Inkslinger

I didn't expect much from a text game, but to my surprise, it's one of the most enjoyable narrative games that I played in months - I would even suggest using headphones because the sound design is just so good. The trailer does not give the game justice, I think it's very atmospheric and even haunting to some extent, it just has that foreboding feel when you play it. It only has about 40 minutes of content for one playthrough, not counting multiple endings, so it's closer to 2 hours for completion. The way the game tells a story is very creative as you have to help people by conveying their thoughts into letters. The characters will present you with multiple words, and you have to type the most appropriate one within the context. If you want, you can screw up on purpose and get some funny responses, which may result in a different ending. In a way, the game kind of checks your vocabulary, it starts easy, but some of the characters will talk in poems and metaphors -- I didn't get it o...

[b]Inkslinger[/b] is a very unique indie game that deserves so much more recognition. It focuses on a single concepts, pinpoints what it wants to do and does it masterfully. And that concept is single: you're an Inkslinger, a very specific being that not only can but must write letters for the inhabitants of Isle Shammer, lest their inkveins wither. If that setup seems vague, that's because it is. The only things you learn about yourself and the game are gleaned through tidbits of conversations and parts of the letters you write for your clients, which is a wonderful way to create a story that takes place in a world way bigger than itself. Gameplay-wise, there isn't much to do in [b]Inkslinger[/b]: you make a handful of choices between several words in order to convey different feelings and styles of writing, which can more or less correspond to what your client is expecting of you. You're got all the time in the world to type and you can't game over, only get a different ending accor...

After hearing about this game on a podcast I thought it would really click with me and got it on the Summer Sale, I love the worldbuilding and the setting and the writing, and the way you have to interpret the requests. However I have a problem with the game. The speed at which the text advances is just a bit too slow for my reading speed, which ends up being quite annoying (I saw an article that said you can speed it up by holding Enter, but it never worked, and I desperately kept trying other keys to no avail). This is just a minor issue when first getting through the game, but there's multiple endings, and you have to replay the game to get them all, with the slow text, and no skipping any already-read dialogue. I just can't imagine doing it, so I'll stick to one ending. I know that the speed and pacing is probably very deliberate, and I shouldnt be complaining about it slowing down a less-than-one-hour experience, but when any other game has a slow text crawl problem it's annoyin...

Eerie and unsettling, utterly original. The most well-written and evocative game I have played since... Return of the Obra Dinn? Whereas most games aiming at some ludic equivalent of the Weird Tale settles for hackneyed gameplay tropes and blunt Lovecraftian clichées, Inkslinger gives you that perfect glimpse into a strange universe, beautiful and mad, delivered through mechanics that are intuitive, yet foreign and bizarre.

Fun and unique indie game with an interesting and refreshing mechanic and fitting art style. Not to mention, the supporting characters and the twists I've unlocked are a perfect mixture of funny and tragic, respectfully. My only criticism is, besides being rather short (which I don't mind personally), is the lack of a skip button. I've only been able to get one ending because it's such a pain to sit through cutscenes where every word of narration is typed out slowly and needs a prompt to get to the next. I don't mind replaying the actual gameplay, but some kind of visual novel type auto-skip would help me a lot to experiment and get different endings. TL;DR I'd definitely recommend getting it on sale if you enjoy story-based games with distinctive mechanics and twists. There's not really anything like it out there.

There's some ingenuity on display. The gameplay is very unique - typing words representing styles and with each keystroke your character types more of what you're supposed to write. I've never seen anything like this. Also, the soundscape is an excellent companion. That said, the game's narrative didn't grab me, and in general I didn't feel any hook at all. I imagine I'm just not the target audience, which is surprising considering I like reading, writing, and text-heavy games. Maybe I just didn't get to the good part - but the start lost me quite quickly. I'm leaving a negative review to say: hey, even though you might think this game is for you, pay attention to the aesthetic. Do you like it? If yes, then by all means, get this game. I tend to look past the aesthetic to get to the core of the game, and it turns out the aesthetic here is a good indicator of the general colour and flavour of the story, so to speak - as such, I should've paid more attention. Cheers to the dev(s) for ...

I'm a sucker for typing games and have played just about all the ones Steam has to offer. This one, like Epistory, has a diagetic reason for you to be typing -- in Epistory it's because you're using words to re-create the world after a disaster, while here it's because you are a supernatural creature who brings people's wishes to life by writing letters for them. I love the mechanic, simple as it is, and the worldbuilding is evocative and fantasy-Victorian in the way of the Fallen London / Sunless games. I also love the way that you slowly build up an understanding of your clients and of the plot as you play through the narrative. The game had its flaws. The cutscenes are very slow and unskippable, and you have to sit through them numerous times if you're trying for multiple endings. There is some ESL weirdness in a few of the vocabulary choices, which matters a lot because the words you choose decide whether you "succeed" or "fail" at writing a letter (though the results are int...

It is a unique spin on text-based games, mostly because of the interface. I really liked the aesthetics, but the text is really small, which can become tiring in a game based on reading a lot.

I unfortunately found it to be very buggy (I had to uninstall and reinstall to even play it) but it's a short game, very evocative. Many trigger warnings, though. [spoiler]Sexual assault, child sickness, child murder.[/spoiler]

Great, really unique game. Some mechanics could be explained better, and the need for pure perfection (without ease of skipping through to see all the endings does make it a bit inconvenient after the first playthrough) is a bit annoying. However, those are just small points against what is otherwise a wonderfully made, beautiful, and well-written game.