Sorrow of a Furry Father

[Syos Spaniel]

A story of family love, reconciliation, and getting transformed into a fox.

https://imagifox.itch.io/sorrow-of-a-furry-father

[bicilotti]

An interesting game, in which the characters goes through very rough times and a metamorphosis.
I really enjoyed the puzzle, they managed to be unique and fit the theme. Bits of poetry through the game were good too, added to the atmosphere. Did not like the old sierra interface that much to be honest, as it didn't add that much to the above mentioned puzzles or the game itself.

I still have to finish it (outside General store), congrats on the release!

[heltenjon]

This game grew on me. The first impression may not be all that much, but it is clearly a work of love, and the author has put a lot of work into this, especially the puzzle design.

The game has two parts. In the first part, we are treated to single screen challenges and puzzles while the story develops. The puzzles in this part are generally quite good, and there are also hints available, even when you play in difficult mode. There is a sort of color-based maze, which I found very original and fun to play (a bit hard for the colour-blind, though). However, I had some problems with the way the story was told in this part. I think the game would have benefited from being told from a different POV in the first chapter. Noone will think "I need three items to cheer me up" or "Two of three were correct". But this will work if the POV is set outside the player character: "Find three items to cheer him up!" This first chapter plays like a puzzle game with a background story more than a traditional adventure game. It could easily have been a separate download and labeled chapter one.

In the second half, we play the part of the man-now-turned-fox in a more traditional point and click, inventory based gameplay. In this part, the POV works fine. The advantage of having this as a separate download would be that players who only want the point and click parts, could get that. This is where the main difference lays - easy mode will be easy or moderate, while difficult mode is not only hard, but at times almost impossible. Luckily, I played at the same time as @Wiggy , so we could exchange hints, and the author also provided solutions if needed. Search for the hint thread if you are reading this after some time has gone by. 

Graphics and sound: The main graphics won't win any prizes. But my main gripe with them is that I wished they could be somewhat bigger. Some objects are hard to find, and it is a pixel hunt sometimes. Luckily, the author has provided hints. For instance, the fox may smell something, giving us the idea that we have to search the screen. There is a bit of music, but most of the time, the game is silent. (It wasn't my style of music, so I didn't mind.) There are also lots of shortcuts. Many characters and actions are not shown, but only described in captions. The game is definitely guilty of telling, not showing. This could have been solved by making stills, which would still save the animation work. But I would rather have the game this way than not having it at all, so I find it hard to really be annoyed by this.

The story is odd, there is no way around that. There is a mix of very serious undertones and a kind of redemption story, and hilarious oh-no-newspaper front pages that kind of clashes. But okay, if I can play a kid who want to be a pirate, I can certainly play a fox that wants to be his son's pet. Most of the time, I knew what goals I had and what I needed to try to do.

Puzzles: This is the game's strong suit and its weak suit. Many of the puzzles are quite original and different from other games. There are fetch quests, poems to unscramble, riddles to solve, items to combine (though never in the inventory window) and position-based puzzles. The variety is huge, and I liked many of them. In easy mode, the puzzles are fewer or involve fewer steps. There are also more comments from the fox along the way that ease the player experience. In difficult mode...well, congratulations to anyone who manages to solve this alone without hints! The final code - well, I do not think I under any circumstances could have solved that without brute forcing it, trying out all 40000 combinations...

Some suggestions for improvement: I think there could have been more feedback to the player in some places. When gathering items for the kids' pirate game, the boy could have told me how many items were missing when I talked to him, for instance. The tug of war puzzle

Spoiler

was perplexing to me because the floor didn't respond to any other interaction. I had no way of suspecting there was a hotspot there. I had tried using the cup of water directly on the boy, but not right beside him. If looking at the floor was possible, then this would be signalled to the player. One could argue that the puzzle is easier if the hotspot is visible, but I don't think concealing it is the correct way of making it harder for the player. (Even though I did something similar in Getting the Picture.)

[close]

The locked box puzzle is fine in easy mode. In difficult mode

Spoiler

I don't think it makes sense. If the fox could puzzle out that he needs to break off some teeth from the comb in order to open the box, he could bite them off, or he could search for a hard object to break them with. As it is now, the fox breaks the comb, and then it fits the holes completely by accident. There is a hint from the narrator, but the way this is told, it is not logical problem solving, as the fox has no reason to use the comb on the rock. The narrator gives the player a hint, but the fox doesn't know that.

[close]

The poachers:

Spoiler

I would have liked if we got a picture of the fox giving the evidence to the shop clerk, who in turn could get hold of a ranger. As it is, we are simply told that the fox gets hold of a ranger. How would he do that?

[close]

The owl puzzle:

Spoiler

This has a hint, and indeed, this may be solved by accident or pure luck. I almost feel bad for suggesting something that's hard to code, but I would have liked a visual clue here - like the eyes of the owl actually following the fox's movements. (I'm impressed that the author has coded it the way it is, already!) I have to admit that the twisting technique was a bit lost on me, and I just kept trying it on stuff to see if it had any effect.

[close]

In conclusion I'd say that people can give this game a chance and give it a try. It's a bit different than most adventures, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.