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Prosperity of
Cheaters
Reviews
Author: Rip_CPU
Date: 2009
Z-Code
What does AIF stand for? Adult Interactive Fiction.
If you likely to
be offended by games with sexual content, you are advised not
to open these
files.
Reviewed by A. Ninny (Inside
Erin: The AIF Community Newsletter Volume 5 Number 7 – July 2009)
Overview: You’ve got the hots for a girl, but she’s got a boyfriend. You have a
girlfriend, so if you want to score you’re going to have to cheat and convince
her to cheat as well. Now’s your chance: it’s the wildest
party of the year.
Review: I’m going to review this game as it is, ignoring for the moment that it
violated the mini-comp rules by using three non-player characters, instead of
the maximum two. I penalized it for this when I voted; no need to penalize it
twice.
This is a nice little game, not too ambitious, but it works well in an
old-fashioned mini-AIF kind of way: a simple setting, a straightforward goal, an
endlessly repeating script to give you plenty of time to figure out
the solution, and a puzzle that isn’t too taxing, but one that has six different
outcomes. If this weren’t a mini-comp game, instead of two sex endings and four
non-sex endings, you could have different pairings
and even orgies. Maybe Rip_CPU will go back and add these later – it would make
for a fun little T&AIF. The game doesn’t concern itself too much with characters
or background. The PC expresses his feelings in
a basic way about the boyfriend of the target girl (he’s a jerk, of course), his
own girlfriend (gotta get her out of the way somehow), and the desired girl (hottie),
but that’s all the depth we get on them. Still, even
though we don’t get much characterization, it works with the casual sex college
kid attitude that permeates the game. The sex writing is decent; there are two
different sex scenes, and they’re quite different from one
another. I think it’s worth your while to find both.
Concept: B. It’s a simple idea, executed reasonably well.
Writing: B. Concise, simple to follow, writing that doesn’t challenge, but still
provides enough detail to carry the story. The writing could have been improved
if the party atmosphere was noisier – the game has scripts constantly running,
why not add some party activity in the background?
Characters: C+. They’re certainly not profound, but there’s enough here to work
with.
Hotness: B. Two different sex scenes, nicely detailed, with several different
responses for each action.
Technical: C. I found quite a few bugs, commands that gave no responses, objects
that didn’t disambiguate properly, and overall I think the implementation could
have been more robust.
Enjoyment: B-. Again, I found this to be a simple concept built into a fun
little game.
Reviewed by ExLibris (Inside
Erin: The AIF Community Newsletter Volume 5 Number 7 – July 2009)
It says something for the prevailing themes of this minicomp that despite
casting the player in the role of someone who happily drugs people and cheats on
his girlfriend, Cheaters was actually one of the 'lighter'
games.
I think it's pretty safe to say that of the two games the author contributed to
the minicomp, this is the one that was finished second. Compared to Obedience,
it feels unfinished and lacks the same degree of polish.
Objects mentioned in room descriptions aren't always implemented (a pet peeve of
mine) and the sex scene (or at least the one I've found so far) feels fairly
perfunctory. There were also a few bugs, mainly actions
that could be repeated when they shouldn't (e.g. talking to Beth or using the
phone).
Cheaters does breach the rules as far as characters go, and I've reflected that
in where I've ranked it. But I think I would have ranked it quite low in any
case, as characterisation is one of the areas where the game is
lacking. There's no ask/tell system, which wouldn't be so bad except that
talking to characters rarely produces anything meaningful either. The only real
source of characterisation is a few snippets of
conversation that you overhear while standing about in the main room. Of course
sometimes a little is enough, and hearing their respective opinions on Twilight
was certainly enough to make me want to pick
Beth over Kirsten.
A consequence of the limited characterisation is that there is no real
relationship built up between the PC and Bethany. The PC is told that she's hot,
but that's about it. If it wasn't for the Twilight thing she and
Kirsten would be virtually indistinguishable. Beth really needed more spotlight
time than she received to sell her to the player as a desirable lust object. As
it was, when the sex scene made its appearance, Beth
moved from being 'girl you've just met' to 'girl you're having sex with' very
abruptly and unconvincingly. From memory the conversation ran something like
this: PC: "Oh dear, my girlfriend and your boyfriend are
having sex." Beth: "Yes, that is a shame. Perhaps we should have sex also?" PC:
"Okay". I'm exaggerating a bit, but that's the overall impression I have of it.
As mentioned above, the sex scene is comparatively brief and one of the weaker
entries in the competition. The lack of characterisation led to a sex scene that
had no real power attached to it. If it had been written
differently it could have been carried by simple physical lust, but that didn't
happen either and the scene felt like something of a dud.
Overall, I'd classify this game as a might have been. Having multiple endings is
always a plus, and I feel that the basic concept was a good one, though not
necessarily for a minicomp game. It also needed more
time and polish to properly realise that concept.
Reviewed by Gary Plume (Inside Erin: The AIF
Community Newsletter Volume 5 Number 7 – July 2009)
This had nice gameplay if a bit simplistic in manipulating humans and timing
their routines. I didn't mind the rule violation because I'm not a stickler by
nature. Sex with the object of your affections seemed
anticlimactic. It was fun trying the game over to reach all six endings: a nice
device to keep me coming back. There is a technical problem with talking to Beth
in the bathroom in scenario 6 - her discovery of the
boyfriend's infidelity repeats. In post-mini-comp modifications, wouldn't mind
playing for a menage-a-troi ending or even a lesbo voyeur ending. I was annoyed
that the punch couldn't be used to spike drinks.
Perhaps a solution could be a warning that "The purple color of the punch is
going to be a dead giveaway if you spike drinks with it." "Ask ____ about ____"
provoked puzzling nonresponses.
Reviews should be considered copyrighted by their respective authors.
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