If Comp 2009: The Believable Adventures of an Invisible Man

I didn’t get very far in to this one.  It has some typos and some downright confusing bits. I was frustrated by the lack of simple QOL fixes: the game needed automatic door opening in particular.

More spoilery things:

By not very far, I mean, I managed to make it in to my lab, having figured out the envelope puzzle, but couldn’t figure out what to do after there.  The envelope puzzle I kind of liked.  Although… it was really fiddly, and I almost screwed it up the first time, and you probably can make the game unwinnable if, say, you mail the white envelope back to the university without putting anything in it first.  (Though I can’t confirm that you can, since I didn’t try it, I did accidentally drop the “vanilla” envelope in the box the first time and have to go back and do it again, being sure to drop in the correct one.)

Dear Author: you meant Manila Envelope.  Those are the big beige-colored envelopes that inter-office communication is often tossed in. You did not mean “Vanilla Envelope,” which is not actually a thing. I used to make this mistake when I was a kid, so I understand, but you really gotta check these things.  Though I guess if you had betas, they didn’t catch this either.

It occurred to me that the only reason this was a puzzle at all was because I was invisible. If I hadn’t actually drank the invisibility potion, I could’ve just showed up to my lab like normal.  I was still getting a paycheck, so it’s not as if I was persona non gratia at the university.  Of course maybe I didn’t even need the chemicals from my lab, either – the walkthrough says they’re just to get through the crowds I have to fight, but I never would’ve figured that out since it’s not very well clued…  I mean, it’s possible that the entire game’s set of events would be completely trivial if I was not invisible, but I’m out of time on the game and don’t feel like inputting the entire walkthrough to find out. Apparently I later have to disguise myself with bandages so as to appear not invisible?  I guess this is a satire on how being invisible doesn’t help.

The first note in my short set of notes about the game reads: “I don’t know my goal.”  That really basically sums the game up in a nutshell.  I’m aware my goal is some kind of unspecified revenge, and that is presumably mostly on my boss, whose office is locked, but I don’t know what sort of revenge or what any of the intermediate steps are, and it’s not super fun flailing around trying to figure that out. Especially when it’s (apparently, by the walkthrough) so very convoluted.


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