playing. I definitely recommend this game, one of the best interactive novels I’ve read so far :)
– Real player with 15.0 hrs in game