Curses

The Good
The game is chock-full of vivid, well-written imagery. The room descriptions and overall setting would not be out of place in a game from Infocom or any other of the "big names" in interactive fiction. (Actually, Graham Nelson is considered one of the big names in IF these days....)

The puzzles, while often difficult, are satisfying to complete -- with one notable exception which I shall address in the next section. They tend to make sense logically in the context of the game, and range in difficulty.

In general, this is an excellent work. If you are a fan of high-quality IF, this is a game worth playing.

The Bad
Some of the puzzles in this game are very difficult; which, in and of itself is not a bad thing. I find, however, that I tend to think a puzzle is unfair if, after reading the solution, my initial reaction is something along the lines of, "Heck, I never would have thought of that on my own".

One puzzle like this in particular stands out in this game. While I won't reveal too many spoilers in this review, I will say that it involves speaking to an NPC in such a way that is counter-intuitive and breaks the immersion of the game (in particular, you are very aware that you are a game player typing into a text parser, rather than being a character trying to find his way in the game world). I will submit the full spoiler in the Tips & Tricks section, so as not to spill the beans here.

I like hard puzzles. I don't like unfair ones. :)

The Bottom Line
If you are someone who enjoys Infocom-quality text adventure games, then you will absolutely want to add this game to your "Have Played" list. It is probably a bit daunting for a newcomer to IF, but well worth the hours if you are looking for a challenge.

The Good
There is nothing not to like about this adventure game. It is huge, it has a great storyline, great characters, great puzzles and great atmoshpere. It even has great graphics (in the sense that Graham Nelson writes very good room descriptions). This game is so challenging and involving that I just couldn't stop playing. (I'm actually still playing...)

The Bad
Uhh... its dead difficult? Well, actually, the puzzles are more or less logical (or at least there is something pushing the player into making the correct illogical conclusions), and there aren't any arcade sequences. (Though there is a maze, but thats just one of the puzzles, and a dead clever one at that.)

The Bottom Line
Its great, its free, its platform independent (I reviewed the "DOS version", because I find that adventure games are most playable in a DOS screen on a PC), and its on your hard drive, I hope. This must be the ultimate text adventure game ever, and it really takes advantage of the possibilities of the Inform language. Whether you own an Amiga, Atari, or Imsai, buy it now! No, wait, just download it... and forget about playing it on your Imsai, that was just a cruel joke.