Red and Gold by Christina Nordlander

[raw]
made by Christina Nordlander for LD28 (JAM)
A raising sim in Twine where you are an incorporeal alien possessing a human. You need to train up your human Casing to the point where it can defeat the opposing faction's champion in a battle.

Source code is available.

I apologise for the unpolished state of this entry: even with the extra day for the Jam, I had to dummy out a bunch of variables (for example, I was planning to implement a money and food system), and the theme of "you only get one" would have been more prominent. Still, the entry as it stands is fully winnable (and losable).

Some tips for successful human management:

-Don't work your human into the ground. Not only does that impact the human's health, but its suspicion that it is being controlled will also rise.
-Running is kind of poor for levelling up the Toughness stat. However, other options are available.

Inspirations: "Bloody Princess Farmer" by Porpentine; "Horse Master" by Tom McHenry.

EDIT: Note that the list of options may sometimes extend past the bottom of the screen. If anything seems to be missing, just scroll down.

Ratings

Coolness 75% 2
Overall(Jam) 2.69 426
Audio(Jam) 1.35 476
Fun(Jam) 2.26 467
Graphics(Jam) 1.42 542
Humor(Jam) 2.04 353
Innovation(Jam) 3.16 166
Mood(Jam) 2.88 267
Theme(Jam) 3.05 188

Feedback

Vi-King Games
17. Dec 2013 · 00:14 UTC
So far, this is the most original way to use the theme I've seen. Good job!
gamesbyangelina
17. Dec 2013 · 14:14 UTC
Nice use of the theme! I liked the tension in reading books, and the time management in going to town to expand the options. Nice work all around!
Aaants
18. Dec 2013 · 22:16 UTC
Interesting approach. I tried to make him super smart but, unfortunately, the smart kid tends to lose the playground fights :(
tripleVisionGames
18. Dec 2013 · 22:27 UTC
Great use of the theme. Really do enjoy this kind of game (Porpentine's work in particular is fantastic), this is great work within the 48 hours
kristoffer zetterberg
19. Dec 2013 · 15:22 UTC
impressive, and vaguely disturbing, the way i wouldn't let my human get intelligent enough to see how i used it.
SecondDimension
19. Dec 2013 · 19:59 UTC
I love the imagination that has gone into this, such an original idea
PaperBlurt
20. Dec 2013 · 16:09 UTC
Good Job.. Nice entry, that works fine with Twine!
MrTedders
20. Dec 2013 · 16:19 UTC
Wow innovative stuff here. Really well done
Techblogogy
20. Dec 2013 · 16:20 UTC
Awesome game
tobbez
20. Dec 2013 · 16:35 UTC
Liked the buildup although it was much too slow to replay. The text got repetitive quickly and there were many unneccessary clicks that could have been removed in the training process.
🎤 Christina Nordlander
20. Dec 2013 · 16:38 UTC
@tobbez: Yeah, when I played through it for troubleshooting I realised it was very click-heavy.

Thank you very much for your comments, all of you!
postmodestie
20. Dec 2013 · 18:03 UTC
As for a LD entry, it would have indeed benefited from less repetitiveness, as stated before..
NikinCZ
20. Dec 2013 · 18:18 UTC
Not much fun, it's repeatedly clicking. Like a classic text-adventure.
Gungnir
21. Dec 2013 · 07:56 UTC
Enjoyed the build up and the conclusion. Wish there were more branching opportunities during training, possibly the case - but perhaps I missed the opportunity. Like the concept, point of view and general language.
PaperBlurt
21. Dec 2013 · 08:18 UTC
As Christina gave my entry (also Twine) a lot of feedback.

I went back and wanted to pay her entry the same respect:

The first time I played it I gave it a shot - I liked the style and the build-up.

After a while, when playing it again, I, as many other comments state, see that it's real repetitive. The main concept of controling a unaware human is interesting, and could be something good.

But eventually the constant clicking gets tedious.

Feels that, instead of doing a shorter game with less content, you've tried to make a longer game with the same content.

Anyways.

I like the different style (a lof of Twine games are just the standard design) and the start grabs you.

But the end doesn't really delivers.
🎤 Christina Nordlander
21. Dec 2013 · 10:03 UTC
@Gungnir: More branching for the training would definitely have been great, but I kind of bit off more than I could chew with this game, and was lucky to even get the main story finished on time.

@PaperBlurt: You're right, within hindsight it should have been shorter. This is the first simulation game I made, and it was rather hard for me to gauge variables such as length, challenge level etc.

The original idea was actually for the game to be even longer, which wouldn't have been a good thing.

Thank you very much for your in-depth critique.
SnoringFrog
22. Dec 2013 · 04:41 UTC
I like the idea, but it did get a little monotonous. I am about to begin my 3rd playthrough where I will attempt to make my human smart enough to find me out.
Xanjos
24. Dec 2013 · 19:22 UTC
Game was pretty interesting and quite enjoyable but it seemed too long and repetitive.
BradleySmith
24. Dec 2013 · 19:28 UTC
Interesting take on the theme. :)
Erkberg
25. Dec 2013 · 16:53 UTC
A very interesting game. It did get a little repetetive, like stated before. A little more variety in the outcomes of actions would be nice. For example, I was hoping to find some more by going to town than just one thing or that something will happen if I let the human read enough or maybe some random event happens while going for a run. Overall though, it kept me interested for one playthrough, good job!
🎤 Christina Nordlander
26. Dec 2013 · 13:05 UTC
@Erkberg: All those are very good suggestions. I would definitely have put in more of that if I'd had more time.

SPOILER


Actually, if you take the option of running at night, the human has a low risk of getting assaulted by muggers. The outcome depends on their level of strength and remaining fatigue. If they're injured, going to town the next day will open the opportunity of visiting the hospital.
loxo
28. Dec 2013 · 18:57 UTC
I like the idea very much. But I think the game would really profit from a different kind of presentation (some graphics), because there is not much variation in the text and the given options. In the current form maybe shorter days would work better. But you had planed more, so maybe you find some time to incorporate your other ideas.
x70x
30. Dec 2013 · 23:56 UTC
I feel like this was a lot of clicking for very little payoff. A Twine game should give me something new to read as often as possible. I was skipping past the repeating text as much as possible. The concept and setup was interesting though.
emmelineprufrock
01. Jan 2014 · 01:10 UTC
Very interesting entry, and very cool use of twine + variables.
local minimum
01. Jan 2014 · 21:52 UTC
I liked the tone in the text, it felt a bit long, the character training with too few ways to influence the how one progresses. It was hard to know what stats were good, so some general indication would have been great. A nice text-game though.
finefin
03. Jan 2014 · 12:36 UTC
really interesting way to use twine for an RPG-esque game! the texts could have been a bit more philisophical/existentialist - for example the moment the human recognizes he's controlled could be fleshed out... but hey, I really like it!
RodRoy1
04. Jan 2014 · 23:39 UTC
nice game. The use of twine is great, and the management sim idea is good. I used twine for the competition, but i didnt manage to play much with the formatting before submission. I always love a good text game.
Peni6
05. Jan 2014 · 23:31 UTC
I'm not spending this long just to assign skill points