The Bottom of the Well Reviews

The Bottom of the Well, despite being short, turned out to be a surprisingly engaging and challenging little VN. For a free game, this is absolutely worth your while.

I enjoyed it enough at first but there is too much repetiton and it's a touch unrealistic for my tastes (though I have no problem with super-natural elements). It was a good idea with great atmosphere but the game portion needs some improvement. I was going to give the game a positive review because it is free (and that counts for something, even though I have played similar free apocaylse virtual novels that I enjoyed more) but I am now running into a lot of bugs and my crowbar has been removed as an option. Speaking of crowbars... I don't get what the big deal was. I wouldn't call them a "specialy" tool: we always had one growing up and at the current moment I have two or three different types. But the game treated owning one as a huge deal... But it's just like owning a hammer - at least, where I live in the USA, it is.

It's free, easy (?) to play and oddly compelling. There's no flashy graphics, no complicated key combinations, the action is delivered as a narrative, only you decide from a list of options what our heroine (Alice) does next. Unfortunatly the choices I've made so far have resulted in her death, some more gruesome than others, but....It's free, did I mention that? Get it, try it, you have nothing to lose, except Alice's life.

[b]Pros:[/b] - Many ways to die - Atmospheric - Simple - Customizable character sheet - Free - Achievements [b]Cons[/b] - Finishing can be quite tedious - What items are good/bad not clear Personal Rating: 3.5/5