Exactly. The majority of SugarCube developers don’t even use the Twine editor… which is what a beginner needs for Twine.
3 Likes
This only works if the game in question hosted on itch is only and HTML file. This will not save any other document that were uploaded by the author inside the Zip file. See my reply above for a more complete way of downloading a Twine game on itch.
Twine will decompile any HTML compiled with a Twine format (e.g. SugarCube, Harlowe, Chapbook…), to show each coded passages on the Twine app, in the code of the relevant format.
You will need not only the correct version of Twine installed on your device (Twine 1 or Twine 2), and not only the correct format BUT the correct version of the story format of the project installed (a project in SugarCube 2.36 won’t run in a Twine app where only SugarCube 2.3 is installed).
Chapbook also has a built-in editor, and can be used by beginners. The format is also included in Twine when you install it.
Tweego users are quite vocal about leaving Twine as a project editor. But the majority of SugarCube user are still on Twine.
4 Likes
That’s actually really interesting. I honestly thought it was the other way around. Just changing the Story Format in the Twine editor requires a level of understanding that most beginners can’t fully grasp yet.
Syntax highlighting is a game changer for learning to recognize coding patterns, especially for beginners. I would be very excited to try SugarCube if it ever took advantage of that Twine editor feature. I hope that happens soon. 
From the main page of the Twine website:
The Twine Reference is a guide to the Twine user interface. If you’re new to Twine, start here.
Chapter 6 is all about changing Story Format.
1 Like
I simply meant that new users most likely think Twine is just its own thing; self contained. (You make Twine games using Twine, basically.) I found it confusing at first because Twine is more a set of story organization standards (passages, links, etc.), integrated into an editor… but it’s not the engine really, nor the language.
Perhaps I’m in the minority with my initial confusion when I first started. Maybe I’m still confused. 
2 Likes
The more I look at the various story formats, the more I think you’re basically right. The “engine” is HTML5, its supporting assets, and the browser used to display it. The story format dictates the syntax of the programming language, the quality of the text editor you use to write it, and the default appearance of the webpage used to display it. The most important native features of TWINE that are common to all the story formats are a set of tools for creating new passages, tagging them, and visual workspace to organize them.
1 Like
…and the majority of the capabilities of what you can do with the story. Picking the Story Format to use is the most crucial decision a Twine author has to make. There’s practically nothing (other than static link markup) that is shared between them. A Twine author fluent with Harlowe has very little transferable knowledge to switch to SugarCube and vice versa.
I still don’t understand it. At all. And to be honest, this initial confusion is the reason I’ve used Ink and ChoiceScript but not yet Twine!
2 Likes
Maybe “TWINE ELI5: Parserhead Edition” would be a more helpful topic than it first appears.
4 Likes
I am also very intimidated by Twine, I have to say! Kudos to all the authors who have figured it out - maybe one day I’ll manage it but it seems quite hard.
4 Likes
Harlowe and Sugarcube are very different syntactically, but I wouldn’t say there’s nothing transferable about learning one and then the other. They both share some common data structures, logic operators, and the manipulation of tagged sections of text. Some of these are features common to (nearly) all programming languages and certainly to all HTML adjacent languages. But those are just the sort of ‘basics’ that a first-timer to programming is going to muddle through.
There are some ultimate obstacles to what Harlowe can do (and challenges to what Sugarcube can do without the help of JavaScript) but these difference would be hard to explain to a beginner, and might never reveal themselves in most types of projects.
2 Likes
You basically have to pick a language first. Then commit to it. It’s a leap of faith to get started with Twine. Unless you do an amount of research beyond what a beginner should ever have to do… which is why I think Twine is not as beginner friendly as it could be.
The best language is SugarCube. The problem is that it’s not setup to do syntax highlighting in the Twine editor so serious SugarCube authors use VS Code and Tweego as the compiler and don’t even touch the Twine editor. Setting up that environment is not as easy as firing up the Twine editor. However, you may want to get started in the editor and then when you’re tired of looking at white text on a black background, install the other stuff and carry on.
Harlowe is the default language in the Twine editor and the syntax highlighting makes it really nice to work with and see where the logic is versus the text content, because sometimes you’re constructing sentences with conditional prose and seeing code into the middle of written content… well it’s nice to see the code look different from the story text. Harlowe is pretty solid, but its manual is tricky to find answers at times.
Chapbook is a simplified story format that is very limited, but also very easy to use. However, it’s limitations are apparent once you start to want to do dynamic things within the same passage. Like if you click a link, but only want something to change on the current page without refreshing the entire page and seeing the text flash again, then you’re probably better off with either of the prior two mentioned.
Snowman seems to be geared for programmers who want a bare bones framework that doesn’t get in the way and want to develop their own language and functionality of sorts. Not for the faint of heart, but there are times when you want to work around the default behaviour of Harlowe and/or SugarCube.
All the languages can be extended in various ways, but SugarCube, Snowman and Chapbook are intended to be extended. Harlowe is like Fort Knox with it’s API. It really doesn’t want you poking around in it. This sort of capability is great if you think you might want to push your story’s presentation beyond the norm. All Twine games are browser-based. Browsers can do a lot of things with media. You can build a 3D Twine game if you wish, but that’s only possible by extending the Story Format.
Because Twine is browser-based, all presentation is controlled by web technology. CSS, HTML, JS, SVG, etc. Unfortunately those web technologies have their own learning curves so beyond changing the colours of text, it can get a bit daunting. Especially, since web standards are evolving… at a snail’s pace, but evolving, nonetheless.
This is just my take. I have only worked with Harlowe and Chapbook, very briefly with SugarCube (but read a lot), and I’ve only read up on Snowman. I have a solid understanding of web technologies so I’m always trying to push Twine stories beyond what they do out of the box. Hopefully this helps people get started on the right foot. I encourage others to correct me on anything as this is meant to help beginners and not be an opinion about anything.
I don’t mean for this to derail the original topic, but it’s actually still very relevant for a beginner who wishes to start authoring with Twine.
6 Likes
Thanks, this is very useful. I suppose I’m still not sure what Twine actually is. It seems to be neither the language nor the editor?
3 Likes
That’s the question I ended up asking as well when I started using Twine.
From the outside, looking in, Twine seems to be a set of standards for how a user can navigate pages (called passages) of text. Like the classic Choose Your Own Adventure books. Here’s is an excerpt from Twine’s documentation for beginners (What Is Twine Good At?):
- Text-based storytelling. Twine is very text-focused, though you can use images, sound, and video.
- Branching narratives. Twine’s user interface is designed to make it easy to visualize the flow through branches of a narrative.
- Web-based publishing. Twine publishes to HTML files which can be uploaded on any web hosting service or shared privately. People can play the things you make without installing any extra software.
Then it talks about what Twine is not good at, just in case another IF software might be better for your needs. And then it immediately tells you to choose a language:
In order to use Twine most effectively, you should spend some time reading the documentation for the story format you’re using. (Wait, what’s a story format?)
That’s the kicker and the most confusing part of Twine. Immediately, for new beginners, Twine’s documentation asks you to research 4 very different languages and make a decision about what’s best for you. This was very confusing to me (and it still baffles me a bit to this day). This is what I mean by taking a leap of faith with a story format.
Upon clicking the What’s a Story Format? link, you get the following (and more):
Twine is a tool for editing interactive narratives. It isn’t a tool for playing interactive narratives. When you share a story with players, it exists as an HTML file that can be opened in any web browser, and doesn’t require players to install Twine themselves. Twine helps to edit a story, but what happens once players actually open it in a web browser is the job of story formats.
And that’s when you begin to realize that Twine is an editor for multiple different Story Formats that don’t necessarily adhere to any set standards. The story formats can be anything they want to be, as long as they store their story content and logic in blocks known as passages that the Twine editor can arrange (like cards on a table) and edit. At the end of the day, the Twine editor (with the story format chosen) will produce a web page HTML file that has all the JavaScript coding/logic embedded to be a self-running interactive story.
In a very weird (yet very accurate way), it’s easier to think of Twine, by not thinking about Twine at all. Treat Twine as an editor, first and foremost (and technically, an optional one at that). Just focus on the Story Formats. Each one has a few basic similarities, but they all eventually diverge enough where they have their own flavours. Each story format is that owner’s vision of what a Twine game can be and they definitely have different points of view the more you explore them. Make a Chapbook game, make a SugarCube game… but don’t think of it as making a Twine game.
Twine is like Visual Studio… and Unreal, Unity and CryEngine are the story formats.
3 Likes
Oh man! The last dozen posts have been great. I’m learning a ton that I had no idea about.
So then what tool/software/IDE should I download for an autistic 10-year-old and/or his 40-year-old dad to begin making very simple CYOA stories? Sounds like if I go the Twine route that Chapbook is the story format I should choose. Or should I skip Twine and look to Ink, ChoiceScript or something else instead?
Many thanks for all of this info/education!
4 Likes
You’re looking for offline tools, right? Because inklewriter is sort of the baby sibling of Ink and has a nice scaffolded editor for basic branching… more guided and less overwhelming to start with than Twine, I think. But it’s online only.
If you’re starting with Twine, I’d go with Harlowe, I think. It’s the default, so you don’t have to change any settings to get there. It has (I think) the easiest support for simple text effects like changing colors and applying transitions and other “changers.” It’s not necessarily so great for advanced coding things, but I think you should start with just links and passages anyway: you can get a surprisingly long way without getting into coding stuff.
If you don’t mind spending money I’d highly recommend Anna Anthropy’s book Make Your Own Twine Games! – it’s very approachable, maybe pitched even a little too young but there’s some surprisingly sophisticated techniques explained in simple language. And she walks through making some simple games, with ideas on how to adapt them or come up with your own ideas entirely. You can get print versions along with DRM-free ebooks from No Starch Press at the link above.
If you want to try more text-adventure style room-and-object games, maybe Gruescript? You can download that for offline use, and you can do things more simply there than with Inform or TADS (and maybe more simply even than Adventuron? YMMV there).
Also, if you’re willing to go with online tools, Bitsy is “make two-color graphical tile-based games where you walk around and bump into things to make stuff happen.” But I think that’s online-only unless you can do the web-dev stuff to build a local version from the source?
So I think… I’d pitch three possibilities:
-
Twine / Harlowe, stick with just links at first and then maybe add basic variables (did you pick up the sword? yes/no), get Anna Anthropy’s book (you can get the ebook instantly). Twine has changed interface recently so you’ll have to translate a bit but the design stuff is great. Best for simple branching stories but has the possibility to do lots more complicated stuff later / switch Twine story formats etc. Also maybe you would want to read On Links: Exercises in Style (pdf) to think about how you decide which words to turn into links? Though a bunch of that is in Anna’s book.
-
ChoiceScript with CSIDE: branching stories (with good support for stats). Maybe more directed than Twine because in Twine you can put the links anywhere but in ChoiceScript it’s a bunch of text and then a menu of choices at the end, so it narrows down the design space.
-
Gruescript: more text-adventureish stuff, you’d need to dive into variables and stuff more quickly, and it’s a one-man project so there’s less examples and community support but it’s pretty simple so I think it’s approachable. Maybe try this if drawing a map and then putting it into a game and then making object puzzles feels like more fun to you than branching stories?
6 Likes
Moiki is pretty neat too! and a bit similar to inklewriter as well.
3 Likes
Seconded.
Harlowe is way more popular than Chapbook so you’ll get more help from people and there is more information online for Harlowe too. You’ll reach the limitations of Chapbook quickly. Harlowe gives you a longer runway and it’s almost as easy as Chapbook.
The Twine Cookbook will be your friend for specific code examples. Use the Twine 2 Examples section in particular.
If you have any coding experience, you’ll be fine. Otherwise, we’re here to help. You can post any specific questions in the Authoring: Twine forums here.
→ https://intfiction.org/c/authoring/twine/46
I did pretty much the same thing you are with your child. We had a lot of fun bonding over it. We still talk about some of the games we made 10 years later. I wish more parents would take such active roles in their children’s development. You get mad parent props from me.
2 Likes
Another Autistic writer here, with two autistic kids about the same age as yours, plus a bonus two autistic niblings (my sibling’s nonbinary kids), also a similar age. (Special interests including writing and cats, so anyone who read “Fine Felines” last year and “Bali B&B” with the cat option this year could probably guess I was autistic.)
Mark Marino writes specifically for kids, and his own kids are part of his writing team, so that may appeal although I don’t think he writes in Twine.
I often teach a fast-and-dirty IF workshop featuring Twine and ChoiceScript, and I’ve taught it to both adults and kids. Twine is excellent for very branch-y choice-based IF. The thing it does well is immediately draw up a map for you, really really easily.
ChoiceScript is far better for delayed branching (with stats) and longer stories (which is why I muuuch prefer it).
I can teach either to a ten year-old in a few minutes (however, I’m very strictly choice-based as my various brain issues explode at the slightest hint of parser stuff).
Since a 10 year-old is unlikely to be writing a novel (or at least unlikely to finish one), I tend to encourage them towards Twine. I took care of the “which flavour of Twine?” question by ignoring the issue and playing whatever happened automatically.
I wrote “Fine Felines” with kids in mind but not as the key audience (I was just excited that I was writing a story with no violence, for once), so the language is relatively simple with lots of cat pictures, but the disability/fibromyalgia plotline and the goal of running a small business are both utterly dull to kids.
A LOT of people who don’t consider themselves readers will play a game for many many hours even if it’s literally just words, so if your kid has trouble finishing books it may help to download some games as phone apps. (Humans are so easily manipulated.) Eg Choice of Games, Hosted Games, Tin Man Games’s “Choices That Matter” app.
I remember “Choice of the Cat” being fun but I would, wouldn’t I?
9 Likes
I know I’m beating a dead horse here, but I found this very enlightening post with an awesome summary from @Greyelf.
→ What exactly is Twee? - Twine Q&A
I didn’t realize how Twine started and what it was solving for authors and now I kind of appreciate why things are the way they are today. It’s confusing for new authors to fully understand the evolution of Twee and Twine. Anyway, just more info for those starting with Twine.
5 Likes