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The game The Other Line is one driven by the player’s uncertainty and desire to find out what happened to them. It makes good use of the prompt it is given, a world where two walkie-talkies are linked and the two much wait for the other to pick up as the only means of connection. The game begins with the player having woken up in a cavern that they have fallen into, the only exit blocked by a large boulder. At first everything seems planned by an outside source, as indicated by the crate of supplies that lie there when they awake. They fix an old walkie-talkie and are able to make connection with someone outside, though, they too are trapped in a hole. They have no idea where they are in relation to each other, and are only able to sit and wait for time to pass and something to happen; whether than be salvation or their own demises. The person on the other side of the walkie-talkie stops speaking one day, the same one where the player finds a whole that leads elsewhere. Exploring the hole, the player learns that the person on the other line has been in a hole feet away from them with the other walkie talkie. Though, the person is bones and when speaking with the player they had alluded that it was 1951 rather than 2021. I can only perceive that this means the player was speaking with the other bodies ghost, rather than a person. Or alternatively, that that person was alive and had been trapped there for so many years and had just died. Whatever the answer may be, it has left me with a lot of questions. The game is both horror, because it’s unknown how they got there and what is keeping them, as much as it is fantasy.

As for the environment of the game, the player is limited to moving within the space of cave that they are trapped. Each day they are limited to one or two action to complete, ones that if they do not do then the game does not move forward. I think had the addition of choice be given to the player and multiple endings, this game would have been even stronger. Having the choice to not fix the walkie-talkie or perhaps dig would have made for an interesting diversion from the story and allowed for multiple play throughs. All in all, the game has left me contemplating the story it is trying to tell, as well as how it could be improved upon for more installments or building off of this one.  

 Burger Tetris is a fun return to the game classics. The formatting, colors, and controls are reminiscent of classic Tetris game mechanics. Like the original, the way that the game is formatted so that the main controls and scoring are always present on the screen. Block colors cycle through a set array of colors, and randomly change through out playing. There is no goal to work towards, simply to play and have fun in the mindless stacking of blocks and collection of points. There is no uncertainty, mystery or narrative, it is a reliable game for someone to play and have fun.

I apart from this, I would have loved to have seen the mechanic of Tetris being taken further than the classic version that it is. For example, I do wonder why its titled “Burger Tetris,” and what this means. Adding some other imagery or rewards for reaching a certain score would have been an improvement upon the original. Like, if the player had reached a certain score amount, increasing the speed at which the blocks fell; Or similarly, displaying an image or other after reaching a certain score, but something all together that builds off of the original.

However, there is some room for improvement here; In my initial play through It was not apparent right away which key allowed for the player to speed up the rate at which blocks fell. In the game it is labeled “_” rather than being the down arrow that it is. It was also unlabeled how to turn the Tetris blocks, of which I learned through trial and error. Having the arrow keys and turning of the blocks clearly laid out from the beginning would be conducive for newer players that would be unfamiliar with the game mechanics. Concerning the use of arrow keys to move the blocks downward, I also ran into the problem where my browser would scroll down while playing and pressing the down arrow. I think having the game be played in full screen or using other keys would fix this.

All in all, the game accomplishes what it set out to do and is a fun interactive game to play. I would be interested to see where this game could be taken even further than where it is now. 

Star Wanderer is everything that I love about story-based or exploratory game such as this. The player feels as though they are in control, when they are actually being led along on a single path dictated by the creator. Although this means that the game is limited to being played once, maybe a few times if you return to it every few years, but it is still a strong game. Some of my favorite games growing up were games that could only realistically be played once before you knew what was going to happen and the uncertainty was gone. However, I have been returning to these games again, some 10 years later, and have been replaying them; I think this could be the same for this game.

I really enjoyed the varying environments and felt immersed as a space dweller traveling the cosmos. I especially liked the use traveling to the very end as every key shift changed the environment and as a result a different secondary color. The use of these different colors added to the feeling that you were going somewhere, not staying still, even if the background was the same and only changing colors. The use of space, secluded to only a few squares of movement, kept the game at a consistent pacing. The player was trapped, but these limitations weren’t restricting because the elements that they would want to explore closely are what progresses the game play. The use of different transitions, just like the use of color, also made the game feel otherworldly. It achieved a sense of animated transition that I have not seen in most of the bitsy games we have played.

Following the game, I am left questioning what it all meant; whether it is trying to tell us to slow down and admire the world, or if there is no encompassing message at all; This game was simple, but felt much larger than it was. If there were one thing that could be improved upon, it would be stretching the story even further, similar to that of the “How to be a Tree” game that we played this semester. Because of the fast pacing and limited exploratory nature on the part of the player, the game is over rather quickly. If there were a few more elements that the player could interact with or lead them down different paths, I think this game would be the best it could be. Like how “How to be a Tree” takes the player to the limits of the universe, this game does so, though, is missing what is keeping the player going throughout. What is at the end of the universe/beyond that we are moving towards? The uncertainty of the game is left unfulfilled by the end of the game play.

The Piano Sitter is unlike any game that I have seen before in this genre. The ominous music that is present from the start, instantly sets the tone for what the game play will look like. Though, the game does not live up to normal horror game expectations or parameters, and for this it makes the game stronger. I found myself expecting a jump scare while I was following along with the music, as I missed quite a few keys in my playing. I’m not a fan of horror games that skip over the build up of tension that comes with the uncertainty of the game play, as seen here with the music and note left for the player. We don’t know what is happening, what will happen if we make a mistake or what will happen if we succeed. The imagery also adds to the uncertainty of the game, as I found myself wondering who is displayed above the piano, if it was their son they spoke of, because it almost appeared unhuman. This, with the music and tension of the atmosphere it all created, left me with a sense of eerie prying into something I felt wasn’t for me.

As for the game play, it is reminiscent of the Guitar Hero franchise that I grew up playing, and for that I was instantly a fan. I was able to pick up game controls quickly, though written in the introduction they were somewhat wordy and confusing. This aside, I enjoyed the game and how it brought a horror narrative to a game play that relies on the players complete attention to succeed. This amount of focus that I had to dedicate towards the game is what had me on end, as it felt like something might come out at any moment while the game had my undivided attention. I think the game could benefit in some aspects for the piano playing, however doing so could alter some of the games overall feeling. Having the keys that needed to be pressed be displayed ahead of time, would help in pressing them at the exact moment; As it is currently the player has to go into the game play blind. However, by not having them displayed ahead of time, also adds to the inherent uncertainty of the game. Even having played it twice through, I did not know which keys to expect per each song and so made the tension of the gameplay greater than if I had known what was coming. So, adding this could have dual effects, making it easier to follow along, but also perhaps not as haunting. I could also see aspects being added to this game, such as searching for the piano notes, as mentioned in the opening title, and waiting for the parents to arrive. This game has great potential for future additions to it and I am interested to see where it is taken. 

Playing through “Clean Up,” I think much of the game and how to win comes from the uncertainty as to where the player can anticipate new puddles forming as well as the mop bucket. To win the game, it is not so much that the player requires extensive skill as it is quick reaction and chance. The puddles and mop bucket appear in areas and so quickly that is it impossible to anticipate where and when they will appear. If there is one skill that the player learns with this game it is to learn to avoid the larger dark puddles. The game depends on the speed in which the player collects/diffuses the other various puddles, and walking through these large puddles slows the player down when they are overlapping. Though, walking through these puddles is also unavoidable in some instances as the smaller puddles will appear overlapping, sometimes a large portion or entirely, with the dark puddles. This presents a problem because the number of puddles that appear on screen, three, are only as many that will spawn. Thus, if the player avoids collecting the overlapping ones to save time, the are now down by one how many they can collect. Similarly with the mob buckets that increase the amount of time the player has, sometimes they present themselves at inopportune times and areas for the player to collect them fast enough. The player must simply rely on their quick reactions to win the game. 

With Frog Land, the player is trust right into the challenge of the game from the moment they hit play. There is no time when start is pressed for the player to anticipate where the frog will be in relation to the fast dinosaurs moving across the screen; Because of this, it can feel as though the game wants you to lose. Even though the game starts in this way, the stakes for winning the game are not as high as they appear. The player, playing as the frog has a certain amount of health that they are allotted from the start that will gradually go down when they run into the various dinosaurs. The game and its enemies, the dinosaurs, to not anticipate the players moves but this does not make it any less difficult. The game is easily won if the player does not care if their health decreases by the time that they get the lily pad to the end. Though, if the player sets out to win the game with full health intact, like I did, this is much more difficult and impossible to accomplish. Anticipating the movement of the dinosaurs is difficult because of the speed at which they are going, where the lily pad is that needs to be collected and the areas where the dinosaurs overlap in their movement. These factors, though they make winning with full health, and in my mind score, difficult this does not mean that they make the game any less interesting to play and attempt to learn the best path forward. 

While playing it is immediately apparent that the game and its spaces are organized to promote the player to explore the world. Path’s branch off in multiple directions that make it so the player has to choose an area they want to progress into, they have the free will to go back but going forward in these areas will open up new dialogue and adventure for the player. The experience is shaped even more by the fact that interacting with certain characters will point you to walk into areas that are not immediately apparent will lead you into a new place. The separation of each scene that the path lead you down are small in size, but together make the world feel large because of how they are cut up. As you go into each space you have an amount left to the imagination where you can theorize that it took the player some time to walk to these new spaces. You can infer as the scenes cut together that the passing of time to walk is being cut out to focus the experience on the places that they are going rather than how they got there. The real-world experience is enforced by the fact that the player cannot walk through trees, fences nor the homes and other various object that obstruct their path. There is not ceiling for the top of the world keeping the player in place, this is instead put in place through the use of these objects in their path. Triggers are placed in spaces where they would naturally be placed, like the entrances to caves, houses, and down paths. 

The subject of this game focuses on the player’s exploration of an FBI compound and their rescuing of the captives held there. Along the way, the player is also fed information through the way of notes lefts around the compound. The game takes the position that the player will learn how to progress through their own experimentation of controls and the limits of the space. They are given some direction first thing by way of the robot and FBI agent closest to them when the game loads that tell their objectives, though, but this is it. This being the only element that connects the player to their objective and the world that is takes place in I think adds to the mood of the story. They are isolated on the compound just as much as they are isolated in their initial direction. Though, I think the game would benefit if the player had the ability to access the note fragments once they have collected them all or if they were numbered. Without this, the information that they are telling the player can be confusing as to what is happening on the compound and why the people have been held captive. Similarly, though the exploration aspect of the game works well for it, I think that this requires that the player be led through where their limits are much more. Namely, concerning the tunnel located at the bottom of the initial scene. It took me some time to discover that the player could keep walking down this path and into a new area because when I walked to the left most part of the first scene it did not move me into a new area, and gave me the belief for there that I wouldn’t be able to more from scene to scene this way except through specified doorways. 

From the very beginning with the use of the black background with overlayed white text, this game sets the scene for what is to come; even more so with the use of the red highlighted text that is used to highlight the choices that the player must make in order to progress. There is noticeable uncertainty right off the bat when the player must choose between the left path, or the right; and then even further they must make the choice to keep their same path after the prompting whether they should turn back towards what is happening, like the person crying, or whether they should keep with their initial choice. There are a few different directions that the game gives you, whether you should go towards the person crying, towards the clearing, or to not investigate entirely. The game foreshadows future development with the book that brushes up against the persons leg and, whether they choose to investigate it or not. Though, I’m personally lost as to what occurs if the directions in the book are followed, I can assume they are to be used in the clearing to lead the player to another ending. Although, I also found that the player can be caught in a continuous cycle of going North within the clearing. Going into the game and based off the coloring of the text and background, I had the already formed expectation that it would be a horror game or similar to. From this, I had the expectation from the genre that I would not have the choice to turn back after a certain point or that there would be no achievable good ending. In light of this, it reverted from my expectation about the possible endings because I soon discovered there was an escapable good ending to get out of the maze.

Compared to other similar twine games that we played these past 2 weeks, in this one it is important for the player to click a certain passage so as to retain new information about the characters and to progress the story. Rather than auto-advancing the passage, this way of constructing the game is do so as to include the player in the game playing out before them and so they can choose what various misadventure they might get into. The player can choose based off their own experience and personality whether they want to fight with the manager or the employee working at the Papa Johns, or even if they want to walk away from the situation entirely. These choices in turn lead the player down alternate paths put into the story, one of them being whether Ryan will choose to let Dave hold the pizzas from Domino’s or whether he declines and holds them himself. Choices are limited between 2-3 per passage and are words of agreement, or actions to be performed by the player such as to argue with the manager, leave, etc. These words are located in one of two places in the passage at different times, one being in line with the other text to explain something, like who Dave or Ryan are, or progress the game; And the other being at the bottom of the passage so to highlight the choice that the player has to perform an action. Clicking in this game can lead to further explanation or the player speaking or walking. One specific and memorable usage of the clicking action that the player can perform is when they eat the pizza at the end of the story. Clicking in this instance is used to let the player eat the pizza that they have adventured to retrieve, a surprising and well used use of the clicking action that they player is asked to perform. 

If I were to describe this game as if it were an object, I would say it is similar to that of a Chinese finger trap. You get sucked into trying to master each of the 4 provided tools and trying to work out if there is any rhyme or reason to them, that you don’t realize you’ve been playing for quite a while nor how to get out in a way. There is give to the game in that you have freedom to create what you wish on the canvas as well as opportunity to clear the canvas at any time. But you are still very much placed into a sandbox in which you can only do so much with what the tools allow you to do. Like for instance, the “yellow line?” where you are able to draw with the yellow line but have no control over its size nor color variation. Similarly with the ellipse tool and click ones, where you are given a set color palette and conditions that they let you do. If I were to recreate this experience, I think an important part to it would be the player be afforded a yellow pen, confetti for the dot tool, and then for the ellipse where you can only make circles using a pen and compass. What might get lost in translation is the ability with the click tool in which where ever the cursor goes is the grey cross, and then it turns pink once pressed. I cannot think of how this might be replicated in a real-world setting. Making the game more physical I think would make the player be more thoughtful with what they are making, compared to the digital one in which they can reset the canvas within seconds. 

What drew me to Budget MS Paint was at first the title, because having used MS paint is I think a shared experience by a number of people. But what struck me even more when I got to playing is that it is also very reminiscent of PictoChat featured on the Nintendo DS. Its this familiarity that to me made the experience feel like I was playing rather than using a piece of software to draw. Although you have to bring your own creativity to really enjoy the game, this is what makes it fun. Like with PictoChat, I found myself mindlessly coloring in the whole canvas with color and testing the limits of the provided brushes. Exploring, I found that the color of the dots could not be controlled, similar to the rainbow brush, but I think that this ultimately made the brush more fun to doodle with. I can see myself creating some fun art with this program, because even though the color options and brush size are limited, I know that creating can be even more fun when you have those limits. It reminds me of art challenges I see all the time where artists only use around 3 or5 colors to create a piece. While I was playing, I didn’t so much tell myself a story but rather thought about what I could create with the very saturated colors and dots that could be a serious work of art. Which, is a difficult task to do with colors and brushes that don’t let you adjust their saturation without making a final drawing hard on the eyes. 

What stood out to me, and I think benefitted the game, about Wipe It in relation to those by others in class is the fact that the player is not pushing or pulling an object to solve the puzzle. This game was to me a big step away from the Sokoban mechanic, and for that made it entirely new and enjoyable to play. The player is slowly introduced to the rule that once they walk over a dark streak on the floor it will disappear through the first and into the second level. What the second level teaches the player is that if they walk over a darker still patch of floor that it will need to be walked over twice in order to make it disappear, and ultimately clean. This reminded me of similar games in which the player walks over ice that melts away in their wake as they walk over it. What is different about this game, and I think makes the experience more enjoyable to different player types is the ability for the player to keep playing and make up for any missteps they make later; Because, if they walk over a part of clean floor that spot will then dirty. I found myself using this to my advantage later when I mistakenly took the path that I didn’t want, and instead took more steps to correct it and complete the level. Having this fail-safe for the player made me want to keep playing without resetting the level, and ultimately made the game more enjoyable rather than continuously having to reset after a mistake. 

While playing Squirrel Simulator I noticed two game rules in which there were big consequences when it came to the further levels, which were ultimately fruitful in making me want to keep playing the level over and over so that I could win. These rules are the ones in which if the squirrel walks into a “bad nut” the level is over and they must reset, as well as the rule in which if the squirrel pushes said “bad nut” into the nest, it is also game over for that level. Although easy mistakes to make in the first few levels, and ones that can be easily corrected, in further levels these mistakes hold a lot more consequence. I found that in about the 4^th or 5^th levels that making these small mistakes were a lot easier if you were too quick with your movements, thus making them more difficult to complete these levels. Although, in my playing I did also find a few work arounds on these consequences, at least when it comes to walking into a “bad nut” because you can move these nuts by using the buffer of a “good nut,” and then making easier paths to trapeze around with the “good nuts” in the levels. Though this was the only positive I could find to come out of the consequence of the “bad nuts,” it changed how I thought about the layouts of the levels and what movements I would make to get to the finish. The consequences of the “bad nuts” and how I learned to work around them overall made me driven to complete the game no matter how many times they made me stumble in my playing. 

Next to the use of very saturated colors in the background tiles and sprites, I noticed how the space shrinks as a result of the players actions. The game is dependent upon the player walking around the space in order to progress to the next space, in this case the shrinking of the room. To move around the space and to simultaneously avoid the shrinking of the room is unavoidable no matter what. When the player is initially dropped into the world, the space around them will almost immediately shrink by a space in the matter of about 3 steps. By having this occur, enacts a sense of urgency in the player to hasten their search. But, by doing this the room will still continue to shrink. The pace at which the player randomly walks the perimeter of the room, is the pace at which we see the room shrinking around them. Its pacing it at first slow, and then as the player is faced with the realization that they must find the key in order to leave its shrinking seems to quicken. The player is both given all the control in their walking, and yet none at all as the room confines them to less and less space to walk. In my playthrough of the game I first made my way towards any sprites or objects that I could individually interact with or pick-up, and then rightfully back where I came from to try the exit again. Only to discover that the object that I had picked up was not, in fact, the key and that my search must continue. Seeing as I had run out of things to interact with, my next measure was to try to see what exploring more of the space would do. I had this same mindset once the room confined to nothingness and I was left to a room with a tree. 

Playing this game, the monochromatic use of the color blue is one of the first things I noticed. The blues you use are very saturated and reminiscent of the kind used on arcade games. They are bright and eye-catching, giving off the mood that this game will be an upbeat one rather than one filled with melancholy. In the context of the game, I associate the use of blue to be with that of the ocean surrounding the island that the player is stranded on as well as the open blue of the sky. I think its also important that you chose to use the same color palette throughout when you could have changed the tonality of blues to indicate the progression of time on the island as the day goes on or the seasons changing on the island. Instead, by keeping with the same color palette, the player is made to feel as though time is stagnate as they are stuck on the island. The only change we see is the person digging for treasuring going deeper and deeper into the ground as the days go on.  The similarity in hues of the blues used in the background tiles I would estimate were purposeful so as to make the player feel like they were in great open waters. The horizon line indicated by the line of waves is the only thing that breaks up the clear blue. There is otherwise no separation between the water and that of the sky, which to me while I was playing the game had me equally edge as the saturation of blues calmed me.