Gameshelf video episode #8 - Modern Interactive Fiction

General chit-chat, ramblings, odds and ends.

Moderator: Alastair

Post Reply
Message
Author
User avatar
Samwise
Posts: 87
Joined: Mon May 17, 2010 1:23 pm
Contact:

Gameshelf video episode #8 - Modern Interactive Fiction

#1 Post by Samwise » Tue Aug 24, 2010 10:43 pm

Anyone seen this?

Quite interesting, including some brief interviews with Andrew Plotkin and Nick Montfort:

http://gameshelf.jmac.org/video-podcasts/

Sam.

Mr Creosote
Posts: 966
Joined: Tue Sep 22, 2009 9:23 am
Contact:

Re: Gameshelf video episode #8 - Modern Interactive Fiction

#2 Post by Mr Creosote » Wed Aug 25, 2010 9:06 am

Phew... some interesting stuff for newcomers, but I don't like the general tone.

"You have to download an interpreter along with the game which is a huuuuuge chore" - Nonsense, installing an interpreter is a one-time action which will then allow you to play every game (simplified, too, but you get my drift).

"The parser is horrible! It's a false promise!" - My pet hate. Complete bullshit. Where does a command line prompt promise anything? It's obviously just like any other command line, understanding a fixed set of commands in a fixed grammar.

And, of course, the timeless: "Everything old is crap"

User avatar
Samwise
Posts: 87
Joined: Mon May 17, 2010 1:23 pm
Contact:

Re: Gameshelf video episode #8 - Modern Interactive Fiction

#3 Post by Samwise » Wed Aug 25, 2010 9:50 am

I didn't get the sense that they were bad-mouthing interpreters so much as trying to encourage newbies to use Parchment - which I feel is often cited these days as being the miracle pill which will enable IF to gain massive adoption. Personally, I don't think it has anything to do with ease of use - like you say, an interpreter is really no different to most other programs as far as getting it running goes. The problem (if you perceive it as such) is just that the majority of games players prefer games that don't require so much reading. Parchment won't fix that ... tho, I agree it is a cool piece of software and is a nice way to get support for IF on other patforms that can support that level of javascript.

The command line thing I can sort of see what they're getting at, though I think most people are familiar enough with IF that it's really not an issue for most games players anymore. In fact, I wonder if that argument isn't more applicable to Inform 7 these days. That appears as a natural language interface for writing IF when, of course, it isn't really and there are just as many syntax rules to follow as before. It just looks less like code than most ppl are used to.

Agree with the old thing, definitely. I've said to Gunness before - one of the reasons I quite like this place as opposed to many of the other serious IF hangouts, is that older titles are given just as much time as the latest stuff, if not more so. Members seem to appreciate classic titles, even if they are limited and somewhat buggy. They are a product of their time.

I always get the feeling that the modern IF crowd is almost embarassed about the majority of the main wave of commercial era releases, once you discount the Infocoms and Magnetic Scrolls et al ...

Sam.

Mr Creosote
Posts: 966
Joined: Tue Sep 22, 2009 9:23 am
Contact:

Re: Gameshelf video episode #8 - Modern Interactive Fiction

#4 Post by Mr Creosote » Wed Aug 25, 2010 10:50 am

Samwise wrote:Parchment - which I feel is often cited these days as being the miracle pill which will enable IF to gain massive adoption.
Exactly. While I admire Parchment from a technical point of view, I doubt it will be the silver bullet making people play text adventures, though. It's yet another hype.
Samwise wrote:The command line thing I can sort of see what they're getting at, though I think most people are familiar enough with IF that it's really not an issue for most games players anymore. In fact, I wonder if that argument isn't more applicable to Inform 7 these days. That appears as a natural language interface for writing IF when, of course, it isn't really and there are just as many syntax rules to follow as before. It just looks less like code than most ppl are used to.
I think we're talking about different things here. The quote about the 'false promise' refers to the user interface of the games presented to the player, not the writing side. Another current hype seems to be lots and lots of talk about abolishing the parser completely in favour of dumbed down systems like that 'keyword interface' used in the over-hyped Blue Lacuna. I.e. let the game solve itself by selecting the right actions at the right time if the player just types the name of objects without saying what he actually wants to do. Or, even 'better', to abolish any sort of puzzle solving altogether. There's a long-winded current article by the person who the 'false promise' quote is from here: http://emshort.wordpress.com/2010/06/07 ... ng-anyway/. My advice is not to read it, though. Most of it is a lot of extremely pretentious claptrap. Big words which stop sounding good once you actually start thinking about them.
Samwise wrote:I always get the feeling that the modern IF crowd is almost embarassed about the majority of the main wave of commercial era releases, once you discount the Infocoms and Magnetic Scrolls et al ...
Unfortunately, it goes even further. You'll find lots and lots of people slamming even Infocom games these days. That's the same people who will jump at you for talking about 'games' or 'playing' at all. It's reading and blah blah blah (insert more pretentiousness here)...

User avatar
Samwise
Posts: 87
Joined: Mon May 17, 2010 1:23 pm
Contact:

Re: Gameshelf video episode #8 - Modern Interactive Fiction

#5 Post by Samwise » Wed Aug 25, 2010 11:20 am

Mr Creosote wrote:Exactly. While I admire Parchment from a technical point of view, I doubt it will be the silver bullet making people play text adventures, though. It's yet another hype.
That's a bit harsh - and implies there's nothing of substance to Parchment. I think we agree that Parchment is an achievement and certainly has advantages in exposing titles to people on platforms who may have a web browser but no interpreters. It may be being hyped by others as a tool for mass exposure, but that's not due to the Parchment project itself.
Mr Creosote wrote:I think we're talking about different things here. The quote about the 'false promise' refers to the user interface of the games presented to the player, not the writing side.
Well, up until I compared it with the writing side, perhaps. :)

I think talking about the implied promise to the user that a game's parser will be able to mostly understand English when they play, is really not that much difference to the promise that is implied by Inform 7 that you will no longer need to be a programmer - you can design a game in English, and it will just work. Neither is true, of course - they require a strict subset of English, with specific syntax rules. How well you consider these promises are fulfilled, is probably a personal opinion. In the case of Inform (and not that I've yet to do anything significant with it yet), I think I prefer my code to be code (i.e. Inform 6) ... but I can imagine there are others who find the initial English-appearance of a project to be encouraging, especially for those who may be more reluctant to start something when confronted by a typical computer language.

Sam.

Mr Creosote
Posts: 966
Joined: Tue Sep 22, 2009 9:23 am
Contact:

Re: Gameshelf video episode #8 - Modern Interactive Fiction

#6 Post by Mr Creosote » Wed Aug 25, 2010 11:41 am

Fully agreed about Parchment. I'm not trying to badmouth the project itself, just the people who believe it will save the world from starvation, desease and everything ;)

Re. the parser question: Again, agreed. However, what irks me that certain people nowadays interpret this whole question as a fault of the system (i.e. 'false promise') as opposed to the idiot player (i.e. 'false expectation' or 'false perception'). Seriously, anyone who has ever seriously used a computer simply has to know that computers can't think!

An interesting thought: If a parser were a false promise to the player, wouldn't a 'natural language' system like Inform 7 be one, too? Following that train of thought, Inform 7 would be a bad idea in the first place, because it would only frustrate people. Yet, the same people talking about parsers being a false promise praise Inform 7. So much for consistency.

User avatar
Samwise
Posts: 87
Joined: Mon May 17, 2010 1:23 pm
Contact:

Re: Gameshelf video episode #8 - Modern Interactive Fiction

#7 Post by Samwise » Wed Aug 25, 2010 2:07 pm

Mr Creosote wrote:An interesting thought: If a parser were a false promise to the player, wouldn't a 'natural language' system like Inform 7 be one, too?
That's what I've been trying to say! Albeit perhaps, badly. :) That was my point - it's really two sides of the same coin and I think we're agreed that it should be readily apparent that even now, computers still can't understand English completely, whether it's for playing games or writing them. They need syntactic rules to follow - even if the language now looks closer to Engish than they used to.
Mr Creosote wrote:Following that train of thought, Inform 7 would be a bad idea in the first place, because it would only frustrate people.
As someone who's used to traditional programming, I do indeed find it unnatural. I think the idea is that it is more appealing to complete novices - traditional writers, for instance. Whether Inform 7 has resulted in more works from non-traditional programmers is, again, probably up for debate. It's not my cup of tea, but if Graham, Emily et al want to explore it, then you pays per money and you takes yer choice. Inform 6 is still under the covers and is a very flexible system.

Sam.

Mr Creosote
Posts: 966
Joined: Tue Sep 22, 2009 9:23 am
Contact:

Re: Gameshelf video episode #8 - Modern Interactive Fiction

#8 Post by Mr Creosote » Wed Aug 25, 2010 2:42 pm

You lead me to see your point quite cleverly - making me believe I came up with the analogy myself :D

I have written two games in Inform 7 so far and it's really much more 'traditional' than the marketing department would want you to believe once you get to the complicated details of the game logic implementation. Sure, it's 'closer' to natural language than any other programming language I know, but then, even C is based on the English language in many ways (loops and conditions make this apparant). So I wouldn't really call it a big revolution yet.

User avatar
Samwise
Posts: 87
Joined: Mon May 17, 2010 1:23 pm
Contact:

Re: Gameshelf video episode #8 - Modern Interactive Fiction

#9 Post by Samwise » Wed Aug 25, 2010 3:30 pm

Mr Creosote wrote:You lead me to see your point quite cleverly - making me believe I came up with the analogy myself :D
haha. Am I a genius or simpleton? You decide! :)
Mr Creosote wrote:I have written two games in Inform 7 so far and it's really much more 'traditional' than the marketing department would want you to believe once you get to the complicated details of the game logic implementation. Sure, it's 'closer' to natural language than any other programming language I know, but then, even C is based on the English language in many ways (loops and conditions make this apparant). So I wouldn't really call it a big revolution yet.
I agree - I just personally find the NL thing just gets in the way too much for my preference. It's not how I prefer to think about a game conceptually.

Not that I've done much yet - I'd like to write some I6 stuff ... but just never seem to have the time to spare. C'est la vie!

Sam.

Post Reply