Hi Ali,
I've only just had the chance to download and play the game, although I've been keeping my eye out for it ever since I saw some preview art in the "Critics Lounge"!
First off, I just want to say I had a really great time playing this game! The puzzles were a healthy mixture of simple and challenging across the board, and I didn't have to use the Hints page once! Some of them were quite imaginative - I particularly enjoyed ...
... figuring out the correct Pirate's Guild tattoo ...
... and I didn't even mind ...
... the cryptography puzzle in unscrambling the piraglyphics ...
... because all the clues were made readily available to the player, which shows some nice forethought. I also really liked that you could pick up extra clues / move forward just by learning things and asking old characters for new information - it made for an enjoyable storyplaying experience.
The graphics and humour were both superb, too! The game had a simple but very charming, polished and original look to it - it reminded me somewhat of an early 90s cartoon! Both the look and the witty, character-filled dialogue really drew me into the world of the game and I loved every second I spent there. As other people have said, the humorous pirate game always risks feeling cliched after the MI games but I think you successfully pulled off your own take on the genre.
I do agree with some minor criticisms that other posters have made. I, too, grew a little weary of the repeating dialogue trees. I like that you wanted to make information constantly accessible to the player - it's always a blessing to be able to go back and check! - but in many games, the original dialogue gets replaced with a much more succinct version that reiterates only the most important points. I think there were several dialogues in your game that could've benefited from that technique.
I also didn't like that some puzzles, i.e.:
Using the iHook on the "Hook-a-Duck" pole only AFTER Nelly has played the game and realised it was rigged.
were "time-released", so the player couldn't perform the action until the game decided it was the right time. It reminded me a little of
Discworld (one of my least favourite games), where you'd try something and Rincewind would tell you "good idea ... but not just yet!" It was frustrating in the extreme because you then had to work out what logic function the game wanted you to complete first, rather than carry on playing the story. I like that you wanted to provide a breadcrumb path of clues for the players - in fact, there were occasions when I really appreciated it! - but there will always be times when the player's mind leaps ahead a few stages, and the game should allow them to do that, too.
But these are just minor cavails. I must emphasise how much I enjoyed playing the game - and how much I enjoy looking forward to playing it again soon!
