Ratings War

Got to about chapter 6 or 7 before all the heavily influenced liberal nonsense just ruined the story. I don't appreciate whenever a story forces a political narrative in a story where it has no place. I forwarded through after that. As far as worrying, I'd give the story a solid 5/5. Overall though, I'm giving it a 4/10 because the forced politics ruined the story.

This was the first title by the 'Choice of Games' that I have played, and I was pleasantly surprised to rediscover the 'choose-your-own-adventure' genre in digital form, having only encountered it previously in childrens' literature. 'Ratings War' is, however, far more comprehensively realised than most examples of it's kind on your bookshelf. Though I wouldn't discourage children from playing the game I would emphasize it's maturer writing style and suggest it's suitability for any age, according to taste. The story itself is engaging, reasonably original and has a good sense of narritive cohesion, though now on my second run-through I'm unsure whether the choices I made had any real impact on the story itself, rather affecting other more superficial (but equally important) features. It's difficult to give a specific example without spoilers, but romantic implications, for instance, may arise that affect your gameplay. I picked it up at £1.34 in a sale but at it's normal £2.00 price 'Ratings War' more than reasonable for an evening's entertainment. With a playtime of around 3 hours and some deal of replayability it's definitely worth a look. The free demo contains the first chapter, which I think is enough to decide for sure if this is the game for you! To conclude, in case you haven't realised this by now, I would thoroughly recommend this game to any fan of crime fiction.

For the price of a coffee you can have a brilliantly written, gripping, and hilarious short interactive novel. Filled with interesting characters, difficult choices, and tone so thick you can feel it oozing off of the page.

Well written as some sort of short polar story, but not as a choice novel. Choices are really limited, the branching is obvious and once you made one choice you're quite of forced to stick to all choices similar to that one "skill choice" you made at the beginning. The story is very linear and there is very little differences in the writings or in the story based on your choices. Same can be told about the endings : very little variations. Well written, but not really a choice novel, more like a short kinetic linear novel. Enjoyable, but I would not recommend it because there are'nt really anything specific here and it's not free.

I usually enjoy Choice of Games' products very much, with the Hero-saga and Choice of Robots being among my favorite text-based games. However, this game seemed a bit... off. The ending was slightly abrupt, and the game seemed to be pretty bland, with your choices having minimal effect on the actual story. The setting seemed cool, but it was left largely unexplored. If this game was being sold for a buck, then sure, but three euros is too much for the quality provided. If you want to try out a text-based game, I'd recommend something else, like the aformentioned Choice of Robots.

Ratings War is a story about being a reporter in a near-future setting. It's competently executed and I've recommended it to several people already. The cyberpunk theming is nice, but not deep, which I think is actually the fault of the character POV rather than the author. It isn't sci-fi to the character! The author does seem to have given thought to the implications of the technologies presented. I can't give an unmixed recommendation, but I'm going to limit myself to one big complaint. My biggest complaint with the game is with a certain character who is both 'the cavalry' at a critical point, and then talking about throwing the PC under the bus a few pages later. Come on, that doesn't make sense. An ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ can save the day without ceasing to be an ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. "I don't like you, but I'm not letting THAT happen to you," is a thing people can be motivated by. The protagonist herself (her by default; player can choose otherwise) is a peaceful but tenacious individual who is sympathetic in every path I've played so far. I like that decisions are typically given sympathetic treatment whether they conform to the preferences of people outside of journalism or not. People aren't villains in their own POV. (I wonder if accepting that bribe is treated sympathetically, too...) In general, the game's writing is empathetic, and save for the character I complained about in the second paragraph every character major or minor is given some footing for the decisions they make. That's pretty awesome. Although it is not without its quirks, I recommend Ratings War as an experience.

It's like if Adam Jensen worked for a news network, and couldn't fight for ♥♥♥♥, and the whole world was even more dystopian cyberpunk than before. It's a short, sweet, to the point adventure that I heartily recommend for anyone who enjoys the Choice of Games line. I feel like there was some wasted potential in how long it took for me to complete it, there could've been more stories, more politics, but hey, for what it is, it's good. Choice of Robots will always be my personal favorite, and what I compare all their stories too. I didn't enjoy this one as much as Choice of Robots, but I can say it was very solid, despite the inherent weaknesses of the genre.