The Evil, Ugly Guy On My Shoulder's Verdict: Hey, I'm up for any game involving going around and slaughtering/consuming living beings. Only thing this game is missing is a necrophelia subplot, but I guess you can't have everything.
The Nice, Handsome Guy On My Shoulder's Verdict: This game took me only five minutes to finish, but it brought joy to my heart and a smile to my face.
My Verdict: Do they make games easier...or greener...than this?
Game Information
Game Type: Inform
Author Info: David's a second time IF author, but beyond that I know not. I searched for but could not find his first IF offering - tell me if you have any better luck.
Download Link: Coming post-comp
This is probably the easiest of the Dino-Comp 2000 entries - at least it is so far of the ones I've played. I was a little surprised by the shortness of The Loneliness of A Long Distance Runner, but this game really takes the cake. It is a three minute game. You only need to use two commands to win(aside from movement related commands, that is). A hardcore IFer like myself is hardly thrilled at the prospect of such a ridiculous easy game because I like my text adventures to be challenging and immersive, but I imagine that this is the sort of game people who really suck at IF would enjoy a lot...might be a lot of fun for people just starting to play IF, too. Can't solve puzzles? No worries! Anyone can win a game that only requires you to use two commands on your way to glory! I also would recommend depressed people with low senses of self to play this game as well, for this is an adventure that can make anyone feel like a bleedin' genius. The trouble is that this game is so short and so easy that I've already spent ten times more time writing this review than I spent playing the game. There's very little to say, and indeed you would probably be better served to download/play the game instead of wasting time reading this boring review. But since you're here, you might as well read the next paragraph, too.
As a fearsome(and hungry!) tyrannosaurus rex in pursuit of prey, the player of Dinosaur Dinnertime! must journey to all four locations in the game world and find a way to consume all three NPCs...edible dinosaurs of various types. There is a status bar in the upper right corner of the status line that keeps track of how hungry you are. There doesn't seem to be an actual time limit, so there's no need to be too worried if your status bar tells you you are "starving" - it's just this game's way of keeping score. The first thing I noticed about this game was the groovy green text - the way the game opens up to a paragraph(dark green text) and then prompts the player to "Press space bar to continue"(light green text) makes it look very much like a BBS door game. So I liked it from the start just for that. There really aren't any genuine weaknesses to this one - what's here is certainly nice and well designed. I even like the "inventory" message. Once again I must say that I would love to play another, longer, more fleshed out game by this same author. If nothing else, perhaps Dino-Comp 2000 will serve as a starting point for some future great talent?
Simple Rating: 4/10
Complicated Rating: 18/50
Story: 4/10
Writing: 4/10(Competent, but there's not enough game for me to really judge the writing.)
Playability: 6/10
Parser Responsiveness: 3/10
Puzzle Quality: 1/10
Back to my other reviews