Alone in the Park isn’t an overly complicated game. The player drives the journey of a first-person narrator as she tries to find pieces of a map hidden throughout a nearby public park. Half of the screen is dedicated to the narrator and her descriptions of the people and places that are encountered and the actions that the player chooses. The other half of the screen includes a section of the overall map (with locations hidden until approached) along with an inventory grid containing pictures of the people and objects encountered. That side of the screen also houses icons associated with each place the character has visited and allow for quick travel. It’s simple and intuitive and that’s exactly what’s needed for a game of this nature.

The saying goes that life’s about the journey, not the destination, and that’s definitely true of this game. Katharine Neil of Cheap Drunk Games has done a wonderful job with the storytelling. Although the characters our protagonist meets along the way tend to be one-note stereotypes, Neil manages to keep the narration fresh, a bit saucy, and generally funny. Sarcasm, innuendo, and off-kilter observations are employed to great effect from beginning to end. The story of a largely text-based adventure is perhaps the most important element in separating success from failure. Alone in the Park scores a big win here.

Search a park full of nutty characters to piece together the purpose of a mysterious letter.

Alone in the Park wouldn’t be a complete game if there weren’t some level of challenge to it. As mentioned earlier, the player is tasked with finding pieces of a map to help solve a mystery and find a treasure. More often than not, the map pieces aren’t hidden but instead held by characters not immediately eager to part with them. In those cases, the player must complete a task to satisfy the owner. These can vary from fetch quests (thankfully only a few) to legitimate problem-solving  using acquired items. The items may be actual objects found or icons representing other characters already met. Depending on if it’s the right context, the player can use these icons in order to open a new line of dialogue and eventually earn that precious map piece.

Most people should be able to solve the majority of puzzles without too much trouble, but trial-and-error with the different objects can eventually net success. There were only a couple of puzzles that I was stuck on for awhile, but it was these puzzles that were ultimately the most rewarding. All told I was able to squeeze about four or five hours out of the game while playing at a leisurely pace. Because the individual puzzles are largely compartmentalized – and for the most part non-linear in their order – it’s easy to leave the game and come back without being at a loss for where to pick up the trail.

The park’s residents won’t be quick to part with their pieces of the map.

Because there’s not a lot of action involved, I believe this game can hold an appeal for audiences of a wide age range. The mature nature of some of the jokes, however, has necessitated an age restriction of 17 years or older in the App Store. Still, it’s the humor and overall writing that’s the strength of Alone in the Park and what places it high in the ranks of casual adventure games of the text-based variety.

Overall Rating: ★★★★☆ 

What does this score mean?

This game was reviewed using a copy provided by the developer for that purpose. The game was reviewed using the iPad version, but you can win a copy of the PC version by entering the contest below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

© 2013, The Indie Mine. All rights reserved.

Late last year I had the pleasure of reviewing Buddha Finger, a charming kung-fu themed game for the iPad and developed by Lady Shotgun Games. The writing and music for that title was handled by Katharine Neil who is about to release a game under her own label, Cheap Drunk Games. That game is Alone in the Park and I had a chance to get my hands on an iPad preview build. This text-based/graphical adventure game hybrid impressed me with how the game is structured and the casual feel of playing it. I’ll save a full review for when it’s released, so for now here are some relevant facts and impressions about what to expect.

The setup for Alone in the Park is that the player’s character discovers a mysterious letter indicating that there’s a treasure to be found in a nearby park. The location of that treasure is uncovered by finding map pieces through exploration and puzzle-solving. Along the way, the player encounters a variety of oddball characters most of whom will require some sort of favor to be completed in order to gain important information or a map piece from them. Naturally the process of completing that goal isn’t simple, and will often require backtracking to find other clues and achieve other goals in order to progress further.

Uncover new locations and characters in the park through exploration.

Perhaps the most interesting element of Alone in the Park is how it is played. Half of the user interface is a text area used to describe what’s going on and display conversations between the characters. The other half of the GUI is the graphical portion of the game. By default it will display the park map while the player is exploring. The entire map isn’t visible at one time, and key locations in the park must be discovered by walking near them (think ‘fog of war’) at which point they are drawn on the map. The player enters those locations in order to find objects, animals, new characters and in general to help the story progress. Any objects, clues, or characters that are encountered receive an icon in a tray for use later.

Interaction with the characters is handled in a simple, straightforward approach from the player’s perspective. The developer intentionally focuses on not including complicated conversation trees. Instead, the player can drag an image of an object or creature they’ve encountered onto the picture of another character in order to potentially initiate a new conversational topic (only some topics are conversation-worthy to a particular character). It’s in this manner that the plot is developed and puzzles are solved. I couldn’t help but be reminded of my experiences playing the old LucasArts adventure games like Sam & Max Hit the Road. Like the characters in that game, Alone in the Park plays heavily on stereotypes. The characters are pretty one-note like the spiritual healer, the eco warrior, the businessman and so on.  Cheap Drunk gets a lot of comedic mileage out of it thanks to text-based storytelling full of witty sarcasm and a heavy dose of puns and innuendo.

Although the characters encountered are one-dimensional, there’s plenty of humor to be found.

Aside from a bit of nostalgia, what I enjoyed most about the preview build was the leisurely way in which it can be played. There’s a log of all current tasks and the latest progress on them, so it’s really the kind of game that someone can play for brief bursts and come back to with little trouble. The final game will be a short experience (an estimated four hours or so), but that seems well-suited for a casual mystery. Alone in the Park is scheduled to release on June 15th for PC, Mac, Linux, and the iPad. Be sure to check back here at The Indie Mine for a full review. In the meantime, you can find the trailer below.

© 2013, The Indie Mine. All rights reserved.