FAQ

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Interactive Fiction FAQ from ifwiki

This document was created to contain succinct and up-to-date information about interactive fiction, including games, development systems, and the IF community. It is mainly for people new to IF or new to certain aspects of it, such as writing games. While it contains links to other resources, it is also meant to be useful as a stand-alone document that someone might read offline or print out.

What is "interactive fiction"?

Formal definitions are available in several places, e.g., interactive fiction. In brief, an interactive fiction (sometimes called a "game" or "work") is a program that lets you type commands to a character, who wanders around in a simulated world of some sort, usually one that is described in text. "Text adventure" and "text game" have been used to mean pretty much the same thing. Examples include Adventure, Zork, Deadline, Planetfall, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The Hobbit, and Curses. Some people include graphical adventure games such as Myst when they use the term, but those sorts of games aren't the focus of this FAQ.

What happened to Infocom (Magnetic Scrolls, Level 9, etc.)?

None of the major companies that produced IF during the 1980s are still around and producing IF. Infocom was acquired by Activision in 1989, for instance, and is now a (not very active) "label" of that company. Interactive fiction from this era is often hard to find outside of abandonware sites and online auction sites, although some of it has been made available to the public by the company that produced it.

Plenty of people are still creating IF, however, and there are hundreds of free new games that have been developed since the "commercial era" of interactive fiction.

How can I download and play IF?

Most IF that has been written recently is available for free download from the IF Archive.

Authors have made some game available for you to play on the Web or download in stand-alone form. But you usually need to download both an interpreter for your particular platform (a sort of "reader" or "player") and the particular game's "story file" (the data file that is read by the interpreter).

If you use Windows and want to run the zcode file curses.z5, for instance, you need a Windows zcode interpreter. Frotz for Windows is a popular one. One you have installed Frotz for Windows, you will be able to play any zcode interactive fiction just by downloading and opening the file, which usually will end with .z5 or .z8.

You can find a popular interpreter for your platform and IF format in the following table:

Zcode TADS Glulx Hugo Adrift
Windows Windows Frotz 2002 HTML TADS ... ... ...
Linux Frotz QTads ... ... ...
Mac OS X Zoom QTads ... ... ...
Mac System 9 Nitfol, Zip HyperTADS ... ... ...
Palm Frobnitz ... ... ... ...
Windows CE ... ... ... ... ...
DOS ... ... ... ... ...

These are not all the interpreters available, just some of the most popular ones from the most popular platforms. The IF Archive has a comprehensive, if not exactly friendly, list of interpreters that you can download:

Where can I find out what games I might enjoy?

  • Baf's Guide is a complete listing of the games on the IF Archive. Most games have mini-reviews, and there are powerful search tools, but like the Archive itself it might be overwhelming to trawl through.
  • The Usenet group rec.games.int-fiction is a good place to ask, particularly if you have specific tastes.
  • Interactive Fiction Ratings is a site that lets anyone give IF games ratings out of 10, and publishes a list of (among other things) the highest-scoring games. This gives some idea of which games enjoy the most popularity in the community, although it shouldn't be considered the final word on the quality of games.
  • Looking back through past XYZZY winners or games that did well in the IF Competition can also give you some idea of which games are (or were) highly thought of.
  • Many sites host reviews and recommendations.

What can I do when I get stuck?

Some games have in-game hints. For others, hints or a walkthrough (a list of commands that will win the game, sometimes annotated) may be available on the IF Archive or elsewhere on the Web. If Baf's Guide doesn't list any files for the game you're playing, search the Web for the name of that game and the term "walkthrough" or "solution." You can also ask fellow players for a hint on rec.games.int-fiction. Just be sure to include a spoiler warning and spoiler space before you reveal any details of the game, so you don't ruin the game for others by giving away some of its surprises.

How can I post a review of a game I've finished?

If you like, you can simply post a review to rec.games.int-fiction, as many people traditionally do with the Comp game after the Comp has ended. You can also submit your review to SPAG or IF Review, or post it on your own site or blog. The Interactive Fiction Review Conspiracy is a (somewhat) formal group for reviewing recent games; you may wish to join as a reviewer if you like writing reviews of IF.

What is this "IF Comp"?

The IF Competition is an annual, Internet-wide competition for short games (ones you can complete in less than two hours), started in 1996 and currently run by Stephen Granade. Anyone who is online can vote in the competition. Having played and rated five games is the only qualification necessary for judges. In recent years there have been dozens of entries and hundreds who voted: The 2004 Comp had 38 games voted on by 174 judges.

How can I write my own game?

Although some people try to develop IF from scratch in general-purpose languages, winners of the IF Comp and developers of successful longer games have shows that it can be a good idea to use one of the highly capable and free interactive fiction development systems. Inform, TADS, and Hugo are the most powerful and cross-platform of the options, but there are others. You can seek help from fellow developers on rec.arts.int-fiction as you work, and avail yourself of some of the extensive documentation, tutorial material, and sample code that is online.

Which development system is best?

No one knows for sure, but a safe way for you to decide for yourself is to review all of them at Roger Firth's Cloak of Darkness page. You should also consider the development communities for different systems, what sample code and tutorial and reference information is available for each, the whole range of these systems' capabilities (inclding multimedia capaibilities, if these are important to you), and whether interpreters are available on the platforms you care about.

What if I want to develop my own system?

One of the attractions to interactive fiction is in the underlying architecture of a parser and world model mechanism that is accessible via a programming syntax. Many people have been more interested in this aspect of the IF community than either writing or playing games. A good place to ask questions is on the Usenet newsgroup rec.arts.int-fiction. Another place to discuss system development is on ifMUD on the #craft channel.

It's probably wise to keep in mind that most of the IF community is focused on writing and playing games and although others are interested in building new systems, the support for such endeavors is limited to listening and offering advice. You won't find much help in actually creating your system.

Most people will recommend that you use one of the current systems, such as Inform, TADS, Hugo, or Glulxe.

But if you're really interested in developing your own system, we think that's great. In fact, the ifwiki has an index for such endeavors at Building a New Interactive Fiction System.

How do I get people to test my game?

Very good question. You have the right idea: It's very important to have others test and review your game before releasing it.

The IF Beta Site Info Page has information about beta-testing, including links to several articles about how to helpfully test games, and it also provides a way for you to sign up as a tester and submit your game to be tested.

There are several other ways to find testers. If you've tested someone else's game, you might ask them to reciprocate. You can also politely ask for testers on rec.arts.int-fiction or on ifMUD.

How do I get people to play my game?

Releasing it in the IF Comp can be a very effective way, if it is suitable for the Comp -- not based on previous copyrighted work, able to be won in two hours. There are other competitions at other points in the year which are less popular but still provide good ways to release a game. If you don't release your game as part of a competition, you should announce your game on rec.games.int-fiction. Although the editors of IF review sites will learn about it from rgif, you can politely bring it to their attention by email if your work hasn't been reviewed anywhere after a while.

You may also want to publicize your game outside the IF community, if there are other groups who might be interested in it: e.g., Latin teachers, if your game is in Latin; the Electronic Literature Organization, if your game is written for a literary audience; the Keeler Society, if your game is an adaptation of a Harry Stephen Keeler novel.

Major Resources

  • Baf's Guide to the IF Archive
  • SPAG

Newsgroups, Lists, and other Communications

Events

  • The Annual XYZZY Awards
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