I Will Be Your Eyes And Hands

By: Cam Miller
Engine: Twine
Playtime: 10 min.
Link:www.springthing.net/2019/play

I Will Be Your Eyes And Hands is a short sci-fi dystopia that moves between the real and dream world.

The retro aesthetic lends itself well to this piece, though, it was hard on the eyes at times especially if there had been more text on the screen at one time. Thankfully, the author avoided this and parsed out the text bit by bit.

The writing is reminiscent of Philip K. Dick’s, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? The tone is true to the genre creating the feeling of despair and wonder by transporting the reader from the dream world to the dismal “real” world. It plays on a lot of tropes but does so in a way that does not feel tired.

The gameplay is standard for twine and the links all lead to the same place, creating the illusion of choice. There is little expansion provided by exploring the alternate links. The work scene is the strongest point in this piece that drives home the dystopian themes. That said, this feels more like a vertical slice than a finished piece, albeit a well done one.

While I enjoyed this piece, I found that the word choice was limited. At the start, “wandering” became quite grating. The ending left me wanting more, which is a good sign, but there is no real conclusion. It would be fun to see how the author or even others would take what is already a solid start and expand upon it. It would be great to see short pieces like this be opened up to other authors and designers so that they could then build their own stories with the rules provided, kind of like writing prompts.