A Very Exciting Announcement

Some small bugs that were preventing the Inform 7 extensions RSS feed from appearing quite right under Firefox and Safari (two different bugs) have now, we think, been resolved.

I knew you’d be thrilled.

Inform 7 Build 5T18

…is up. This is a milestone in a number of ways: it’s the 15th Birthday edition of Inform, and it finishes a number of things that have been in progress since January of last year. The Mac IDE comes with a simply awesome table of contents, which lets you view just a small section of your code at a time, or zip back up to the top level; this will filter through to Windows as well. I already find this so essential that during the testing phase I hated those occasions when I had to go back to using the last official build to test user problems…

So you want multi-player IF?

Thanks to Jesse McGrew, there is now a system for same! See this announcement, which — despite the date and initial goofy front — is actually true. You can make yourself an account, create your own realm within the larger multiplayer world, and compose a game in Inform 7 that allows multiple players to connect and play simultaneously.

Yeah, really.

Assorted News

There is indeed an IF Art Show again this year; deadline, May 2.

Play This Thing! is reviewing Photopia (not my review, this time, but I thought people might be interested).

Jeff Nyman has another interesting post on his IF classes, this time on why his next class will be using TADS 3 rather than Inform 7.

Grandtextauto points to Hypertextopia, a program especially for the creation of “axial” hypertexts — there’s one main line of narrative to follow, with what might be considered footnotes, expansions, or embellishments. I wasn’t thrilled with the couple of examples I briefly looked at, but it represents a possibly-interesting alternative take on how hypertext design might be done.

PC Plus article out

The current issue of PC Plus (in the UK) is carrying a tutorial I wrote on interactive prose and description. (Code samples in Inform, but the design advice applies to other languages as well.) This is one of two; the second piece, on action design, is due (I think!) for next month.

A really intriguing post on IF and storytelling

Jeff Nyman has written up some experiences using Inform 7 and TADS 3 with authors new to IF (or at least new to IF programming) and their responses about storytelling this medium and the specific tools involved.

Deluxe Doors extension

Added a new extension:

Allows for doors that are implemented as having independent ‘faces’ — to put a knocker on that can only be seen from on side, for instance, or to allow the player to lock one side with a key but the other with a latch. Also introduces a ‘latched door’ kind.

In Search of Test Cases

Short essay question:

Suppose someone handed you a brand shiny new library for implementing conversation in IF. What kind of thing would you want to use it for? What options do you want to make sure have been accounted for? [more inside]

Another day, another extension

Have uploaded to the Inform extensions page updates of Locksmith and Facing, and a new extension called Approaches. Approaches implements a GO TO… command as found in the manual, but produces somewhat more elegant output, coping with cases where the player’s movement is blocked by a door or some other kind of movement requirement. For instance:

You go north to the aforementioned unwelcoming hut, north again to the unattended pathway, north again to Paris and west to Bois du Boulogne.

or

You go north to the dusty street, then head west to the church. Entry into the church is barred without a hymnal, though.

or

You go north to the open field, then head north again to Seamus’ Hut. Unfortunately, you find you lack a key that fits the hut door.

or

You go to Crimson Chamber by way of Grooved Channel, Shallow Jade Amphitheater, Silver Filigree Prison and Mandarin Casket Room.

or… well, many other variations of your own devising, really. If you try it, though, remember to make sure you have the new Locksmith, too.

Three Room Description Styles

As die-hard I7 authors may know, I’ve had available for some time a Room Description Control extension which allows for greater control over how room descriptions are printed — in particular, what we want to leave out, and what order we want to print descriptions in.

Room Description Control requires, though, a kind of front-end extension as well, to form the paragraphs of the description. Until now, there have been two options, neither of which really conforms to the default Inform description.

I have now released a third version, Ordinary Room Description, which tries to stick as close as possible to the way Inform prints descriptions by default, allowing the author to use the special abilities of RDC without giving up other aspects of Inform’s room description printing.

After the break there are examples of output from all three variations: Single Paragraph Description, Ordinary Room Description, and Tailored Room Description.