Archive for the ‘Interactive Fiction’ Category
50 Shades of Jilting, by Lankly Lockers
Surreptitiously, you somehow concretize the abstract (its appearance in your inventory was admittedly a great first step) and physically transfer your run-down relationship into the pocket of Sam’s coat under a smoke screen of small talk about the weather.
You have one move to break up with your lover, at which point the story rewinds and you can try it a different way. This is an excellent concept, and the writing goes down terrific when in small doses (as above) but there are some giant clumps which go on and on and on:
“Sam, I’m going to see if we can get these drinks to go. It’s a beautiful day and I just can’t bear to be inside.” “No problem,” says Sam, “I’ll put on my shades.” Five minutes later, you’re strolling down a pedestrian mall with paper cups in your hands. “Do you mind,” you ask, “if we head over that bridge? I’ve got a bee in my bonnet to get out of downtown.” “I’ll have to walk back here when we’re done,” starts Sam, “but I can do that.” Half an hour later later, you make a suggestion: “How would you feel about hitting up that big park at the edge of town? Something just rubs me wrong about being among all this asphalt and cement on a day like today.” “I can appreciate that,” replies Sam, “though I might need to have a rest break or two on the way there. It’s nice out, but I’m getting a little winded.”
Maybe I wasn’t in the right mood, but I admit to skimming some of the text. I also did not come close to finding all the endings. Does someone have a spoiler list?
Mirrorwife, by Virgil Caine
You touch one palm to the a wall. The stone is damp and rough and makes you think of salt. During your time underwater, you often wondered if it would have been worse to be surrounded by rock and left in darkness. If the queen was ever here, however, you find no trace, and you would know. Of all people, you would know.
From lengthy to succinct, and the effect is lovely. I played through multiple times, even though the interaction is minimal and as far as I can tell the structure is “linear with side descriptions and a final choice.” I want to see more of this world. I want to see what happens after.
Groove Billygoat, by Efrain Finnell
True confession: I picked the song here. The King of Pop is source for a truly odd music video, as well as suggestive lyrics (“So They Came Into The Outway / It Was Sunday-What A Black Day / Mouth To Mouth Resus-Citation / Sounding Heartbeats-Intimidations”). There were all sorts of threads I thought a potential int-fic could go on, but I was surprised to find Groove Billygoat took every thread imaginable and went crazy with it.
“It’s him!” shouts Rufus, pointing down the block, where an unearthly light as if from a hundred garbage truck headlights grows around the corner, casting the shadow of a thin man against the wall. He emerges around the corner, his white suit blinding in the golden light, surrounded by clouds of mist from a curb grate.
The sidewalk slab lights up as the man steps, and then the next one as he steps onto it, only fading after it his shoes have left the surface. This can’t be… you think, trying to blink the mirage from your eyes.
It’s like it invents a new genre: dance noir. It is wild and swerving. The lyrics in Smooth Criminal, are (to be polite) difficult to understand; this game turns that fact into a puzzle. There is a random easter egg reference to Thriller. MOONWALK is a verb. Go play it (although cling, somewhat gently, to the hints).
Sparkle, by Karly Di Caprio
“What do you seek?”
“I seek the truth, shifu.”
She hit me on the fingers with the head of her cane, like many times before.
“You say you seek the truth, but only lies come out your own mouth. What do you seek?”
You can turn a dog into a flute with the power of your mind.
So there’s this event called ShuffleComp where people sent in playlists of songs and received random sets of 8. The same people then wrote works of interactive fiction based on those songs; 33 came back with an entry. Voting for works that get a Commendation goes to the end of May.
However, there’s this extra rule where each review counts as an extra yes vote. It’s an experiment that I believe is intended to tilt feedback to more-positive-vibes-than-negative but it makes me anxious, because even on interactive fiction I enjoy haven’t been able to tell if it’s “worth” the bonus boost of a review. Also, in some cases I’d like to talk about interactive fiction I’d consider a “no” vote but still have interesting discussion points.
The only way out of this is to write a review for everything. So I’m going to do that, with the caveat that reviews near the deadline might be choppy sentences without grammar control. Mea culpa in advance.
(I entered my own work under a psuedonym, and since I don’t plan to review myself the reviews have a side effect of potentially giving away my secret identity early. There’s a rule of no-speculating-on-pseudonyms but that’s for public discussion and you’re welcome to play the home game. I also realize I reduce my own chances at Commendation by one vote by implicitly voting for everyone else, but c’est la vie.)
Truth, by John Earthling
The intrepid player here must stalk about a minimalist town in a mission to root out untruth:
The man leans close and, glancing about conspiratorially, whispers “Snakes are the only animals with opposable thumbs.” Then he slinks away into the shadows.
OK, that clearly wasn’t the truth.
[You have debunked an untruth!]
The game feels loose and uncomfortable to me; I don’t really have much to latch onto. Either than prose needs to be deeper or the interaction stronger or the comedy just funnier. I’m keen on the scoring system, though: [You have come across a fib!] or [You have exposed a prevarication!] or etc. occur every time another fib has been found.
Tea and Toast, by Maria del Pangolin
Does a story need conflict? I don’t think so, and neither does Tea and Toast:
It was at the bus stop you first saw her. The first week, you stole glances as you walked past. The second week, you tried to figure out if she was stealing glances back. The third week, you decided to start taking the bus to work… even though it’d be a bit of a walk back.
It’s simple: you prepare tea and toast and memories flow in. Except, hm, I must be bad at preparing tea, because I keep messing things up by turning on the teapot (which is a thing you can’t do?) or trying to put leaves in without a strainer (which I guess is bad?) or doing a list of other things that are apparently wrong.
Still, it’s the sort of thing you play to be happy, and it works.
Fallout Shelter, by Amadeo Voss
Dreadful scratching sounds, the kind that remind you of when you were a little girl, hiding under the covers so the monsters wouldn’t get you.
I think (other than a weird burst of autobiographical material in a notebook) that perhaps the shelter is a little too sparse, because I couldn’t visualize anything; this was just words. There’s a choice about staying or leaving that doesn’t make me feel like any kind of story progression happened at all. The ending I had to work hardest at was getting eaten by the monsters, so I’ll call that my VICTORY END and move on from there.
Illuminate, by Summer del Mono
The surface of the table seems to bubble even as the clear ball approaches, magnifies it many times over, cracks spreading across its surface, until it shatters with a brief burst of red flame, leaving no trace of the table.
You find you have the crystal orb and the blood orb once more.
What remains: An orange wall. A fruit tray lies on the floor. Deep scratches and pits mark the plain table.
This reminds me of entries from the IF Art Show (wow, the last one was 2007? we should revive that sometime) where the goal is to fiddle with things (in this case, four paintings with matching orbs) and see what they do. This would be more engrossing if the prose had more style; as is it’s a bit dry. Still, I was intrigued enough to play about for a while and I do wonder if there’s any secrets I have yet to unearth.
It’s done, or at least I’m calling it done, which is how all these things go, I suppose–
Download Renga in Four Parts here
You’ll need a Hugo interpreter: Hugo interpreters for various platforms. Alternately, you can use an interpreter which runs multiple formats, like Gargoyle.
What should I type? It’s up to you. You can type particular words that occur in the text, or words that are implied. You can be entirely experiential and use word-association. Keep in mind that what you type is much a part of the poem as the verse.
>kite
Hovering, unobtrusive
watching over
the grey-sanded beach
Enjoy!
This is the “central” portion of the Acheton map (click to enlarge):
The most striking difference between Old-IF and New-IF is sheer size. I’ve already gone into the issue with Zork. However, unlike Zork, the size in Acheton doesn’t give me a feel of world-immersion. I’ve been trying to figure out why.
Zork has some random bits like Hades or a robot, but the general intent seems to be a unified dungeon one can lovingly map on a single page. Acheton essentially demands segmentation: there’s an entire hedge maze, an entire ocean, an entire desert, an entire temple, and an entire wizard house complete with two mazes.
Moreover, the setting-as-backstory in Zork, while minimal, goes a long way to providing a unified environment. Flood Control Dam #3 is iconic enough to make a graphical appearance much later. Even the much-reviled Bank of Zork was memorable. I can’t think of any locations in Acheton that move past the merely generic.
For your perusal, one of the most evil parts of the game:
> s
You are in a large room with a polished floor and smooth walls. The only visible exits are an upwards passage to the north, and a downwards sloping corridor to the southwest. There is a 15 foot high triangular rubber object leaning against the east wall, with the words “ONE NINGY” embossed on it.
> get ningy
You pull the ningy away from the wall, but then discover that it is far too heavy for you to support. You jump away just in time to avoid being crushed by it, and then see that there were several holes in the wall behind the ningy, the largest of which is about four feet across and directly to the east.
> e
A hideous mocking voice sneers: “I suppose you think you’re clever, don’t you!”
You are in a long east-west corridor, the ends of which are out of sight.
There is a three foot black rod with a rusty star on the end nearby.
How obvious was it that you just lost the game? (You can incidentally get in about 5 hours or so in before realizing that fact.)
Test yourself: based on the text, what should you have done instead?
Via Acorn Electron World.
You are in a large room with a polished floor and smooth walls. The only visible exits are an upwards passage to the north, and a downwards sloping corridor to the southwest. There is a 15 foot high triangular rubber object leaning against the east wall, with the words “ONE NINGY” embossed on it.
> climb ningy
OK.
You’re in a contorted passage which ends abruptly in a two foot wide hole to the west. In the other direction the passage turns two full circles before exiting to the north.
The relevant map section:
A few extra comments:
1. The long time period before realizing there’s a mistake isn’t quite as bad as it sounds given that the optimizing-lamp-time aspect to Acheton means you’re likely need to a restart somewhere along the way. However, it is quite possible to have done that restart and still not know about the ningy trick.
2. The mocking voice is supposed to be a hint you messed up. So helpful.
3. The holes in the wall described in the text are behind the ningy. Not above. I suppose because you can’t see the one above. How lovely.
4. There really seems to be no way to even have a chance at knowing what to do without screwing up first. This hence represents five simultaneous violations of Graham Nelson’s Player’s Bill of Rights all in one go:
Not to be given horribly unclear hints
To be able to win without experience of past lives
To be able to win without knowledge of future events
Not to have the game closed off without warning
Not to need to do unlikely things
The first maze you’re likely to encounter. Click to enlarge.
When the player is tempted to write a Java program to discover a Hamiltonian path through a maze, the maze is perhaps a bit too difficult.
— Matthew T. Russotto
There’s a lot of mazes. Acheton might hold the world record.
I’m going to spoil them thoroughly below.
I haven’t hit all of them in my current playthrough, but from memory there’s:
a.) The lodestone maze depicted in the map above. The “unique” trick here is the treasures are randomly arranged at the start of a game so a walkthrough needs to give a route that passes through every room (hence Matthew’s desire for a Hamiltonian path).
b.) An ice maze consisting only of two exit choices (SE and SW) but lots of deadly thin ice. The trick here is to take a (magical) item that will point in the correct direction to get to the single hidden treasure.
c.) A wizard’s maze with a start that involves going in circles trying every exit out of a room and returning to the start. After trying every door, the player enters the maze. The maze is generated at the moment it is entered. The way to get out is to use the same order of the exits tried before entering. It’s quite possible to get all the way through the maze without realizing this until the end. This marks (excluding the “room reassignment” used in Mystery Mansion as a memory cheat) the first adventure game with dynamic room generation.
d.) A maze with deadly snakes which I can only describe as a turn-based version of Pac-Man (although before Pac-Man was invented). Very tricky timing is involved.
e.) A fairly mundane hedge maze that you can burn down if you like. You might get tired of mazes and want to go ahead and destroy one.
f.) A section in the desert that might marginally be termed a “maze”. It’s based on a transport-based-on-limited-resource puzzles, rather like this one from Martin Gardner:
A group of airplanes is based on a small island. The tank of each plane holds just enough fuel to take it halfway around the world. Any desired amount of fuel can be transferred from the tank of one plane to the tank of another while the planes are in flight. The only source of fuel is on the island, and for the purposes of the problem it is assumed that there is no time lost in refueling either in the air or on the ground.
What is the smallest number of planes that will ensure the flight of one plane around the world in a great circle, assuming that the planes have the same constant ground speed and rate of fuel consumption and that all planes return safely to their island base?
(The Martin Gardner puzzle is incidentally top-flight and I’d recommend everyone giving it a go.)
In any case, the interactive fiction version requires wrangling water in the desert in appropriate places to avoid death.
g.) Was there another one? I don’t remember. I suppose I’ll find out.
In any case, the only maze I’d call “straight” would be the lodestone maze. It honestly isn’t that traumatic to map compared with that evil one from Adventure and the only reason I see the Hamiltonian path being necessary is that in order to optimize the number of turns (given the low life on the lamp compared with how many steps are needed) there is a good chance a game restart is needed somewhere. Still, once someone gets to the “cave” portion of the game they can just save, wander through using the map noting where all the treasures are, then restore and go only for the important rooms.
> e
You find yourself surrounded by gently swaying silver birches which appear to change position when you’re not looking. Plenty of openings are visible between them, but these close up in some mysterious way whenever you approach them. The trees give off a heavy scent which becomes almost overpowering at times.
> dig
You start to dig a small hole with your hands. As you do so a strange high pitched musical laughter can be heard all around. The branches of the nearby trees shake, although there is no wind blowing. I think you must be tickling the tree roots!
Just like Adventure and Zork, Acheton features caverns in darkness; you need a lamp to see. Unlike the former, darkness is not immediately deadly.
You’re in the sandstone room.
> e
It is pitch dark.
> e
It is pitch dark.
> w
It is pitch dark.
> e
It is pitch dark.
> w
It is pitch dark.
> e
It is pitch dark.
> w
You fell into a pit and broke every bone in your body.
In other words, there is a random chance of death, rather than guaranteed immediate death via grue or falling in a pit.
One thing I remember from playing Acheton the first time around is that I ran out of lamp time but I was very close to the end of the game. So for about the 20 steps it took to walk to the endgame portion I was having to walk through darkness, saving every few steps and reloading if I died. Given I was efficient in that playthrough, the lamp has a VERY tight timer. I’ll try to be as careful as possible.
Speaking of death, there are plenty of instant deaths in Acheton. Modern gamers would call them “unfair” but many were clearly intended as “funny”. For instance, there’s keys and grate identical to the start of Adventure, except for one slight detail:
You are in the hallway of a disused farmhouse. Once there were doorways leading off into several other rooms, but these were all securely boarded up long ago. Outside is a road leading off to the west.
There is a small aerosol can of white paint here.
There is an empty bottle on the ground.
There is a bunch of keys here.
There is a brass lamp on the ground nearby.
It is off.
> get keys
OK.
> get lamp
OK.
> s
You are on the road near the farmhouse.
> s
You are at the bottom of a slight hollow, from which a path leads north.
There is a 3×3 steel grate set in the ground nearby.
The grate is locked.
> unlock grate
OK.
You are standing in the depression.
There is a 3×3 steel grate set in the ground nearby.
The grate is open.
> d
You fall into a well. The water is icy cold, and you rapidly die of hypothermia.
I’m afraid you haven’t got far enough to qualify for reincarnation yet.
A second tempting entrance (a tunnel into a deserted mine) also leads to instant death. Once finally locating the real entrance, followed by the first treasure (noted with a (!)), well–
> n
It is pitch dark.
> light lamp
The lamp is now on and burning brightly.
You are in a small room with a narrow counter running most of the way across it. At the end of the counter is a sign reading “CLOAKROOM” and there is a row of broken hooks on the wall.
The only exit is to the south. There is a mink coat (with bulging pockets) lying below the hooks!
> get coat
OK.
As you take the coat, a couple of ferrets leap out of its pockets and savage you. You die shortly later from loss of blood.
–that likely could have gone better.
Death really is the mildest thing the game can do, though. The problems are the points where the player can make the game unwinnable without realizing it (that is, Cruel on the Zarfian scale). I’ll talk about one of those parts next time.
The portions-of-the-map-closing parts of Stuga are getting to be a pain (there’s a part that doesn’t seem to have any way in now — I’m not sure if it’s a bug, or if there’s some strange timed thing, but it looks like I’ll have to restart) so I’m diving into Acheton.
Via Mobygames.
Perhaps the first adventure game written outside the U.S. was “Acheton” (c. 1979), by Jon Thackray and David Seal, with contributions by Jonathan Partington, working in the mathematics department of Cambridge University, England. “Acheton” is an enormous cave game, whose name is a confection of “Acheron” (the river that dead used to cross in order to get to Hades) and “Achates” (minor character in Virgil’s “Aeneid”), based around exploration and collecting treasures.
[rec.games.int-fiction FAQ]
I’m using the Z-code port (courtesy Graham Nelson, Adam Atkinson and David Kinder), which is about as authentic as I could hope for (and reports a start date of 1978, not 1979):
Our aim has been to restore and not to modernise or “improve” the work: the original parser has been recreated and all textual responses are authentic. Our only additions have been the following commands: “inform”, producing this text; “restore”, which allows saved games to be restored (the Phoenix originals instead asked about this at the start of each session of play); and “script”, which allows the transcript of play to be written to a file.
The only catch here is this was a mainframe game where the original 1978 version is lost, so this is the last part from 1981. This is semi-frustrating for the true gaming archaeologist, but really, I’m just here to play. In this case, play again — I finished Acheton a few years ago (for fun, not part of any project) and still have my maps. I have a deep and possibly unnatural fondness for hand-drawn maps, so I’ll see about popping some scans up as my game progresses. Since this is a replay, it won’t be quite the same as my prior games; pretty much everything I solved myself I still remember, although there were a couple sections I relied heavily on walkthroughs and hence my memory as to actual puzzle solutions is foggy.
Late in the game there’s one of the coolest yet also impossibly unfair puzzles I’ve ever experienced. So there’s that to look forward to. Onward!
I’m nearing the end and a new feature has hit (I don’t know exactly when it happens, but I’m guessing when your score reaches a certain point) where map exits start closing off. Two examples:
You are in a room with an upward escalator and a door forward.
UP
Just as you’re approaching the escalator, it stops and a man runs in and closes it.
You are in a room with an upward escalator and a door forward.
The escalator has been closed by Cottage’s highways department.
Nearby:
You are in the Studio.
BACK
The lock of the door has jammed so you won’t get out that way!
Your keys don’t fit the keyhole.
You are in the Studio.
Mind you, there’s still a way to get where is necessary, but it starts to be more circuitous as the game goes on. The portions of the map that involve (more or less) random travel start to get more appealing.
This led to a welcome kind of tension, lending a modicum of atmosphere and the feeling of other presences, rather like when entering the trapdoor from Zork it gets closed and barred from the other side. It’s not exactly a horror tension (the game is too silly for that) but more of a strategic tension.; I felt like I needed to do some actual planning.
There is a particular art to reviving a half-finished adventure game. Quite often I find I have to restart because I have a.) lost my maps or b.) lost the thread of the plot.
b.) is no worry: there’s no plot. As for a.), I posted my most recent map on the last post on this blog (back in 2011) so I don’t have to reconstruct everything. I still have the same sluggish feeling about this game though, so I need a battle plan.
I went to the hint file and pulled out the list of all the treasures as well as all the things that get points. Fingers crossed: a checklist might help me psychologically get through this thing.
Renga in Blue 