New walkthroughs for September 2021

On Tuesday, September 28, 2021, I published new walkthroughs for the games and stories listed below! Some of these were paid for by my wonderful patrons at Patreon. Please consider supporting me to make even more new walkthroughs for works of interactive fiction at Patreon and Ko-fi.

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Captain Cutter’s Treasure (2021) by Garry Francis

In this game, you play as Jim, a tavern worker who wakes up in the broom closet. You soon learn that, years ago, the pirate captain, Cutter, had his former crewmates (including your boss, Harold) hide a treasure for him, and now he wants it back. Return the treasure by sunset or else Harold’s daughter, Brenda, will suffer the consequences.

This game was an entry in PunyJam #1 where it took 1st place.

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

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J’dal (2012) by Ryan Kinsman

In this adventure game, you play as a young black woman named J’dal, born on the other side of the sunset. Everyone else here is white. You, Dad (who adopted you years ago), the experimenter Stolas (who Dad met when turnside), and the thug Roderick have been hired to find an artifact hidden in the mine west of town. They need you for your superior night vision.

This game was an entry in IF Comp 2012 where it took 16th place.

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

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Kook U (1997) by sbfaq

In this silly but very rude game, you’re the Network Administrator at Kook University. It’s your job to restart the Network whenever it’s down, but Dean F. L. Uffy also demands that you stop the USENET Abuse by six terrible students or else you’re out of a job!

Content warnings: profanity, drug use, comedic deaths and murder, references to illegal forms of pornography, and horrible poetry.

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

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Danny Dipstick (2021) by Garry Francis

In this small game, you play as Danny Dipstick, a dork who’s had no success picking up chicks at the local nightclub, but tonight will be different. With your neighbour’s advice, you will fix your problems, you will talk to a nice girl, and you will get her phone number.

This game was an entry in ParserComp 2021 where it took 13th place.

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

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Eight Miles High (2014) by Josh Giesbrecht (as “Lambert Lambert”)

In this short choice-based game inspired by a song lyric, you play as someone who arrives at an airport, then takes a limo to some street. You’re not sure where you are and it’s hard to focus in all this rain.

This game was a participant in the first ShuffleComp event.

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

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Sohoek Ekalmoe (2020) by Caleb Wilson

In this short story, you play as a plant called Sohoek Ekalmoe, “one who sunders the paving stones”. Your enemies cast you into this deep shaft a year ago, but now it’s your season to grow.

This story was written for NarraScope 2020.

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

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Chipmonk (2019) by Jason and Luke Swanson

In this small simple adventure, you play as a monk named Chip, equipped with your trusty katana. Your quest is to kill the dragon known as The Destroyer. You begin in the cave entrance.

My walkthrough and map

New walkthroughs for July 2021

On Friday, July 9, 2021, I published new walkthroughs for the games and stories listed below and at IFDB! Some of these were paid for by my wonderful patrons at Patreon. Please consider supporting me to make even more new walkthroughs for works of interactive fiction at Patreon and Ko-fi.

(Yes, this is much earlier in the month than usual. I’m moving at the end of the month, and I don’t even have a new place to move to yet, so I wanted to get the month’s batch of walkthroughs out as early as I could so I’d have the rest of the month free for home-hunting and box-packing. Hopefully, I’ll find a new place and get back up and running without too much of a break, but it’s also possible I’ll fall off the grid and won’t be anywhere for a while. Wish me luck!)

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Grooverland (2021) by Mathbrush

In this large fantasy puzzle game based on the works of Chandler Groover, you play as Lily Lee. It’s your 11th birthday and you’re the Queen of Grooverland for a day! The amusement park has set up several surprises just for you, and they’ve also given you a quest: find all the pieces of your regalia before sunset for your coronation in the Queen’s Castle. The Mirrored Queen and the Scarlet Empress are waiting for you.

This game was an entry in ParserComp 2021 where it took NTH place.

IFDB | My walkthrough and maps

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The Planet of the Infinite Minds (2000) by Alfredo Garcia

In this whimsical puzzlefest where science is magic, you play as a librarian leaving the funfair. There, a gypsy girl tells you a crackpot story about you both being Jah-cuez-ah, or the Infinite Minds, aliens who can do anything. But after an unconvincing demonstration of her power, she leaves and locks you inside her caravan! Bother. This is going to be an adventure, isn’t it?

This game was an entry in IF Comp 2000 where it took 19th place.

IFDB | My walkthrough and maps

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Jon Doe – Wildcard Nucleus (2019) by Olaf Nowacki

In this homage to James Bond, you play as Jon Doe, an MI5 operative. Your new assignment is to investigate the suspicious death of Edulard, an elderly scientist at Wildcard Inc and a secret informant. Your leads are the scarred and monocle-wearing Adolf von Bolzplatz, who is Wildcard’s CEO, and Edulard’s beautiful daughter, Valerie, who is engaged to Bolzplatz.

This game was an entry in IF Comp 2019 where it tied for 51st place.

IFDB | My walkthrough and maps

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Martha’s Big Date (2008) by Mary Potts

This game is based on a fanfiction series written for Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman. You play as Martha Jeraldine Kent, teenaged daughter of Superman, and you need to get ready for your big date with Troy.

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

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Charming (2018) by Kaylah Facey

In this game, you play as a young witch practicing for her coming of age test in the Pentacle Chamber. Unfortunately, your ventus spell became a tornado and smashed up most of the room! How can you, the worst witch in West Witchington, fix the mess — and learn the required spells for the test — before midnight?

This game was an entry in IF Comp 2018 where it took 24th place. At the 2018 XYZZY Awards, it was a finalist in the Best Individual NPC category (for Arthur the cat).

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

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In The House of Professor Evil: The HAM HOUSE (2006-2008) by S. John Ross

In this small silly game, you play as someone who wants to escape the house of Professor Evil, who now lies dead on the floor. He planned to make a ham rule the universe, but forget about him. You crave ham. How long has it been since you ate a really good ham?

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

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A Pilgrim (2020) by Caleb Wilson (as “Abandoned Pools”)

In this tiny spooky game, you play as Absalome Pilcrow, an ancient of Panzitoum. You’re exhausted from a long day of walking and stop in a grove of poison pine. Perhaps you can sleep in the low building just off the path to the north.

This story was entered in the La Petite Mort English division of Ectocomp 2020 where it took 2nd place.

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

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A Quiet Evening at Home (2010) by Ruth Alfasso (writing as Anonymous)

In this slice of life, you play as a homeowner returning home after a day of work. You have an urgent need to use the bathroom at first, but the rest of your evening is more relaxing. Exercise your hamster, make dinner, take out the trash, play with your laptop, then go to bed.

This game was an entry in IF Comp 2010 where it took 25th place.

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

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Journey from an Islet (2001) by Mario Becroft

In this small game, you play as an adventurer. You have traveled long and far and have now fallen onto an island in the darkness before dawn. How will you escape from there and continue your journey?

This game was an entry in IF Comp 2001 where it took 12th place.

IFDB | My walkthrough and map

Affordances: GO BACK

This is the second in a series of planned posts about affordances in parser-based interactive fiction. Affordances are features that enhance the playing experience in some way, perhaps by making the work of IF less tedious, less frustrating, easier to play, more attractive, more interesting, or more fun. Affordances may be said to improve the play value of a game; reviewers will often point to these positive features as reasons why they liked a particular game.

Have you ever used the command “GO BACK” in a work of interactive fiction? Here’s what it can mean:

• GO BACK can mean go back to your previous location, assuming the travel route you took from there to your current location isn’t one-way. This is the usage I wish to discuss.
• GO BACK can also mean go back towards the beginning of the story, as opposed to GO FORWARD meaning to go towards the story’s conclusion. This is the usage in Gun Mute, for example, whose geography is topologically linear and whose story is strongly goal oriented.
• GO BACK can also mean to go back relative to the way the player character is facing, so if the player is facing north, “GO BACK” means to turn around and go south. This usage is very very rare in IF; I can’t remember any works that use the relative directions FORWARD, LEFT, RIGHT, and BACK this way.

GO BACK in the first usage is an affordance because it gives the player an extra way to help them navigate through the game’s geography. But although it was used in the very earliest text adventures, the command has all but faded away into obscurity today. So I’m curious, what happened to this lost affordance? Why was it added in the first place, and why did it disappear? I have some guesses on the last question:

• It was too much effort for the author for too little gain for the player. Although I don’t think it’s a difficult affordance to add, really. The game just has to remember whenever the player changes locations what the last location was and whether or not the mode of travel is reversible or not.
• Players just didn’t use it. Once you start navigating with compass directions, you don’t suddenly start thinking of relative directions. “BACK” just isn’t part of the compass.
• It was eclipsed by UNDO, a far more powerful tool for retracing one’s steps in a game.

I’m inclined to think it was a combination of all these factors, especially UNDO, that contributed to the demise of GO BACK as an affordance. And I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not. Are we missing something by not having GO BACK? One early game, The Sound of One Hand Clapping, used GO BACK in a puzzle. A sign quoting MGM’s The Wizard of Oz told players: “I’D GO BACK IF I WERE YOU”, and if you typed GO BACK at that location, you’d end up somewhere you couldn’t reach any other way. Which was kinda cool to figure out, but probably isn’t enough to ask other authors to add GO BACK as an affordance in their games.

Hm. What about games where UNDO is disabled? Would GO BACK be a welcome addition then? Ummm… I don’t know. Maybe? You’d have to tell players that the command was there, and even if they knew, would they use it?

I have more questions than answers about this one. Players, would you use GO BACK in a game? (Assume you can abbreviate the command to BACK or B.) Or should the command remain in the dustbin of history? Please let me know what you think in the comments below.

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