I came into this thinking I’d like to do parser-based, since that’s been my experience “back in the day”. But the more I look around, it looks like a lot of people went choice-based, which presumably lowers the barrier to entry for the player at the cost of descriptiveness and control, which gives a more novel-like and less game-like experience. Are there any other common “formats” where this is concerned? Is my short-hand analysis more or less accurate or am I missing important components?
The intfiction.org community includes more parser IF enthusiasts than choice-based IF, but there is a larger audience available outside this forum for choice-based IF.
Twine is the most popular authoring system for choice-based IF, but other solid options include ChoiceScript, Inklewriter, Undum, and Choose Your Story.
You might also want to look into Squiffy for choice-based IF.
I knew I was forgetting something. > < And Squiffy!
(I’m probably forgetting something else too…)