Promoted! - part of Disk 1195
  Author Mike DeSanto, ported to Inform by J. Steingreaber

                  Reviewed by John Ferris

Some SynTax readers may have read my review in the Articles
section of "Mad Bomber", an arcade game written with the Inform
language.  This demonstrated quite well the flexibility of the
language and Promoted! shows how this flexibility means that
Inform games don't have to all be the same.

Promoted! was originally written with a utility called
Rexx-Adventure for the OS2 operating system that apparently uses a
point and click text interface.  This port is meant to simulate
this environment, except you can't use the mouse. Commands are
entered using a cursor key driven menu at the top of the display.
The display is then split horizontally with a status bar below
which is the output section.

My first instinct was to groan at such an input system and indeed
I found it slow and annoying. It's an interesting idea but it
doesn't work for me. Reminds me of my early Amiga PD days,
trawling through catalogues for adventures only to find most of
them had "novel" interfaces or other twists (like not working)
that put me off. However, perseverance does pay off.

The game itself is set in what appears to be a computer company,
populated by four kinds of employee. At the top you have the
lawyers who have their own elite band of commando lawyers who tend
to hide in secret compartments. They leap out and carry off
managers who have made the mistake of entering a location
containing anyone but lawyers. This is because managers only
communicate with the Peasants (software and hardware engineers)
via telephone and email, never in person (this sounds like work
used to be a few years back, although these days the place is
swarming with them.).

Lowest on the ladder are the Untouchables; those who actually do
manual work like receptionists and cleaners. They are permitted
not to wear ties because they are actually invisible and so their
appearance will not shock any visitors. The game is actually full
of untouchables, but you don't notice them.

You are a Peasant, or were until you were promoted. Now you have
to navigate from your cubicle to your office, finding a phone and
a computer along the way while staying out of the way of the
Commando Lawyers who are after a scapegoat for the board.

Leaving your cubical is easy but leaving it without being fired
had me confused until I began to play with the objects in the
cubical. This counts as a "sudden-death" location as there is no
warning that leaving will end the game. This was one of the two
difficult puzzles that I found, the second I had to use the built
in hint system for. In general, the puzzles are fairly
straightforward and experienced players will solve the game in
perhaps an hour. Attention to detail is needed especially when
changing disguises. One breach of the dress code and those
Commando Lawyers swarm all over you.

The game itself is quite amusing and clever but short. The
locations are well described and are full of ironic references
that perhaps those who work in any environment will identify with.
I didn't spot any spelling mistakes or bugs.















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