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Invitation to a Dream (IGMC version)

  • Liberty
  • 02/22/2016 01:07 PM
  • 681 views
Invitation to a Dream was one of the entries for the IGMC (Indie Game Making Contest) for 2015. As one of the judges of the competition it is my pleasure to share my thoughts on the game. This review will basically just be the notes I took cleaned up. It will be based on the competition version of the game, so certain aspects of the game may have been changed, and thus I won't be giving an official star score (though I will be including an unofficial score).

Presentation
The game as a whole is a mixture of interesting and questionable.

The graphics are a mix of drawn and textures and while it works well enough in some areas (using bark textures for tree trunks) it doesn't work quite as well with others (huge wooden boards for floors inside a house). It creates an interesting dichotomy but can be a bit too much at times, especially when size becomes an issue. Case point: the floorboards in the bedroom at the start of the game are huge in comparison to the character and furniture, making it look very strange.

Writing was quite well done in that there were no issues with grammar and spelling that I could find, though the characterisation was another thing altogether, as the main character went from antagonistic towards the main male lead, to friendly, to romantic within what seemed like mere moments. There's no build-up to this romance at all and it comes completely out of left field, making you wonder what the hell just happened.

The growing love between the main character and male lead would have made for an interesting tale, but considering she met him twice, for about 10 minutes tops, and started out disliking him, the 'love' between them was unrealistically accelerated and really didn't make sense at all. It felt more like a girl who had been bewitched into loving him more than anything - something that the ending would have us believe was not the truth. In fact, the whole ending hinged on the idea that theirs was a true love, to beat out the false loves he'd had in the past. It was rather unrealistic to say the least.

Sound was decent and music was very nice and fit well with the game scenes and areas.

Gameplay
The gameplay was also pretty good, though it had some issues too. Honestly, it was a little lacking, bar the battles. You walked around, picked up an item or two, mainly either solving riddles through name input menus or fighting battles.

The riddles were a decent challenge. The battles were interesting in one way but not in another. You could either move forward or backward, attack with your sword or defend and jump. You had to beat your foe before they beat you and most of it, if you played aggressively, was easy enough.

Thankfully the game was too short for you to grow tired of the mechanic but even the five fights in the game were enough to make you want a bit more to the combat. Just swinging a sword was a bit dull, after all. At least there were no bugs that I found.

Engagement
It wasn't the best and most interestingly crafted story but it did provide a modicum of interest to see where it was going and while the characterisation was pretty damn spotty, there wasn't anything to make you run away screaming - it was short so finishing it wasn't a big deal, though some of the fights could get a bit hard if you weren't paying attention to what was going on and having to redo fights made them a bit more annoying and bland.


Overall, the game was decent enough. It's a good thing it was short as the battle system could have gotten boring over extended use, but the majority of the game was okay, though there were questionable texture use and the character interaction was quite unbelievable, considering the way they met and the ending itself.

If I were giving it a score, it would be 2.5 stars - middle of the road. Not great but not bad either. In the IGMC I gave it a 45.