Game review
New Year's Eve, 2019
7.3 / 10
- Developer
- Autumn Chen
- Publisher
- Independent
- Released
- 1 January 2019
- Platforms
- Web browser (desktop and mobile)
- Genre
- Interactive Fiction
- Monetisation
- Free, open source, no ads and no in-game purchases
- Players
- Single-player only
The short version
New Year's Eve, 2019 is a compact, introspective piece of interactive fiction — you're at a party you're not sure you still belong at, surrounded by friends you're not sure are still your friends, and every choice is a tap or a click on a link. It's a smaller work than the same author's other three Dendry-engine pieces already on this shelf, but it's built the same reliable way: every interaction is a plain anchor tag, with nothing that treats a mouse differently from a finger. The only real issue this review found wasn't a touch problem at all — the shipped build was missing a required jQuery file and failed to start entirely until that was restored from the identical dependency the author's other three games already ship.
Biggest strengths
- Every interaction is a tap-or-click on a plain link, the exact same mechanism already confirmed working across this author's three other accepted Dendry-engine games, and confirmed again here by actually starting the game and advancing through two real narrative beats via simulated touch
- Clean, legible presentation that reads comfortably at phone width — the same proven layout template as the author's larger works, appropriately scaled down
- No analytics, no third-party trackers, and a clear MIT licence with proper attribution
Biggest weaknesses
- "The build as checked out did not run at all: `index.html` requires a local `jquery-1.11.1.min.js` that isn't committed to this repository, and the game threw `jQuery is not defined` on load, leaving nothing but a blank failure. This was fixed by substituting the byte-identical jQuery build already shipped with the author's three other accepted games (verified via matching checksums) before this review could proceed at all — a real gate-1 hosting problem, not a touch-specific one"
- Noticeably smaller in scope than the author's other Dendry works on this shelf (38 scene files versus a much larger interactive fiction), which caps how much choice and consequence it can offer in a single sitting
- As with the genre generally, there's no mechanical depth here beyond reading and choosing; the appeal is entirely the writing
Who it's for: Fans of short, personal interactive fiction, and anyone who's played the author's other three works already on this shelf
Our recommendation: A smaller, solid entry from a proven author — worth the twenty minutes it asks for
7.3 / 10
Autumn Chen's Dendry-engine interactive fiction has already earned a strong track record on this shelf — Pageant, The Archivist and the Revolution, and Social Democracy: An Alternate History are all accepted works built on the same foundation. New Year's Eve, 2019 is a smaller, more personal piece from the same toolkit: you're at a party, it's 6:00 PM, and the opening lines don't waste time on scene-setting pleasantries. "At least your friends are here. Or are they your friends still? It's been so long..." The whole piece is built around that kind of quiet unease rather than plot mechanics, and the choice structure — tap "Introspect" to dig into who you are, or move forward into the party itself — matches that introspective framing from the first screen.
A real bug, and it wasn't a touch one
Before any of that could be tested, the game didn't load at all. The shipped build's index.html references a local jquery-1.11.1.min.js that simply isn't present in the repository, and the page threw jQuery is not defined immediately, leaving a blank, broken shell. This is worth naming specifically because it's exactly the kind of failure a phone-focused checklist could miss if it only checked for touch-specific problems: the game was unplayable on any device until fixed. The fix itself was straightforward and safe — the same jQuery 1.11.1 build is already bundled with all three of this author's other Dendry games already on the shelf, and a checksum comparison confirmed the four copies are byte-identical, so copying it in restored the exact dependency the author's own build process would have produced.
Confirmed working once it actually loads
With that fixed, the interaction model held up exactly as expected from the author's other works: every choice is a plain anchor-tag link, and a simulated touch tap on "Start game" correctly advanced into the opening scene, with a second tap on "Introspect" correctly advancing the narrative again. There's no separate touch layer to fall out of sync and nothing here that treats a phone as a second-class citizen — it's the same reliable, link-driven interaction that made the author's larger works work well on this shelf, just applied to a shorter, more contained story.
Should you play it
If you enjoyed the author's other pieces here, this is a smaller but genuine companion — the same careful, specific voice in a shorter form. It won't take the place of the bigger works, but it's a solid twenty minutes once the one real bug standing between the player and the story is out of the way.
Pros and cons
Pros
- Every interaction is a tap-or-click on a plain link, the exact same mechanism already confirmed working across this author's three other accepted Dendry-engine games, and confirmed again here by actually starting the game and advancing through two real narrative beats via simulated touch
- Clean, legible presentation that reads comfortably at phone width — the same proven layout template as the author's larger works, appropriately scaled down
- No analytics, no third-party trackers, and a clear MIT licence with proper attribution
- A genuinely personal, specific piece of writing rather than a generic party scenario — the opening beats establish real tension about who these "friends" still are to the protagonist
Cons
- "The build as checked out did not run at all: `index.html` requires a local `jquery-1.11.1.min.js` that isn't committed to this repository, and the game threw `jQuery is not defined` on load, leaving nothing but a blank failure. This was fixed by substituting the byte-identical jQuery build already shipped with the author's three other accepted games (verified via matching checksums) before this review could proceed at all — a real gate-1 hosting problem, not a touch-specific one"
- Noticeably smaller in scope than the author's other Dendry works on this shelf (38 scene files versus a much larger interactive fiction), which caps how much choice and consequence it can offer in a single sitting
- As with the genre generally, there's no mechanical depth here beyond reading and choosing; the appeal is entirely the writing