Use your cybernetic abilities to infiltrate a long-abandoned research facility where you were once a subject.
This is a classic text adventure, with all the conventions that come with the genre. It will likely take a significant amount of time to complete, especially if this is your first text adventure. I've taken the liberty of providing both some general advice as well as a handful of more specific guides and hints to hopefully avoid you getting fully stuck.
As some general advice: You should be [examine]ing basically any object that seems like it might be useful. Almost everything will at least have unique flavor text, but progress hints are also often hidden in item descriptions. If it's described, it can be [examine]d. Many things will also have text, which you should absolutely [read]. Once you progress far enough, you also have the ability to [analyze] certain objects. If something is described as simply a [device], it can be analyzed, even if it's only described in a room description.
A few extra goodies are also linked below: The standard Inform postcard which explains the most common default commands, a handwritten hint guide which tries to point you in the right direction without explicitly giving you answers, and a full command-by-command solution to the game (which should largely be used for phrasing advice as no game text is provided).
This game is also very thematically dark. If that's not something you're prepared for, maybe skip this one.
Made in Inform 7 without any use of Artifcial Intelligence, using the Secret Doors extension by Gavin Lambert.
Fixed on 10/19: issues relating to the knee implant and padlock combination
Thanks to your game, I’ve realized I miss text adventures :) Is the text input handling all coded, or does it use an LLM? No judgment, just engineering curiosity. Great job!
Fun bite-sized text adventure! The descriptions and sense of space were well done- it was easy to visualize the environment and it was fun to piece together what was happening. I think some of the reveals could have been a little subtler or later in the story, but I also understand wanting to ensure the player gets what you're going for.
I liked the plot- creepy stuff! Nice that there's multiple endings, although I think that it could have been cool if it was only possible if the player found a hidden item earlier, or something.
It seems like you implemented a lot of custom commands, and the implementation of the implants was cool. I liked that the terminals (which give score) served as indicators that progress is being made while also telling the story. There were a few things which caused me some grief (confusion when entering wrong padlock code, forgetting to install an implant and getting temporarily stuck) and I wish that some things were a little more flexible/intuitive, but I still enjoyed the game regardless. Good job!
The story telling is, as always, incredible. I love the way you describe every room, and the character descriptions and lore are wonderfully written. My biggest issue... I have no idea at any moment what I can or cannot interact with or even examine. Your room descriptions mention rust appliances, yet ">Examine rusty appliances" yields "You can't see such a thing." And I think the biggest source of my confusion could be solved if there was some formatting used to denote intractable objects, like square brackets or bold text. If you put me in a room and say something like, "The corner of the room has some rusty machinery you don't recognize, and [plants] that have not been watered in decades." Then I don't need to waste my time attempting to fiddle with the machinery, yeah?
Anyway, I'm not experienced with playing text based adventures, but I can only imagine the struggles I faced here were authentic to the old games of the 80's as well, so I'm awarding you... er- I'm attempting to award you with the- I'm giving you the- I'm *using the award on*- I'm... ah forget it.
`>Examine award`
It's the Tech-Based Adventure Award.
I also recorded my gameplay, which gets a bit rough. I am tremendously bad at this genre, so apologies in advance.
Comments3
I liked the plot- creepy stuff! Nice that there's multiple endings, although I think that it could have been cool if it was only possible if the player found a hidden item earlier, or something.
It seems like you implemented a lot of custom commands, and the implementation of the implants was cool. I liked that the terminals (which give score) served as indicators that progress is being made while also telling the story. There were a few things which caused me some grief (confusion when entering wrong padlock code, forgetting to install an implant and getting temporarily stuck) and I wish that some things were a little more flexible/intuitive, but I still enjoyed the game regardless. Good job!
Anyway, I'm not experienced with playing text based adventures, but I can only imagine the struggles I faced here were authentic to the old games of the 80's as well, so I'm awarding you... er- I'm attempting to award you with the- I'm giving you the- I'm *using the award on*- I'm... ah forget it.
`>Examine award`
It's the Tech-Based Adventure Award.
I also recorded my gameplay, which gets a bit rough. I am tremendously bad at this genre, so apologies in advance.