healyg | IF Comp Review: Kane County (Reply)

Hello, all and sundry! We're in the final stretch of the IF Comp judging period, so I'll be reviewing one game a day until Saturday, November 14th. (That's an extra 4 reviews!) Up next, it's Michael Sterling and Tia Orisney's Kane County.

Kane County is a game of survival set in the Utah desert. The basic gameplay is kind of like a cross between Oregon Trail and a Fighting Fantasy gamebook. You have a water stat and a stamina stat, each of which can go down thanks to troubles on the road. You need to balance between scavenging for restoration and other helpful items, and moving on before you lose more water and stamina than you can handle. The game feels fairly well-balanced, and I made it to a winning ending on my first try, though not without some hardships. Writing-wise, the descriptions and such aren't so sparkling, and I spotted a couple typos, but this is more of a mechanics-focused game than a story one, and the mechanics are solid.

Conclusion: Kane County is a perfectly fine survival sim, especially if you like gamebook-esque mechanics.