Avatar of the Wolf

One of the better choice of games I’ve played! The wide range of options really gave me a sense of control and connections to the characters. Plus gotta love letting loose and eating your enemies once in a while, amiright. Though, [SPOILERS] some parts of the ending should be fixed—even when I chose to keep things peaceful between the Rising Sun and the enclave, they still declared war however I played it. And also when I became Lyall’s partner, that somehow meant I was disconnected from the enclave? Not sure if there’s a glitch somewhere, but the endings are always the same.

If you want to go on an action-packed saga of revenge, this is the game for you. Enjoy the variations you can take on that route. If you want the other routes, well... that's less interesting. The game's decisions are not well-set-up for rewards for pacifistic choices. Spider (deliberation/selfish) is interesting because it plays against the choice system - most selfish choices seem to go against deliberation, and most deliberation choices are non-selfish. Unless I missed the appropriate boosts, playing the Spider Path takes some thought to actually keep both traits above 50%. The Rising Sun path is welcome, as a rebellion against the gods, but would be more interesting if the default path didn't have half the pantheon attempting to kill you anyway. Speaking of that, I apparently had a moderate approval rating for my actions after the ending... say WHAT? How? Is there any way to have a LOW rating, if one can have their approval after openly declaring one's hostility to the pantheon and immediately making good on it?! I really liked this game. It feels complete. However, I wish there was more reward for changing from Wolf - say, becoming the new Hawk or Bear avatar. Or being able to romance their current avatar. (If that's good enough for Spider...) It feels like the game barely acknowledges being on their paths, which is a pity. Overall: buy and go Wolf. You can and should do others on replays, but RPing as Wolf's loyal avatar will give you the best first-experience of the plot events.

Great story, but comes and goes really fast.

This is a great interactive novel. Albeit a bit short. Would love to see more of this. Maybe a second will make an appearance?

Avatar of the Wolf by Bendi Barrett is a text-based adventure game published by Choice of Games and using CoG’s ChoiceScript engine. The ChoiceScript engine is also used by all of Choice of Games’ games, as well as by all Hosted Games games (Hosted Games, despite being listed as a separate publisher in the store, is just a brand used by CoG). If you haven’t played any of the other ChoiceScript games, they play like a hybrid between RPGs and chose-your-own-adventure novels. At each page, you are presented with a multiple-choice question about what your character does. Unlike the paper CYOA books, you also have stats, which are altered based on your choices. Some choices may seem to have no immediate effect on the story, but they can alter your stats, which can unlock certain options much further down the road. Now, I will warn you, since I know it will turn off a lot of gamers: CHOICESCRIPT GAMES ARE ENTIRELY TEXT-BASED! THIS GAME CONTAINS NO GRAPHICS OR SOUND OF ANY KIND. IF YOU PLAY GAMES PRIMARILY FOR THE GRAPHICS, YOU SHOULD NOT GET THIS GAME. Okay, are they gone? Good, let’s get on to the game. Avatar of the Wolf is set in a dark fantasy world, which until recently was dominated by a pantheon of six gods: Bear, Eal, Gazelle, Hawk, Spider, and Wolf. The people of the world were also divided in to three tribes, called Clearwater, Highwalk, and Quietly Swimming (you get to choose your character’s tribe in the first chapter). Aside from your tribe, you will also quickly be prompted to decide on your character’s name, gender and sexual orientation. Up until right before the story started, your character was the titular Avatar of Wolf: a mortal chosen as a vessel by the god to manifest in the world. But right as the story starts, Wolf has vanished completely. The pantheon of gods now has only five members, and no one knows what happened to Wolf or even if he still exists. Now, the remaining gods, and their followers, are squabbling over the remaining power. There’s also a faction of mortals called the Rising Sun, whose objective is to eliminate the gods altogether. You are caught in the middle of everything. Depending on your choices, you can team up with one of the existing factions, found your own, destroy the remaining gods or become a god yourself. Now, on to your stats in this game. The stats page has your stats divided into four sections: Self, Skills, Disposition, and Favor. Self includes the basic information about your character: name, gender, tribe, and orientation, all of which you decide in the first chapter. Your tribe affects how some characters react to you. Your orientation only matters if you want your character to pursue romance in the game. I don’t think your name ever has any effect on the story or the choices you are presented, aside from being spoken in the dialogue many times. Next up are your character’s Skills. Skills don’t affect what choices you are presented with, but they do alter the effects of those choices. Here’s where Avatar of the Wolf becomes less like a paper-bound choose-your-own-adventure novel and more like a game. Anyhow, the skills you get in this game are Survival, Combat, Ritual, Quick-Thinking, Sensitivity, Influence, and Restraint. The next section of stats is your Dispositions. This section includes two pairs of linked stats. The first pair is Action/Deliberation. Each can range from 0 to 100, and the sum of your Action and Deliberation is always 100. You also have Selfishness/Equity, another pair of linked stats that always add up to 100. Unlike skills, disposition effects what choices you are given. For example, if your Action gets too high, you may be unable to take a choice that involves waiting. Finally, your character has Favor. This section tracks your relation to various important NPCs and factions, including each of the remaining gods and the Rising Sun. Having a positive relation with important characters can open up options much later in the game, and can have a huge effect on the ending. This section of the stats page did occasionally shake my suspension of disbelief: the game tells you if certain NPCs have a positive or negative view of your character, even if your character wouldn’t know how they were perceived. Normally I don’t mind knowing information that my character doesn’t in a game, but in this game, Favor is the only think you learn that your character wouldn’t know. Everything else in the game is presented entirely from your character’s perspective, and this one exception through me off. All in all, Avatar of the Wolf contains a richly detailed world and an intriguing variable storyline. The wide range of choices means that you could easily play this game more than a dozen times without things feeling repetitive. Or, at least, everything after chapter one wont’ seem repetitive, since you need the first chapter to set things up. You’ll need to play through many times if you want all the achievements, and the game offers enough to make it an enjoyable experience.

It was mildly entertaining. Character development is poor and it is very short. Just needed more but had potential.

I can't believe how the quality of choice of games has fallen. I haven't seen a decent Game posted for a long while now. Most of the good ones are under the hosted games. In any case main problems are the story is unclear and confusing, it has little replay value and I couldn't understand what was my ultimate goal.

Best nee choice of game release! I have been waiting for a good one like this. The past few were pretty bad.

I really like the universe that was created, it makes you feel more invested in the story. It gives you a lot of fun options to choose from, being able to take different approaches to conflicts in a meaningful way.

Very well written but a little difficult (compared to the other games I've played) for me to figure out which things increase which stats. Overall I'd recommend to a friend and I'll be replaying this a number of times