Player Comments on The Dream Thief

I was planning to not comment on your story until after the contest, as my opinion differs from the comments, and I didn't want anyone to judge mine harshly for my opinion on your story. But as you down-rated several games with your recent comments... Here is what I thought about your game, a fair assessment.

A) Writing ability: You clearly have inhuman writing capabilities. By sheer length and writing alone you easily outshone the rest of us. And the scripting was amazing coming from someone who, admittedly, was new at scripting. The fact that it was finished in 8 days, wow. And you were able to post for help in the forums for scripting and even asked for someone to look over the game for you. I happily did this as my own game was nearing completion. I especially found it amazing that a game already so long had two more massive parts plus scripting the very next day. I am speechless...

B) The story itself: It was long, yes. But it was not perfect. There were grammar/punctuation issues here and there. It did not flow smoothly, though. The differences between the different parts made it not jibe right to me. And because of the length, some pages tend to blur together causing it to almost become boring. Just on and on and on. Nothing really to make me like the character, aside from pity that he lost his family...

C) Playability: There were numerous issues with your scripting. I even found some unfinished pages with no links. The forest section particularly had many issues. And the final part came off as very confusing. Also, your walk-through was very hard to read and not easily read or understood. Some of the directions were out of order or missing. It was fairly difficult to navigate. It took me over an hour on the last part of the game alone, just trying to follow the walk-through. Finally, after randomly guessing the last parts (after 33, I believe it was) I finally finished you game. It was not fun to me. It was hard and although long, not always engaging.

D) Puzzles: There weren't many puzzles in your game. Just a couple that I saw in the last scenes. The puzzles themselves weren't easy or fun at all. Sorry, but this is just my personal opinion.

-- Many people may not agree, but hey, that's okay. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. I am honest to a fault, and my own worst critic but I do not down rate anyone for my own gain. Congradulations on your story entry, I have no doubt you will most likely win. Have a great day!

This game is very impressive. It would have been impressive even if it had been written over the course of a couple months, but the fact that something of this quality could be produced in less than two weeks is frankly mind-boggling. That being said, the time-frame makes any kind of mistakes or oversights much more forgivable, even if most of the problems I have with hastily written storygames are nowhere to be found in this game.

For one, it's not linear at all. In fact, it branches out like a Christmas tree, with so many different paths and outcomes that I probably haven't even found half of them after two hours of playing this. There are a few places that could use a little more polish, but overall, the amount of plotting and writing behind this monster of a plot is staggering.

The 8/8 difficulty rating is absolutely justified, but the game is interesting enough that I kept trying different paths to try and find the solution. A large part of the motivation is just how well-written and compelling the main character is. He has a very realistic condition and a very nuanced personality, with thoughts and emotions that propels the plot forward without ever feeling overdramatic or forced.

The danger that lurks around every corner and the mystery surrounding the plot also ratchet up the dramatic tension and kept me hooked. As I hit dead end after dead end, I really got the feeling that there was something terrifying and dangerous slowly closing in, which was great for a suspense game.

I did have a few gripes with the forest survival section, because it seems rather buggy with pages that were missing links and no concrete way of telling when you would run out of time, although I suppose that might have been intentional to reflect that actual difficulty of surviving in wilderness. For what it's worth, it's a commendable first try at advanced scripting, but I feel like it didn't fully mesh with the style of the rest of the game and would have been better presented in storyline format instead.

Other than that nitpick though, I found the rest of the game thoroughly enjoyable, excellently written, and impressive as hell.

I'm also half-convinced that the writer is some kind of inhuman writing machine with twelve arms and six heads typing on half a dozen different computers simultaneously, because nothing else can explain the ridiculous pace and quality with which this was produced. That's entirely besides the point though.

wow. that was so much better than I expected. all I can say is just... wow.
the plot was so branched out with all those different choices and the character was so realistic... (although it did seem like more of a modern adventure or something else other than a mystery...)
to be written in such a short time, that's just amazing.

Wow, this story was really unexpected. First, I thought this was about a man living with autism, and then it turned much darker. The ending with the homeless people dying was unexpected. I didn't even get any choices after asking for vegetables. Overall, very interesting.

dream thief? hell~o, you just created a dream of surviving in the wild and escaping convict with murder, isn't that wild? ;)

(But to be honest though, without the walkthrough, I believe it is impossible for anyone to figure out how to survive either the forest or the village)

Not to mention... your game greatly reminds me of another commercial released role-playing video game developed by Atlus for the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 video game consoles called Persona 5. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7U4Ahox93g
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persona_5
Can't wait for the sequel where you beat up the real monsters. ;)
"Freedom!
As I press on the lever with my bronze sword, it releases, making me vanish from this world. I am momentarily in a black daze resembling the dark matter of our universe, but I am awake.
I open my eyes, to find myself in the same place I was before I fell asleep. Now I just need to not fall asleep or go unconscious in a hurry, and my life will continue..."

By the way, really appreciate the effort you put into creating this game. I learned a bit of scripting and realize how difficult it can be to make all the links work. If you really did make the game in 8 days, you must be a genius! =D

This is a great story!!!

Well written even though I noticed some grammatical mistakes. Otherwise, the story had a nicely planned out plot, and I enjoyed this book to my heart's content.

There was such great character development that this story got me crying at the end.

Decently well-written and a good length. Although I felt that a good portion of the story was more like something that belongs in the Love/Dating or the Modern Adventure category rather than the mystery one.

Well written, you can really feel everything the narrator feels. No matter how many paths I tried I never found a truly happy ending. Didn't feel like much of a mystery, maybe a modern adventure would fit better, i don't know. It was still a really good story.

This was an amazing experience. Thank you so much for making this. I felt really into it. I love it so much, and I love how much time you put into it. Love it! Two thumbs up! 10/10 5 star rating. <3 <3

This was an amazing story!
I felt the emotions of the characters!
Well done

ey daz pretty gud

My gosh, quite the sad story.

very well written but there was a lot of text between the choices

There is one 'epilogue', but it is very hard to achieve.

The various endings are so wide. I wonder, is there a way to win?

very difficult, but rewarding. My only problem is that the character looses his personality as the game progresses. He never thinks of his wife or kids again, and never acts like his autistic self. Work on making the puzzle sections have more personality

It needs more pages and needs more choices. Other than that, really interesting! I really like the storyline, but if you used the advanced editor to make items, it could be longer and better in my opinion. Anyway, I should be going. (7/8)

I had mixed feelings on the story. The writing was definitely good, but I found some of the stylistic aspects jarring.

The back and forth between present and past tense in conjunction with the large time jumps was particularly annoying to me, as they just didn't seem to flow properly. I don't have a problem with time jumps, but the way this was handled just didn't meld well for me. I think this may have been less glaring had the time jumps been written in the present tense, essentially making them a quick gloss over of the time-frame to keep the reader current - rather than having them take on a reflective nature.

Overall, I liked the voice, but again, a few things stuck out that may me go, 'huh?' In the beginning, the voice seemed far too sophisticated for a toddler. I just couldn't envision a small child operating with such an extensive vocabulary or efficiency of mind - autistic superpowered or not. The voice never really develops as the protagonist grows up. I think the voice would have been great for an older version of the protagonist, but I think it would have worked better if he transitioned to that state over time. Toddlers, preteens, teenagers, young adults, grownups and seniors all have a different tone to the workings of their inner minds, which develops subtly as they age and experience new things. If this was written in 2nd person, I don't think it would have mattered as much. But an aging 1st person viewpoint is a difficult feat to handle and the large time skips didn't help pull off the illusion of advancement through life for this reader.

I found the concept interesting. And though I couldn't really relate well with the protagonist, I found him likable enough. But why didn't he have a name? The story was already written in first person, so there's no point in not giving him one. (Unless I somehow missed it, but I find that hard to imagine.) Because, I mean, mom/dad actually referred to him as 'son' to his face. Who the heck does that? Serial killers, that's who.

Overall, I enjoyed the story, but I think there are some areas that could use improvement. For a ten day contest, this was really good, but I cannot help but think it would have been a better idea to focus more on a condensed, more polished story. (Pot calling the kettle black on the last line, as my ambition outran the time-frame for my would-have-been entry.)

I almost feel like this would have carried better with just the format of the first half. Even so, it had good mechanics and the story was interesting.

I Liked it a lot not difficulty 8 maybe 3 and the same not 8 length at all like 2-4

Also way to easy not many choices

Still super good!!

Excellent writing, original and unusual in a good way and overall a really good choose your own story :D 8/8