PyramidIF

I've been trying to keep up with playing and reviewing ParserComp entries.  I managed also to use my tax return to replace my ailing iMac with a Mac Mini and a 26" HDTV screen!  So everything is easier to see now.  Oh, and where have you been all my life, Magic Trackpad?  I'm sorry you have to conceal the scrapings from the old Magic Mouse that used to be there ruining my desk. I looked at three games: Terminator by Matt Weiner;  Down, the Serpent and the Sun by Chandler Groover (possible best author name ever); and Six Gray Rats Crawl Up the Pillow by Boswell Cain.

Caelyn Sandel gives us a quick, tightly implemented escape the room game.   I found no technical issues with the actual game at all, and there's a nicely implemented hint system.  It begins with the impressive banner that it is a "Social Justice Horror Story." Okay.  That's timely, and a great foundation to base a horror game on.

A Long Drink, by Owen Parks aspires to be a noir-y hardboiled-ey mystery story.  I'm a detective investigator who has just quit his job.  I'm driving on a snowy road, avoiding the cell phone in my inventory.  Then comes a hairpin turn, a crash.  I kick out the windshield and climb back up the road to meet a dame named Val.   Up to now everything's been quite good.

Choice of Games has made Eerie Estate Agent (retitled For Rent: Haunted House ) available for free but supported with ads on the iOS app store. I'm really glad I had the chance to check it out, because it is quite a departure from their normal style. The writing is excellent and dryly comical, lacking the earnest seriousness of many previous CoG games I've sampled.