The Gauntlet II: Returning Home

My attention having been drawn to this game by its being mentioned on the forum, I figured I'd see what 2005 had to offer me here at the end of 2019.

The beginning felt as if I were making some real and meaningful choices, although *why* my choices ended up with the results they did was sometimes perplexing: if I wait, I get a vine; if I go, I get a stick. Well, at least if I wait I don't get an insta game over. As we know, in 2019, that is an automatic 1 from many a reviewer.

The game uses items, but in a pretty haphazard fashion. I had berries, but I didn't see the opportunity to eat them, unless I could only "use" the item in a particular place. And it didn't matter, either, because although I was told I was hungry, the game never brought the issue of food up again. The crazy color of that berry was pretty funny though. I was looking forward to seeing what that did to me.

The game's choices were either rather obvious (go right to bed or search the area first) or a total crapshoot (stab the monster's eyes or throat?) with death awaiting you if you choose the wrong answer. This style made the game feel a good length, although requiring heavy use of the back button.

The challenges were interesting and varied, and felt suitably dangerous, especially since for much of the game you are armed pretty poorly. The prose felt all over the place, though, the writer sometimes tossing out just a few brief sentences on an armored opponent, and sometimes spending time tracing the ecology of the wasps that were affected by the ants that the laser-eye beast was feeding on. You can clearly tell where the author was feeling it and where the game just needed to get done.

The worst offense of the game was the narrator being way too cutesy with the player. ("And then, do you know what happens?...." [next page] "Nothing!") And then to do that same joke twice in a row! Not cool.

A cute diversion. They didn't really have much in the way of entertaiment in 2005 as I recall, as most of the greatest works of art had yet to be created, so I can see why this would have been a top ten for that year.

As I was decently entertained by the original Gauntlet, I decided to play G2. I left a long comment on Gauntlet I, so I was very interested to see if G2 kept the good parts and removed the bad. Let’s do this.

My initial thoughts aren’t very positive towards the image on the first page. Not only is it formatted in a funky position, it looks too real to be included in the story. I would have preferred no images or a fantasy picture used; something that fits the story better. The pictures look like a stock photos from National Geographic. Not very engaging to the story.

I will say that there was some level of nostalgia involved. The original Gauntlet starts off strong and full of danger. Once you’ve made it through, barely surviving, it’s a nice pace of things to start slow. It reintroduces me back into the world in an engaging way. Nice job.

If I remember correctly, the first Gauntlet doesn’t use items. It’s more of an obstacle run through. G2 heavily uses items. Not all of them seem very useful, but it’s a sweet little thrill when you choose to look inside a nest and find a dagger. Not to mention, the world is a safer place with one less armed bird.

Keeping with the same style as the original, G2 is like navigating through a maze with traps everywhere. Some of the death pages seem a bit random, although death isn’t really something that can be entirely rational. Shit happens, you know? Sometimes you turn a corner and death is there to greet you. What do you say to the god of death? Not today. Unfortunately, that doesn’t work in Gauntlet.

By no means is this a memorable or life-changing storygame, but it’s entertaining for the time being. I had fun navigating through, even though it seems a bit absurd the main character would find themselves in similar situation as the original Gauntlet. I suppose the author is like Han Solo in that way: Never tell him the odds!

This was a fun experience. Congratulations, you did make me laugh. The moment in the canyons with the false alarm of dark clouds was a fun punchline. The same could be said about a lot of the fight scenes. They were written to be extremely punchy for example with the fight with the knights where you had the option the hop on their horse. Although there were a lot of nonsensical dead ends like with the fight with the wolverine, the witty writing makes up for it in my opinion. The humor in the story was just my kind of humor.

When did they make this???

wow I won.

Not that bad, not bad at all.

If you’re bored might as well hit this story and it’s first part

so many choices great story

i could not figure out how to survive at all and even though i got a dagger from the magpie nest it still said that i didn't have a weapon

Cool, but very easy