Player Comments on Sixteen Words

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 lots of spoilers, so I suggest you read the storygame first.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

As this storygame is a site classic, I’m surprised it doesn’t have any long reviews. Then again, should I even be surprised? Long reviews are actively discouraged, considering the structure of this game, the quote at the start, and the word count limit that the description imposes on comments. But zeroes are worth nothing, so I’m sure you’ll forgive me if I use the loophole of writing precisely 16000 words.

I love the attention to detail in the description. Almost every single paragraph has exactly 16 words. I wanted to do that in this review too, but realize it'll be more challenging than it's worth. Nitpick: that last paragraph ruins the streak as it’s not 16 words, but only 11. Even adding something like ‘go check that thread out' or 'you will get extra credit' would have made it 16 words. But we're here to study English and not Maths, so I'll move on.

WRITING STYLE & FORMATTING

This storygame uses a cave-of-time branching and each path is ‘supposedly’ 16 words. The choices move towards the right as the storygame proceeds. On the first path, the storygame’s text represents the nemesis’ action and the choices are the protagonist’s actions. It reads like an outline of a fight scene.

I like how formatting is used to make the story dynamic despite the word limitation. Lava is in orange text. Teeter has its letters spaced out to show its wobbling motion. eMErGE... ...cHaNGeD makes use of spacing and random capitalization to convey the meaning of its words, and it’s a nice touch that ‘the end’ becomes ‘enD thE’.

The only issue is that this storygame used symbols to represent pictures. Everyone knows that a picture is worth a thousand words, so there are several thousand words in some paths.

Color and font is used to convey characters. The purple text and a different font is used for the ‘sister’ character, making it clear what her responses and reactions are. The vampire’s text is in gray and surrounded by inverse triangle brackets, perhaps representing fangs? And the exclamation mark between the triangle brackets followed by slayer makes it clear what happened to him. As the protagonist’s text has been black the whole time, when he becomes its spawn, there are triangle brackets around the black text. I liked this cool detail. The spider parts were in all caps, yet when the spider protagonist became depressed, there wasn’t even capitalization for the first word haha. There is so much forethought for what appears to be deceptively a simple sixteen words storygame.

Another nitpick: during the paradox, the storygame loops to the start, making it so that there are more than 16 words! Perhaps this balances out the ‘silence’ plotline as the text becomes purely ellipses.

I only found one typo, which is the word supremacy spelt ‘supremecy’. But I suppose this is thematic. After all, when one is truly supreme, no one dares question their spelling.

The word ‘powerless’ getting smaller and smaller after each choice is a nice touch considering puppet kings have no power.

Possibly my favorite stylistic choice was the one with the blue dashes like waves, and the word ‘glory’ being spaced out, each letter on a new line, moving towards diagonally, giving the impression of drowning.

CONTENT

There is a coherent storyline in each path. Despite each having only 16 words, basic elements like plot, characters and setting are not sacrificed. Some parts even had plot twists and humor.

Readers can choose the protagonist’s actions and personality. There is some juxtaposition in choices: to ‘watch’ as someone dies or to have ‘mercy on them; to either see their death as a ‘victory’ or a cause for ‘sorrow’; to take the ‘throne’ or to be a ‘hermit’. In life, there are opposites. Highs and lows. An event that may bring joy could also cause sorrow. Something that may raise a person up may also alienate them from others. The throne being a typical happy ending, with colorful ‘ceremony’ and ‘fireworks’ contrasts the gray ‘mountaintop contemplation’. I would have liked to see the colors represent a hidden word there, but that's probably cheating, making more words out of less. (It’s also what I did in a poetry assignment with limited words once: I created a poem within the poem, having the bolded words paint a completely different picture of the narrative, and thankfully, my teacher found it clever).

Some paths tell a full story, like the person who set off to destroy an enemy, succeeded, but felt sorrow. They retreated home and either got traumatized or healed. Again, there are lots of polar opposites, perhaps to maintain a balance between positive and negative. That's why I'm writing this long review—to balance out the shortness of others.

A plot twist came in the form of showing mercy, but when embracing the opponent, there’s a treacherous push. Adjectives are used sparingly, so ‘treacherous’ becomes more significant. Falling references the other path with lava, using the word ‘sizzle’. There is continuity between paths. I noticed a lot of fire-related choices of diction too, though I have not figured out why. And I like the cliffhanger pun haha.

Speaking of humor, there’s a lot of it. Obeying the teacher leads to being a prized pupil but nurturing hatred leads to… ulcers? The randomness of this caught me off guard. There are many in-site jokes and references, e.g. the sister incest and being gay. Ogre’s storygame Boobs made a cameo too.

Dark humor was used as well, like the guillotine and ‘half sister’. There are more wholesome jokes too, such as the one about common tropes like the barkeep being a low level quest giver. Innuendos and the play on words with ‘booty’ (the treasure kind vs the other kind) were funny too.

This storygame works as an outline for longer stories too. It has good plot beats, build up and consistent characters like the mentor or the nemesis. Some parts hold good advice: In a mission, acting immediately leads to salvation where being confused may cause an apocalypse. Wavering in battle may lead to death, so strike when you can. If you get blind from grog, remember that’s an opportunity for a profitable lawsuit.

There's a time loop too, which is fun. The protagonist gets to attack their nemesis again, but since they’re more powerful this time, both choices are similar: mutilate or instant kill.

On the ‘university, hired’ path, one of the choices is tenure. It leads to ‘cackle’. Gower, are you trying to tell us something about being a professor at a university?

Haha, readers can also play as a spider and raise kids. Honestly, some parts of this storygame resembles infinite craft, where one can combine words and see what result they get. For example, killing the farmers lead to ‘farmer-poltergeists’. ‘Lamenting’ and ‘sure’ leads to ‘co-dependent relationship’ lol.

But there were some moments of realism: not bending to authority as a chief justice may lead to getting brutally murdered, while agreeing allows the protagonist to continue their role. Having endless delays with negotiations and attorneys and court hearings is so real, given everything I’ve learnt about law so far.

REAL ENDING

It’s ironic how the ‘boring’ path is the least boring. The protagonist has an epiphany, changing the course of the story, and suddenly, the narrator is no longer confined to 16 words. Maybe I’m overthinking, but I found three themes in this storygame.

—Theme 1: the only limits that exist are those we place on ourselves—

Our imagination is so vast, so limitless, that even from the barebones of a story, we can create our own tales and weave word after word of a whole new world. Even the assumption that we can only read 16 words before getting tired is a self imposed limitation which we can break through. Boredom may help with this. How many times have we been bored to the point where productivity is a welcome distraction? Or maybe that’s just me.

—Theme 2: everyone may have different interpretations of the same words—

Everyone may have derived different meanings from this story. The way I've interpreted them in this review may be completely different from another reader. Such a thing is most prevalent in this storygame, but even in tales where the meaning is clearer, readers still have conflicting views. Even the author's view may not be authority on the manner to some, though that's a topic for another day.

—Theme* 3: Gower takes this opportunity to teach readers about cumulative sentences—

*Yes, I know this is not a theme, and my creative writing teacher would mark me down for this, but I wanted to add something about this here. When this path is unlocked, each sentence expands the story, new details fleshing out the narrative, altering the meaning of the sentence, yet ensuring its original statement is kept intact. It first follows a subject, verb and object structure as a simple clause, then it is modified with a dependent clause. Soon, more and more clauses are added, full of descriptors and modifiers. This is an ending to die for, though in the context of this story, we have already died to reach it.

TL;DR - a good read for readers with short attention spans and writers looking for inspiration.

Not the absolute best, not the worst. This is a nice game of sixteen different words.

Amazing!! Was not sure how this could work, super fun following the paths.

got boobie ending. totally amazing. Thank you for the game.

I had seventeen words in my last comment. That’s really quite embarrassing and I'm extremely ashamed.

Wow.

Much in few words.

Characters, setting, emotions, well written.

Good formatting and word choice.

Highly recommend.

Cute.

Ulcers…

It was very confusing and I want a walkthrough.. Thank you however. I didn’t really enjoy

I have no idea why this is a fantasy storygame, but I am not complaining because

Wow. Fun and unique! Variety of branches. Perfect for us who have no attention span. Excellent!

Never thought you could do so much with so few words. The end feels like enlightenment.

The sixteen words gimmick was cool, but surely sixty four or something would be more engaging?

Unique concept, will have to use your imagination, somewhat interesting story, but it is very short

I died horribly. It's hard to explain why in sixteen words, but that's the rule here.

Fun use of fonts and colour,
Love the word choice and the humour.
Congrats my man.

This is a very intriguing premise, and surprising well done. Every word is very impactful. Recommended.

Creative. I enjoyed how simplistic, but also brimming with depth that this game was.

Sixteen words.

What can I say that has not already been said in this story: an actual story.

So, I have to write sixteen words for a review, eh? Well, the plot is a-

An entertaining game rife with humor, which makes it work well. Who needs over sixteen words?

The short length of sixteen words means that every choice seems to have a massive impact. The words chosen make it clear what every choice will do. The idea of sixteen words doesn't allow for much description - however I was still able to understand what's going on. Interesting concept, and the endings were very varied and intriguing.

Reminds me of the beginning of Fallout: New Vegas where you answer Doc Mitchell's word association test.

I enjoyed it for what it was.

1st play: Apparently I'm Lawful Good. Now I wish I'd shoved that fucker in the volcano.

2nd play: Great, now I'm dead. Now I REALLY wish I'd shoved that fucker in. Retry!

3rd play: My sister thought I was a dude. She also wanted in my pants. Ick.

Traumatized? Sail West!

This game was so short but yet...I still love it.

very funny :)

fun and short. not too bad

Freytag's Pyramid. Connect the dots. Fast read. A story-game for the impatient reader! Recommended.

What just happened?|)(|<--Is this a butt or boobs.

I didn't understand it.

An interesting concept. The form is unique. But... this isn't my cup of tea.

Very good considering the constraints. Favorite part was the "Scantily-clad" path. I highly recommend this.

You actually made this, that's funny. It's a cute idea. Considering the constraints, I liked it.

Novel idea, weird execution.

This was a bad idea. One word per page is not enough. I rate this 3.

Good. Continue.

just replayed a few times and was very good

it was a very interesting concept certainly, but the end result wasn´t amazing, but it was still good

Great story.
Lots of variation despite being compact.
Shocking, actually. Most impressive.
Definitely a solid seven.

This is actually pretty good, leaves a lot to the imagination but that is the spirit.

Why is this? What is the sixteen? Is that a magical number? It is in computers.

But still, why would you do this? I can see how, but why? For what reason?

Is this truly a representative sample? Does your survey include all groups? I don’t think so.

So it sounds like your premise is flawed. That means the rest is useless as well?

But what if it is not? Why would you continue? Could there be additional, hidden value?

There is not, should you listen to the academics. Their review procedures are clear, you know.

However, this is not the academic world. In fact, it is clearly far, far from it.

Does that make this effort better or worse? Or should the author know better? He does.

But does anyone else care? Based on the activity here, it would appear that they do.

Anyway, obviously I have finally gotten around to reading this interesting story here on the site.

I have read many paths through the short story and have found many endings to them.

Have I found them all? How could I know? I might suspect there are sixteen endings.

Based on the challenge line listed on this page, there may not be sixteen after all.

Do I really try and find them all? Surely it would not take long to determine.

I think perhaps I will give it sixteen minutes to see what I’m able to do.

My time is up, and this is what I have. Now read the story for yourself.

Inspiring plots of lust and power entertain for an hour. Will you die or reign supreme?

Unpredictable, unforeseen, much wonder, such wow.
Beautiful, one of a kind, accomplished astonished raising of brow.

This is a really fun idea and I found myself trying many paths. Highly recommend it.

Even though I was forced to read this, this is actually more entertaining than I thought!

It's obviously a quick game, and the humor benefits from this. Every choice worked the to raise the tension that every subsequent click escalate. I got a chuckle or two from most of the endings.

...wow. how do I even describe this

Compliment game. List good things. Sarcastic joke. Constructive criticism. Much nitpicking.
Pointlessly repeat self. Lavish praise.

I have a woeful attention span. Behold, the perfect game. Much thanks Gower, you masterful minimalist.

A cool and unique concept for a game. Thanks for so many cool games, Gower. Epic.

This is the fast-food of Haikus. Swag, spicy with rowdy starting and amoney shot finish.

Compressed storytelling enhances the reader's imagination faculties to produce an innovative outlook on CYS. Sincere respect.

Formicophilia, incest, AND I get to seduce myself in this game? Nice indeed. Thank you, Gower.

16 words comment poem:

Intriguing, to say the least
Clever, until it ceased

Different than others
Treasured as if lovers

I don't get it. I really don't. But then again I'm a foreigner here in CYStialand.

I have sixteen words.
This is pretty innovative, as expected of you.
Thanks for the laugh.

So many amazing plots in this story. Very deep for just sixteen words per each path.

Neat experiment! Sparse yet epic wording made me envision vivid plots; evil sisters, boobs, and more.

Very well done. Each story is represented through keen word choice, color and font. Quick fun!

It is a fun interactive fiction. Some paths are better than other paths, I highly recommend.

I thought this was very clever and you did very well to write this so skillfully.

This is a clever little story that give you, what is usually, single word situations and single word solutions.

It still manages to tell pretty interesting, though vague, stories. The grammar is non existent because this is a series of sixteen word stories. It would matter if there was though because the author is a English Professor, so he's automatically right if he disagrees with me about the English language.

Give it a read. Don't diddle you sister.

got my sister therapy because I'm normal human being

shoulda entered this in best of 2k19

finally. a game I can read and not get very bored half way through.