Facade

platform dependent

Looks interesting, but as a potential reader without the necessary technology to access this marvel I can only wonder what it might be like. I'm glad that people are doing stuff like this though; it should help promote interactive fiction.

One of the reasons I like Inform so much is that it is usable by some many people on so many platforms. I'd hate to work for a year or two on an IF and arbitrarily exclude a fraction of my potential readers. Of course, the reductio ad absurdum of this is that I should go back to writing conventional hardcopy fiction and remove the technological barriers altogether (aside from the distribution of paper copies). So I suppose each art has to accept the limitations of its medium.

Since I'm blathering, I'll throw out another thing. I think the textual nature of IF is a real strength. The imagination can do so much more than some 2D graphics on the screen. Unless you are doing million dollar cgi animation the reader's brain is bound to do a better job at imagining. One of the reasons novels are still so popular after all these years.

Re: platform dependent

I agree with most of your points.

The tricky point is the strength of IF's text. Sure, what your imagination conjures up will be more detailed (and in many cases, more immediate) than a 2D graphic. But, just like novels, the limitation here is that it is so very hard to get certain things into text. Fast paced, natural conversations are very tricky to write, as are describing subtle facial expressions and body language. Of course, the converse is that some other things are tremendously easy to do in text, but are very tough to capture in other media.

I'm big into having my IF characters act as much as they talk, so body language is key. But describing it adequately and smoothly, without breaking the flow of a paragraph, is very hard. This is a limitation, I think, of text (as well as my own ability to write).

One of the benefits of Facade is that they have a pretty good facial animation system. On many of my plays through the game, it's turned out that Grace has walked out on Trip (not my fault, honest!). When she walks out the door, the voice and facial expression on Trip as he says, "No... wait!" breaks my heart every time. With just two words. If someone could match that in IF, (or in a novel), I'd be impressed.

I guess the strengths of a medium can also be responsible for its weaknesses.

Re: platform dependent

In addition to writing novels, I also draw and dabble in filmmaking. I love what the camera can do and how it captures the facial expressions and emotions of a character. Pound for pound the camera is a better descriptor than words; however, I find myself keep coming back to text, words on a page (or on the screen in the case of interactive fiction). There's something mysterious about language, something beautiful about the reader dictated pace of reading. Reading text is a meditative act that directs concentration in a different way that viewing a film or listening to sound.

I'm not so sure I would be interested in interactive fiction if it wasn't text on a screen. I can see a place for pictures and sounds in interactive fiction, but when it becomes animation or video it becomes something less literary and more filmic. Not a criticism or a complaint. Just an observation.

As an author, someone who deals in words, I'm willing to accept the difficulties of text. That being said, I spent an hour last night coding a flashlight so that it can be turned on and off and recharged if need be. These are certainly technical concerns that the average novelist doesn't have to worry about. So even the text of IF is very different than the text of novels.

Have you ever read any of Alain Robbe-Grillet's novels? He wrote/writes highly descriptive prose. The objects are more important than the characters it seems. He'll spend pages just giving technical and geometrical descriptions of things. R-G has also made films. He's worked in both mediums. His novels would make great IF. The writing is a model for any IF author.

Re: platform dependent

I agree! (And last night I spent five minutes writing text that essentially said: "People light and sit around a campfire" and took an hour after that getting all the objects in the scene to do just that...)

I'll keep an eye out for Alain Robbe-Grillet, though I may not like his style (I'm strictly a storytelling-first, object-engineering second kind of guy).

Re: platform dependent

Two weeks ago when I started trying to figure out what all this IF stuff was about, my goal was to see if it could be used for storytelling, as in an alternative way for a reader to read a novel or a short story. Since I try to be scrupulous and systematic I thought I should read/play the existing literature in the genre prior to writing any of my own. I was struck by the similarity of IF descriptive writing and Alain Robbe-Grillet's fiction.

Given that you are a story-first IF writer I would like to see some of your work, to see how storytelling it is done. So far I've formed the impression that the extant IF literature is about readers exploring object filled worlds and collecting objects that allow them to explore some more. Some of the worlds are fascinating and the writing is quite good, but doesn't really qualify as a story. But this impression is probably due to my limited sample.

Re: platform dependent

Try out Galatea.
http://emshort.home.mindspring.com/galatea.htm

Re: platform dependent

Ah, yes. I've spent some time talking to her. Very nicely done.