This Fate

General Recommendation: I definitely recommend this game. It’s an intriguing concept, and it’s done well.
Preview: Caught in a time loop where you always fail to save the love of your life, how will this cycle finally end?

=SPOILERS BELOW=

General notes:
An excellent game, taking an interesting concept and exploring it fully and thoughtfully through multiple possibilities. I’ve always thought the cyoa format would lend itself well to time travel stories, and it’s nice to see a storygame take this premise and execute it so well. The conclusion of the final ending works well in this format; the player knows, of course, that fate does not exist; they’ve already seen this scenario play out in a dozen different possible ways. Seeing a game take advantage of the format in this way is satisfying.
There’s the sense that each individual playthrough could count as another iteration of the loop, made stronger by some of the endings. Each pathway in this game is made stronger by the others.
The length of this game is just right. A shorter game could not explore the conept in the depth it deserves, while a longer game would nee much more complexity and history to pull it off as well. The size of this game allows the concept to be successfully approached from a more thoughtful and introspective space.
The major players in this game (the narrator, “her”, the empire, etc.) are never named, with the focus instead resting on the narrator’s internal thoughts. After so many loops, these details are unimportant to him, and it does a good job conveying the extent of the time that has passed. The game does not dwell on the romatic aspects of the protagonist’s relationship; instead taking this relationship for granted and using it to tell a different story. This works well with the impressionistic tone of the story.
The emotional impact of the writing is done well. With a quick pace and focus on action, it never crosses the line into pointless angst, instead having the narrator’s emotions speak for themselves. The simplicity with which they are presented pairs well with the work’s overall tone, making it more impactful.

Specific notes:
-Ooh, time loops.
-Italicizing character thoughts is usually a good idea, and sentences in parenthesis should still be capitalized.
-I like the narration style. It does a good job conveying what the narrator has been through, and how familiar he is with these circumstances. The use of dashes does this well.
-I also like the use of the page titles to continue the story. It makes a kind of call-and-response effect, which adds to the poetic nature of the story.
-Many sentences are not capitalized, is this a stylistic choice? If so I’m not sure it’s working, it just seems like poor editing and doesn’t add to the reading.
-Generally, limiting the amount of one-linke choices is prefered.
-I like that the third branch takes the form of a flashback sequence. It’s a good way to show the history.
-It’s not completely clear what’s causing these time loops, even in the finale. How did the narrator’s friend get access to these secrets of time and fate in the first place?

Grammar
A couple issues, such as the lack of capitalizations. Some of the grammatical issues may have been a stylistic choice, but I don’t think it was a useful one.
Mastery of Language
Excellent. Despite a couple grammatical issues, the language is poetic and moving in a way few other games on this site approach. The use of titles, dashes, and parenthesis makes the narrative seem a lot like the narrator’s stream of consciousness.

Branching
There’s quite a lot of branching in this game, with a wide variety of both epilogues and codas. The player’s choices really do matter.

Player Options/fair choice
Good; the consequences of actions are logical.

PERSONAL EXPERIENCE:
I first reached Code: interlocking time loops. I don’t usually like romance games, but I quite enjoyed this (perhaps because of the time travel).

CONCLUSION: 6/8, though I was tempted to rate it 7/8 for the creativity that went into its use of the cyoa format.

I just realized I never commented here.

SoSaidL, I absolutely adored this. Stories in the 'love & dating' genre don't usually do much for me but throw in some tragedy and time loops and an oppressive empire and apparently things change. :P

The way everything kept intertwining and the sense of growing futility there were an excellent uses of the medium, I feel like the whole concept of time loops just works so well with a CYOA and I've so rarely seen it done.

I'm actually going to disagree with Bucky here because I feel like we got to know exactly enough about the characters. The main character in particular is singleminded and devoted enough that it doesn't take long to get in his head and believe what he believes, that they're locked into this by fate and the girl is the only thing that matters.

On the path I started out with, enough was seen about how she was originally to make the changes that started effecting her intriguing, especially the way it tied in to what had to happen to save her. I'm trying to remember if I've seen something like that kind of gradual, subconscious effect in a time travel story like this before, but I'm drawing a blank.

The one thing I thought maybe should have been explored even if it just turned out to be another dead end, was the idea that maybe the time loops were meant to save /him/. After repeatedly trying and failing to save her, it seems like there would be a point where he at least attempted to change things by just leaving town a week in advance, if only to see if everything would reset if he wasn't even around when she died.

A little more thought put into the fates of his family would have been realistic too seeing how he had to live with them knowing they would die too just as many times, but I do get that would take the focus off the two of them.

Anyway, thoroughly enjoyed this. :) I got several Coda endings but the Rebel Warrior was the only epilogue. I guess there's two more, but I didn't get the sense any of them would be legitimately happy endings. (Even this one, it's kind of sad thinking of how he basically had to make her into a completely different person to save her, and I don't have the highest hopes for the future of that setting when the winning side has arguably become just as bad as their enemies...)

Is the other story you're working on in the same setting? From the blurb it looks like it may be from the other side's POV, so, should be interesting. :D

Well the lack of speech marks was a constant annoyance and I would've preferred to see more choices instead of page after page with only one link, but that out of the way, I really enjoyed it.
You're not the best writer as far as grammar and punctuation are concerned, but you definitely know how to draw people in and get them to care about the fate of the characters, which is a way more important skill. I really felt the protagonist's desperation from the start and that really set the tone of the game for me.
I guess the biggest downfall is that I never really picked up on why this particular girl was so important. I get that they were childhood friends and all, but I never saw what was so special about her that her life was worth more than the lives of everybody else in the village combined, including his family. That said, she was a very interesting character that I did want to see survive.
All in all, a very good game but please, please, please use quotation marks next time.

Boring bad quality bad bad bad ones try no good ending

That was very sad!!! :'(

beautiful

damn. That was great and so heartwrenching. I'm so happy I got all the 3 epilogues! The only epilogue that was close to a happy ending was the "Scarlet Empress" epilogue. My heart was broken with "The rebel warrior" and "The empire's assassin" epilogue.

It was really wonderful! , I was a little frustrated at how short it was the first few times I played, but then I played it again and discovered a longer path that I enjoyed a lot!
I recommend playing it over and over again so you could get the full idea of the story. I haven't yet but I do plan to.

really sad. I tried again and again and I couldn't find a happy ending.

Brilliant.