I’ve been spending many, many of my evenings lately trying to figure out how to use a program called Inform 7. The program is used for writing interactive fiction, which is, in the words of Wikipedia:
software simulating environments in which players use text commands to control characters and influence the environment. Works in this form can be understood as literary narratives and as video games. In common usage, the term refers to text adventures, a type of adventure game where the entire interface can be “text-only.” …
Why on earth would I be doing this? Because I’m assisting in a “History of Video Games” class at our homeschool co-op, and I volunteered to help the kids write their own interactive fiction. Possibly not my brightest move, since I didn’t have a clue to actually do it myself.
However! I’ve kind of sort of been figuring it out. And so I present to you my very first and most likely only Interactive Fiction game thing: Tangled Up in Bob. To play it, click “play in browser.” The player should load; then you have to type directives like “go south” or “take the gnome.” You run around doing little tasks and eventually you win. The game doesn’t make much sense, and it may well still be pretty buggy.
Give it a shot, and let me know what you think! (No making fun of me, Gamer People.) Once you’ve finished laughing at me, check out some of these games that are intricate and impressive:
Inform 7 is supposed to be the “easy” way to write interactive fiction. I will just say that I’ve stayed up way too late on far too many evenings trying to figure out how to make it do what I want it to do. And if you play my silly little game, you’ll see that what I wanted it to do doesn’t seem all that complicated. But I did find some very helpful guides and tutorials for Inform 7, so let me know if you’re interested in trying your hand at it and I’ll link up to them.
What I learned from your game is that I am bad at these games.
Or that I’m bad at making them.