This would probably be horribly complicated...

Authoring Inform 7
1

…but would it be possible to make Inform’s game output appear as if it were being typed? As in text appearing character by character, preferably with slight speed variation. But fast, obviously, so it wouldn’t be horrible to play. Maybe some extension could be wrangled? Or am I being ridiculous?

2

You might be able to get Real-Time Delays and Text Capture working together. I shudder to think about getting this to play nice on every interpreter, though; even if you think you’ve got it working nicely, I’d include an option to turn it off.

3

It’s been done before. I’d recommend saving it for special parts in the story, otherwise it will be too frustrating.

4

Ditto Dannii.

5

Well, it wouldn’t be for the whole story, and I agree it could be frustrating unless done very well. And I would definitely include a disable option. Could you point me in the direction of games that have used the technique?

6

There is, I think, a bit in Shrapnel where this happens. (It’s subtle. I totally missed it the first time around.)

7

Interesting… I was just recently considering trying to get Inform to display output as though it was being throttled through a 14.4k modem… I imagine similar techniques would be used. (Then the only thing keeping me from enshrining my BBS nostalgia will be converting ANSI art to Unicode… I fear I’ll have to give up combinations of foreground/background colours though. Maybe not. Either way it should qualify as among the biggest pains in the ass for the least impressive rewards category.)

8

I know it’s been discussed here before but I can’t find the right search terms…

Wait, no here it is! https://intfiction.org/t/inform-the-reliques-of-tolti-aph/67/1

9

A few Spanish games do this.

Sometimes they allow you to turn off the effect, or to press a key to skip to the end of the paragraph. It’s AWFUL when they don’t. Trust me, you do NOT want to play a game where almost every command you type - certainly every command that advances the game - comes up with a typewriter-style response.

10

A xyzzy is born! :smiley:

Thanks, I’ll take a look.

This looks helpful, thanks!

You’re absolutely correct, I don’t. Typewriter-style makes me think slow, clunky, annoying. If I do this, it will more of a speed-type effect, probably faster than average reading speed.

Thanks for the input, all!