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I'm AMAZED to see no reviews posted for this one. Did I miss 'em?



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REVIEWER NAME: Joe Murphy

1) CREATIVE AND EFFECTIVE INCORPORATION OF RULES (1-10): 10
Feedback: Just perfect. Glass is used (brilliantly) by the character's
LCD faces. The characters report to a Committee at the end of the
game. And the whole point of the game is to test Emotions. Even
Ancient is covered, as the setting is a futuristic New Olympus based
on ancient Greek principles (and everyone wears togas).

And the characters live for eight hours before they face the committee.

This game is packed with awesome, awesome, brilliant stuff.


2) CLARITY (1-10): 10
Feedback: Absolutely clear. The opening fiction set up the setting.
The setting leads to the rules. The rules have a zillion examples.
There are example NPCs, all good. And then there's an appendix with
character sheets and 'face cards' for the eight basic faces the robots
can use.

In fact, every time I read a rule and didn't quite get it, a great
example popped up.


3) COMPLETENESS (1-10): 10
Feedback: This is complete. Unless you wanted blueprints of the robots
or something nutty like that.

I particularly liked the aforementioned 'face cards'. Such a great
playing piece.


4) ESTIMATED EFFECTIVENESS IN PLAY (1-10): 8
Feedback: The only problems I could see were that there were some
skills missing. I wasn't sure how I'd arbitrate if the characters were
trying to, say, resist pain or fire. There's no 'stamina' ability, for
example. I also wasn't sure if robots had any inherent abilities or
qualities that humans didn't - toughness, speed, perception etc.

And could a robot download skills like 'Persuasion'? How about
'Wrestling'? What proportion of a skill is programming, and what
physical?

But really, these are niggling points.

The emotions/skills and how sins and virtues are generated looks like
a solid system. The gaming session could maybe do with a little more
structure, but looks fine as is.


5) SWING VOTE (1-10): 10
Final Feedback: Wow.

_Wow_.

I'm a little lost for words at how complete and solidly written the
game is. Did we have the same 9 days to create a game? =)

It's a game of extended character generation, where the whimsies of
fate slowly create a person the players portray. It's like raising a
child.

'Liquid Crystal' is a brilliant, beautiful game that I want to play.


TOTAL SCORE (add items 1 through 5, above): 48

To be honest, the 'game calendar' of Merryweather left me almost totally cold. Fortunately for both myself and the author it wasn't one of the ones that I had to review. I just felt that the calendar was over-structured. When I run an RPG I have enough trouble keeping track of what events are happening without also having to worry about forcing the plot and the players to conform to a pre-designed plan. The calendar looks like it has been quite closely modelled on the modern Hollywood method of movie production, not necessarily a bad thing, but anyone who's got a copy of the rulebook could look at the calendar and think 'OK, so this is happening next?' Takes a bit out of the mystery for me and restricts you a little too much in how the plot develops.

I'd also note that while the time limit is strictly enforced by the rules in Merryweather, there is no physical reason that I can see for the time limit that is enforced, other than the rules say so. The rules even point out that the GM has to keep a careful eye on each scene to make sure it doesn't "dead end" and it's anyone's guess what would happen if a particular part of the calendar was resolved quicker than expected. So while the time limit is part of the rules, it doesn't really seem to enmesh at all with the setting and the time limit could in fact get in the way of the plot. Maybe I'm missing something here, I don't know, it just didn't gel with me.

My own feelings about how the time limit has been used in this year's Game Chef is that a fair few (at least of the ones I've read through, about ten or twelve so far) have designed games that they think ought to run for approximately that amount of time without enforcing it, or tacked on the time limit as an afterthought rather than having a reason for it. Merryweather makes interesting use of the time limit mechanically but it doesn't seem at all necessary for the time limit to be there, it's just a device to keep the game from overrunning. There's an interesting use of the time limit in Cage of Reason, where each two-hour session is meant to be a Sunday evening type wrestling show, although that was exactly the opposite of Merryweather; it was well-supported in the background and theme of the game, but poorly executed with a regard to the rules.

Still it would be a boring old world if we were all the same!

Ash