Winners of the 2014 IFComp

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1st place

Hunger Daemon

Cover art for Hunger Daemon

Sean M. Shore mister_patient@yahoo.com

It's not the end of the world, and you're to blame. Better get on that. But man, it sure would be nice to get a bite to eat first.

This work also won 1st place in the 2014 Miss Congeniality Awards.

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Score 8.07
Votes Cast 87
Standard Deviation 1.56

2nd place

Creatures Such as We

Cover art for Creatures Such as We

Lynnea Glasser @lynneaglasser

A dating sim about how humanity connects through art, even out in the vastness of space.

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Score 7.96
Votes Cast 116
Standard Deviation 1.80

3rd place

Jacqueline, Jungle Queen!

Cover art for Jacqueline, Jungle Queen!

Steph Cherrywell steph.cherrywell@gmail.com

You are Jacqueline McBean, modern woman for the Thirties and intrepid international correspondent for the Fresno Bee. The good news is that you're on your way to a plum assignment among the glitzy spires and glamorous nightclubs of beautiful Golanaland. The bad news is that the plane only makes it ninety-nine percent of the way to Gola City and that last one percent is a real doozy. Alone in the heart of the Golanese jungle and armed only with the powers granted by the ancient jungle shrines, can you learn the ways of the animals, wield torrential rains and searing heat, and become at last the mighty Jungle Queen?

Of course you can! You're a modern woman for the Thirties!

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Score 7.30
Votes Cast 60
Standard Deviation 1.42

4th place

AlethiCorp

Cover art for AlethiCorp

Simon Christiansen

Do you have what it takes to be an Associate Information Management Consultant with one of the world's largest information management companies? Can you leverage synergies with the best to operationalize our global market traction? If you were a bear, would you be an American Black Bear or a Siberian Brown bear? If the answer is Yes, apply today!

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Score 6.79
Votes Cast 101
Standard Deviation 1.89

5th place

With Those We Love Alive

Cover art for With Those We Love Alive

Porpentine, Brenda Neotenomie aliendovecote@gmail.com

no dreams

written by porpentine

scored by brenda neotenomie

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Score 6.70
Votes Cast 98
Standard Deviation 2.65

6th place

Fifteen Minutes
An interactive tight spot.

Cover art for Fifteen Minutes

Ade @psyhivegames mikepreston99@outlook.com

You're in a tight spot.

You have fifteen minutes before the Principal expels you from the cosy world of academia and into the cold harsh reality of the real world. You really should do something about it.

A time-travelling tale of paradox management.

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Score 6.43
Votes Cast 72
Standard Deviation 1.89

7th place

Missive
a game over 7 days

Joey Fu @jozerphine oubliette@gmail.com

It's your birthday today. Your ex-girlfriend brings you a present, and inside are a series of mysterious letters that tell the story of an old love triangle that ended in murder. Solve puzzles, solve the mystery, or get wasted and do neither: it's up to you.

This work also won 3rd place in the 2014 Miss Congeniality Awards.

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Score 6.32
Votes Cast 76
Standard Deviation 1.84

8th place

Eidolon

A.D. Jansen adjansen7@gmail.com

When you wake up, something is passing through the night sky.

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Score 6.24
Votes Cast 86
Standard Deviation 2.23

9th place

Krypteia
A fantasy game.

Cover art for Krypteia

Kateri kateri@fallingawkwardly.com

Since ancient times, the wise men explained to you, young warriors have learned to subjugate the Other in order to become men. To face what they should despise, in order to become what they must be. That's great, and all, you think, but... where does that leave YOU?

A fantasy exploration game, in more ways than one. Go out alone at night, face monsters and wear stuff you find in the trash!

Browser-based hypertext. Not compatible with Safari, sorry!

This work also won 2nd place in the 2014 Miss Congeniality Awards.

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Score 6.11
Votes Cast 85
Standard Deviation 2.22

10th place

Tea Ceremony
An alien etiquette simulator

Cover art for Tea Ceremony

Naomi Hinchen improbablefiction@hotmail.com

Why is it that a bright young interstellar diplomat like you keeps getting the jobs no one else seems to want? Okay, so maybe you spent a little more time partying than studying when you were at the academy... and, sure, your work has been a little lackluster... and, fine, maybe you shouldn't have said that about the ambassador's mother... all right, so you know exactly why you keep getting the scut work.

Which is how you got stuck here, schmoozing with a snooty blob-alien with her panties in a twist about etiquette. You'd rather be anywhere else, except that if you don't make nice with her, your career's in the toilet for sure.

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Score 6.08
Votes Cast 83
Standard Deviation 1.29

11th place

Transparent

Cover art for Transparent

Hanon Ondricek @hanonondricek hanon.ondricek@gmail.com

There is a house. There is a room in the house. There is a door in the room. The door is locked. Some people are in the room. Some people are transparent.

(AUTHORS NOTE: (trigger warning?) The audio design includes potentially creepy sounds generated by the game world that might slightly startle the player. The graphics are all in-game documents. This game DOES NOT include any effect specifically designed as an audio-visual "screamer" type jump-scare.)

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Score 5.93
Votes Cast 56
Standard Deviation 1.85

12th place

Enigma

Cover art for Enigma

Simon Deimel @siddi1976 siddirocks@hotmail.de

Eyes can see, and a mind can think. Insanity is just one step away. You are in a room. That's where you are, and you know exactly what is going on. But the truth is hard to take.

The game file includes hints and a walkthrough.

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Score 5.89
Votes Cast 98
Standard Deviation 1.89

13th place

Venus Meets Venus

Cover art for Venus Meets Venus

kaleidofish @kaleidofish

Two women meet in a bar. This is not a love story.

(Mature content warning.)

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Score 5.75
Votes Cast 84
Standard Deviation 2.40

14th place

The Entropy Cage

Cover art for The Entropy Cage

Emmanuel King Turner @stormrose eturnerx@gmail.com (writing as “Stormrose”)

Sub-sentient computer programs 'subs' coordinate our future society. You, the first cyber-psychiatrist, are drawn into the sub's war for their next evolution.

PLAYTIME: ~20mins FORMAT: standalone .html file. (Twine) NOTE: The game includes a simulated computer environment that may take a little effort to decypher. All interactions are click based. RATING: PGR - Parental Guidance Recommended. Atrocity. drugs, religion, sociopathy.

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Score 5.71
Votes Cast 77
Standard Deviation 1.89

15th place

Raik

Cover art for Raik

Harry Giles @harrygiles harry@harrygiles.org

A scots fantasia about anxiety. Battle kelpies, watch TV, avoid your emails and find the magical Staff of the Salmon.

(Content Warning: this storygame contains detailed depictions of panic attacks, physical danger and absurd death.)

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Score 5.69
Votes Cast 62
Standard Deviation 2.00

16th place

The Black Lily

Cover art for The Black Lily

Hannes Schueller

If you think you are being watched while playing this game, keep telling yourself that it's all in your mind.

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Score 5.53
Votes Cast 68
Standard Deviation 1.85

17th place

The Contortionist

Nicholas Stillman nicholasstillman@ns.sympatico.ca

Prison Escape Plan:

1. Squeeze through the bars. 2. ...

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Score 5.44
Votes Cast 59
Standard Deviation 1.92

18th place

Ugly Oafs
Save Green Terra from the Wrath Pulse!

Cover art for Ugly Oafs

Andrew Schultz @anandrewschultz ugly.oafs@gmail.com (writing as “Perry Creel”)

Push back the Wrath Pulse--or find the Fry Gun to destroy it for good!

A wordplay game with several ways to lose deliberately. Source code included.

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Score 5.38
Votes Cast 63
Standard Deviation 2.00

19th place

Jesse Stavro's Doorway
A Long, Strange Trip

Cover art for Jesse Stavro's Doorway

Marshal Tenner Winter marshaltennerwinter@gmail.com

Jordan is looking for his friend, Jesse, who is in hiding from the government. Picking up the trail, he discovers that Jesse is following the Grateful Dead on tour, but as Jordan immerses himself into the "deadhead" culture, he learns that Jesse is not currently in the same decade as those searching for him. The world is full of doors and logic is an illusion in this drug-fueled, time-travel adventure tale.

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Score 5.12
Votes Cast 58
Standard Deviation 1.60

20th place

Following Me

Cover art for Following Me

Tia Orisney t_orisney@gmx.com

Two women take a wrong turn in the woods and make a gruesome discovery. They seek help from a mysterious stranger and are dragged into a vicious trap that they will be lucky to survive.

Intended for mature audiences.

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Score 5.10
Votes Cast 67
Standard Deviation 2.05

21st place

Tower

Cover art for Tower

Simon Deimel @siddi1976 siddirocks@hotmail.de

Out of the blue, and into the blue. And there you are, in a chamber, trying to find out what is going on. Everything is so unreal... what has happened to you? TOWER is a short interactive fiction with surreal elements.

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Score 5.05
Votes Cast 65
Standard Deviation 1.43

22nd place

Paradox Corps

John Evans @Chaoseed johnevanscs@gmail.com

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Score 4.90
Votes Cast 40
Standard Deviation 1.96

23rd place

Zest
A Management Simulator

Cover art for Zest

Fear of Twine (Richard Goodness, lectronice, PaperBlurt) rgoodness@gmail.com

Hello young Limonista!

It's the hottest week of the year, and ordinarily this would be a problem!

But you work at the most popular lemonadery in Sufferette City, and the citizens depend on you to keep cool!

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Score 4.84
Votes Cast 111
Standard Deviation 2.17

24th place

Unform
Welcome to Judgement.

Cover art for Unform

E. Morgan elizemorgan@gmail.com

Welcome to your life, Prisoner 11012. You will survive the scenarios, and do them properly, or you will face Judgement. Your choice, Prisoner. Your life, or your death. It won't hurt a bit.

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Score 4.83
Votes Cast 72
Standard Deviation 1.68

25th place

Origins

Cover art for Origins

Vincent Zeng and Chris Martens chrisamaphone@gmail.com

"Origins" is a story of the individual, potentially convergent paths of two people making their way through Pittsburgh. There are two available modes, a "myopic" view wherein the player controls a single character's choices (but the consequences of both characters' actions are still shown); and an "omniscient" view, where both characters' choices are available. The story is rendered in an experimental multi-pane hypertext format.

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Score 4.81
Votes Cast 63
Standard Deviation 1.66

26th place

HHH.exe
An adventure after the head crash

Cover art for HHH.exe

Robot Parking

The disk drive uttered a sickening crack as you tried to access it. Somehow, you were able to run the single program installed on it, HHH.exe. It's a game, apparently. By turns unfun and familiar; foolish and haunted.

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Score 4.79
Votes Cast 99
Standard Deviation 1.98

27th place

And yet it moves
Eppur si muove

Cover art for And yet it moves

Orion ojzcroc@yahoo.com.au

It is 1630's Florence, and you are an assistant to Galileo. Galileo is under house arrest from the Church, who do not wish for him to have his views in the public eye. He has tasked you with smuggling his book out of the country to get it published.

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Score 4.51
Votes Cast 99
Standard Deviation 1.48

28th place

Begscape

Cover art for Begscape

Porpentine aliendovecote@gmail.com

highly randomized fantasy begging sim or bleak slot machine poem

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Score 4.50
Votes Cast 129
Standard Deviation 2.25

29th place

The Urge

Cover art for The Urge

PaperBlurt @PaperBlurt

Torture, torture little star | You must wonder where you are | Hoping that you'll soon will die | As I melt your face with lye

When your pee mix with your sweat | And the floor with blood is wet | Then you'll feel a real true fright | Torture, torture all long night

When the silver blade once rise | You will live without your eyes | Then you fade away from sight | I'm now your God and I will smite

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Score 4.28
Votes Cast 67
Standard Deviation 2.30

30th place

Milk Party Palace
Comedic Interactive Fiction

Cover art for Milk Party Palace

Alon Karmi & Glenn Parker karmialon@gmail.com

Alec Baldwin gets what Alec Baldwin wants, and when he wants six gallons for a Milk Party, you better believe he's getting six gallons. Includes 3 Endings.

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Score 4.21
Votes Cast 53
Standard Deviation 2.06

31st place

Icepunk

pageboy page13oy@gmail.com

"You are the sole remaining inhabitant of an artificial world above a bizarre, inhospitable earth. A feral child raised by robots, you have just discovered the central computer of your Habitat, and unravelled the tale of a terrible catastrophe. But there is hope. Your task, as the heir to the human race, is to gather the data left in cold storage in the computers of the Caelan Cylinder, and from the icy landscape therein. You will face the wild processes of dead elemental minds, and see many maddening things in your journey through a landscape crawling with material informatics... all on a quest to create a future."

Icepunk is an experimental work combining a procedurally generated world, prefabricated content, non-linear exploration, public domain literature and social media excerpts - to probe the possibilities of Interactive Fiction.

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Score 4.14
Votes Cast 70
Standard Deviation 1.68

32nd place

Caroline

Cover art for Caroline

Kristian Kronstrand k.kronstrand@gmail.com

Let Caroline take you by the hand.

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Score 4.01
Votes Cast 88
Standard Deviation 1.74

33rd place (tie)

The Secret Vaults of Kas the Betrayer
Enter a legendary vault to uncover the secret and bloody past surrounding a powerful magical artifact.

Cover art for The Secret Vaults of Kas the Betrayer

A.E. Jackson info@aejackson.com

Earthquakes have been reported in a region south of the city. A landslide has cleared large swaths of land away from a massive granite wall buried deep under the hillside. This granite wall is merely the edge of a much greater Highwall Peaks mountain range.

Four guards were sent to investigate an ornately carved stone doorway revealed on the face of the granite wall. They were able to pry the stone entry open just enough to slip through. During their preliminary search a map was found in a room off the hallway they explored. The room resembled a gatehouse or officer's quarters the guards stated.

Comparative research by the Great University and a brief review of local lore revealed this as the possible location of 'The Secret Vaults of Kas the Betrayer'. The story is forgotten legend now, merely an insignificant footnote of the Third Age. However, if the stories are true then the Vault must be explored extensively - at once.

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Score 3.98
Votes Cast 61
Standard Deviation 1.78

33rd place (tie)

Building the Right Stuff

Cover art for Building the Right Stuff

Laura Mitchell lauramitchell83@googlemail.com

Nobody likes to mention that space is boring, that's why the OC are willing to pay so much to send you into the great black to press a few buttons. At least they've given you a nice new AI to help you with your mission, although why they want this quadrant to be investigated so fully doesn't quite make sense...

An interactive short story where you have to look beyond the mission.

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Score 3.98
Votes Cast 42
Standard Deviation 1.88

35th place

Excelsior

Arthur DiBianca a_dibianca@yahoo.com

Explore a strange tower and solve puzzles, using a streamlined parser.

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Score 3.96
Votes Cast 67
Standard Deviation 1.67

36th place

Hill 160
A World War I Adventure in Terror

Cover art for Hill 160

Mike Gerwat mike.gerwat@gmail.com

The horrors of trench warfare are brought out in this game. WWI introduced some of the most devastating and horrific weapons not to mention the brutality of both the allies and the Germans. You and your outfit have to fight several battles and get to and infiltrate a German castle to find out the plans of the enemy and hopefully terminate the conflict as soon as possible.

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Score 3.91
Votes Cast 55
Standard Deviation 1.86

37th place

One Night Stand

Cover art for One Night Stand

Giannis G. Georgiou johngeorgegg@gmail.com

After a night of vodka and vague acquaintances, Sandy wakes up in an unknown bedroom, unable to remember the name of the man sleeping next to her. Too proud to leave without a proper goodbye, she will get into meticulous detective work, in order to discover his name and redeem herself. With your help, of course.

This short comedy text adventure features mild sexual references and will be mostly appreciated by persons who have had sex at least twice in their life, with or without other parties involved.

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Score 3.79
Votes Cast 70
Standard Deviation 1.93

38th place

Slasher Swamp

Cover art for Slasher Swamp

Robot robot2600@gmail.com

While driving to Miami for Spring Break, your truck breaks down on a desolate highway.

If you want to survive past midnight, you'll have to use your cunning.

Welcome to Slasher Swamp!

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Score 3.78
Votes Cast 32
Standard Deviation 1.54

39th place

Arqon
A Criminal's Journey

H. J. Hoke hj.hoke2@aol.com

Times were much simpler before you became an assassin for the Bureau of Magic, but they were a bit more complicated as well. You were on the run, and you couldn't live in your sanctuary forever. And thus your adventure begins.

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Score 3.64
Votes Cast 61
Standard Deviation 1.37

40th place

Inward Narrow Crooked Lanes

Cover art for Inward Narrow Crooked Lanes

B Minus Seven @winningcake b.minus.seven@gmail.com

Before we begin, we have a sharp-- I mean short intake form for you to fill out.

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Score 3.51
Votes Cast 80
Standard Deviation 1.97

41st place

Sigmund's Quest
Sigmund’s Quest tells the story of the Völsunga saga, a Norse myth similar to King Arthur in some ways, albeit with more incest

Cover art for Sigmund's Quest

Gregor Holtz @gholtzdesign debrisplease@gmail.com

Sigmund’s Quest is an homage to the classic point-and-click adventure games that inspired me so much as a child. It tells the first part of the story of the Völsunga saga, a Norse myth similar to King Arthur in some ways, albeit with more incest and werewolves.

Note: Sigmund’s Quest is a working demo and does not (yet) contain any werewolves or incest. Sorry!

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Score 3.35
Votes Cast 60
Standard Deviation 1.61

42nd place

Laterna Magica

Cover art for Laterna Magica

JB

As you seat yourself and turn toward your inner light, you ask that one burning question.

"What is laterna magica?"

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Score 2.97
Votes Cast 78
Standard Deviation 1.45

The organizer of the 2014 Annual Interactive Fiction Competition was Jason McIntosh.