daelsepara
commented
5 months ago I myself, am no writer. I find that it is easier to digitize popular gamebooks rather than creating my own interactive fiction from the ground up and implementing complex user / NPC interactions. Choice based gamebooks, even as clever as Virtual Reality Gamebooks, are way simpler than to implement than Zork. I used ZIL because the output is portable. I didn't have to worry about how it would look like in other machines. The ZIL language itself is feature-complete, i.e. everything needed to create Zork-style games, ZIL has it. I didn't even have to use the more sophisticated parts of ZIL to get a simple choice based game engine working. Dealing with simpler systems allowed me to avoid getting stuck. Back then, I was able to convert 1 gamebook a week at my peak.
Those ZIL works started as an academic exercise and proof of concept that ZIL can create other simpler forms of interactive fiction. Right about the time that I had enough proof, I looked for new challenge, i.e. SDL. While I enjoyed doing SDL work, I spent more time (almost) fighting against it or getting frustrated at how the simplest things required lots of work and trial-and-error. Nowadays, there more powerful and better and easier engines to work with.
My advice would be to get the gamebook mechanics working first before implementing a friendlier and more polished UI. With SDL designing UIs come at the pixel level. It can be very hard to find even the time to learn it. Hopefully, if you get enough conversions under your belt, the storytelling skill improves at the same time.
Good luck
Hello daelsepara and others,
I say your interactive fiction or gamebooks are successful, but I find little evidence of their popularity. The only gripe with them is that virustotal.com malware scans suspect a few number of possible dubious code and/or designs. That said, there is no official malware. I guess I could look forward to a strictly GNU-Linux/Flatpak/Flathub/AppImage build in the future (trying not to use the .exe or other Windows dependencies). I still consider the development on other operating system platforms such as Mac and Windows.
Without further ado, I am making a request to start creating these projects, assuming that they are gratis due to their GPL-3.0 license. I assume that learning C programming language and SDL libraries are required. I explored a bit on ASM, HTML, CSS, Javascript, and Java (obsolete language due to security flaws). The SDL tests remind me of playing around with ASM for a successful Hello World program as either alertbox or window size.
As for game development, I tried RPGMaker (variants) based game. It was not a easy task to navigate with GUI and database. The result was a scripted map as a intro movie and a stop to explore the map, including a red screen ovelay error. I got a working story just to work on something, but the effort to implement the project is exhausting. In the end, I dismantled the project. I know it's based on the old text adventures, which is not bad. However, the graphical representation of the bird's eye view or world/map navigation leaves me to yearn for better aesthetics. It's like trying to look good, but couldn't. I was like, "Why bother in the first place if it failed?". I could accept graphical roguelikes sprites/tiles given the focus of the game. I could even accept the sprites/tiles of the Dark Disciples series (old games that may include malware according to virustotal.com). Maybe the design was the focus on basic representation in terms of balancing between quality and quantity. Or rather maybe it was the real-time walking that nags me for some reason.
I explored other paths of RPG as modding. So far, I haven't gotten to mapping such yet. I managed to create monster and ally mods. I even done sample maps, including a non-map dialogue system. The system is not some text on the screen, but text and drawn images on the hud. It's too bad that I don't have the time to finish a map with NPC conversations. I still have plenty of mods to finish before starting on the dialogue system alone than dialogue system with maps.
Yes, there are times that I could just use HTML as interactive fiction. After all, the appeal of such games is the story, design, and other RPG functions/interfaces. I didn't go too far because of writer's/mathematician's block.
As for this topic, I think interactive fiction would be a great alternative to RPGMaker. I could use quality images without compromise. And if I must represent mapping navigation, I could just use images or maps that won't hinder production values. I think I might first try remaking choice-based (e.g. Endless Quest and Star Challenge [visual novels also apply whenever applicable]) titles. Then maybe condition-based (e.g. Virtual Reality Adventure [as mentioned in your repositories) titles. My ultimate goal would be dice-based (e.g. Legendary Kingdoms [as mentioned in your repositories]) titles. The goal will satisfy RPG and gamebook elements (I recalled random battles or nonlinear gameplay, but maybe it's the probability roll than conditions [may apply to noncombat actions] as vivid moments in memory). Until then, I wait for some replies. I don't think I would be getting a interactive fiction project of this complexity straight away, but I believe that it would be the right direction.