My name’s Cody. I started playing around with Twine recently because I absolutely fell in love with a game called Seedship by John Ayliff. It was only much later that I realized that it was made with Twine and SugarCube. (Who actually reads the game credits, eh? ) It was then that I realized that Interactive Fiction doesn’t have to be heavily story-based… to tell a story.
That’s where my brain is at, at least. I’m working on a project that will probably never see the light of day, but I’ve always wanted to make a game so Interactive Fiction seems like a great way to scratch that itch.
Also, I just have to say that I’m quite impressed with these forums. It’s a real web-design achievement. Very slick.
Anyway, I look forward to bothering you all with my inane questions.
Thanks for reminding me of Seedship. It had been a while since I last set out for the stars to find a new home of hope for humanity.
I launched three missions. Two became Oppressive Theocracies, one with Industrial Revolution tech, one with height-of-Stone-Age tools. The other developed into a Egalitarian Republic (apparently at least in part inspired by the natural beauty of the planet) with complex Stone Age technology.
Have you played A Firelit Room? It’s similar to Seedship in letting the player extract a complex meaningful story out of very basic decisions (which do add up) and small storylets.
I haven’t played A Firelit Room, but I will definitely check it out. It looks really good at first glance. Effective minimalism. That’s my cup of tea. Thanks, man!
I’ve been better. Work has been piling up. There’s stuff to do around the house that I just can’t bring myself to finish because I keep spending most of my time learning how to make IF games. How are you?
My name is Chantelle, I’m relatively new to the IF community itself but have been writing my first IF for the last few months - it’s called Summer of Love, it’s basically an all-bisexual Love island and there’s a demo currently on dashingdon.
I definitely feel like an amateur writer, but I’ve always wanted make something along these lines and finally got the guts to get on with it.
I may have a variety of ‘daft’ questions because I’m still learning, but I thought I’d introduce myself first.
Hello everyone! New to the community here so I thought it would be nice to fire up an introduction post and get to know you all!
I’m Jon/Bogus! I’m a full-time stay-at-home dad by choice to two wonderful daughters and am an avid fan of video games. I’ve been playing for over 35 years now, cutting my teeth on the Atari 2600 and the Apple IIGS as some of my early gaming experiences. I dedicate a lot of my time exploring virtual worlds and figuring out what works and why for me personally. Perspective is so important and I can not stress enough how much I appreciate the perspectives of other people to help better understand games and to approach games in new and novel ways to enjoy these games. I am, by no means, a person who gatekeeps or flaunts my perspective as some objective truth.
While my experience with text adventures and IF only began at the turn of the millennium as a teenager, it exploded with a deep rooted passion for text parsers and how we interact with software.
Even though I had some experience with BBS door games and MUDs prior to playing text adventures and IF, my first real text adventure was Spellcasting 201 by Steve Meretzky. Being a teenager, it immediately sucked me in, but it also segued me into other works by Meretzky, A Mind Forever Voyaging in particular and from there I absolutely adored the medium. Almost 2 years ago, a dear friend of mine who is not much of a gamer approached me and asked if I could show them the original Zork and play it together with them. I hadn’t completed much of the Infocom library, so I heartily agreed. He took control of the game and I mapped things out while we both collectively worked through the puzzles of the game and it was absolutely transformative. Add to it that we stream our experiences and open up that think tank to the folks in chat (as long as they aren’t looking at a guide or have played the game before) and there has been no going back.
We set out to play through the entire Infocom library chronologically. We made our way up to Suspect before we decided to create an interactive fiction club for veterans and newbies alike to the medium. Each month we rotate between classic Text Adventures and more modern Interactive Fiction and then record a podcast discussing the game.
With some lovely encouragement from some folks within the discord, I thought it proper for me to come in and enthuse with the interactive fiction community at large and the rest is history!
I can not wait to get to meet everyone and get to know about the games they make and the passion they have for the medium and learn more and more about interactive fiction and the reasons why everyone loves it so much!
Hey Jonathan! I watched your play through of my game (What Heart Heard…) and it was a surreal and awesome experience, so thank you for that. I’m really looking forward to having you here weighing in on the discussions.
Hello! I suppose I should post here first, get it out of the way so that my first post here isn’t me asking a stupid question. Not to say that I’m planning on asking stupid questions, I just want to acknowledge the possibility.
My name is Liam, and while I have read a lot of Interactive Fiction, I’ve never written it before. (Technically, I did write about two paragraphs worth of practice with Twine years ago, but to be completely honest there wasn’t much interactiveness). I’ve decided to finally learn how to use Twine, and I’m using this opportunity to try to kickstart my writing-brain. It’s been a while since I’ve tried to write something, but now I’ve got a story in my head so I might as well try.
I think I initially turned to the idea of making an IF because of worldbuilding. I have a world that I’ve been working on for a while now, a few years at least, and at first I thought of attempting a book. But the problem is that I’m bad at decisions. I had the feel of a storyline, but I didn’t know how I wanted to go through with it. Now I hope that making it an IF will give me a bit more freedom with it.
I think I went on too long with this, but I think that’s a bit expected with an introduction post. I hope that now I can be more involved in the IF community, instead of just lurking.
Hi Liam! Welcome to the forums- they’re a great place to connect with other developers and seek clarification on any questions you might have throughout the interactive fiction crafting process!
I noticed that you mentioned wanting to learn Twine.
My friend Manon, runs a super helpful Tumblr blog, and she has compiled a masterlist of coding resources for people in your very situation! It is biased towards the Sugarcube format, as that is her preferred one to write in- but is great for anyone looking to get their bearings. She’s really generously provided some free to use templates as well in said masterpost to help you get started on customization.
Hi Liam, a very warm welcome to you! Always exciting when another Twiner jumps in the pool (shoutout to Sophia’s comment above, those resources are top-notch).
I noticed the conlang in your bio - would love to hear more about some of your faves or your own projects sometime!
) It was then that I realized that Interactive Fiction doesn’t have to be heavily story-based… to tell a story.
!
