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Return to Pleasantville Reviews
Author: Lamont Sanford
Date: 2013
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 Unknown
Lamont Sanford announced himself on the AIF scene in 2012 with Peril in Pleasantville. It was a
hugely ambitious game that failed to reach the heights it aspired to. The writing was generally
of poor quality, it was buggy, the genre suddenly (and jarringly) changed to science-fiction
halfway through, and it was very obviously 'inspired' by SD3 and Meteor (by which I mean that a number of elements were direct
lifts).
Despite those problems, playing PiP was actually
a lot of fun. Although not a great writer, Lamont Sanford does have a good ear
for dialogue, which came to the fore in the many 'ask' responses and really
helped the characters come alive. There were also several interesting puzzles
and Easter eggs to figure out, and in general it had a sense of unselfconscious fun that reminded me of the early days of AIF. Since then LS has released two other games (The
Adventures of Super-Schlong and Gasparillo), neither of which made
much of an impact. Now he's released a sequel to PiP, the inventively named Return to Pleasantville. So what’s
it like?
Simply put, I found it to be a major disappointment. Nearly all of the original's problems are repeated. Despite increased
beta testing this time around, minor bugs abound, and the game was so unstable that the undo function had
to be disabled. From the very first paragraph the
writing is filled with comma splices, misused punctuation, and simple spelling
mistakes. The plot switches from 'slice of life' to horror for no obvious
reason. And, again, there are elements that are very obviously 'borrowed' from
GoblinBoy's games. The fact that RtP is LS's fourth released game makes this
all the more disappointing, since by this point he should be showing
some signs of progressing as an author.
However, it's not those problems that are not my major criticism of
RtP, it’s the absence of all the things that made PiP enjoyable. The
well-implemented characters from PiP that I'd grown to like are largely absent,
and their replacements are barely implemented at all. All the PC can do is
flirt with them and then fuck them. The fucking itself is pretty unexciting,
with few of the scenes having anything to make them memorable. That's a problem
when at least half-a-dozen of them fit the basic description 'PC and girl
he's just met fuck in bar toilets'. The sex scenes are also highly dependent on the
use of graphics, with a ratio of one picture per sentence of text. As far as I
could tell there were no real puzzles, apart from a maze at the end (and mazes ceased
being acceptable in interactive fiction almost twenty years ago). In fact, there's little in the game
world that you can interact with at all, even if the absence of both undo and
save functionality didn't already discourage experimentation.
RtP is a game of two halves. On day 1 the PC wanders aimlessly around
Pleasantville. The town feels like it's shrunk since PiP because so
many of the locations are either closed or inaccessible. Unlike the various Easter egg
scenes in the first game, which each formed a little mini-story, the vast majority of the random women the PC
can interact with exist only to be fucked by the PC. Sure, you can flirt with a
girl, arrange a date with her and then flirt with her some more. But there’s no
real story or character development so it’s all instantly forgettable. Although
LS has obviously taken GoblinBoy as his model, he differs from him in his apparent
unwillingness to inject any drama into the PC's life. As a result none of
the scenes have any repercussions. Even though he’s got a girlfriend (plus two
'friends with benefits'), the PC can happily screw random stranger after
random stranger. When he's finished with them, the girls
disappear out of his life, never to be seen or heard from again. It all feels
utterly meaningless, and I was glad to get to day 2.
How wrong I was. Day 2 takes the form of a camping trip (where have we heard
that before?) and consists of a long non-interactive cut scene, followed by a moment
of freedom, followed by another long non-interactive cut scene. As with PiP,
the game suddenly and pointlessly changes genres, becoming
splatter horror. You might think this would lead to some interesting puzzles as
you outsmart the fiends, but no. All you can do is run until they catch you or
you find your way out of the maze. Oh, and RtP's only interesting new character
gets pointlessly killed off in a cut scene. If you survive, the PC’s girlfriend
finally makes an appearance and they decide to be exclusive for no obvious
reason (other than the fact something similar happened in SD3), and the game is over.
The most obvious problem with RtP's design is that day 1 and day 2
are so different that they might as well have been separate games. Day 1 is entirely irrelevant to what
happens on day 2 (apart from picking who's going camping with you), and vice versa. The most obvious way in which RtP could have been improved would be to ditch one of the days. The question is, which
one?
I don't think many people would have complained if a sequel to PiP
had been "more of the same" (ie. day 1). However, one of the
weaknesses of literal time (ie. one turn equals two minutes in this case) is
that it makes the gaps between scenes seem larger and emptier. To compensate,
the scenes have to bigger and more memorable, not short and forgettable, which
means more work for the author. I also think that day 1 needed some sort of plot to make it more coherent. Even Gamma
Girls (the rompiest game I can
think of) had more of a plot than the PC being slightly jealous of Emily's new
boyfriend (something that is resolved on day 2 in the laziest way imaginable).
The more interesting option would have been to make day 2 a
standalone game. With the exception of Chris, all of the characters had been
previously introduced in PiP so much of the groundwork has already been
done. The smaller cast and gameworld also means that there could be a focus on quality,
rather than quantity. Without the distraction of day 1, the horror elements
could have been foreshadowed better (ie. at all) and perhaps serve as the
pretext for some interesting puzzles.
As it is, trying to crowbar both day 1 and day 2 into the same
game stretched the author's resources too thin, and neither was successful.
Lamont Sanford should be applauded for his energy and dedication, but
unfortunately this game represents a step back for him in terms of story,
characterisation and gameplay.
Reviews should be considered copyrighted by their respective authors.
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