Game Review: Tavern Crawler (2020, Josh LaBelle)

Posted on October 16, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

Tavern Crawler is an entrant in the 2020 Interactive Fiction Competition. All of the entries can be played here.

Tavern Crawler is an incredibly addictive Twine Game. It starts out with a typical Dungeons and Dragons style set-up. You and your two companions meet a wealthy man in a tavern. The wealthy man is named Walter Barnes (not much of a fantasy name but that’s the point) and he offers you a fortune in gold. All you have to do is find a dragon’s lair, kill the dragon, and then return with its head.

Sounds simple right? The problem is that you were quite drunk when Walter approached you so, even though you heard about the dragon, you didn’t really hear the name of the tavern where you were supposed to meet him afterwards. Though finding and dealing with the dragon is a part of the game, Tavern Crawler is more concerned with what happens after the quest. Will you be able to find Walter or will just get spend all of your time wandering from tavern to tavern, getting progressively more sloshed as you search?

Tavern Crawler is unique just for the amount of options that you’re given. Every decision you make has a consequence and effects how the game will end. There’s not single throw away decision to be found and, as a result, you can play Tavern Crawler over and over again without once playing the same game twice. Will you remain relatively sober and not only find Walter but also discover the secret of the dragon? Or will you get so drunk and obnoxious that you’ll end up penniless, bloody, and abandoned by your companions? The choice is yours!

I liked everything about Tavern Crawler. There’s several side quests that you can chose to get involved with and the town, its residents, and its taverns are all described so precisely that you feel like you’re right there, drinking ale and wondering whether or not to get involved in the knife game that’s taking place in the back of bar. Tavern Crawler creates a world that you’ll want to explore and the game rewards experimentation. As soon as I finish writing this, I’m going to replay it just to see how many bad decisions I can make before dying.

Tavern Crawler can be played here.

Witchcraft VI: The Devil’s Mistress (1994, directed by Julie Davis)

Posted on October 15, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

Warlock-turned-attorney William Spanner is back in the sixth installment of the strangely long-running Witchcraft franchise.

Previously, William was a defense attorney and then he was an insurance attorney and now, he’s apparently a divorce attorney who occasionally consults with the police on cases involving the occult. In this film, William is played by an actor named Jerry Spicer. This would be the only film in which Spicer would play Spanner. He doesn’t do a bad job in the role. He’s not as memorable as Charles Solomon was in parts two, three, and four but he’s not as boring as Marklen Kennedy was in part five.

When a serial killer starts targeting women who wear cross necklaces, Detectives Lutz (Kurt Alan) and Garner (John E. Holiday) consult with William. Though William is still reluctant to acknowledge his warlock ancestry, it doesn’t take him long to realize that the women are being sacrificed to Satan. Mr. Savatini (Bryan Nutter) has to find a virgin to sacrifice at the next solar eclipse but virgins are hard to find in Los Angeles. So, Savatini has ordered his followers to target any woman wearing a cross, on the chance that she might be religious instead of just fashionable.

Witchcraft VI not only tells us that there aren’t any virgins left in Los Angeles, it also shows us why that is. If nothing else, the success of the Witchcraft series was proof that people, especially people in the 90s, would sit through anything if there was a chance that they would get to see some breasts. Everyone’s getting it on in Witchcraft VI, except for William’s secretary, which means that she’s destined to be the next victim. Unless, of course, William can call upon his powers once again.

Witchcraft VI is dumb, poorly acted, and sloppily directed but it was still a major turning point in the Witchcraft franchise. It introduced the characters of Lutz and Garner and established the idea of William being the police department’s unofficial police consultant. It’s not a bad idea. If not for all of the softcore sex, the Witchcraft films could pass for a TV show. Of course, it wouldn’t be a very good show. Witchcraft VI was another direct-to-video hit so, of course, it was followed by Witchcraft VII.

Game Review: Desolation (2020, Earth Traveler)

Posted on October 15, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

Desolation is an entrant in the 2020 Interactive Fiction Competition. All of the entries can be played here.

In this piece of horror-themed Interactive Fiction, you have just escaped from a mansion and a blood-thirsty cult and now, suddenly, you’re in the desert. You have no food. You have no water. Your phone isn’t going to save you and the sun isn’t going to stop beating down on you. You’ve got a flashlight but that won’t help if you die of thirst and there’s a good chance of that happening since you’re stranded in the desert.

Or are you?

Desolation does a good job of keeping you guessing as to what’s really going on. After a few turns of wandering around in the desert, the game took an unexpected turn and then, a few turns later, it took another unexpected turn. I can’t go into the details without spoiling the game but I will say the Desolation kept me on my toes. I’m terrible at IF games that require you to figure out how to survive in a desolate location. I always go the wrong direction or pick up the wrong object. That happened to me a few times while playing Desolation but I still enjoyed the game. It’s a real challenge and requires more than a little thought. If you’ve never played an IF game before, this is probably not the one to start with. But people who know the format should enjoy the challenge of Desolation.

One final note: Desolation is actually a sequel to an earlier game, Two Braids Girl. I haven’t play the earlier game but that didn’t stop me from enjoying Desolation.

Desolation can be played here!

Witchcraft V: Dance with the Devil (1993, directed by Talun Hsu)

Posted on October 14, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

Warlock-turned-attorney William Spanner is back and he’s getting dumber all the time.

In this, the fifth film of the improbably long-running Witchcraft sage, William Spanner is no longer played by Charles Solomon. A considerably more bland actor, Marklen Kennedy, has taken over the role. William is still an attorney and he’s still dating Kelli (Carolyn Taye-Loren). He’s also still in denial about how impossible it is for a former warlock to live a normal life.

Usually, franchise heroes get smarter with each film but William gets progressively dumber. This time, he allows his girlfriend to take him out to yet another club that’s secretly a front for Satanism. Though he should know better than to put himself in the situation, William allows a hypnotist to call him on stage. The hypnotist is Cain (David Huffman), who uses his power to take control of William’s mind and use him to kill his enemies. In order to keep William from breaking free, Cain’s servant, Mala (Nicole Sassaman), frequently sneaks into William’s house in the middle of the night so that they can take part in the type of softcore sex scenes that would, for most people, eventually come to define the future entries in the Witchcraft franchise..

Realizing that something is wrong, Kelli goes to her minister, Rev. Meredith (Lenny Rose). Rev. Meredith sends over a white witch who is played by Aysha Hauer, the daughter of Rutger Hauer. The white witch doesn’t do much but the Hauer connection is cool. Another cool thing is that Greg Grunberg has a small, uncredited role as a bartender, proving that everyone had to start somewhere.

Although the first four Witchcraft films were passably entertaining, Witchcraft V is too dumb to be believed. For someone who doesn’t want to be a warlock, William has a really bad habit of getting involved in stuff that only a warlock could get involved with. Given his long history of dealing with Satanists and sleazy club owners, there’s no way that William should have been dumb enough to allow someone named Cain to have a chance to hypnotize him in the first place.

Probably the best thing that the previous Witchcraft films had with them was the idea of William being both an attorney and warlock. He had the potential to be an interesting character. Unfortunately, in Witchcraft V, William is not just stupid but also reduced to being a supporting character. He doesn’t get to do much, which seems unfair to the three or four people who might actually be invested in his story. Instead, most of the movie focuses on Cain and, strangely, Reverend Meredith. Neither one of them is really interesting enough to carry a movie.

William Spanner would return, albeit played by a different actor, in Witchcraft VI.

Game Review: Ascension of Limbs (2020, AKheon)

Posted on October 14, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

Ascension of Limbs is an entrant in the 2020 Interactive Fiction competition. You can browse and play all the entries here.

In Ascension of Limbs, you play the owner of a mysterious antique store. You may have bought the store. You may have inherited from a relative. You may have gotten it in some other mysterious way. There’s a lot of randomization involved in Ascension of Limbs, which means that you can play the game several times and have a totally different experience each time.

Your goal in Ascension of Limbs is to not go broke, to not go insane, and to not end up poor and destitute. That’s not as easy as it sounds. There are some dangerous things in that antique shop and, if you’re not careful, they can sap away your sanity and lead you to do some terrible things. (Losing a point of sanity limits what you can do in the store, sometimes at the worst possible moment.) If you can’t find anything to sell, you’ll lose money. Lose all your money and the game is over. It’s not easy to make money when you’re also losing your mind. Lose your mind and the game is also over. Balancing both money and sanity will be challenge but the game offers a lot of ways to do it.

Make your choices. Do you promote your store or do you hope the customers will just find you? Do you call the police about criminals or do you use them to commit insurance fraud? Do you build up a strong base of loyal customers or do you murder them, for either their money or as an exchange for forbidden knowledge? The choice is yours!

Ascension of Limbs is a challenging game but I can’t recommend it enough. For those with patience and a tolerance for the occasionally macabre, Ascension of Limbs is a game to play again and again.

Play it here.

Witchcraft IV: The Virgin Heart (1993, directed by James Merendino)

Posted on October 13, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

Witchcraft IV continues the endless story of William Spanner, warlock-turned-attorney.

When this movie begins, William is no longer working for the public defender’s office. Instead, he now handles insurance law. He comments that it’s been years since he last used his powers and he’s happy that he is, once again, living a normal life. However, when Lily Wild (Lisa Jay Harrington) shows up at his office and tells him that her 17 year-old brother, Pete Wild (Orien Richmond), has been arrested for a murder that he didn’t commit, William agrees to serve as Pete’s attorney.

The police are convinced that Pete not only murdered his girlfriend but that he’s also a serial killer who has been responsible for killing at least six other women and removing their hearts. With the police refusing to be of much help and also apparently withholding evidence so that it doesn’t inspire a copycat killer (?), William decides that the only way to defend Pete is to solve the murder on his own.

Searching the scene of the crime, William finds a matchbook with the word “Coven” on it. Coven is a club and William’s investigation leads him to both a stripper named Belladonna (Julie Strain) and Santara (Clive Pearson), the club owner who makes aspiring rockers famous in return for their immortal soul. Santara has not only a very famous father but also a connection to William. No matter how much William tries to escape his past, he keeps getting pulled back in.

Witchcraft IV is unique among the franchise in that it features William narrating his story. William obviously learned how to narrate by watching old film noirs but it’s appropriate because Witchcraft IV is more of a direct-to-video neonoir than a horror film. The horror and supernatural elements are there, of course. But Witchcraft IV is more interested in the mystery aspect of the story than the horror aspect. Unfortunately, the mystery itself isn’t particularly challenging and it seems as if William, given his past, should have been able to figure things out quicker than he did.

The best thing that Witchcraft IV has going for it is Julie Strain in the role of Belladonna. Strain gives a typically uninhibited and forceful performance, one that suggests that, if she had been born many years earlier, she could have had a good career as a noir femme fatale.

Witchcraft IV was directed by James Merendino, who later achieved cult success with SLC Punk! This would also be the last time that Charles Solomon would play the role of William Spanner. In Part V, the role would be played by Marklen Kennedy.

Game Review: Last House On The Block (2020, Jason Olson)

Posted on October 13, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

Last House On The Block is an entrant in the 2020 Interactive Fiction Competition. All of this year’s entries can be played here.

Mr. Harrison, who has lived in your neighborhood longer than anyone who can remember, has died. Mr. Harrison was the neighborhood hermit, a quiet elderly man who lived in a big house and who rarely talked to anyone. Everyone assumed that he had to be rich. Because Mr. Harrison had no family, the city is going to come to his house and take everything. That leaves you with only one chance to explore his house on your own and find the money that you’re sure Mr. Harrison had secreted away.

Just from the set-up, Last House On The Block sounds like it’s going to be horror game but actually, it’s a slice-of-life. You explore Mr. Harrison’s house and see how the old man lived. In order to discover where Mr. Harrison hid his secrets, you’ll have to pay attention to ever detail and start solving puzzles early. From the very start of the game, you’re presented with a puzzle that will either lead to you having a friend to help with your search or leave you with the next-to-impossible task of doing it all by yourself. Some of the puzzles are more difficult than others. Luckily, the game does have a walk-through. I had to refer to it several times but there’s not a single puzzle in the game that can’t be solved on your own. You just have to pay attention.

Last House On The Block is a good example of a search-and-explore type game. I appreciated and enjoyed the care that went into describing each room in the house. By the end of the game, I could visualize every aspect of Last House On The Block. It can be played here. The walk-through is here.

Witchcraft III: The Kiss of Death (1991, directed by Rachel L. Feldman)

Posted on October 12, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

After being a baby during the first Witchcraft and a horny high school student during the second Witchcraft, William Spanner becomes a public defender in the third Witchcraft movie.

William (Charles Solomon) is still trying to hide from his heritage as a warlock. He refuses to discuss his family with his girlfriend, Charlotte (Lisa Toothman) and instead tries to concentrate on helping underprivileged people who have run afoul of the legal system. His latest client, a teenager named Rubin Carter (Ahmad Reese), claims that he didn’t commit the murder that he’s been accused of. William is determined to make sure that Rubin gets a fair trial, despite the machinations of the ruthless DA, Vivian Hill (Nicole Lauren). William has found a way to be useful to society without having to use his magical powers.

However, events are conspiring to force William to embrace his warlock heritage. Louis (Dominic Luciana) is hitting the bar scene and picking up women so he can give them the “kiss of death” and transfer their lifeforce to his girlfriend, Roxy (Lena Hall). After Louis arranges to befriend William, he focuses his attentions on Charlotte. In order to save his girlfriend, William is going to have use the same powers that he’s spent years trying to deny.

Particularly when compared to some of the films that would come after it, Witchcraft III isn’t bad. William’s motivations for hiding from his past actually make sense and Louis is an enjoyably cheesy villain. The film features William getting advice from a witch doctor, which introduces the idea that there’s all sorts of different magic in the world. It’s an intriguing idea, or at least it is when compared with what usually passes for a deep thought in a Witchcraft movie. That’s the whole key to enjoying Witchcraft III. Don’t compare it to a real movie. Compare it to the other Witchcraft films.

I like the idea of a warlock lawyer. It seems like it could have been a good TV show. Instead, it would just be a part of horror’s longest-running franchise. Witchcraft III was enough of a direct-to-video success that Witchcraft IV soon followed.

Game Review: Trusting My Mortal Enemy?! What a Disaster! (2020, Storysinger Presents)

Posted on October 12, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

This TWINE game is an entrant in the 2020 Interactive Fiction Competition. Because it’s October, I’m currently concentrating on only playing the horror and fantasy-based entries but I hope to have played and reviewed all of the entries by November 29th.

In this game, you are Lightbearer, Garden City’s greatest hero. And you are also Promethium, Garden City’s most nefarious villain. You play both roles in this unusual text adventure. When Lightbearer finally defeats Promethium, it might mean that she’ll have to leave Garden City and, for a lot of reasons, she’s not ready to uproot her family and make that move. So, Lightbearer and Promethium make a deal. Lightbearer will let Promethium go free on the condition that they continue to have regular “staged” battles. Lightbearer and Promethium meet regularly at a coffeeshop to choreograph their fights ahead of time. Depending on the choices that the player makes, the hero and the villain can bond over their unexpected similarities or, as the title suggests, trying to trust your enemy can be a complete disaster.

I enjoyed this game. It took me by surprise and both Lightbearer and Promethium were interesting and well-written characters. This game explored why a hero needs a villain and vice versa and the story led to some very unexpected places. It’s not a short game but it is a rewarding one. It’s well worth the time required to play it.

It can be played here.

Witchcraft II: The Temptress (1990, directed by Mark Woods)

Posted on October 11, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

The second of the never-ending Witchcraft series continues the saga of William Churchill Adams Spanner.

We last we saw William, he was just a baby and he and his mother had only barely managed to escape from two 300 year-old witches. In Witchcraft II, William is now 18 years old, which leads to some odd continuity issues. Since the first Witchcraft was clearly set in the late late 80s, this would suggest that Witchcraft II is taking place in the early 21st Century. However, judging by the clothing, the cars, and the slang, Witchcraft II is taking place in the year that it was made, 1990. So, I guess despite all appearances to the contrary, Witchcraft was actually taking place in 1972.

(Then again, Witchcraft II is a Troma film so it’s even more probable that no one involved gave it any of that any thought.)

Having been adopted by Mr. and Mrs. Adams (two white witches who fled the evil coven), William (Charles Solomon) is now a typical teenager and is obsessed with getting laid. Unfortunately, his girlfriend, Michelle (Mia Ruiz), isn’t sure if she’s ready to do that, which leads to William whining and trying to change her mind be playing air guitar. Yes, air guitar.

While William is playing his invisible instruments, the evil witches are coming up with a plan to bring William back over to the dark side and, not surprisingly, it all centers around William’s need for sex. Elizabeth, who was the main witch in the first film and who apparently didn’t actually die at the end of that film despite the fact that everyone who watched it saw that she very clearly did, has been transformed into Deloris Jones (Penthouse model Delia Sheppard), and she is now living next door to the Adamses. While William has hallucinations of Michelle cheating on him with his best friend, Deloris plans to capture William’s soul (and much more) by leaving strange packages on his doorstep and frequently baring her breasts.

The first Witchcraft was low-budge but it still felt like a real movie, albeit not a very good one. Witchcraft II, on the other hand, is very much a direct-to-video production. It has the look of an amateur 80s music video and the actors struggle with even the simplest of lines. The film’s tone is unexpectedly serious, which makes it even stranger when mysterious pentagrams starts to appear on everyone’s chest.

Probably because of the buxom presence of Delia Sheppard (who was very prominently featured on the movie’s VHS and, later, DVD covers), Witchcraft II was a direct-to-video hit. This, of course, led to Witchcraft III.