4 ms·

If someone wanted to write an interactive text game like these and put it on the web, are there any frameworks available? If not, a lot of the work would be on

If someone wanted to write an interactive text game like these and put it on the web, are there any frameworks available? If not, a lot of the work would be on figuring out how to parse the player's input, how to map out the possible paths through the game, etc, instead of writing the story.

dsr_ 15y ago
Heck yes. It all started out with the Z-Machine, the first major virtual machine architecture. The most recent is Glulx. Glulx itself is here: http://eblong.com/zarf/glulx/ http://eblong.com/zarf/glulx/ with a new interpreter here: http://eblong.com/zarf/glulx/quixe/ http://eblong.com/zarf/glulx/quixe/ /
mquander 15y ago
There's a whole programming language, testing & documentation framework, and IDE. http://inform7.com/ http://inform7.com/
wccrawford 15y ago
I actually started working on a Ruby IF framework, with the intent that it could also be used to create MUDs and IF-ish games that had combat, so they can be played like an RPG. I haven't gotten far yet, sadly. You are correct about the player's input being an issue, and the mapping has some issues to resolve, but the biggest problem is actually the interactions between objects or the player and objects. For instance, the 'push' command is going to mean something different to every entity. Some won't respond (default response) but others might move or react. I actually implemented that once in C# in such a way that it confused most of the other developers and they quit. I offered to scrap my code, but that was kind of the end of the project. -sigh-
- Stwerner 15y ago
  Have the ruby thing on github by any chance? Id love to check it out. I've been toying with the idea of writing a mud in ruby, and giving it a graphical web frontend to make it more accessible to new players.
  - wccrawford 15y ago
    Not Github. Back then I was using RubyForge. Fair Warning: I think I as far as I got was logging in. I don't remember if I got any commands working at all. http://rubyforge.org/projects/textualize/ http://rubyforge.org/projects/textualize/ I will probably move it to GitHub soon as I've been thinking about working on it again.
    - Stwerner 15y ago
      Cool, I have one from a while ago that I got about that far as well. I was thinking about working through the Mud Game Programming book to get a working foundation going, but send me an email (in profile) once you start working on it again.
beza1e1 15y ago
Use TADS [0], if you like programming, or Inform [1], if you do not. Alternatively, for web only, you could try Undum [2]. [0] http://inform7.com/ http://inform7.com/ [1] http://www.tads.org/ http://www.tads.org/ [2] http://undum.com/ http://undum.com/
- Twisol 15y ago
  Just FYI, your 0 and 1 links are swapped. ;)
  - beza1e1 15y ago
    Correct. I cannot edit it anymore, though. :(

dsr_ 15y ago

Heck yes. It all started out with the Z-Machine, the first major virtual machine architecture. The most recent is Glulx. Glulx itself is here: http://eblong.com/zarf/glulx/ http://eblong.com/zarf/glulx/ with a new interpreter here: http://eblong.com/zarf/glulx/quixe/ http://eblong.com/zarf/glulx/quixe/ /

mquander 15y ago

There's a whole programming language, testing & documentation framework, and IDE. http://inform7.com/ http://inform7.com/

wccrawford 15y ago

I actually started working on a Ruby IF framework, with the intent that it could also be used to create MUDs and IF-ish games that had combat, so they can be played like an RPG. I haven't gotten far yet, sadly. You are correct about the player's input being an issue, and the mapping has some issues to resolve, but the biggest problem is actually the interactions between objects or the player and objects. For instance, the 'push' command is going to mean something different to every entity. Some won't respond (default response) but others might move or react. I actually implemented that once in C# in such a way that it confused most of the other developers and they quit. I offered to scrap my code, but that was kind of the end of the project. -sigh-

Stwerner 15y ago
Have the ruby thing on github by any chance? Id love to check it out. I've been toying with the idea of writing a mud in ruby, and giving it a graphical web frontend to make it more accessible to new players.
- wccrawford 15y ago
  Not Github. Back then I was using RubyForge. Fair Warning: I think I as far as I got was logging in. I don't remember if I got any commands working at all. http://rubyforge.org/projects/textualize/ http://rubyforge.org/projects/textualize/ I will probably move it to GitHub soon as I've been thinking about working on it again.
  - Stwerner 15y ago
    Cool, I have one from a while ago that I got about that far as well. I was thinking about working through the Mud Game Programming book to get a working foundation going, but send me an email (in profile) once you start working on it again.

beza1e1 15y ago

Use TADS [0], if you like programming, or Inform [1], if you do not. Alternatively, for web only, you could try Undum [2]. [0] http://inform7.com/ http://inform7.com/ [1] http://www.tads.org/ http://www.tads.org/ [2] http://undum.com/ http://undum.com/

Twisol 15y ago
Just FYI, your 0 and 1 links are swapped. ;)
- beza1e1 15y ago
  Correct. I cannot edit it anymore, though. :(