Creating a creative project.

March 2, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Before we began looking at the different programs used to make electronic literature, it never once occurred to me how much time and effort needs to be dedicated to making even the simplest form of electronic literature. As I began creating my own project using Inform 7, I quickly realized how difficult the task of creating a text adventure could be.  Every single action, thought, etc needs to be stated, even if it seems unimportant or obvious to you. One wrong or missing piece of text could prevent your text adventure from working correctly.  The text adventure I created was very simple, yet I still spent hours planning and testing the work before it was ready to be released.  I couldn’t even imagine all the effort that is put into other,more elaborate works of electronic literature.

The text adventure I created is called “Island Adventure.”  My game begins on a shipwrecked island,and the purpose of the game is to find the way off the island. Originally I wanted to do something entirely different with the text adventure, but having little prior experience with Inform 7 prevented me from doing so.  After multiple attempts, I was never able to figure out how to tell Inform 7 to do certain things I wanted it to do, so I had to change many things around.

Kudos to everyone who dedicated time and effort into making these works of electronic literature.  I can now say I know from experience just how hard it is to create one.

Anyways, you can try out my game on Playfic.  The URL is:

http://playfic.com/games/hholden88888/island-adventure

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Optimizing room descriptions and object lists in Inform 7

February 24, 2012 By 1 Comment

Once you start building games in Inform 7, you may notice that the basic process of describing a room and then putting things in it will default to a somewhat rigid or mechanical output. So a common question I get is, “How do I hide things”? Or, “How do I get rid of that long list of items?” I’ve given various bits of advice for different games and situations, but since this is such a common question, I thought I’d summarize some common situations I’ve seen and methods for dealing with them. In preparing these snippets, I’ve put together a small game in my Playfic account, so if you’d prefer to skip to the final product you can play it there. Otherwise, read on!

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Text Adventure- Progression of Literature

February 23, 2012 By 2 Comments

In the last few weeks, I have been exploring various examples of interactive fiction in order to decide which genre I would like to base my project on.  The form of Interactive Fiction that I seem to be exploring the most are the “text adventure” games on Playfic.  I find these games to be remarkably interesting because of their ability to combine storytelling and game playing in one, without having to add in extra graphics, etc.  In addition, I find these games intriguing because in a way, it allows one to create their own story.

Prior to this class I had never even heard of these text adventure games, let alone actually sat down and played one.  The first game I played, Colossal Cave Adventure, was incredibly difficult to grasp because this was the first game I have ever seen that was based only on text. It took a few attempts to understand and imagine myself in the adventure, but once I figured out the basic concept, the game and story began to unfold right in front of me.  Although the instructions and commands are very simple, these games can still be very difficult to master.

Since I began playing other text adventure games I have realized that these games are indeed a form of literature.  Each game created a story.  Each game is unique in its setting, characters and plot, all of which are elements of literature.  These games are revolutionary for literature.  Unlike traditional stories, each time you play a text adventure game you have the option of changing what happens.

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