Category Archives: interactive fiction

Wrapping Up At the GDC Austin

By Rubes | Published: September 18, 2009

I’m finally getting some time to put some thoughts together on this year’s GDC Austin, as I sit in the airport waiting for my flight back. Luckily, it’s still possible to put some thoughts together, after dumping half a beer on (and in) my laptop last night. I thought for sure that was the end of the line for the MacBook Pro, but it seems to have survived the scare.

It was an impressive amount of beer dumped directly over the power button and right half of the keyboard, and I wasn’t exactly the swiftest to respond. But after giving it some time to dry upside down, it did start up the first time I tried. After that, though, on subsequent power-ups it would only cough and gasp before shutting down. It looked bleak. I’m not sure what did the trick. I gave it one last shot by holding down [More...]

Also posted in Vespers, characters in games, game design, text in games | 3 Comments

A Moment To Pause and Catch My Breath

By Rubes | Published: September 1, 2009

Well, that was a bit longer hiatus than I was expecting, but there you have it. It was quite a July and August. Mixed in with an impossible workload, particularly in August, was a couple of vacations (including an awesome backpacking trip to Yosemite National Park, which required more preparation than I had expected) and a big deadline. Yeah, that deadline. It’s amazing, particularly without having children, how easily free time can get sucked away before you realize it. So just about every spare minute I could find was spent working on my presentation, which has left very little time for any Vespers work recently.

I’ve given a lot of scientific talks and lectures before, and it’s pretty rare to have to prepare my talk well in advance. On only a handful of occasions can I remember having to turn in my slides before I gave the talk, which [More...]

Also posted in game design | 4 Comments

Gulp

By Rubes | Published: July 10, 2009

This, to be perfectly honest, isn’t something I ever expected to see.

It certainly does make it real. I was hoping to put together something like a panel discussion to take some of the pressure off, but that turned out to be more complicated than I thought. So there it is, and here I am, all jittery and uneasy two months in advance and hoping that I can come up with enough interesting material to justify this trust I’ve been given.

The AGDC Game Writers Summit web page has been updated with most of the sessions, so I have been able to glance at some of the company I have been placed in. Looks like there are some big designers and writers from Valve, Eidos, Sony Online, Red Storm, and Ubisoft. Wonderful. And there are some really interesting talks planned, such as Mary de Marle’s “Redefining Our Role [More...]

Also posted in game design | 5 Comments

IF@AGDC

By Rubes | Published: June 7, 2009

So apparently the powers that be at the Austin GDC were curious enough about modern interactive fiction to give it the floor (part of it anyway), for a few minutes at least. I received notice the other day that my proposal for a talk on “game design innovations in IF” was accepted for presentation during the Game Writers Summit. I’m pretty happy about that, especially considering that last year I found the Game Writers Summit to be the most interesting part of AGDC. I’m curious to see how many people are intrigued enough by the topic to attend. I’m hoping it’s more than four.

Of course, the e-mail notice was soon followed by one of those “Oh shit” moments. I suppose this means I actually have to do it now.

That happens on occasion in the day job. We submit grants all the time for various ambitious research projects, [More...]

Also posted in game design | 2 Comments

Deadlines Are Just Rough Guesses, Anyway

By Rubes | Published: May 8, 2009

So a couple of deadlines have been extended, much to my relief. Perhaps.

The deadline for IndieCade, the annual independent games festival/competition, was extended from April 30th to May 15th. This is good because I really had no chance of having something close to submission-worthy by the end of April. It’s still up in the air if I can have the demo ready by the 15th, but at least I’ll have another shot.

Additionally, the submission deadline for the Austin GDC conference (for presentations) was just extended from today to Wednesday, May 13th. I’ve spoken with a couple of people about a presentation already, and I’ve prepared a draft of my abstract, so the extension will allow me/us to edit and refine it a bit more. Although I’ve submitted many abstracts for scientific research conferences in the past, I’ve never prepared an abstract quite like this before, so [More...]

Also posted in miscellaneous | 2 Comments

XYZZY Awards Tomorrow

By Rubes | Published: March 13, 2009


Just a quick reminder that this year’s XYZZY Awards for interactive fiction will be announced tomorrow, Saturday, March 14th, at 3:00 PM Eastern time. As usual, the format will be a gathering on ifMUD (http://ifmud.port4000.com), so head on over and get yourself an account if you don’t have one already.

Come drop by and enjoy the ceremonies!

More info about the XYZZY’s can be found here.

UPDATE: The awards ceremony will be rescheduled…at a date to be determined. Check the XYZZY site for further information.

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blueful

By Rubes | Published: January 27, 2009

Aaron Reed has written some pretty fine IF. Gourmet was one of my favorites from the 2003 IF Comp, just a lot of fun to play. It even has its own theme song (judge for yourself). And of course there’s Whom The Telling Changed, which received much well-deserved recognition and was a finalist in 2006 at the now-defunct Slamdance Guerrilla Gamemaker Competition. I also see that Aaron was interviewed back then for Get Lamp, Jason Scott’s (hopefully) upcoming documentary on text adventures.

He also lives about ten minutes away from my house. We met a couple of times at the quarterly Utah Indie Gamers Night, and he’s a pretty fascinating guy.

Aaron is about to launch his epic new work of IF, Blue Lacuna, which he is calling an “interactive novel”. Before that, though, there is an online [More...]

Also posted in games as art, indie games | 2 Comments

Write from the Start

By Rubes | Published: January 18, 2009

So pretty much one of the most challenging parts of making games for the small indie or hobbyist developer is getting the extra help you need. The developer who can do it all on his or her own — programming, artwork, writing, modeling, animation, web design, yada yada — is a rare breed with far too much talent and disposable time. When I made Missions of the Reliant way back when, in (gulp) 1994, I could handle most of it myself because things were just…simpler. I didn’t have to worry about modeling or animation, and web design meant little more than plain text and a few animated GIFs (mostly I just focused on BBS’s and AOL — and, sadly enough, eWorld). Life, as they say, was so much easier when we were young.

Unless you start from the beginning with a set of partners, it’s tough to find people [More...]

Also posted in 3D/if, game design, story in games | 6 Comments

Text Adventuring, MMO-Style

By Rubes | Published: January 15, 2009

Coyote and Scorpia beat me to it, but apparently a group is interested in bringing the Zork universe into the MMO realm, as reported on Ars Technica. It’s to be called Legends of Zork and published by Jolt Online Gaming, a group headquartered in Dublin. There isn’t a whole lot of information available yet, though.

From the press release:

“LegendsofZork.com will provide online gamers with a persistent online adventure, playable from any Internet browser. Players take up the role of a recently laid-off salesman and part-time loot-gatherer, as he explores the Great Underground Empire. Designed to provide gamers with a casual MMO game they can play on their laptop, desktop or Apple iPhone (in school, work or on the bus), there’s nothing to download, just go to www.legendsofzork.com.”

I have to say I’m not completely surprised, given some of the recent advances in browser-based IF and [More...]

Also posted in adventure games | 3 Comments

IFComp08: The Results Are In

By Rubes | Published: November 16, 2008

The voting ended yesterday, and the results have been tallied. The winner of this year’s IFComp is Violet, by Jeremy Freese – an excellent piece which I thought was well-constructed, well-written, and entertaining. The top ten finishers in the Comp are as follows:

  1. Violet

  2. Nightfall

  3. Everybody Dies

  4. Afflicted

  5. Piracy 2.0

  6. Snack Time!

  7. Opening Night

  8. April in Paris

  9. A Date With Death

  10. Berrost’s Challenge

Overall, I thought the competition had some good entries — some really creative ones like Violet and Buried in Shoes, and some traditional ones with good puzzles and engaging writing like Nightfall, Piracy 2.0, and April in Paris. I also enjoyed some of the more lighthearted entries such as Recess At Last and Snack Time! I think there were a reasonable number of solid entries — I would say somewhere around a quarter to a third [More...]

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