A Hill to Die On

Disclaimer: to the author, take everything in this review with a grain of salt. I’m not a professional writer and only somewhat of a seasoned reviewer. To the readers, this review will contain some spoilers, so I implore you to read the storygame first.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

The description introduces the protagonist, his situation and his overall goal for the story. And it does so succinctly, without wasted words (unlike some of my reviews).

Instantly, I'm drawn in by the description. I loved how it set up a supposed victory in the first few sentences (which confused me, given the title and description), only to turn it 180 degrees with the line, “Oh, that was before it turned to hell”. The prose is really well-written, though to an extent, as it's all in the past, there isn't much tension or stakes when reading them. In a way, it feels like a very nicely written history book, at least, if it weren't for the protagonist's distinctive personality reflected through the narration.

Not sure if it's intentional, but I like how the enemy ‘Inglen’ sounds like a certain tea-sipping country.

Only caught one grammatical error: “You had have suspected Gorbak of treachery” (should be ‘have had’).

A suggestion would be to avoid overusing passive voice too often. E.g. “It made your men restless and shifty, many had their armor and heavier weapons lost in the baggage train attack” and “The bridge not far beyond they had amassed too”. Yet, a caveat: in some instances like “you were cut off, craggy cliffsides to one side, and bristling foes on the other”, it makes sense to use passive voice as it means the ‘you’, the protagonist, is the subject of the sentence.

WRITING STYLE 

One of this storygame's main strength lies in its scope. Despite its limited word count, it chooses to focus on one singular event as opposed to a larger plot at the cost of stretching itself too thin. This means it's able to focus on immersing the reader in each scene, without rushing the pacing.

I enjoyed reading the vivid, well-written descriptions. They plunged me into this medieval world with beautifully crafted weapons. However, as with anything, too much of a good thing might end up negatively impacting the story. At times, it felt like the pacing was moving too slowly. It was supposed to be a moment of combat, yet the protagonist was hardly concerned, taking the time to note the details on his sword and reminisce on the background behind its name. 

I'll rephrase some advice I heard a while back: whatever you choose to describe, you’re drawing the reader’s attention to. And readers have limited attention spans. Therefore, some of my favorite techniques include: interspersing description with something that moves the plot forward (action, dialogue, etc), describe the surroundings through allowing the protagonist to interact with it (slamming a sword into armor, then noting how sharp it is compared to ordinary ones), or making it relevant to the plot (placement of weapons in a battle scene before the protagonist chooses which to go for).

A note on dialogue: when using a dialogue tag in the center of a sentence, do not capitalize it. Nor do you use a full stop for the end of the character's speech, but instead, replace it with a comma. For instance, ‘It must appear as though we are trying for a big push." You say.’ should be ‘It must appear as though we are trying for a big push," you say.’ However, this does not apply for action. Therefore, replace the comma after ‘ale’ with a full stop here: ‘You sip your ale, "You must wipe that foul frown from your face.”’

Aside from these, there aren't many grammatical and spelling errors. A few: a missing apostrophe for ‘some Earls cry rallies them forward’, ‘renwed’ and ‘reinforcments’.

I enjoyed the way battle scenes were written. They focused on the overall battle, using sight and sound to engage the reader, occasionally mentioning specific details of the men who were involved in the fight. At first, Imog's death seemed to happen so swiftly and was sort of brushed aside, yet considering the protagonist's familiarity with war, it makes sense he wouldn't dwell too much on the death. There was a paragraph where ‘bloody’ was used very often, yet it could have been a recurring motif rather than repetitiveness.

Even the death scene is described brilliantly. It focuses on the shock the protagonist feels, then the feeling of pain suddenly flaring, followed by the reaction. Only then does the enemy surface. It really puts the reader in the scene, allowing then to experience the events in the protagonist's shoes.

Given the emphasis on the sword at the start, I enjoyed the poeticness of this death science's last line: “Say what you will, Red Winters bite was every bit as cold as the bards claimed”.

CHARACTER & PLOT

The protagonist's beliefs and thoughts shone through the narrative, whether this was describing the enemy as “soft bellied dogs” or strategizing plans to defeat them. His main goal is to defeat his enemies. He is well-versed in combat and strategy, though he refuses to give up despite the overwhelming odds against him. The metaphor in the title makes sense as he's willing to fight to his death. I also like the foreshadowing at the start with the description of the hill: “Not even the best of hills mind you, the slope wasn't great, but it was the best you could find”. This implies that most attempts to defend the hill would prove unsuccessful.

As for the other characters, their dialogue showcases their personalities too. Halerd cusses often and constantly speaks of the heat; Imog seems sensible based on his suggestions and concerns; Karog and Bort appear indistinguishable. While there wasn't much time to characterize these men and the other named ones before they were thrown into battle, they were given enough to somewhat distinguish them from one another and they acted in-character whenever they were mentioned.

The battle is the main focus of this story. All the choices are ones that may either prolong the war or cut it short. At times, the plot feels slightly repetitive with endless fighting, as there isn't really an indication of how much progress you're making. Still, this probably makes it much more realistic.

I also liked how positive the men were in the face of death. They were singing songs, sharing stories, and at one point, they released a mad man and laughed as he destroyed the enemies, even knowing that he would soon die and they would eventually meet the same fate. It's like the saying of how the journey matters more than the destination. This is also a nice contrast from the previous brutal battle scenes.

Speaking of contrast, I enjoyed how the sword is called Red Winter and described as ‘ice cold’, juxtaposing the hot weather conditions and the protagonist's ‘hot fury’.

The victory felt somewhat unpredictable, to be honest. There wasn't really always a clear indication as to what choices are more strategic than others. However, that's probably what battle is like, and the results were always realistic. I enjoyed the ending where the protagonist made a deal with the king too, as it showed the importance of choosing one's battles.

This was an enjoyable story to read and kept me immersed throughout. I recommend it to anyone glancing at this review.

Review 8

Corgi, I was planning to rip on your story and have a good laugh at it, especially because I thought by looking at the low word count that this story would have been very rushed. I don't think it was and if it indeed was, it wasn't very apparent to me. For readers and aspiring story tellers, this story is a perfect example for how your first story should look like and how big of a scope it should be.

For lots of writers, they want to start with a big sprawling fantasy epic with multiple battles with court intrigue and wanted to start the story from the protagonist's birth. This would be a great idea if they had the experience and discipline to finish that darn story. There are plenty of amazing stories that I have read in this website that never were finished, purely because the scope was too big. I have also given that advice multiple times. "Start with one battle." "Start with one scene". No one listens. Well, except Corgi. You made use of your limited time so amazingly and chose the perfect topic to make a short storygame about. The story unlike Avarga for example, didn't feel rushed. The pacing was marvelous even. There was a proper beginning, middle and conclusion. You wrapped up all the lingering plot threads at the end and I was able to easily follow it. This is genuinely impressive.

I think your first page was very strong in the sense that it establishes all the things I want to see in a story. You spoke of the main conflict, WHERE the story takes place, WHO the protagonist is, WHO the key figures are and WHAT is at stake and WHAT to expect in a page that is relatively short for first pages. I like that you also establish the weather, something that isn't often mentioned in stories. I think it is also important, especially during battles between big armies.
However, the light critigue I have is that Halerd and Bort weren't very distinguishable from each other. All in all, the characters were a little bit flat, but considering the length and the topic of the story, I didn't really mind. (hough I would have liked if one was very cowardly and the other one was very bloodthirsty. I sensed that they had a bit of this dynamic going on, but you could have pushed it a little more).

I like the title. It is a fun play on words, especially because the battle takes place on a hill. I think it's clever and I do like me some punny titles.

My most favorite action scene was probably the protagonist getting burnt. Great scene. I like how you mention the pain in a pretty realistic way. The initial shock and adrenaline does make you feel the initial blast a little less than it should. I like that you mentioned that and It's good attention to detail to also mention the kind of injuries the protagonist got afterwards. Kudos to that. It's often a thing some writers forget to include.

All in all great story, great read. I give it a 6/8. Corgi, my man, I hope one day that you would start another big epic like the last chieftan, but this does make my day :).

This was a fun read! The grammar and spelling were okay, nothing super notable jumped out, except for the spacing between the paragraphs – that bugged me a little bit. Minor things to consider:

- On the “Hold the Crossings” page, paragraph 6, add a “by” after “preparing”. There are also some fragmented sentences that might flow better if you connect them to other sentences.
- On the “Charge” page, there’s no need for a comma to be after Gorbak in the last paragraph. Honestly there’s a lot of sentences that don’t necessarily need commas.

Prose succeeded in evoking the vibes of a classic Viking fantasy, and I loved their names, haha. The banter didn’t feel forced, and I liked the mug joke.

Since it was short, I played through it a couple of times, and I had one pathing note. On the “Hold the Hill” page, both choices read as the same. I read the page a few times, and each of the pages and they seem like they’re the same choice (closing the gap), worded differently, with different results.

Overall, I liked this, even if it turns out I’m a horrible strategist. It had some replay value considering the decent number of branches for how short it was. I also agree with Milton about the magic!

So I did enjoy the prose that this story offered, it was like something out of a medieval-themed book. Gave me 'A Song of Ice and Fire' vibes. The grammar was also good.
However, the story was rather short, and could have benefitted from more writing. The spacing at the beginning of each paragraph also got on my nerves a little bit. 5/8

So I tried to get every ending, so here it goes.
Needless to say that there will be spoilers below, so if you haven't played the game, please do so.
First off, I thought it was good.
It may have been a bit short in parts, and I definitely think that certain parts could be explored more, but I think it was well done.
I couldn't find any grammar issues, and I didn't notice any typos anywhere., and, as I said before, I tried to find every ending to the game that there was.
I think that perhaps some of the characters needed a little background, and their was little personality to separate them, in my mind at least, but over all, it was well writen, and worth playing.
Thank you for making it, and I hope this helps.

That was my first ever CYOA, I have only just found this genre, shameful I know, what a nice short read.

Always fun to be fighting in battles and I thought this was a good little story with a good enjoyment factor. A few minor typos but nothing to really detract from the enjoyment, I thought this story was the right length and well-written, a good read :)

my ancestors…

Bold, gory, and action-packed. The story was filled with battle scenes and various brutalities of war. One moment you could be felling dozens of foes, and the next you're coldly reminded of your mortality by a singular arrow.

While your backstory and worldbuilding aren't the most developed, the story works well as a self-contained event.

An appropriately satisfying and quick war story. Good stuff.

A nice, bloody tale! It clearly drips with historical inspiration from viking raiders. The action is very well told and flows smoothly. I also liked what we got from the characters. You're not supposed to like these guys, but you don't have to. It's just got to be a good, violent time!

While there is a technical fantasy element, the idea of magic isn't really explored here that much. It doesn't even seem to be necessary for the story, which isn't a bad thing. However, I would be curious about a version of this story where magic is a more prominent element that effects warfare in specific, more descriptive ways. Perhaps have the idea of changing fate?

All in all, an enjoyable storygame. Never try to pay off a barbarian. He'll just come back to get the rest later!