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The Big ScoopAuthor: Johan BerntssonLanguage: z-code Score: 7
Summary:
In this whodunnit, you must try and get to the bottom of a conspiracy
which has framed an innocent person for murder.
Writing:
First, I thought that the story was done well. No, it's not an
original story. Still, I liked the implementation, especially the way
that the setup of the story is acted out as the player, instead of a big
info dump. Motivation remains strong throughout the game and I was
never left wandering and wondering what I was supposed to do next. The
downside? The writing itself needs a whole lot of work. The author of
The Big Scoop, like the author of Chronicle Play Torn, is not a native
English speaker and it shows. The very opening of the game reads:
Loud signals wake you from a deep stupor. You open your eyes and try to sit up, but a thumping headache forces you back. The signals continue...Is using "signals" instead of "ringing" a matter of regional dialect? If so, I've never heard it used that way before. In any event, it certainly disrupted my reading of the text, if only for a moment. The rest of the game suffers more from awkward sentence structure, mistakes in grammar, and worst of all, bland summaries of actions that should have been made more alive. One example is in the intro, where a mistake can quickly end the game: "The police enter the apartment and arrest you." That's it? How about a little more oomph there? The room where I work has the plain appellation of "Newspaper Office". I shouldn't have to have left the building in order to discover that my newspaper actually has a name. Finally, the dialog really needs some work. Not only is it flat and lacking any real feeling, it has a tendency to switch between quoting and lifeless paraphrasing. >ask linda about murderDialog is a real opportunity to bring the characters to life and let the players get to know them. As it is, they exist as very shallow cliches: the journalist, the innocent woman trying to clear her name, etc. Technical:
From a technical standpoint, I found the game fairly well constructed.
I did encounter a few bugs, though nothing that affected gameplay. One
particularly noticeable bug occurred within the introductory sequence
and I'm rather surprised that it got through even the most cursory
play-testing: the phone rings twice after the game starts and answering
it got me the same conversation both times. I appreciated the driving
system, as it closely mirrored something I'd been considering for one of
my works-in-progres. You can drive to locations only after you discover
them or discover a reason for going there. As for the conversation
system, it is a fairly standard ASK/TELL arrangement, plus the added
benefit of a TOPICS verb. Unfortunately, the topics list includes
subjects that could only be known through telepathy. They were never
mentioned and there's no reason that my character should have known to
ask about them. Topics should become available as I learn about them
through discussion; I shouldn't know to ask about all of Linda's
co-workers by name until she's referred to them herself.
Fun:
Despite the writing issues I detailed about, I did enjoy myself
playing this game. As I've said, motivation is never an issue because
of the guidance I received from an NPC. The few puzzles there were had
(in my opinion) reasonable solutions. The game as a whole felt like an
unfinished skeleton. It's a foundation and structure, but there's no
detail. The characters and writing need to be refined and have some
life breathed into them. Then we'd have a really solid game on our
hands.
Final score: 7
High point:
There's one point in there where the PC is trapped in a cellar with an
NPC. When my first idea proved fruitless, I tried telling the NPC to do
something rather unorthodox and it worked! (I was a little disappointed
that trying that action myself produced a nonsensical response.)
Low point:
Answering the phone multiple times and getting the same message. An
obvious bug so early in the game should have been caught very quickly in
development.
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