Chapter 7: Continued:
Section 7.14 is Going by, going through, going with. It refers to vehicles, doors, and pushing:
Instead of going to the Front Stacks by the trolley, say "The Front Stacks are far too confined for the trolley to manoeuvre into them."
(Reminds me of the hedge roller in Curses!, which is fun)
Before going through the green baize door, say "Through you go..." After going through the green baize door: try looking; say "...and here you are."
Instead of going from the Office with the trolley, say "But it looks perfectly placed here. Why push any further?"
(It seems in the first example the player is riding the trolley, while in the third they are pushing).
A final nugget of wisdom:
“Going” is not the only action which moves the player. Another is “exiting”, an action which moves the player out of whatever he/she is currently in or on. This action is often caused by the player typing just OUT or GET DOWN, and there’s no noun as such. But Inform allows the syntax “exiting from” to make it easier to write rules about the exiting of particular containers or supporters:
After exiting from the Mini Cooper: say "You painstakingly unpack your limbs from the tiny car."
Many examples!
First is 104, No Relation:
Instead of going by a vehicle (called the auto) to somewhere offroad:
say "You can't drive [the auto] off-road."
The ignition is part of the car. Instead of going by the car when the ignition is switched off: say "The ignition is off at the moment." Instead of switching on the car, try switching on the ignition. Instead of switching off the car, try switching off the ignition.
We have to specify ‘going by a vehicle’ instead of ‘going by something’, since otherwise if a player is on a pedestal and tries going north this rule will trigger.
Example 105 is Mattress King:
After going a direction (called way-pushed) with something (called the thing-pushed):
say "You push [the thing-pushed] [way-pushed] to [the location].";
continue the action.
(Usually inform just prints the description of the new room)
Example 106 is One Short Plank, a bridge that collapses if the player is carrying something over it or pushing something onto it:
The East Jungle is a room. The plank bridge is west of the East Jungle and east of the West Jungle. The plank is an open unopenable door. "A precarious plank bridge extends [if the location is West Jungle]east[otherwise]west[end if] across the chasm." The description of the plank is "Extremely fragile and precarious."
Instead of going through the plank when the player is carrying something:
say "You step gingerly across the plank, which bows under your weight. But your meagre possessions are the straw which breaks the camel's back!";
end the story.
After going through the plank:
say "You step gingerly across the plank, grateful that you're not burdened.";
continue the action.
There is a feather in the East Jungle.
The gigantic stone ball is a thing in the West Jungle. It is pushable between rooms.
Before going through the plank with something:
say "Surely you jest." instead.
Example 107 is Provenance Unknown:
This example uses the rare and mysterious ‘setting action variables’ command, generally used for when the authors are pulling something monstrous and outrageous out of nowhere:
Setting action variables for pushing something to:
if the noun is enclosed by a pushable between rooms thing (called the pushed item) which is in the location:
now the noun is the pushed item instead.
Example 108, Zorb, lets players push things up or down.
The new can't push unpushable things rule is listed instead of the can't push unpushable things rule in the check pushing it to rules.
This is the new can't push unpushable things rule:
if the noun is not pushable between rooms:
say "[The noun] [are] not amenable to being pushed from place to place." instead.
The can't push vertically rule is not listed in any rulebook.
Section 7.15 is ‘Kinds of action’. I alluded to this earlier; it’s a way to group actions to make rules about them together.
I have a lot of testers who like to do weird things like lick the sun, so I take every action involving physically touching something and call it ‘physicality’, and have rules like ‘instead of physicality when the noun is distant…’
Here’s the books example:
Kissing Mr Carr is unmaidenly behaviour.
Doing something to the painting is unmaidenly behaviour.
Instead of unmaidenly behaviour in the Inn, say "How unmaidenly!"
Example 109 is Dearth and the Maiden, based on novelist Georgette Heyer. It essentially uses the above example.
Example 110 is Mimicry:
Asking someone about something is speech. Telling someone about something is speech. Answering someone that something is speech. Asking someone for something is speech.
Before speech in the presence of an ungreeted person: try waving hands.
One complication is that “asking someone to try doing something”, which describes commands such as FRED, GO SOUTH, cannot be made into a kind of action. This requires its own rule:
Before asking someone to try doing something in the presence of an ungreeted person: try waving hands.
Check waving hands:
unless the player can see someone who is not the player, say "You are alone." instead.
Carry out waving hands:
say "You nod hello to [the list of ungreeted people who can be seen by the player].";
now every ungreeted person who can be seen by the player is greeted.
The report waving hands rule is not listed in the report waving hands rulebook.
This example also includes some arcane rules:
A persuasion rule:
describe poor reception;
persuasion fails.
To describe poor reception:
if the player is in the Invisible box,
say "Everyone convulses with silent laughter as you try to shout from within the invisible box.";
otherwise
say "You attempt to convey your meaning with gesture and interpretive dance, but [the list of visible other people] scorn[if the number of visible other people is 1]s[end if] your performance, refusing to respond."
I’ve never used persuasion rules or persuasion fails, so I look forward to learning more about this.
7.16 is Repeated actions. I think someone was asking about this recently:
Instead of examining the tapestry for the third time, say "All right, so it's a masterpiece, but is this really the time to make a detailed study?"
Instead of examining the urn at least twice, say "It's an urn. What do you want from me?"
Instead of going nowhere for the 20th time, say "Do stop walking into walls, there's a good fellow."
Typing something like:
Instead of taking something for the fourth time, say "No. I'm capricious."
means that it is the fourth time a “taking…” action has been tried, and does not mean that the same item was taken each time. Also, note that we are counting the number of times the action has been tried, not the number of times it succeeded.
Example 111 is Y ask Y?
A thing can be examined or unexamined. A thing is usually unexamined. Carry out examining something: now the noun is examined.
Taking inventory is acting confused. Looking is acting confused. Examining an examined thing is acting confused.
After acting confused for the sixth turn:
say "(If you are feeling lost, try typing HELP for suggestions.)"
I remember reading about Lynnea Glasser designing Coloratura (one of the best parser games of the 2010s) and doing stuff like this but more subtly, so that if the player is stuck the game gently guides them forward.
Example 112 is a true 4-star example. It is the entire text of Emily Short’s A Day for Fresh Sushi, which is a real game in its own right that is fun to play. It has a fish that comments on everything you do. It says stuff like
After examining cloths for the first time:
say "'Whatcha looking at? I can't see through the doors, you know.'"
Section 7.17 is Actions on Consecutive turns:
We can also reckon the number of consecutive turns on which an action has been repeated, by talking about “turns” instead of “times”, as demonstrated in the following example story. Note also that we are allowed to use the phrase “doing it” to mean “the same description as the previous one except for the part about turns or times”, like so:
Instead of examining the Daily for the first time, say "The best article seems to be about how your star sign affects your best swimsuit colour. Really: that's the best article."
Instead of doing it for the second time, say "You now know a generous amount about a typical week in the life of a weather forecaster."
Instead of doing it for the third time, say "You would now know how to cook herb bread, except that you have already forgotten the names of both of the herbs."
Instead of doing it more than three times, say "Nope, you've drained it of all conceivable sustenance, even the small ads about French farmhouses to let (sleeps 7) and breast reduction surgery (with alarming photographs in sallow light)."
After waiting for four to six turns, say "This is getting mighty dull." After waiting for seven to eight turns, say "Really, exceptionally dull." After waiting for nine turns, end the story saying "You have died of boredom, something previously thought medically impossible".
So I think only the bottom example uses the new ‘turns’ phraseology.
Finally, Section 7.18 is Postscript on actions, which just says that future sections will explain how to make NPCs do actions, create new actions, and completely redirect the effects of an action.
Great chapter! This is the real core stuff here.