New Hosted Game! "War of the Gods" by Barbara Elzey

Game was short but neat a nice distraction from life. The whole free thing was surprising and pleasant to see. I did pay to remove adds twice, once on phone and once on the computer. I forgot to buy it on computer first.

At first I was mildly confused at the length until I realized it was several stories. Still good game and I’m happy it was made. Thank you to the author and thank you to hosted games for what you did with it.

11 Likes

I don’t see the problem here. It is like Zombie Exodus: Safe Haven, when that was released it was very branching and consequently very short with the promise of new content to be added over time. War of the Gods is pretty much the same, we get the opening sequence to play through from different perspectives (giving a not insignificant word count) and more content will be added over time.

20 Likes

Ive never played that one and had no clue that was an option

I think its great

1 Like

This one got me super excited and I wanted to try every single start, enjoyed everything about it until it was over… then each start was a single chapter… mega buzz kill. Felt like the shortest book on the site despite the overall word count being OK…

It’s a real shame, this could have been held onto until it was more fleshed out, priced higher. I’d have paid it.

6 Likes

Wow that’s really crappy. I don’t know why people are complaining if they’re free. You either read them and enjoy the freebee or decide it’s not for you if you don’t like the gender locking or subject matter and move on :confused: There’s been some trolling happening in general on HG/COG titles lately so it doesn’t surprise me that trends continuing. (There’s a one * review last time I checked about a helicoper that’s obviously a troll review.)

For everyone who complains about the game being super short despite being 85k words, that’s why most authors aren’t writing super branchy games anymore! The backlash just isn’t worth it. While I could understand unhappy reviews if it was put forward as a paid game if it’s obviously incomplete, it’s free so yeah. (There’s other examples of this like Founder’s Saga on HG which was free but only ever got part one. You can either read and enjoy what’s there, or wait and see if the rest gets released first.)

17 Likes

Had no idea it would be continued, but how can I complain if it is free? Once all is out I will no doubt buy it, because as it stands it was a nice little introduction, call it lightweight? Not to say it is not good, merely easy to get into and through. No Asimov heavy-style, more Shannara, for those who know about those. :grin:

It was quite fun to play the same story from the other side of a character you met. :smiley:

Sure, I wish I could play the whole thing, but it felt a bit like Dragon Age Origins with many different options to play, some I liked a lot more than others, just as DAO. :wink:

So, I will wait to buy it, I think, but I quite enjoyed this one. Especially one path, ft me nicely. :relaxed:

9 Likes

I really liked the premise! And like some have said here before me the fact that you can interact with a character you were a few play throughs ago was a little funny. :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes: My ONLY complaint is that I want mooore… ! If the author is going to tackle this episodically, I think I’ll wait on buying/downloading the story until a good chunk of the series is done. That way I can play all the different routes a bunch more and feel like I have read a decent amount in each story. Otherwise I quite enjoyed the idea and the characters.
Oh and I forgot to put this; if the author feels it is nessesary - and only if they choose to do this of their own volition - they could see if they could mention in the description somewhere that due to multiple routes the progress of each character will be shorter. As I see it, the multiple routes help you to envision the world and to get a grasp of the different factions… :heart_eyes: It’s free game, I don’t see what the big deal is about? I mean you pay for TV with ads. The ads on this are not even that bad! And if you don’t like the shortened routes just wait for more like me! :grin:

5 Likes

I personally don’t have any problem if the free games on HG are short. as long as they are a completed work of IF or at the very least, not having any loose ends. Which in this case, War Of the Gods was not. I was actually really surprised when i beta-tested for the author that the whole game ended abruptly and with a cliffhanger but i chalked it up as “Oh, maybe the author will release the subsequent chapters after this while still in beta testing.” But boi, i heard 0 feedback from the author themselves about my input. Which was kind of disappointing? since i was really absorbed with the game-play and the universe that the author has created. The story itself has a LOT of potential of being one of HG’s most beloved games. But i guess we don’t really have the right to complain much if it’s a free game, we can only hope that the author add more chapters one-by-one in the future (which there is no info that i’m aware of that they’ll release chapters episodically).

The majority of it has been corrected but some of the misspellings and missing quote marks that was in the game, still exist from when i was beta-testing it, even though i’ve already reported almost every single tiny misspellings to the author directly when it was still in the testing process. idk about other tester’s feedbacks though…

5 Likes

Yes and no. The author suggests a price but can be overridden. I don’t know if they would make a story free when the author indicated they wanted it to be paid, but they certainly could. It’s part of the deal.

That said, I have done two stories now and in neither case did they make the price less than what I wanted. My guess is that if they ever do so, it would be for a pretty good reason. They have the data to back up why releasing a 52,000 word story for $6.99 might be a bit of a dodgy prospect.

4 Likes

It feels as tho it’s a short story and not the finished product. Sure it’s free but it feels so rushed and I literally finished it in under 5 min I don’t mind buying it but I feel as tho the author should have finished the whole book or game. Not only would the game have a better amount of income but we would also not have a lot people complaining about 1 chapter.

Ps. Not complaining myself just saying after all I liked it because I read the same one the wip, it’s the same thing just with a price on it and I thought it looked far from finished when I first read it so sorry if I’m coming of as a bit rude.

3 Likes

Yes, it will. It is my intent to write much more. It will build to a final conclusion involving all six character lines.

15 Likes

Lol can’t wait for it the only problem I have with it is that I want to read more .

Ps sorry if I came of a bit rude last reply

Thanks everyone for your comments. I do plan to write much more of the game. My intent was a serial format, much like a trilogy for novels. I can see how, because of the six character viewpoints, it seems shorter, despite being 85,000 words. I am currently working on the WOG II and I’ll make this one much longer to compensate for the six story lines, although they will converge at some point, making that a much easier process.

Perhaps I should have said end of Book 1 instead of Chapter 1.

26 Likes

I think that might be a good idea for something to change in an update at some point, making it Book 2 instead of Chapter 2. Also, congratulations on getting it out there!

13 Likes

“Book 1” is probably a better way to end the first installment. I think that the “shortness” problem is due to the multiple playable characters in the game-- each route is going to seem short. If you were to do it over again, maybe having the complete story for one of the characters per game would meet with a better reception. (Or you might get criticised for telling the same story multiple times from different viewpoints…)

I’ve played through the Solarian path and the ending did seem fairly abrupt and I was left wondering why there was a stat increase right before the ending, especially when there was a save. I am now trying one of the other routes and am curious what the differences are going to be. (I’m curious how the timelines line up-- I am uncertain if the stories are really running parallel or if some take place before or after others.)

The game doesn’t cost very much, so I did purchase it since I spend a lot of my time without internet access, and will probably buy the next installment, too, since I am curious to see how the world will develop.

3 Likes

I actually love it, and I can’t wait for the second part to come out, congrats on the game release :slight_smile:

3 Likes

It was good but short. And I don’t mind having spent some bottlecaps on it :slight_smile:

1 Like

Is there a save feature going to be implemented? While chapter/book 1 is short enough that a replay isn’t much a big deal, having the multiple starting options, makes me want to hold off so that more of the game/story is told or that I can save my place in the story.

From my understanding, save features (that are meant to carry choices over into subsequent stories in a series) are generally not implemented into Hosted Games until their sequels are in the process of being published!

3 Likes