Player Comments on Dark Deception

This story was a pretty cool idea. But the execution of it was lacking. It was mostly just collecting items and using them. There weren't too many substantial choices to make, other than how to escape.

And even then you were forced into holding Komes at gunpoint in his own house in the middle of the night, after breaking in (won't the police love it when they see this! I sure got him, haha!) because there was no "End Game and Leave Comments" link in the garage door ending.

I think the story could have used more depth, characterization, and plot. It would have been cool if we could have read the events leading up to the framing, and dealing with evading the FBI and figuring out where and how to gather evidence.

Or even screwing up horribly and getting arrested/shot and still looking bad anyway.

There was so much potential for this, I would honestly recommend taking it down and putting a lot more work into this. With more time and effort, this story could easily be a 5+ rating and well received.

It's a good start but more could be done. Any ways, good job and good luck!

If you're someone that likes tense espionage that features deep plots of betrayal and intrigue, then this story is not for you. "Dark Deception" presents itself as a story that might provide all of those things but none are present in the story. The storygame involves you walking around picking up items and choosing the right item to use to advance the plot.

Decent writing and sometimes awkward writing with no substance is how I'd describe this. It's just boring. Nothing happens. The first choice you make in completely meaningless because you get the same result and every choice afterward has no real consequence.

Some more backstory would have been appreciated. Some build up, reasons as to why I should care about the main character, the antagonist (already forgot his name), and...well everything. The reader has no way of being invested in this story.

There is one thing that stood out in this story that I feel needs to be credited. That picture was great. It was easily the best part of this storygame and I'm not saying that sarcastically. You just need to work on placing it better so that it doesn't break your paragraphs apart because it just makes the text look ugly.

This story...isn't good. It feels like someone fast forwarded to the end of a spy movie, then removed every fun and enjoyable element of the last scene and presented that to us in storygame form. My final verdict is a 3/8.

So the first thing I want to talk about is the picture, which is so ubiquitous that it even shows up in the description of the game. Let me check one thing... okay, it's not part of your profile, at least. Now, I did think it was an interesting concept as far as the transparent overlay on the room picture, but the execution is terrible. It needs to be formatted in someway that it doesn't disrupt the text of the game. Whether it ends up at the top of the page or stays to the side, it needs to allow the text to maintain proper spacing and alignment. As is, it looks incredibly sloppy and I found the page to look much better with it removed.

The next thing is that every single page is written out as if it is an overview. This is likely a result of the brevity of each page coupled with being in the third person, but it prevents any sort of immersion. Every page that I read, it felt like it should be read in a melodramatic voice followed by "Tune in next time to find out!" Your story has no perspective unless you can establish a voice to the narrative. Otherwise it will read like an instruction manual.

I noted the term 'slowly' being used 12 times in the story for dramatic effect, often near each other on the same page. In one sentence, it was actually used twice. I would recommend using synonyms to avoid repetition.

The game itself was extremely easy and didn't really have any impact. The setup had a lot of potential and the description did a good job of hyping the story. Agent Dontrememberhisname was obviously in a desperate state, you could have built up a lot of tension and suspense in the story just by expanding on the premise. Maybe including a little bit of the story prior to the mission just to show the impact on the protagonist. As is, I don't, as the reader, buy into what you, as the writer, are selling to me. The MC felt more like an NPC.

I would recommend reworking the story, as I believe there is a hunger for this type of game, and making changes to the perspective, increase the length/scope, and adding some challenge. Maybe let the player use the gun if you are confronted by the cops without evidence.

Poorly executed in every way. Poor spelling, poor use of perspective, and absolutely no plot at all.

As far as I can tell, this game was written in about 30 minutes total. And why that weird image of the agent has to be on every page is something only the author will ever understand.

this doesn't need an "anything goes" maturity level

I like the idea in the beginning, but I feel like I just helped an agent receive justice, not stop a terrorist attack. You could probably add on to this pretty easily, and I would like a little more choice, or branching. I finished it in a little less than 5 minutes, so you could make it longer.

I enjoyed playing your story game. I wish you had made it a bit more challenging. I finished the whole game in 5 minutes the first time threw.

I was disappointed by this story. The description makes it out to be way more exciting than it actually is, and basically nothing happens here. I'd have expected the plot to deal with dodging arrest, getting shot at, uncovering a mystery or having a confrontation with the person who betrayed you. Instead all you do is walk around an empty house and pick up some items.

The writing is serviceable enough if something were to only actually happen. Although I'm not sure if the third person POV really worked here, you have to work a little harder to get the reader inside the character's head that way, but this just amounted to us getting a summarized description of a guy walking around doing dull things.

I really would like to see a plot like this written out as a full story with more branching and detail.

The only deception I saw was of the reader, even though you did put a 3/8 for difficulty (still too high in my opinion). This wasn't even a mystery/puzzle, you just had to pick up the items and you were done.

You could have easily expanded on the story and on that whole espionage situation but you chose to publish an half-assed editor test instead. Since this is not your first storygame, the time for testing the editor is over and you should take your time with writing instead of rushing things through.

As for your grammar, you should have at least proofread your introduction (and first page) since it has some terrible punctuation.

for a maturity of 7/8 I expected at least <i>someone</i> trapped in the basement.
I never cared about the character. Every use of items is quite evident (which might be a good thing, I hate to be blocked because I didn't use something). There's no way to lose, except if that's what you specifically search for.
I'd humbly advise for more exposition, more difficulty,a bit more efforts with Photoshop and something more than what I keep imagining as a investigation phase in a 1990 PlayStation fps.