Game review
asdf
7.4 / 10
- Developer
- Tim Pietrusky
- Publisher
- Tim Pietrusky
- Released
- 1 January 2012
- Platforms
- desktop
- Genre
- puzzle
- Monetisation
- free
- Players
- false
The short version
A clean, well-presented Simon-says memory game that names itself honestly as a Keyboard-Only-Game and delivers exactly that - confirmed correct with a deliberate wrong-key test that produced an accurate, specific "you pushed the wrong key" game over. Correctly shipped under the desktop-only tier rather than pretending to support touch it explicitly says it doesn't.
Biggest strengths
- Controls confirmed genuinely correct, not just present - a new game was started with the space bar, and a deliberately wrong key press produced a specific, accurate game-over message naming both the correct expected key and the key that was actually pressed, proving the input is read and compared correctly rather than just accepting any key
- Honest about its own limitations - the game explicitly states in its own body copy that it is a "Keyboard-Only-Game (KOG)" and was correctly classified under the shelf's desktop-only tier rather than forced onto the touch shelf where it wouldn't work
- Clean, well-polished presentation for a small game-jam entry - a satisfying rounded four-quadrant layout, a score/level/mode readout, adjustable difficulty and volume, and clear on-screen key legends throughout
Biggest weaknesses
- A stale external script reference (a CSS vendor-prefix polyfill fetched from a raw GitHub URL) is blocked by modern browser security (ORB) and fails to load - confirmed harmless, since the game's CSS renders and functions correctly without it
- Explicitly and permanently keyboard-only by the developer's own admission, so it is not and never will be a touch experience
- A simple, well-worn genre (Simon-says) with only the home-row key gimmick as its differentiator
Who it's for: Fans of classic Simon-says memory games who want a clean keyboard-only take with no ads, no download, and no touch pretence.
Our recommendation: play
7.4 / 10
Opening
asdf is a small, clean Simon-says memory game: watch a sequence light up across four colour quadrants mapped to the A, S, D, and F keys, then repeat it back. It's upfront about what it is - the page itself says "This is a Keyboard-Only-Game (KOG). So please use your keyboard." - and it delivers exactly that.
Controls, confirmed with a deliberate mistake
The best way to confirm a memory game's input handling is to get it wrong on purpose and see if the game notices correctly. That's exactly what was tested here: a new game was started with the space bar, and once the first step of the sequence was shown, a deliberately incorrect key was pressed instead of the correct one. The result was a precise, accurate game-over screen reading "d was the next key, but you pushed a" - naming both the correct expected key and the key actually pressed. That's decisive proof the keyboard input is genuinely read and compared against the real game state, not just loosely accepted.
Two small things found and handled
A legacy Google Analytics snippet was present in the page and has been removed before publishing. Separately, the page references a CSS vendor-prefix helper library from a raw GitHub URL, which modern browsers now block as an opaque cross-origin response; this was confirmed harmless, since the page's styling renders and the game functions correctly without it.
Final Verdict
A tidy, honest little memory game that says exactly what it is and backs that up with correctly-working keyboard controls, confirmed by deliberately trying to break them. Not deep, but well made and free of pretence.
Pros and cons
Pros
- Controls confirmed genuinely correct, not just present - a new game was started with the space bar, and a deliberately wrong key press produced a specific, accurate game-over message naming both the correct expected key and the key that was actually pressed, proving the input is read and compared correctly rather than just accepting any key
- Honest about its own limitations - the game explicitly states in its own body copy that it is a "Keyboard-Only-Game (KOG)" and was correctly classified under the shelf's desktop-only tier rather than forced onto the touch shelf where it wouldn't work
- Clean, well-polished presentation for a small game-jam entry - a satisfying rounded four-quadrant layout, a score/level/mode readout, adjustable difficulty and volume, and clear on-screen key legends throughout
- MIT licensed
- A legacy Google Analytics tracking snippet was found in the source and removed before publishing
Cons
- A stale external script reference (a CSS vendor-prefix polyfill fetched from a raw GitHub URL) is blocked by modern browser security (ORB) and fails to load - confirmed harmless, since the game's CSS renders and functions correctly without it
- Explicitly and permanently keyboard-only by the developer's own admission, so it is not and never will be a touch experience
- A simple, well-worn genre (Simon-says) with only the home-row key gimmick as its differentiator