Diary of a Roadie
Developer: CMMN CLRS [Common
Colors]
Free Game: Entry for the 2016
Adventure Jam
I seldom if ever examine
free games, but this one caught my attention. As noted above, Common
Colors is the name of the Belgium-Germany-based indie game development
team who presented a short, but inventive, and I might add creative
twist on a point and click Adventure Game. There are no requirements
listed on the download site. I suspect they are minimal.
Mechanics
The game downloads as a
zip file, which you should place in a dedicated folder you create on
either your C drive or as a sub folder under Documents. Once extracted,
the game is approximately 14 MB total. There is no install required. You
simply click on the .exe file and the game begins. You will notice there
is no menu. As I said, upon initiation you are playing the game. There
are no saves. You do not really need them.
Navigation is rather
simple and is all done with the mouse. A right click offers four
options: Use, Talk to, Walk to, and Look. It is one click at a time. You
do not see a list to select from. Simply click again for the next
choice. Scrolling your mouse wheel down brings up the inventory, or you
can access it by pressing the letter “I” on your keyboard. The Esc key
quits the game.
The
Story
Our hero
is named Emmett, who is the brother of a touring Rock Band living a full
life of sex, drugs, and Rock'n'Roll. There is nothing graphic. It is all
innuendo and wry humor. The game opens with Emmett passed out on the
ground near the backstage door, to discover he is late for work. He is a
Roadie responsible for stage set up and sound checks before the concert
begins. To Emmett’s chagrin, he discovers he does not have his backstage
pass and cannot get inside. How can he find his pass to avoid getting
fired? Your task is to play the hungover roadie and find a way inside.
Game
Play
The graphics are
exceptionally sharp and crisp with pixel hunting at a minimum. There is
no audio at all. Conversations are displayed on the screen as text. All
puzzles are inventory based, and there are several in this short game. A
sweep of the mouse identifies interactive items. The entire game is
played on a single screen which expands as you walk to the furthest
edges. You interact with several characters that give you clues through
conversation.
Puzzles are not overly
difficult, but require a challenging amount of thinking outside the box.
Yes, there are a number of items requiring mixing and matching inside
the inventory screen. The game is short. Perhaps an hour of time is
required to work your way through it. Playing time is highly dependent
upon your ability to figure out proper combinations to mix, creating the
tools you need.
Summary
For a short game, I
found Diary of a Roadie to have a creative story cleverly done. The
ending, which I will not give away, is perhaps one of the most ingenious
plot twists that I’ve seen in a long time. For the cost (Free) you
cannot go wrong. It is an hour long diversion that is sure to entertain.
You can find it here at
GameJolt.
GameBoomers Review Guidelines
June 2016
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