Re: Instant Death


8 Mar 95 09:05:53 GMT

dmb@rice-chex.ai.mit.edu (David Baggett) writes:

>I've noticed that no one wants to "name names" in this newsgroup.
>Unfortunately, feedback -- positive or negative -- only benefits authors if
>we know who and what you're targeting.

Hm. Well, Dave's challenged me, so here we go...

Here are some of the Instant Death Syndrome examples that annoyed me
and prompted me to post my original complaint. I'd like to stress that
I'm *not* saying these are bad games or anything, and I'm not trying
to pick on the authors... I just don't like these scenes.

SPOILERS for Veritas, Fire Witch and WayStation.

Here's an example from Veritas:

>look
Stairwell, 4th floor
You are in the fourth floor stairwell of G Entry. North leads to
your room (G-43); stairs lead down.

Your roommate follows you.

>south
You tumble over the railing of the stairwell and plummet four stories,
landing with a thud on the cold, hard marble floor. You have broken
your neck in several places.

***** You're toast, pal! *****

In 2 turns you have achieved a score of 0 out of 400. This makes you a
high school applicant.

And one from Fire Witch:

>look
Side Corridor
This is a side corridor leading east and west. It is somewhat
smaller than the long tunnel, which lies to the east. An archway lies
to the west. You can't put your finger on it, but you have a very
strange feeling about that archway.

>examine archway
The archway is made of the same tiled stone as the rest of the
construction seems to be made of. Shining your light through the
archway reveals the dim outline of a room with a safe in the wall
beyond it.

There is something that you can't put your finger on about the archway
that bothers you.

>west
As you are moving through the archway, you hear a sound much like that
of breaking glass, and you suddenly become very disoriented. When you
regain your senses a moment later, you are not where you thought you
would be.

Eastern Cell
You are in a non-descript 10 x 10 room of tiled stone. It has the
appearances of a cell, but has no door.
There is an exit to the west.

There is a loud and horrible rushing noise in your ears, and the room
appears to be filling up with what you would describe as steam if it
were not so very very cold.

>west
You frantically try to push out of the room, but moving through the
doorway is like trying to push through thick molasses.

Your flesh feels like leather and your eyes like glass as a huge block
of ice forms around you. Mysteriously you are not killed outright by
this; instead you fall into a deep sleep. Unfortunately, within a few
days without food you expire anyway.

*** You have died ***

In a total of 19 turns, you have achieved a score of 0 points out of a
possible 10.

And finally one from WayStation:

>look
Building Entrance
You are standing in what appears to be the entrance to this
building. To the south is an open door; sunlight streams through it.
You can sometimes see a glittering strand of some sort across the
entrance. A hallway continues north. To the west is a small doorway.

>examine strand
You squint, trying to bring the glittering into sharper focus. After a
moment, you notice that the glitter is coming from dust motes
reflecting several red beams.

>south
You begin to walk south through the entrance. As you do so, you
suddenly lose all feeling in your legs. When you look down to see
what's wrong, you notice that your legs have been cut into tiny bits by
laser beams that cross the threshold of the door. "My, that happened
quickly!" you think as you fall backwards, into the beams. The second
cut splits your torso into more bits, speeding your death.

>> You have died <<

In a total of 16 turns, you have achieved a score of 8 points out of a
possible 110, giving you the rank of Inept Discoverer.

What annoys me about these scenes is that they're quite arbitrary. I
don't call "You feel uneasy about the archway" or "You see glittering
red beams" to be adequate warnings at all. The descriptions of the
deaths are gleefully morbid (ha ha - you died!). And then a couple of
these games, like many games, insult the player by printing a snide
rank (you have 0 out of 21303 points - this makes you a total loser)
when you croak. In all, these scenes make me not want to play the
games any further. And in fact I didn't.

So there you go. Just more ramblings. I'll hop off this particular
hobby horse now; I'm sure it's getting boring for most folk.

- Neil K.

-- 
  49N 16' 123W 7'  /  Vancouver, BC, Canada  /  n_k_guy@sfu.ca