I posed a challenge on ifMUD: imagine an IF game that can be won using only two verbs. Those two verbs also form the game’s title. Given that, what’d be the most promising title?
Some of the answers may have, uh, wandered away somewhat from the purest possible interpretation of the premise, or stricter interpretations of what precisely counts as a verb. Nonetheless! MY CHALLENGE TO YOU, dear reader, is to take one of these titles, or come up with one of your own, and produce a game that fits the bill. There is no deadline because I cannot summon up the energy to run this as an actual minicomp, and I am not insane enough to try and run a minicomp in the middle of the maxicomp. Also, if you would prefer just to come up with more two-verb titles, or speculate about the games you would make from these titles if only you could be arsed, that is entirely cool too.
I can’t quite parse your phrasing, so I’m not sure if this is the right answer. But the idea is that the player only ever needs to use those two verbs to complete the game. (The game might still respond to, or be winnable using, other verbs; or it might not.) The verbs can take nouns, or not. (Though a lot of the verbs only make sense with a noun.)
So a walkthrough for DROP KICK might look something like:
If you want to be a purist, no. If you don’t, yes!
(Arbitrary and never-to-be-enforced ruling: the Purist Category must be fair and winnable with only the verbs literally in the title, while the Delightfully Impure Category can have directions, INVENTORY and EXAMINE as freebies.)
The purist category would also allow for I ASK. (It’s a conversation game where part of the challenge is to ask NPCs for things and see what they give you.)
ETA: Better would probably be I ENGINEER, though the implementation would require a bit more original thinking.
I only saw portions of this conversation go by in my RSS reader, so was going to chime in here about the limited required verb set of Guilded Youth (think it’s 3 or 4), then realised I was kind of off base. A Vegas thriller could be entitled WIN GAME, perhaps with its postmodern sequel LOSE GAME. Then I wanted to try to make a PUTPBAD joke.
Some more: SUBVERT ORDER, REBEL YELL, IMITATE SMILE, CONFESS SIN, TOTAL GRIND, CASTLE RUIN, DELIBERATE LIE, (E)X HUSBAND, SECOND BASE, SPREAD FEAR. If IF commands count, there could also be VERBOSE TRANSCRIPT (admittedly a bit lacking in the gameplay department).