SPAG 7 Post 1/2: 47K long.


22 Oct 1995 00:04:25 GMT

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The |___/ociety for the |_|reservation of |_|_|dventure \___|ames.
ISSUE # 7
Edited by G. Kevin Wilson (whizzard@uclink.berkeley.edu)

/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~\
< Special 1995 I-F Competition Issue >
\__________________________________/

EDITORIAL--------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Readers,

I hope you aren't too upset, but this month's issue doesn't contain
your standard SPAG stuff. As the official (no one else wanted the job)
organizer of the 1st Annual Interactive Fiction Competition, I'd like to
take time out and just showcase the worthy efforts of the people who entered
this year. I am doing this because I'm excited about the competition. It
has brought I-F authors seemingly out of the woodwork to participate. I am
proud to be a part of it.
Now, as to this month's format, things will be recognizable, but
different. First, I will announce the winners of the competition, listing
the title of their game, the game design system it uses, and what prize they
received. The details of the judging, prize distribution, etc. are all in
SPAG #6, so I won't repost them here. After the results will be the letters
(if any) that I received related to the competition, as well as interviews
with the authors of the games. Then, there will be game reviews, but unlike
most issues of SPAG, the reviews will be restricted to the competition
entries. After this is a section more for game authors than game players.
Indeed, those who haven't yet played the contest entries will want to avoid
this section, as it includes spoilers from several of the entries. Your
humble editor will analyze several of the entries, in depth, and point out
just what makes them noteworthy games. Finally, the usual closing comments
and such. The Reader Scoreboard, and any other missing sections will
reappear next issue. It's been a great competition. Next year promises to
be even better. Oh yeah, you might want to be warned about those interviews.
Some of them have a few spoilers as well.

G. Kevin Wilson
"Whizzard"

CONTEST RESULTS--------------------------------------------------------------

"Before we begin, I'll just point out that the prize draft began with the
1st place Inform entry, skipped over to the 1st place TADS entry, went to the
2nd place Inform entry, and so on, and so on. Now, the envelope, please."

-=-INFORM-=-

1st Place: A Change in the Weather, by Andrew Plotkin.
Andrew chose as his prize: The very first copy of Avalon,
autographed and donated by me.

2nd Place: The Mind Electric, by Jason Dyer.
Jason chose as his prize: $50.00 cash, donated by Martin Braun

3rd Place: The Magic Toyshop, by Gareth Rees.
Gareth chose as his prize: One free registration for "The Path to
Fortune", donated by Christopher E. Forman.

4th Place: MST3K1: Detective, by Christopher E. Forman "and Matt Barringer,"
Christopher chose as his prize: "Castles and Kingdoms: An
electrifying compendium of 15 BASIC adventures you can type into
your Commodore 64" by Bob Liddil, donated by Gareth Rees.

5th Place: All Quiet on the Library Front, by Michael S. Phillips.
Michael chose as his prize: An autographed copy of my first novel, if
and when it's published--for a winner who feels like taking a big
gamble, donated by Jacob Weinstein.

6th Place: Tube Trouble, by Richard Tucker.

-==-TADS-==-

1st Place: Uncle Zebulon's Will, by Magnus Olsson.
Magnus chose as his prize: $100.00 cash, donated by Eileen Mullin

2nd Place: Toonesia, by C. J. T. Spaulding aka Jacob Weinstein, the author
of Save Princeton.
Jacob chose as his prise: 1 year subscription to the printed version
of XYZZYnews, donated by Eileen Mullin

3rd Place: The One That Got Away, by 'The Author' aka Leon Lin
Leon chose as his prize: "Arthur: The Quest for Excalibur" for the
Mac, complete with box, etc., donated by Jacob Weinstein.

4th Place: "It appears to be a tie, ladies and gentlemen."
A Night at the Museum Forever, by Chris Angelini.
Chris chose as his prize: One free registration for Save Princeton,
donated by Jacob Weinstein.

Undertow, by Stephen Granade.
Stephen chose as his prize: A copy of "Leather Goddesses of Phobos"
on 5.25" disk for IBM compatibles, donated by Jon Uhler.

5th Place: Undo, by Null Dogmas aka Neil Demause

-=Editor's Award=-

Magnus Olsson, author of Uncle Zebulon's Will, will also receive a
complimentary copy of Avalon (upon its completion) both as a sort of thanks
for his help with SPAG, and as an editor's choice award. It's not much to
show my appreciation with, but thanks, Magnus.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-
You can reach the authors at the e-mail addresses below if you want
to send fan mail, comments, bug reports, or what have you.

Entry Author E-mail
======================================================================

Toyshop Gareth Rees gdr11@cl.cam.ac.uk
Library Michael S. Phillips msphil@aardvark.cc.wm.edu
MST3K1 C E Forman ceforma@rs6000.cmp.ilstu.edu
Tube Richard Tucker Richard.Tucker@cl.cam.ac.uk
Weather Andrew Plotkins erkyrath+@cmn.edu
Mind Electric Jason Dyer jdyer@indirect.com

Museum Chris Angelini cangelin@uoguelph.ca
The One... Leon Lin leonlin@uclink.berkeley.edu
Undertow Stephen Granade sgranade@scratchy.phy.duke.edu
Toonesia Jacob Weinstein jweinste@castor.usc.edu
Undo Neil Demause neild@echonyc.com
Zebulon Magnus Olsson mol@df.lth.se

======================================================================

"And that, as they say, is that."

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR--------------------------------------------------------

This year's inaugural IF competition has come and gone, and with
it comes an excellent chance to sound pretentious, "literary", and
generally well-informed (no pun intended) about the genre by
reviewing everyone's entries. I learned quite a bit from this
year's entries, from both strengths and weaknesses, and had hoped
to have enough time to expand upon what I've noticed. Sadly,
I'm frantically scrambling to finish this up on the eve of the
deadline for SPAG #7; I hope to have more time to do so and fill
in the reviews that had to be left incomplete in time for SPAG #8.

[Palmer sent me his reviews with this paragraph heading, so I snipped
it off and seperated the reviews into the proper places. Hope he
doesn't mind, since it looked like he wanted this printed.]

-=-=-=-=-=-

Dear Gerry,

Since I know I'm not to late, I wanted to get this out to you as soon
as possible.
I have seen this implied by the large number of posts on the I-F
newsgroups, but no one has ever really come right out and said it, so allow
me to: Thanks for taking the time and energy to do one heckuva job on
setting up the I-F competition this year. With everyone wanting to get
started, but no one quite sure how to go about it, you seized the reins
and formed order where once there was nought but chaos. You got this
crazy thing under control before it was too late.
Just thought you deserved a big round of applause from I-Fers
everywhere.
Looking forward to next year's competition!

[<In a deep bass voice>: "S'allright."]

INTERVIEWS WITH THE AUTHORS--------------------------------------------------

-=-Inform Authors-=-

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
A Change in the Weather, by Andrew Plotkins.

>What first gave you the idea for your entry?

I was walking around the grounds of a restored Colonial-era mansion in
Fredericksburg. Gardens, trees -- two sundials. Sunny, warm. I thought
it would be nice to have a game with that kind of sensory detail. Then
I thought it would be nifty if you had more than one perspective on
the scenery. A tree is one thing on a sunny afternoon; it's quite
another in the middle of a midnight thunderstorm, especially if it's
hit by lightning very suddenly.

The sundials didn't make it in, though. Possibly because of the next
answer:

>Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

I have a graphical game (midway between a puzzle-game and IF) which is
slowly being worked on. It will be called _Moondials_.

But, I mean, *really* slowly. Other projects keep intervening.

>Are you planning to enter again next year?

Yes.

>How did you think of the fox? He's so cute.

Ah, I see he fooled you, too. (It, I should say. The gender is
deliberately not given.)

I just wanted a foil for your character in the story. The fox's role
varied wildly during game-construction. At first I thought you might
need to rescue it, or even rescue a nest of cute little fox cubs. Then
I decided that was much too cliched. For awhile the fox was supposed
to be nesting in the back of the cave -- I guess it still might, but
there's no evidence left of it.

Eventually I just got to like the idea of a non-player character who
knows more than you do, and never tells, and never stops smiling. The
fox's character note is what it thinks of *you*.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Mind Electric, by Jason Dyer.

>What first gave you the idea for your entry?

No comment.

>Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

I've working on a long project that I can only describe as psychological
horror. It's much different than anything else I have seen in the IF
part of the genre.

>Are you planning to enter again next year?

Possibly, although I'll write something alot more silly if I do.

>Did you have a particular vision of 'cyberspace' in mind when you began
"Mind"? How did it evolve as you went along?

For the most part, what you see in "Mind" is what my original vision
was. I wasn't really too focused on what the cyberspace element would
be like while writing, but rather how it would fit into the plot. For
example, I had originally planned to have much more interaction with the
outside world; a "camera room" where you could see views of the outside
world and cause various things to happen. But in the end I decided to
keep everything in virtualspace.

>What are some of the hidden elements of "Mind"?

I doubt most people knew what the cube's calibration message really was,
so I'll give the poetry form and translation here. The words are in Latin,
from Ovid's Metamorphoses.

In nova fert animus mutatas dicere formas
corpora; di, coeptis (nam vos mutastis et illas)
adsirate meis primaque ab origine mundi
ad mea perpetuum deducite tempora carmen

My mind wishes to tell of bodies changed into new forms...
Gods (for you have made these changes) breathe favor on
My undertaking and lead my song from the beginning of the earth
To my own age...

The sounds inside and outside the factory are related; watch the messages
carefully.

The cube has several interesting responses to questions: try asking
it about Kaden, Souden, itself, and creator. The language that the
cube refers to in the first two responses is a form of Japanese.

You can get quotes from trying to TASTE something, or pressing enter
without typing anything.

There are a few other interesting things hiding in the game but I'll leave
them for others to discover.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Magic Toyshop, by Gareth Rees.

> What first gave you the idea for your entry?

I can't remember.

> Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

Yes. It's secret, though.

> Are you planning to enter again next year?

Maybe. If I have the time.

> Where did you get all those neat puzzles?

Dots & Boxes and Dodgems from "Winning Ways" by Conway, Berlekamp & Guy.

Tic-tac-toe and Towers of Hanoi are so well-known that it seemed a good
opportunity to turn the tables a bit.

The robot mouse maze was suggested by the one in "Curses"; the parity
puzzle itself is related to the moving rocks puzzle in "Spellbreaker".

The gnomon was suggested by the one in "Trinity".

The egg was suggested by the eggs in the "Unnkulia" series; the mahogany
matchstick is the rod of fire from "Curses"

The glueing-the-robot-mouse puzzle seemed a good way to introduce the
glue for the Towers of Hanoi without making it obvious what the glue was
for.

The lock puzzle is based on the "Monte Carlo Lock Puzzle" in "The Lady
or the Tiger?" by Raymond Smullyan.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
MST3K1: Detective, by Christopher E. Forman "and Matt Barringer,"

>What first gave you the idea for your entry?

It was actually Graeme Cree's review of "Detective" in SPAG 5 that first got
me thinking about it, but I didn't begin seriously working on it until about
a week before the competition deadline. At that time, there was a delay
from my co-author in regards to text for the game the two of us are
currently writing, so I had about a week with nothing to do. I used four
of those days to put together the MST3K game.

>Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

The completion date for my current project, which my cousin and I are
co-authoring, is rapidly approaching. It's a lighthearted fantasy game
titled "The Path to Fortune," the first in a planned series known as "The
Windhall Chronicles." Currently, I'm wrapping up programming the "fun
stuff" for players to try, and then I plan to send it off to playtesters for
a couple of weeks before correcting any problems. The release date is set
for the end of October (perhaps coinciding with that of Avalon B-). After
that, I plan to work on an interactive sci-fi short story, and then another
I-F fan and I are teaming up to do "something very, very big." (I'm not
saying any more.) The second "Windhall Chronicles" game will be released
sometime in 1996.

>Are you planning to enter again next year?

Oh, definitely, most likely with a more serious entry the next time around.
(I've already got a story idea that I've been tossing around.)

>Some have commented that MiSTing a game isn't really writing a game. What
>do you think about the matter? [Obviously your entry created quite a bit of
>controversy. :)]

Well, I suppose it's not truly writing a game in the sense that MiSTing a
film isn't the same as making a movie. However, the MST3K crew *is* making
a TV show, despite the fact that it's primarily involved with making fun of
bad movies. I've essentially done the same with an I-F piece, and although
it may not be a true game, it has to be considered *something*. Doesn't
writing a game mean that you sit down and type the code? It shouldn't matter
one way or another whether the game is a true original or merely an enhanced
port with humorously derogatory comments added -- I still had to sit down and
code the thing. If my MiSTing doesn't count as a "real game," then neither
should any other port from one language to another. (And if it isn't a game,
what exactly is it?)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
All Quiet on the Library Front, by Michael S. Phillips.

>What first gave you the idea for your entry?

It was one of those caffeine-induced periods of lucidity, in which
suddenly an idea springs forth, fully formed. The fact that it was
immediately after 8 straight 10 hour+ days, staring four more in the face
before the week-end, probably helped. Oh yeah, I suppose I should
mention that I am the 'techie' for the William & Mary Law Library. That
had a lot to do with it :-)

>Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

Yes. Two projects are taking my spare time at the moment.

The first is Release 2 of LIBRARY, which will include several enhancements
(now that I have a better grip on Inform). The help system will be
menued, something I didn't feel I had the time to mess with before, there
are two new rooms, and there are a couple of "niceties".

The second is a game tentatively titled "DJINN!", which takes place in an
Arabian Nights setting. Pieces are falling into place, but I think I'll
borrow a line on when it'll be done: "When it's ready."

>Are you planning to enter again next year?

Certainly! This time I have a whole year, and not a month, to come up
with something..... :-)

>Tell us more about how you wrote "Library."

Well, at the time the idea struck me, we were beginning a shift from one
library system to another (VTLS to SIRSI, for those who care), and there
were an awful lot of hours put in upgrading staff and public PC's. I was
feeling a little zany, and I had just re-discovered a love of IF (thanks
to seeing pinfocom on comp.os.linux.announce, and discovering ZIP and
ftp.gmd.de). I had seen that a competition was being held, and the ideas
just sort of suddenly gelled. If memory serves, it was the end of a
rough day, having just spent the whole week-end working, and I was just
staring at the security gates at our entrance.

There was very little time to do much work (I started coding July 31), and
there was a lot to learn. It was also slow going, because my primary
machine is a 386SX20 with 4Mb of RAM. Fortunately, I'm a Linux user, so I
didn't have to get a drink every time I compiled (which, by the end, was
taking upwards of 3 minutes each time), and I took advantage of the
virtual consoles to have one editing, one compiling, and one playing.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tube Trouble, by Richard Tucker.

> What first gave you the idea for your entry?

Camden Town tube station, in London. I've often arrived at one
platform and ran to another one to change trains, only to find
the train I wanted to catch leaving just as I reach it. Also
they used to have very old chocolate machines that were usually
broken and would swallow your money without giving you anything.

> Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

I'm working on a game that was going to be my competition entry until
I realized it would take me much longer than I thought (that's why
I turned to converting an earlier game). It's my attempt to get around
the classic "guess the verb" problem by substituting a "guess the noun"
problem. Perhaps I'll enter it next year.

I'd love to try and write a full-sized game, but the amount of planning
involved is so much greater.

> You mentioned that "Tube" was based upon an earlier game. Can you
> elaborate?

I had written a crude adventure system for the BBC micro, a popular
machine in the UK and the precursor of the modern-day Archimedes, and wanted
to write a small game on it. I coded the annoying station, and then together
with a friend the rest of the game. All the puzzles and much of the text
were identical in the inform version, but I added considerably to the
responses and introduced a horrible bug too. Converting the game was
a question of reading the original source, remembering how it worked, and
then coding up the puzzles from scratch in inform, which is very quick.
Internally the two versions are very different.

Originally we had plans for a game of which Tube was just one part. It's
(rather quirky) plot was that you were at a party where your host instructed
you to "eat, drink and be merry". When you tried to eat, by picking up a
piece of chocolate cake, the room would go all hazy and you'd find yourself
in the tube station (for no reason at all). Then if you died or won, you'd
return to the party. In the 'be merry' section you had to change your name
by deed poll. The idea was to give the player a choice of what order
to attempt the puzzles in and to make it clear that they couldn't influence
each other, by putting them in different and unrelated scenarios -- this
was something I admired in the Hitchhiker game.

Looking back on it, it seems completely incoherent, and I wouldn't want
to write it now. Then again, my other plans are incoherent too...

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

-==-TADS-==-

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Uncle Zebulon's Will, by Magnus Olsson.

>What first gave you the idea for your entry?

A sudden flash of inspiration, I suppose. I was considering possible ideas
for short IF, and started thinking about the player exploring a wizard's
house.

Now, why would anyone want to do that? Would the wizard still be around?
No, that would be too dangerous, and besides the idea of entering a wizard's
house to steal his things or to defeat him is pretty hackeneyed by now. Maybe
the wizard's dead, and you've come to collect your inheritance? Mmm, sounds
good. What do you find in a wizard's home, then? Lots and lots of neat
stuff, but preferably not just the usual, tired old paraphernalia like
wands and potions and so on. Maybe if there was a [censored to remove the
spoiler]?

Great idea, I said to myself. But could it be made into a puzzle? Yes, for
example if there was a demon guarding the door, and... One thing led to
another, and within about thirty minutes I had the basic idea of the game,
and about half of the plot in my head.

>Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

Yes. I started working on "Bast", a Gothic story with some twists to it,
this winter, but I put it aside this spring due to lack of time, and
haven't re-started work on it yet. "Akorny", a more traditional Zork-like
game, lies dormant since last summer. Then there are some projects that
haven't resulted in any code yet, but which are being processed at very low
priority somewhere in the back of my mind.

>Are you planning to enter again next year?

Yes, if I can find the time to finish a game in time.

>When can we expect the sequel you mentioned at the end of "Zebulon"?

Perhaps I'll enter it in next year's competition, but don't hold your
breaths; right now it's even more vapourware than "Avalon" :-).

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Toonesia, by C. J. T. Spaulding aka Jacob Weinstein, the author of Save
Princeton.

>What first gave you the idea for your entry?

I'm a big fan of animation--I'd rank it as one of America's most
significant cultural contributions to the world. I've wanted to do a
complete game based on my favorite cartoons for a long time. Originally, I
had planned on making it a "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" type thing, with
references to all of my favorite animated works. But after percolating in
the back of my mind for two or three years, the idea didn't develop much
beyond the walking-over-the-cliff puzzle, which was the very first one I
had come up with. So, when the IF contest came up, I decided to narrow my
focus, and make it just a tribute to the Warner Brothers universe. I'd love
to write that longer 'toon game, some day, and pay homage to Droopy, Dumbo,
and some of the other greats, too.

>Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

Well, I'm working on Logomancer, in which you play the Logomancer General
of a sleepy magical world. Or, at least, I'm sort of working on it. I've
been doing a tiny bit at a time ever since I finished Save Princeton, some
three years ago, but haven't really had the time to go at it full force.
One problem with delaying so long, by the way, is that other people steal
your ideas first. A big plot point of the game is that spells have started
working backwards. You can imagine my chagrin when Graham Nelson came up
with a similar idea in Balances.

But I digress.

>Are you planning to enter again next year?

Definitely. It's a great way to motivate myself to produce something. And
sprinting is always more fun than long-distance running, for me, at least.

>So, just how many 'rascally' puns are floating around Toonesia, anyway?

That's a tough one. When I moved cross country, I left my old computer
behind, and I haven't yet transferred all my files to my new Mac, so I
don't have the source code for Toonesia handy. But let's see: there's
rascally Cavett, rascally rabbi, rascally Babbit, rascally habit, and
rascally Cabbot--that's five. There may be one or two I've forgotten. (And
as I type this list, I realize that I didn't think of "rascally ribbit" or
"rascally robot." I'll have to work those in to the next version, in
addition to fixing bugs. And if you don't mind, I'll use your "rascally
abbot" line, too.)

[Later, Jacob sent me...]

I've finally restored all the files from my old computer to my new
computer, and I can give you a run-down of all the "rascally rabbit" puns
in Toonesia:

1) When you try to blow on something, you get the following message:
"You take a deep breath and exhale. If it weren't for that pack-a-day habit
you had as a teenager, you might be able to blow with more force. Oooh,
that rascally habbit!" (Note the misspelling of "habit". I'll have to fix
that.)

2) When you read the rabbit season sign: ""This accursed interference in
the rights of honest hunters like yourself is signed 'Bruce Babbit,
Secretary of the Interior.' Ooooh, that rascally Babbit!"

3) When you try to climb the cliff: "You don't have the strength to climb
the ledge, due in large part to your habit of ordering your servants to
exercise for you. Ooooh, that rascally habit!"

4) When you examine the pictures on Buds' wall:
"The pictures include a photo of Bud Bunny at a party with Chuck Jones,
Fritz Freleng, Tex Avery, and Mel Blanc; a reproduction of the famous
painting, "The Assumption of St. Peter Rabbit;" and an autographed photo of
Dick Cavett. Seeing the last of these reminds you of the humiliation you
suffered as a guest on his show; unbeknownst to you, the talk show host
had arranged for your fellow guests to be the president of Handgun Control,
Inc, and the vice-chairman of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.
Ooooh, that rascally Cavett!"

5) When you try to pick up a gem in the mine:
"As you reach down to pick up a gem off the huge pile, you recall something
your accountant said to you yesterday: "Mr. Fuld, right now, you're in the
nine-nine-point-nine-percent tax bracket. If your value increases by more
than a thousand dollars before the end of the fiscal year, you'll be in the
one hundred percent bracket, and you'll have to give everything you own to
the government." Since any one gem in this mine would be worth several
thousand at least, you realize that your tax bracket prevents you from taking
anything out of here (except that obviously worthless old lamp). Oooh, that
rascally bracket!"

6) When you smell the cologne:
"Smelling it reminds you of the childhood day when little Vincent Cabot,
scion of the only family in town wealthier than the Fulds, held you face down
in a carrot patch until you begged for mercy, thereby instilling in you a
lifelong hatred of the long orange vegetable and all creatures associated
therewith. If only he had left you alone, you might have been spared the
tremendous frustration that faces you every rabbit season. Oooooh, that
rascally Cabot!"

7) When you try to kiss an inanimate object:
Just as you are about to kiss <the object> you recall that, back when
your name was Elmo Fuldstein, your rabbi always warned you against getting
into a mixed relationship. And since a relationship with an inanimate
object is about as mixed as you can get, you withdraw your lips,
overwhelmed with guilt. Oooh, that rascally rabbi!"

So, that's 7 of them. (Six if you don't want to count "habit" a second time.")

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The One That Got Away, by "The Author" aka Leon Lin

>What first gave you the idea for your entry?

I'd love to say that I got the idea for the game while out at some
beautiful lake, trolling idly for fish, the sun warming my tired soul and
the sweet breezes blowing faintly...but I'm afraid I can't. At the risk of
having had the most banal inspiration for an IF game in history, I'd have
to say that the trigger that started my game was an episode of "The
Simpsons" that I saw one night, about Homer going out fishing and
struggling against one of those "mighty fish of the past." That must have
made some kind of an impression on me, because, some morning afterwards, I
was lying in bed when I thought, you know, no one has ever written an IF
game about fishing. Before long, I was up and at my computer. The map
quickly coalesced in my mind, and the game more or less wrote itself. (Of
course, "The One That Got Away," despite its inspiration, is a wholly
original story, with a tip of the hat to some rather tall tales about
angling.)

>Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

At about the same time I was writing "The One," I also started work on a
TADS object library to implement role-playing game elements such as NPCs,
magical items, weapons, armor, and lighting sources, as well as a demo game
to showcase the library. As complex as the library is, I haven't finished
it yet, and hopefully I'll be able to get more work done on it despite my
schoolwork and other responsibilities.

>Are you planning to enter again next year?

Sure, why not! In fact, I should start planning my entry now! ^_^

>So, will we really get to go back in 30 years for a sequel?

I have an idea for a plot and title for a sequel, if I ever write one. But
any continuation of the story is still quite a ways into the future.
Nevertheless, even if I don't write the story, The Old One will still be
waiting... ^_^

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
A Night at the Museum Forever, by Chris Angelini.

>What first gave you the idea for your entry?

I had wanted to do something involving time travel as a puzzle, but
needed a setting. I've always been a Larry Niven fan, so I wanted to use
a 'long dead race', and the idea for a museum housing artifacts of time
was added to bring these all together.

>Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

Yes. At the moment, I'm working on two games, one set in the Superguy
world, and another, more serious ;->, game called Wanderer. The latter
one is fantasy.

>Are you planning to enter again next year?

Yes.

>Any particular reason you decided to write about time travel?

I love the genre, and wanted to use it in a game. My original plans
were more elaborate, but I ran out of time to implement them, and had to
go with a simpler time-based puzzle.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Undertow, by Stephen Granade.

>What first gave you the idea for your entry?

Believe it or not, it was the Sting video for "All This Time." I had been
mulling over the possibility of writing an entry for the IF competition
when I ran across the video on TV. If you haven't seen it, it takes place
on a boat which ends up becoming very cramped. I started thinking of the
possibilities of a game set on a yacht--a yacht makes for a tiny setting
compared to the setting of most other IF games. However, it was just the
size for a two-hour game. In addition, I could more easily convey the
sense of claustrophobia I wanted for my game.

>Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

The short answer is "sort of." The long answer is: I've just started
physics grad school, so my time has become incredibly curtailed. I have
been working on a large game called "Losing Your Grip" for about a year
and a half, with little progress so far.

>Are you planning to enter again next year?

Possibly, depending on whether or not I have the inspiration and the free
time.

>Why did you write a mystery game, in particular?

I had the setting for my game before I had a plot. I thought about what
kind of game could take place on a yacht, and decided that a mystery would
be perfect. I had never written a mystery before, and my earlier IF games
have had a remarkable lack of NPCs in them. This was a perfect chance for
me to take on the challenge of setting a game in a tiny environment,
mastering NPCs, and writing a mystery all at once.

What can I say? I wanted an ambitious project.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Undo, by Null Dogmas aka Neil Demause <neild@echonyc.com>.

>What first gave you the idea for your entry?

I first wrote an earlier version of Undo for a friend's birthday -- it's
based on an inside joke between the two of us.

For the record, the joke goes: "A frog walks up to a hole. 'My, what a
big hole,' he says. A small duck walks up to the hole. 'What large hole?'
says the duck. 'What small duck?' says the frog."

Not much of a joke, it's true -- more of a joke about jokes, like the
Dadaist riddle (one of my favorites): "What's the difference between a
duck? One leg is both the same!" Anyway, after discarding a much better
idea for the I-F contest as taking way too much time, I thought of a
bunch of things I could throw into Undo to turn it, sort of, into a
playable game, though there's still only really one puzzle.

The only purpose of Undo, really, aside from being vaguely weird and
entertaining, is to challenge some of the I-F conventions -- like having
everything be a puzzle (most of the rooms are mere clues at best, and at
worst just diversions), having a score (the "score" of 86 you're shooting
for is another negation joke -- as in, "eighty-six that"), winning at the
end, and so on. It's sort of an "anti-game" in that sense.

>Are you working on any other IF, if so, what?

"Lost New York" is about a month away from beta-testing, three months
away from release. It's a medium to long game (a good bit longer and more
complex than MacWesleyan) set in historical New York -- if you liked
"Time and Again" you should like it.

I also have ideas for three other specific games (including the one I
didn't get around to writing for this year's competition) that I'd like
to do, but I need to finish Lost NY first before I can start on another one.

>Are you planning to enter again next year?

I'd like to, if the timing's right.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Let's have a big round of applause for all the entrants!

KEY TO SCORES AND REVIEWS----------------------------------------------------

Consider the following review header:

NAME: Cutthroats PARSER: Infocom Standard
AUTHOR: Infocom PLOT: Two Seperate Paths
EMAIL: ??? ATMOSPHERE: Well Done
AVAILABILITY: LTOI 2 WRITING: Good
PUZZLES: Good SUPPORTS: Infocom Ports
CHARACTERS: Not Bad DIFFICULTY: Medium

First, you'll notice that the score has been removed, and replaced
by one or two word ratings. These are pretty arbitrary, and should allow
more freedom to the reviewers. The EMAIL section is for the e-mail address
of the game author, not the reviewer. AVAILABILITY will usually have either
Commercial ($price), Shareware ($price), or Freeware. If the commercial
price varies in stores, then it will just say Commercial. If it has been
released in the LTOI collection, this line should say so. Lastly, if it is
available on ftp.gmd.de, the line should add GMD. (Demo) if it's a demo
version. The body of the review hasn't changed.

When submitting reviews: Try to fill in as much of this info as you can.
Also, scores are still desired along with the reviews, so send those along.
The scores will be used in the ratings section. Authors may not rate or
review their own games.

SPAG accepts reviews of any length, letters to the editor, the occasional
interesting article on text adventures (no reprints please), and even just
ratings for your favorite game, if you don't have the time to do a full
review. Please though, at least send me info for each game you have rated
equivalent to the review header for Cutthroats, above. All accepted
materials will be headed by the submitter's name and e-mail address, unless
you request that they be withheld, or do not supply them, in which case the
header will read as "Anonymous."

CONTEST REVIEWS--------------------------------------------------------------

NAME: All Quiet on the Library Front PARSER: Inform v1502
AUTHOR: Michael Phillips SUPPORTS: Infocom Ports
EMAIL: ??? AVAILABILITY: GMD
ATMOSPHERE: Just a little thin WRITING: Expository
CHARACTERS: Cardboard PLOT: Linear
PUZZLES: Quite simple DIFFICULTY: Easy

The premise is quite straightforward: you need to borrow a normally
unobtainable book from your college library in order to write a
research paper. After a bit of wandering around, finding objects
lying about, and giving them to the appropriate people, you do.

I must confess that I was somewhat put off by the fact that the
game is set on a college campus; the college game is second only
to the Colossal Cave-style undirected dungeon crawl/scavenger hunt
for being drastically overdone. It worked in _Lurking_Horror_,
and it's working now in _Christminster_, whose setting is different
enough not to be stale, but every other such game since (not to
mention the innumerable campuses that have been set up on MUDs
worldwide) has felt like walking into someone else's inside joke.
That includes a number of rather popular games that have fallen
flat for me, and I'm probably stepping on a number of toes here;
I tried not to let my feelings for the genre color my judgement.

This entry doesn't just happen to take place on campus, however;
the entire plot is centered around writing a research paper, and
therein lies the problem. Most IF transports the player to a
fantastic place or situation that's genuinely interesting, sometimes
more so than what's going on outside the screen. That's not the
case here -- being stuck in the library working on an undergraduate
research paper is something that one plays IF to *escape*, not
encounter, and the game never really transcends the ultimately
pedestrian nature of its central task.

It is possible to create good interactive fiction based entirely
on everyday experiences if the writing stands out enough to carry
the game on atmosphere (see _A_Change_in_the_Weather_, below).
It is also possible to make a good game out of a fundamentally
unpleasant situation (_Theatre_, for example, or _Bureaucracy_)
if the game provides gripping drama or offers a fresh perspective
on the events in question. _Library_ does neither, offering a
fairly routine scenario executed in expository but uninspiring
prose.

Oddly, the stairwell leading to the upper floor, an area in which
none of the plot takes place, is one of the game's bright spots as
far as writing goes -- the descriptions there are nearly as long
as in busier areas, which gives the author enough space to breathe
life into details like the paintings. Had the rest of the map been
executed with that much care, the game would have worked much better.
It's not necessarily that more words are needed elsewhere (see
_Enchanter_, for example), it's that more thought is needed to make
the descriptions come to life.

Overall, the game is solidly crafted, but feels like it's just
going through the motions. This isn't a *bad* game by any means,
but somehow lacks that certain spark that makes well-written IF
such a joy. Cleaned up and commented, the source to this would
probably make pretty good example code for new authors; it's solidly
crafted, including a basic help system that gives a hint for the next
puzzle.

(After writing most of this review, I learned that the entry was the
author's first attempt at writing IF. It's obvious that the author
*has* in fact mastered the motions that need to be gone through to
create IF, and is just starting to catch on to a writing style; I
look forward to seeing full-length works from him in the future.)

BOTTOM LINE: An accurate simulation of a tedious chore.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Name: A Change in the Weather Parser: Inform
Author: Andrew Plotkin Plot: Non-linear
Email: erkyrath+@cmu.edu Atmosphere: Excellent
Availability: F, GMD Writing: Excellent
Puzzles: Time-critical Supports: Infocom ports
Characters: One, simple but memorable Difficulty: Above average

During a picnic with your friends, you decide that you'd like some
privacy and walk away on your own to explore the nearby hills. Soon,
however, the warm, beautiful summer evening turns into the proverbial
dark and stormy night (the "change in the weather" of the title), and
you find yourself cut off from your friends by a rain-swollen stream
that threatens to carry away the only bridge...

Although unpleasant, such a mundane situation may not seem like the
stuff from which a tale of wonder and adventure is built. That,
however, is just what Andrew Plotkin has succeeded in creating. With
very small means he manages to increase tension until your attempts to
save the bridge turn into a nightmarish struggle against time. The
writing is excellent, as are the atmosphere and the changes in mood.
As if to demonstrate further how far you can get with deceptively
simple means, the one NPC of this game - an endearing little fox -
doesn't do very much, but is nevertheless very effective (of course,
animal NPC's are simpler than humans since they don't speak).

Despite its small size, "A Change in the Weather" is not an easy game.
The author himself classifies this game as "cruel", and that is no
great exaggeration. The puzzles aren't very diffciult in isolation,
but they are very time-critical and you have to perform actions in a
carefully timed order to win. You should be prepared to save and
restore a lot, even to replay from the beginning, since the tiniest
mistake will put the game in an unsolvable state.

This kind of game behaviour has been condemned in the debate on
rec.arts.int-fiction, the main argument being that all the restoring
and replaying ruins the enjoyment of the game and disrupts the
story. Also, of course, it lowers realism if, for example, you have to
die five times beofre finding the right way to disarm a bomb; in real
life you have to get it right the first time.

In this particular case, however, having to save and restore
frequently didn't detract anything from my enjoyment of the game;
in fact, somehow knowing that the smallest mistake may mean disaster
actually enhanced the sense of drama and urgency. It may of course
have helped that you can't die in this game (the worst thing that can
happen is that you have to wade across the stream to get home). The
size of the game certainly played an important part - having to
restart from the beginning is less cumbersome in a tiny game like this
than in a larger game.

To summarize, this is an excellent little game: well written, with a
simple goal that isn't that easy to attain, an interesting sequence of
logical puzzles and an excellent atmosphere; all of which makes this
perhaps the most memorable of all the competition entries.

NAME: A Change in the Weather PARSER: Inform v1405
AUTHOR: Andrew Plotkin SUPPORTS: Infocom Ports
EMAIL: erkyrath+@cmu.edu AVAILABILITY: GMD

ATMOSPHERE: Outstanding
WRITING: Generally well written, though eye slides past in spots
CHARACTERS: Memorable
PLOT: Mutual exclusion between branches
PUZZLES: Nicely done, but with dead ends and save/restore puzzles
DIFFICULTY: Moderately challenging

Now *this* is more like it. The game starts out rather slowly:
you wander away from a picnic to go exploring in the park. After
a beautifully described sunset (and an encounter with the
competition's most memorable NPC), the idyllic day suddenly turns
nasty, and you are forced to seek shelter, eventually thrusting
you into a dreamlike race against time and vague, sinister evil.

The atmosphere, scenery, and overall sense of immersion in this
entry were far and away the best in either division, approaching
that of Infocom's better efforts in spots. In one or two spots,
the writing is dense enough that the casual reader's eye slides
right past (lists of exits, mostly), but otherwise the writing
is among the best in this year's field.

If there's a weakness here, it's the rather languid pace that the
game gets off to at first. That's an unavoidable consequence of
the tranquil, contemplative mood that the author creates in the
first section, but it makes it difficult to warm up to the game
at first. The plot really needs a kick in the tail that it doesn't
get until after nightfall; an opening with enough action to make
wandering off alone seem a welcome respite (playing volleyball until
you get sick of it, perhaps?) might correct this. (The virtues of
establishing emotional context through player interaction rather
than imposing it by fiat have been discussed at length elsewhere.)
Of course, the game flirts perilously with the two hour limit as
it is; leaving out such an opening is understandable given the
nature of the competition. Furthermore, the contrast between the
slow pace of the first section and the frantic pace of the dream
sequence works quite well, and is perhaps the sole example of
such a mood shift in the contest.

The save/restore nature of the section after nightfall is also
likely to put off many players, as is the game's ability to be
closed off after the player attempts actions that are otherwise
perfectly reasonable. While any race against time necessarily
runs the risk of degenerating into save/restore, a bit more time
between the appearance of the light source and the expiration of
the player's time might have been nice; as it was, I didn't get
past that part before time ran out. Likewise, a second (possibly
more difficult) option for getting into the cave after the
destruction of the needed object would also have helped. Still,
the game was quite satisfying, especially in contrast to the
rest of the division.

BOTTOM LINE: Yes. Like that. My choice for the division winner.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Name: Detective - an Interactive MiSTing / MST3K1
Author: C.E. Forman
Email: ceforma@rs6000.cmp.ilstu.edu Parser : Hacked Inform
Plot: See review Atmosphere: Demented
Availability: F, GMD Writing: Excellent
Puzzles: What puzzles? Supports: Infocom Ports
Characters: See review Difficulty: Self-solving

This piece of IF is not really a game, but a commentary on a game -
or, as the author calls it, an Interactive MiSTing. The strange acronym
MST3K1 refers to "Mystery Science Theater 3000", a TV show that hasn't
reached the European networks, but this fact shouldn't scare away any
non-American readers, since the concept is made sufficiently clear
anyway (I had it explained to me by Whizzard after I played the game,
but I didn't really miss anything).

Similar to the TV show, this game consists of the characters of
"Mystery Science Theater" playing - and commenting on - an existing
game: "Detective" by Matt Barringer. "Detective", reviewed in SPAG 4,
is an amazingly bad game; basically, Barringer has committed every
possible mistake in writing it, even forgetting to put in any puzzles.

The core of "MST3K1" is a faithful re-implementation in Inform of
"Detective", complete down to the last bug. As the player walks
through the game (and, believe me, walking through "Detective" is all
there is to winning it), he or she is treated to the commentary of the
MST characters. And this commentary is simply hilarious; together with
the unconscious comedy of the original "Detective", the result must be
the funniest IF ever written. I'm exaggerating only slightly when
writing that "MST3K1" had me rolling on the floor with laughter.

Rating "MST3K1" according to the usual SPAG rules is of course
impossible, since the only game aspects are those of "Detective", which

-- 
<~V~E~SOF~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~|~~~~~~~>
< RTI  T                 Imagination sold and                        |  ~~\  >
< G O WAR E                 serviced here.                           | /~\ | >
<______________________________________whizzard@uclink.berkeley.edu__|_\__/__>