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DELRON
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Time in the Dark Reviews
Author: Purple Dragon
Date: 2007
Inform
What does AIF stand for? Adult Interactive Fiction.
If you likely to
be offended by games with sexual content, you are advised not
to open these
files.
Reviewed by David Whyld
This one seemed a little bland. It starts without any
direction as to what needs doing and I spent some time just wandering from place
to place looking for a way to trigger the next series of events and wishing the
game would give me some more obvious pointers. Fortunately the small number of
locations work to the game's advantage: with so little room to explore, it
doesn't take long to find what you need to do to start things moving. It's still
annoying though.
The blindness angle was interesting, though certainly could have been handled
better. Default error messages - YOU CAN'T SEE ANY SUCH THING - should have been
re-worded to reflect the fact that the player can't see *anything*.
Neither of the game's NPCs* came across as particularly believable. There's your
girlfriend, Jess, who has all the genuineness of a starlet in a porn film (and
even shouts out authentic porn star phrases during sex) and a detective who
comes to interview you who seems to be permanently reading from the auto cue.
* I had the impression that it was a requirement of the minicomp that only one
NPC was present, but clearly not.
Not a bad little game overall but not one I really cared for.
Arousal: about half and half.
Reviewed by Softiron
Playing through this story brought back fond memories of
Optimus’ masterpiece, Memories Are Made Of These. While the plots and even
the subgenres are entirely different, the feelings of
helplessness and claustrophobia are powerful in both. Adventuring (and
later having sex) as a blind man is a wonderfully original idea that certainly
deserves a much larger game, and I hope Purple Dragon or someone else decides to
go with that route. I also know we have at least one member of the AIF
community who is blind, and I would be delighted to hear their thoughts on this
piece.
My favorite two genres of writing are suspense thriller and erotica, and they
mix oh so well together. A primary portion of the game involves searching
for clues as to your potential threat,
and doing so while blind. Better yet, there are three suspects, and each
time you load the game, a different person will be the culprit. The clues
that are left behind are clever, if a bit too easy to decipher. The only
letdown here is that you don’t even need to search for the clues, as you can
guess-and-check the name of the culprit without actually providing any evidence
to make an arrest. Thus, the payoff takes a hit.
Despite this one flaw, I actually did want to replay the game several times to
discover all of the endings, in addition to the multiple sex scenes, not all
visible in one play through. I also appreciate that there is no arousal
daemon, thus the sex scenes seem more real. Moreover, the two characters
who have sex are actually in love, and you can tell. Their personalities
shine through, making for a very pleasurable gaming experience.
I can plainly see that Time In The Dark deserved to finish 2nd on my ballot.
Stroke Meter:
Reviews should be considered copyrighted by their respective authors.
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