Typo
Author: Peter Seebach & Kevin Lynn
Language: z-code
Original score: 5
Revised score: 6
What we have here is another game containing one large puzzle made up
of several related sub-puzzles. (To be fair, nearly all games could be
considered to be one large puzzle made up of smaller puzzles. But life
is not fair. And besides, these puzzles are all tightly related.) The
situation presented is also the familiar "you are a tester" scenario, so
there is no real backstory and a ready explanation for why you are
trying to solve the main puzzle. Finally, there's the gimmick: the
"Psychic Typo Error Correction System" which supposedly reads the
player's mind in order to correct any unrecognized terms in commands.
You're a test subject, running the PTECS through its paces as you
tackle a machine of unknown purpose. That's pretty much the story right
there, except for a brief extra bit at the end. In fact in my initial
attempts at the game, its emphasis on the typo-correcting system seemed
bizarre. The system is after all simply a plug-in library for Inform.
It's not until the end that you find out the reason. While the
conclusion doesn't entirely make up for the blandness of the rest of the
game, it certainly does help to perk it up and add some much appreciated
humor.
There are some aspects of the game where it's hard to tell whether
certain results were intentionally implemented by the authors or if they
are simply bugs. The hoses are the most glaring example. When you
connect them, the hose objects vanish and can no longer be referenced.
You can't examine them or disconnect them because they are no longer
present. Is this a bug? There's an action that can be performed that
partially "resets" the machine, making the hoses accessible again. It
also resets the wire, which is a little odd since no other parts of the
machine are affected. I also had a problem with one of the subsystems
missing from the in-game manual. The game's primary emphasis, the
typo-correction system, works reasonably well, especially on the
occasions when your typing is especially lazy. The only problems I had
with it arose from the game's basic verb set; non-standard verbs were
deciphered in some truly bizarre ways. At least it was more amusing
than your generic "I don't know that word" response.
Once you take control, the game starts a little weakly. To get the
game started, you have to perform an action which doesn't seem like it
would do anything important, even though I think nearly every player
will eventually try it. Once that's past, it's now time to interface
with the machine. Only I ran into two serious roadblocks: first, I had
trouble getting the doors open; second, I didn't think to close them
after I had finished with them, and so I couldn't win. For the first
issue, I turned to the denizens of ifMUD for help. After I got past
that, I found myself completely stuck with absolutely no idea of what to
do next. I thought I had everything completed and set up according to
the manual. Except that the machine did not work and I could not finish
the game by the end of the two hour judging period. So I had to end up
scoring the game based on my frustration and my disappointment in the
hint system. There really should have been more hint topics available,
such as one for each color/subsystem (if you're not going to give us a
walkthrough).
After the comp, I went back and played again, determined to finish it.
Finally it occurred to me to close the doors, and I was done. The
ending helps redeem the game, but only by 1 point. While it's funny and
helps explain some things, the flat fiddle-with-machine portion is the
bulk of the game and isn't enough to carry it.
Originally, the high point had been finding all 5 possible ways to
snuff out the player character. Having finally finished it, I'd have to
say the end sequence.
Being stuck for so long without the hints giving me a clue as to why.
When the doors are open, this for some reason affects two subsystems,
even though they are only involved in one of them. And if closing the
doors is so important, why doesn't examining the doors or compartments
even mention that they are open?
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