COMPLETE: You Are SpamZapper 3.1
Nov. 12th, 2021 08:22 pmMore IFComp 2021 extra credit games. The judging deadline is in a few days, so this may be the last one, actually.
You Are SpamZapper 3.1 by Leon Arnott takes a look inside the world of computers, as many of the games we played this year did. You, as you might have guessed, are SpamZapper 3.1, an email plugin tasked with screening all of your human's incoming emails and approving or zapping them.
The player character begins this tale incredibly jaded; ages of having to read brain-dead "who could possibly fall for this crap?" spam letters all day every day has brought them to the point where they hate their job and they hate people in general. This creates a bit of dissonance which is one of the things for which we have to ding this game: we ended up liking the early portion of the game a lot more than our POV character did. The "approve or deny incoming letters" mechanic is done very well. It feels interesting and is a clever and creative way to present the world of this setting. Even the obvious pointless filler spam letters are written to be amusing to read, and the way the game furthers its plot with the letters from the human's friends in between all the spam is an inventive way to handle the pacing and the drip-feeding of the game's story. It even makes what is actually a somewhat railroaded plot progression feel interactive, with all the letters to approve or deny. All in all, we were really liking this! Unfortunately, SpamZapper wasn't, and having our POV character constantly raining on our parade did feel a bit unfortunate.
Said plot is very intriguing when it picks up, as it explores the question of living and self-aware computer programs and the rules by which they must play, even as they find themselves in the role of unlikely heroes tasked with saving one of the human's closest friends from her overly controlling religious conservative father. It had quite a few moments that the other woodlings, particularly Sara, related to. The plot is gripping, intense, and... unfortunately something like three or four hours long. IFComp has a very strict rule about spending more than two hours on a game. Games longer than two hours are permissible, but only the first two hours can be reviewed. Prospective judges just stop at the two hour mark, write a review, and stick to it without changing it based on any later information. Alas, we were so engrossed with the plot that we lost track of time, missed that cutoff point, and therefore are unable to adhere to those rules without cheating. Therefore, this is another game that we are unable to score and submit.
Still, unofficially? This was outstanding. We love the story and we love the creative gameplay mechanics through which the story was told. It's a strong recommendation overall.
You Are SpamZapper 3.1 by Leon Arnott takes a look inside the world of computers, as many of the games we played this year did. You, as you might have guessed, are SpamZapper 3.1, an email plugin tasked with screening all of your human's incoming emails and approving or zapping them.
The player character begins this tale incredibly jaded; ages of having to read brain-dead "who could possibly fall for this crap?" spam letters all day every day has brought them to the point where they hate their job and they hate people in general. This creates a bit of dissonance which is one of the things for which we have to ding this game: we ended up liking the early portion of the game a lot more than our POV character did. The "approve or deny incoming letters" mechanic is done very well. It feels interesting and is a clever and creative way to present the world of this setting. Even the obvious pointless filler spam letters are written to be amusing to read, and the way the game furthers its plot with the letters from the human's friends in between all the spam is an inventive way to handle the pacing and the drip-feeding of the game's story. It even makes what is actually a somewhat railroaded plot progression feel interactive, with all the letters to approve or deny. All in all, we were really liking this! Unfortunately, SpamZapper wasn't, and having our POV character constantly raining on our parade did feel a bit unfortunate.
Said plot is very intriguing when it picks up, as it explores the question of living and self-aware computer programs and the rules by which they must play, even as they find themselves in the role of unlikely heroes tasked with saving one of the human's closest friends from her overly controlling religious conservative father. It had quite a few moments that the other woodlings, particularly Sara, related to. The plot is gripping, intense, and... unfortunately something like three or four hours long. IFComp has a very strict rule about spending more than two hours on a game. Games longer than two hours are permissible, but only the first two hours can be reviewed. Prospective judges just stop at the two hour mark, write a review, and stick to it without changing it based on any later information. Alas, we were so engrossed with the plot that we lost track of time, missed that cutoff point, and therefore are unable to adhere to those rules without cheating. Therefore, this is another game that we are unable to score and submit.
Still, unofficially? This was outstanding. We love the story and we love the creative gameplay mechanics through which the story was told. It's a strong recommendation overall.