This is a good point, but also raises the question of why we don’t see nearly any IF that takes this approach. We have IF roguelikes, IF single-turn games, and IF optimization puzzles (Verdeterrelikes). Is an IF arcade game possible?
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The reason arcade games were able to survive, IMO, was simply because it used constant attention because it was real-time. There’s no good way to make real time work in IF without becoming a problem. Just my two cents.
EDIT: My bad, I meant to reply to @prevtenet .
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Well, there are versions of Tetris for arcades and versions of Tetris for IF formats 
In the same vein—but more original, there’s Space Shooter (I was surprised to learn that this was something actually released, having just thought of it as just some screenshot on ye olde TADS site :') )
Hot take: there ought to be a way to make real-time in IF without it becoming a problem. The same applies to random combat or LOOK BEHIND/UNDER or Cambridge/Killworth style “no examine” or hunger/sleep timers or mazes or any such IF bête noire.
Splitting the command line off into a separate window ought to stop the most egregious effect of Border Zone-style real time—your command being interrupted.
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This was my goal for I Am Prey.
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There is IF in real time if you look to choice-based games. Here’s a classic one:
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fellas, is it gay to make out in the ashes of capitalism?
(Cackling)
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This is why Gauntlet (1985) is so ingrained in my mind. That was a quarter muncher with actual depth.
Warrior needs food badly!
Elf shot the food!
Thanks, elf.
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I don’t know what your definition of problem is, but TADS3 supports real-time events (I made limited use of them in my game, mostly for effect rather than gameplay).
When a realtime event posts (of course you may already know this, you seem to have familiarity with TADS), the prompt reappears afterward with the same set of characters you had entered up till then, so that typing is never actually interrupted, other than the visual scroll from the new message.
As far as problems go, the main difficulty seems to me to be that the player’s outcome may be too tied to their ability to type quickly or accurately, when their mind may know what to do instantly. But I’m sure creative ideas could be employed. It’s probably something that I would enjoy playing around with if I get a new TADS game underway.
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I watched a video let’s play of the tabletop Elder Sign and my simultaneous thoughts were “wow that looks like fun” and “wow I will never play that because nobody I’m friends with is going to sit and learn what all 753 different types of tokens and counters are and how they work”. I actually found and purchased an app version that could be played solo and having the computer handle all the rules was amazing.
That’s what computers are good for. Same experience with Magic the Gathering - I couldn’t be bothered doing much work with the card collection process, though I enjoyed a few minor games with friends who had cards, but usually anyone who was actually into it was well above my skill level and it wasn’t fun for either of us. My best experience was playing MtG on the computer (which is much quicker and better referee) and more recently Blizzard’s interpretation of CCG which was much more streamlined.
The cool thing is if you study complicated boardgames like Elder Sign it can provide insight on how to take a meta-step away from a narrative, and with bigger less definite chunks, it’s possible to conceive interactive fiction that is re-playable and more “game” like. In some respects “complicated boardgame” = “simplified IF”
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Very true. I checked out the game and it has a complexity rating of 2.34 / 5 on BoardGameGeek. I’d hate to see a game with 4 or more. My caveman brain would probably hit things with sticks and throw rocks.
Unrelated: @HanonO Is there a way to add alt attribute text (for screen readers) for images uploaded to these forums?
Oh, really? I’m probably lucky to know people around me who think it’s fun to play board games for days on end that involve hundreds of pieces, dozens of cards, rules in book form, add-ons (because otherwise it’s not complicated enough) and optional rules. It’s certainly a generational thing (although my daughters are far from scared of it. As my grandmother used to say, dogs don’t make cats).
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One of my all time favorites. I built a 4-player MAME cabinet in the 00’s because it had to support Gauntlet.
While the arcade version was brutal, I could play the C64 version all day. In fact I did that once and made myself sick.
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The alt text is what’s in the square brackets, currently “image”. (Before the image size, obviously. I guess that means you can’t use a vertical bar in the alt text.)
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Works beautifully. Thank you, Dannii!
Now, let’s use it people!
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The owner of the small company I worked at in 1986 would take three of us to the nearby mall arcade and he’d pay for 2/3 hours of Gauntlet play. That damn thing was addictive as hell.
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The code is one half of the equation, and here’s the other: How to write helpful alt text
Now let’s use it, people!
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Here is an article with more specificity.
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Hhgttg was the only game for which I purchased invisibles. (Later I bought both editions of “”lost treasures” which came packaged with invisiclues for every game, allowing me to complete games I’d given up on years earlier.
But no, hhgttg was not my favorite.
One of my favorites was Amy Briggs Pirate Romance, “Plundered Hearts”. That probably counts as an unpopular hot take.
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While it can never catch up at IFDB, Plundered Hearts was the second highest-placing Infocom game in the last Top 50 IF of All Time poll, (AMFV was first). That’s the first time it’s placed in one of those polls. The tide seems to have turned for that one (and it’s very well deserved in my opinion)!
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My first thought for arcade-style IF was parser puzzle fest with procedurally generated dungeons to hold the puzzles or a Sphinx that asks you random riddles until you get one wrong… also find myself wondering how a IF demake of Pac-Man would go… and how IF Tetris works.
And leaning into the puzzle aspect, are there any IF that take a page out of level-based puzzlers’ handbook and instead of puzzles existing in an interconnected world, a la a Zelda dungeon, you have a bunch of isolated puzzles that take place in a single room or cluster of rooms, and while the ultimate goal is to clear all of the levels, perhaps with some kind of extra challenge to get a gold star instead of a checkmark on each level, you can play any unlocked level in any order and as many times as you like and unlocking further levels only requires beating some of the unlocked levels though perhaps secret challenges for completionists… Perhaps the game has 101 levels arranged into 10 worlds of 10 levels each, you start with 9 levels from World 1, beating any five of a world’s levels unlocks the next world, beating all 9 of a world’s normal levels(or perhaps getting gold on all nine) unlocks it’s hidden 10th bonus level, and beating all 10 of the bonus levels unlocks the 101st level of the game. A setup like this could get away with puzzles that could be gotten into unsolveable states without being overly frustrating so long as there was always the option to reset the current level or to exit and comeback with it reset, and such might even be reasonably expected from the later levels and the puzzles being self-contained and not having to clear them all in a specific order could help minimize “where do I use this?” and “That one puzzle” type situations. As for getting “Gold” on a level, possibilities include keeping track of number of moves and rating a player’s performance compared to the optimal solution or the best solution known to the creator, an optional rule that makes the puzzle harder, or needing to find a secret hidden in each level.
Also, as my mind went to Scribblenauts when I thought “puzzle game that doesn’t require you to beat every level to progress” I wonder how that concept would work as a parser game.
Regarding real-time IF and the typing speed issue, I find myself wondering if there has been any attempts to make parser IF playable via voice commands. Or Audio IF more generally.
I wonder how many of the people making insanely complicated board games wanted to make video games but had no knack for programming… and as hard as it can be to explain a game’s rules to another person, explaining them to a computer can be even harder, especially for more complicated rules… Plus, a board game can get away with static character art and no official soundtrack, while most video gamers are going to expect at least some level of animated game pieces and bundled music… Many of these games probably should be video games, but I think it’s fair to say making them video games requires a strict superset of the skills needed to make them board games.
And now I’m curious what Checkers, Chess, and Go would get for complexity ratings from Board Game Geek…
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