@Encorm and I were recently tossing around an idea for an IF game based on Metropolis (1927)—not a direct adaptation, but various scenes from the night of the uprising from the POV of different (probably original) characters. The choices probably wouldn’t affect the overall plot—the main characters of the film/novel are still doing their thing somewhere offscreen—but they would be personally consequential (and maybe affect the other PCs?).
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I want to mention a TV series which kind of shouts “adventure game puzzles”: McGuyver! I mean the old series, but the new one will probably do. You know, that guy who has an atomic bomb and has to build a bicycle from it. Or the other way round?
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The big obstacle I see is, how do you make the puzzles fair?
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You could give clues if the player examines an item. For example that the item can emit light. Or can carry electricity. Or is heavy. Etc.
You could also provide a pamphlet, brochure, booklet or similar. But I would prefer the first help (clues when examining).
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Reminds me a bit of Phineas and Ferb!
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Anything by Alistair MacLean. He was a real story teller. His books/movies have a clear goal, intriguing story, interesting settings, rich characters, lots of action and adventure, twists and turns where things go wrong, and typically a twist at the end. The three that jump out for me are ‘Where Eagles Dare’, ‘The Guns of Navarone’ and ‘Ice Station Zebra’.
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You asked:
What book/story/film would make a good IF…?
One word: Narnia!
The long-defunct Narnia Solo Games (look them up on Amazon) would be abso!utely perfect for recasting in ChoiceScript.
Now, if someone could only persuade the C.S. Lewis Estate Trust to grant the proper license, we’d all be in business!
Unfortunately, they are extremely protective of their properties… Siiiggghhh…
But failing that – as I’ve said here more than once – I’d love to see a ChoiceScript story based on Peter Pan, the advantage being that it is now in the Public Domain (at least here in the United Snakes of America*).
*My Mom – may God rest her – used to love to call it this.
To Max Fog – you wrote:
[quote=“Pebblerubble, post:22, topic:62279”]
that guy who has an atomic bomb and has to build a bicycle from it. Or the other way round?
Reminds me a bit of Phineas and Ferb![/quote]
Actually, it reminds me more of Leather Goddesses of Phobos!
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“Now I have a pair of cotton balls which were randomly found in a nursery. How does this help create a banana peel?”
Yes, you are definitely right.
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I always thought the premise of the movie Source Code (2011) was particularly good for an IF adaptation. I don’t want to ruin the movie for anyone who hasn’t seen it in the last 12 years, but it involves a repeating short time loop, an investigation, and retaining the details learned in previous loops to apply that knowledge on subsequent loops. It also takes place on a speeding train, naturally limiting the scope of the world. Critics and audiences both apparently hated the film, but I unironically loved it.
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Oh, that one! I started watching it on BBC iPlayer, but it was removed the day after a watched half of it, so I never finished it. It had a pretty cool idea, I have to admit.
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There’s an IF game which has some similarities to the movie: “Vicious Cycles” by Simon Mark. The first version was published long before the movie, and I sometimes wondered whether the screenwriter drew inspiration from the game.
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A bunch of irl friends discovered Dracula Daily (an adaptation of Dracula that takes advantage of the epistolary format and sends you each letter on the day it was written) this year, so I’m reading through it again with them, and currently our dear friend Jonathan Harker is giving off IF adventurer vibes.
I went back to the room, and taking a lamp, tried all the doors. They were all locked, as I had expected, and the locks were comparatively new; but I went down the stone stairs to the hall where I had entered originally. I found I could pull back the bolts easily enough and unhook the great chains; but the door was locked, and the key was gone!
That key must be in the Count’s room; I must watch should his door be unlocked, so that I may get it and escape. I went on to make a thorough examination of the various stairs and passages, and to try the doors that opened from them. One or two small rooms near the hall were open, but there was nothing to see in them except old furniture, dusty with age and moth-eaten.
At last, however, I found one door at the top of the stairway which, though it seemed to be locked, gave a little under pressure. I tried it harder, and found that it was not really locked, but that the resistance came from the fact that the hinges had fallen somewhat, and the heavy door rested on the floor. Here was an opportunity which I might not have again, so I exerted myself, and with many efforts forced it back so that I could enter.
I was now in a wing of the castle further to the right than the rooms I knew and a storey lower down. From the windows I could see that the suite of rooms lay along to the south of the castle, the windows of the end room looking out both west and south. On the latter side, as well as to the former, there was a great precipice. The castle was built on the corner of a great rock, so that on three sides it was quite impregnable, and great windows were placed here where sling, or bow, or culverin could not reach, and consequently light and comfort, impossible to a position which had to be guarded, were secured.
He then proceeds to examine the furniture, the windows, the moonlight, the dust, and so on in his search for a means of escape.
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Some great IF archaeology! I never knew that a Robin Hood game existed (though it stands to reason) and the idea that Source Code might be based on an undiscovered indie gem is fascinating.
I also really enjoyed that movie too… in fact, though I’ve heard it said that a player shouldn’t have to fail / die to succeed in IF, where the premise is directly pitched in this way, I think that it makes explicit what is already implicit… that once we’re stuck, we’re probably going to save the position, try any number of stunts and generally rattle the game’s cage whether we end up dead or not. That Groundhog Daydom is part of the appeal for me.
Back on the 80s nostalgia trail, a couple of shows that I felt have promise are Manimal and Quantum Leap. Manimal for the transformations obviously - I think there was an episode where he turns himself into a python to save someone from sinking sand in the desert! Are there games already out there with multiple metamorphoses? Then Quantum Leap because of the hub with Ziggy to multiple worlds / experiences which could break up into mini-quests in a longer story arc.
Only wish my coding were up to creating them!
PS I think Ryan Veeder was working on a Dracula Files adaptation but he may have put it on hold as it was a BIG project.
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If you’re going to do quantum leap, then Sliders should definitely be considered. I really enjoyed the first 2 seasons of that show and it would adapt to IF well.
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One worth mentioning is the Thieves’ World series first edited by Robert Lynn Asprin. The early books were anthologies of short stories by various SF&F authors. They were all set in the same universe, and centered on the city of Sanctuary.
It was fascinating to see how different writers approached storytelling in a shared universe. I recall one writer being ticked-off when another writer killed off a fan-favorite character.
I think this could work well with IF: A shared world with a basic map and outline, and various writers filling out the framework with their own games. It could even be assembled as a jam. (Now that I write that, I bet there was a jam like this at some point.)
(Disclaimer: I’m not the first to suggest this. Other mentions include this thread from 2012 and this post from last year.)
Addendum: I’m aware of games such as Cragne Manor and Pick Up the Phone Booth and Aisle and like. I’m speaking of a broader, looser collaboration, with many games tied together by location and common history.
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I’ve wanted to do this for a while, but it’s a lot of book and I’m intimidated by the scope of the project.
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True; it would probably be best adapted as just a small part, Jonathan realizing he’s trapped in Castle Dracula and trying to escape.
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The closet multi-author thing that actually came to fruition is probably the Andomeda series.
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YES, IT IS TRUE, I have been working on a Dracula adaptation called Ryan Veeder’s Bram Stoker’s The Dracula Files, and my Patreon supporters have seen a few pieces of it. Jonathan’s diary is bizarrely obsessed with the layout of rooms (I swear certain passages would compile in Inform 7) so those parts were easy to adapt. Other parts were harder to design, because a lot of the book deals with people noticing scary things happening and not so much trying to accomplish stuff. So in some places I’ve had to invent obstacles and motivations (and situations???) that aren’t in the book.
This might be a spurious line of reasoning, but many Alfred Hitchcock movies have sequences that hinge on small objects (like a statuette, or a bracelet, or a bomb). The way typical text adventure presentation can draw attention to that sort of object could maybe be leveraged in an adaptation. A lot of Hitchcock movies also take place in small, isolated settings…
Some good candidates:
- The Lady Vanishes
- Rear Window
- North by Northwest
- Psycho
- what I remember of Foreign Correspondent
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