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Genuine question - what is the appeal of a text-based game? Is it that you can play async? Something else? Like why not just play a regular video game with regu

Genuine question - what is the appeal of a text-based game? Is it that you can play async? Something else? Like why not just play a regular video game with regular controller and graphics?

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
yawz 5y ago
Not a text-based gamer so maybe others can respond better, but this is probably similar to reading a book and watching a movie. Imagination has no limit.
- tejtm 5y ago
  The palpable trepidation arising from encountering the only other ampersand (that one is the Balrog)
- Cthulhu_ 5y ago
  The keyword / genre here is "Interactive Fiction"; MUDs fall in the same league as text based adventures of old (which later on started to add some graphics until they eventually evolved into e.g. the Monkey Island games), or even the choose-your-own-adventure (comic) books. It's an older style of games, but honestly, I could have seen myself getting into this back when. It's tech that predates MMO's like WoW or Ultima Online. It's stuff that works everywhere. And of course it's a different way to experience a game and its story. Dwarf Fortress also comes to mind, weirdly.
bovermyer 5y ago
It's much easier to support off-the-wall interactions and new game systems naturally in a MUD. By that, I mean... adding a new race (for example) in a graphical game requires art assets, animation rigging, sound design, and ALSO the programming side of it. There may be follow-on work too, like producing equipment models that suit the new race's dimensions. In a MUD, you just program the new race, and off you go. This ability to iterate quickly, with a lower barrier to ideas, means that you can try all kinds of things on a very low budget.
- danielmarkbruce 5y ago
  These seem like good reasons to build a text based game. I'm wondering what the reasons are to play one.
  - bovermyer 5y ago
    The same thing! Imagine getting new features, new content, and new systems at a far more rapid rate from a far smaller developer. And most MU*s are free. The paid ones, like GemStone, are even better... though the subscription price might be hard to swallow for people who are used to AAA graphical games not costing anything (at least on the surface).
    - danielmarkbruce 5y ago
      This seems like a fair enough value proposition i guess. But, how do people get interested in the first place? Is it just one of those things you see your friends doing and do it for social reasons and then a few weeks later you actually enjoy it for it's own sake and the cycle continues?
      - bovermyer 5y ago
        I don't know how people discover MUDs these days. I discovered them in the mid 90s because I was bored and happened to find out about them on a Usenet feed.
  - muzani 5y ago
    Just take DF for example: "The necromancer managed to raise both a skeleton and a hollow skin, which I'll keep because it makes as much sense as a walking skeleton" "My adventurer fought through around sixty zombies in the tower, killed the necromancer, learned the secrets of life and death, and then raised various limbs (not my own). Then I talked to one of them, and it told me that it was peasant. It was flattered but had no need of my services. I imagine its little fingers were shaped into the form of a mouth and they flapped back and forth while it spoke with a high-pitched voice. I guess there's still work to do." "Of course, you might prefer raining "blood", but we don't have generic blood anymore and I don't think it's proper to add it now that we've got real alternatives, though perhaps a slurry of some kind would be appropriate later. It didn't even work out right with the rodent man blood — the indexing was screwed up, and we ended up with "a dusting of rodent man skin"... dandruff snow." Other bug fixes: https://www.pcgamer.com/the-most-ridiculous-patch-notes-from-10-years-of-dwarf-fortress/ https://www.pcgamer.com/the-most-ridiculous-patch-notes-from...
krisoft 5y ago
It is a different genre with different strengths and weaknesses. I think it is best to illustrate through concrete titles: Counterfeit Monkey by Emily Short [1]: It is a parser based puzzle game. (Parser based means that there is a "command line" where you type in what you want to do.) In the game you play a smuggler who wants to steal some high tech plans from the island of Atlantis. You see, the Atlantans developed cutting edge tools in linguistic manipulation. They have devices which can change one object into an other based on manipulating the written form of their name. For example a d-remover can turn a playing card into a drivable car! During the game you solve a bunch of challenges with different creative application of such tools. If you like puzzles, puns, and word magic you should try this game. Vain Empires by Thomas Mack profile and Xavid [2]: "The memoir of a demonic spy in the Cold War between Heaven and Hell." Another parser game. Here you are playing a devil, who is trying to prevent a global catastrophe. You cannot directly manipulate the world around you, but you can pluck motivations from the non-player characters head and implant it in others. Thus manipulating you have to steal secrets, negotiate a peace treaty and foil your heavenly counterpart’s plan for world domination. And just to show that not every text based game is a pure wall of text. This one is a hybrid visual-textual one: 80 days from Inkle [3]: It is a choose-your-own-adventure style story game. It is based on Jules Verne's 1873 novel Around the World in Eighty Days. You play as Phileas Fogg's manservant, who has to manage the whole travel. There are two different "screens" to this game. There is a globe interface where you can decide on your travel options. Do you take the Orient Express to Paris, or board a ship sailing southward? And then there are the "text" screens where you have to navigate all the unexpected adventures life throws at you. If you like a globe-trotting steampunk-ish adventure this game is for you. So why interactive fiction? These games were generally created by small teams or even by single creators. Such indies can invest their time making games which would be too risky for a big studio. So you will find many strange concepts and weird experiments. You can find many of the interactive fictions are off from the mainstream zeitgeist. Another point is the economics: A single writer can create a whole word if they want. Text is a very efficient medium that way. The core concepts of the first two game in this list is a perfect fit for the textual medium. Would be very hard to transfer their mechanics into a visual game. The third one in theory could be a fully visual game. It would have just cost a lot more to create. All scenes would have an associated hefty development price tag, which in turn would have meant that the developers would have had to design the game much more economically. Because of their medium the developers of 80 days can afford to have a crazy branching story structure. You literally can go anywhere on the globe and find different adventures! If each of those "scenes" were fully developed 3d game elements this would be impossible. Not even an AAA studio could afford to do that. 1: https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=aearuuxv83plclpl https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=aearuuxv83plclpl 2: https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=o2ghqa7oal5f3y0z https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=o2ghqa7oal5f3y0z 3: https://www.inklestudios.com/80days/ https://www.inklestudios.com/80days/
muzani 5y ago
It's like the difference between a movie and a book, or photorealistic animation and pixelated ones. It's not that one is better than another, but changing styles is fun.

Genuine question - what is the appeal of a text-based game? Is it that you can play async? Something else? Like why not just play a regular video game with regular controller and graphics?

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

yawz 5y ago

Not a text-based gamer so maybe others can respond better, but this is probably similar to reading a book and watching a movie. Imagination has no limit.

tejtm 5y ago
The palpable trepidation arising from encountering the only other ampersand (that one is the Balrog)
Cthulhu_ 5y ago
The keyword / genre here is "Interactive Fiction"; MUDs fall in the same league as text based adventures of old (which later on started to add some graphics until they eventually evolved into e.g. the Monkey Island games), or even the choose-your-own-adventure (comic) books. It's an older style of games, but honestly, I could have seen myself getting into this back when. It's tech that predates MMO's like WoW or Ultima Online. It's stuff that works everywhere. And of course it's a different way to experience a game and its story. Dwarf Fortress also comes to mind, weirdly.

bovermyer 5y ago

It's much easier to support off-the-wall interactions and new game systems naturally in a MUD. By that, I mean... adding a new race (for example) in a graphical game requires art assets, animation rigging, sound design, and ALSO the programming side of it. There may be follow-on work too, like producing equipment models that suit the new race's dimensions. In a MUD, you just program the new race, and off you go. This ability to iterate quickly, with a lower barrier to ideas, means that you can try all kinds of things on a very low budget.

danielmarkbruce 5y ago
These seem like good reasons to build a text based game. I'm wondering what the reasons are to play one.
- bovermyer 5y ago
  The same thing! Imagine getting new features, new content, and new systems at a far more rapid rate from a far smaller developer. And most MU*s are free. The paid ones, like GemStone, are even better... though the subscription price might be hard to swallow for people who are used to AAA graphical games not costing anything (at least on the surface).
  - danielmarkbruce 5y ago
    This seems like a fair enough value proposition i guess. But, how do people get interested in the first place? Is it just one of those things you see your friends doing and do it for social reasons and then a few weeks later you actually enjoy it for it's own sake and the cycle continues?
    - bovermyer 5y ago
      I don't know how people discover MUDs these days. I discovered them in the mid 90s because I was bored and happened to find out about them on a Usenet feed.
- muzani 5y ago
  Just take DF for example: "The necromancer managed to raise both a skeleton and a hollow skin, which I'll keep because it makes as much sense as a walking skeleton" "My adventurer fought through around sixty zombies in the tower, killed the necromancer, learned the secrets of life and death, and then raised various limbs (not my own). Then I talked to one of them, and it told me that it was peasant. It was flattered but had no need of my services. I imagine its little fingers were shaped into the form of a mouth and they flapped back and forth while it spoke with a high-pitched voice. I guess there's still work to do." "Of course, you might prefer raining "blood", but we don't have generic blood anymore and I don't think it's proper to add it now that we've got real alternatives, though perhaps a slurry of some kind would be appropriate later. It didn't even work out right with the rodent man blood — the indexing was screwed up, and we ended up with "a dusting of rodent man skin"... dandruff snow." Other bug fixes: https://www.pcgamer.com/the-most-ridiculous-patch-notes-from-10-years-of-dwarf-fortress/ https://www.pcgamer.com/the-most-ridiculous-patch-notes-from...

krisoft 5y ago

It is a different genre with different strengths and weaknesses. I think it is best to illustrate through concrete titles: Counterfeit Monkey by Emily Short [1]: It is a parser based puzzle game. (Parser based means that there is a "command line" where you type in what you want to do.) In the game you play a smuggler who wants to steal some high tech plans from the island of Atlantis. You see, the Atlantans developed cutting edge tools in linguistic manipulation. They have devices which can change one object into an other based on manipulating the written form of their name. For example a d-remover can turn a playing card into a drivable car! During the game you solve a bunch of challenges with different creative application of such tools. If you like puzzles, puns, and word magic you should try this game. Vain Empires by Thomas Mack profile and Xavid [2]: "The memoir of a demonic spy in the Cold War between Heaven and Hell." Another parser game. Here you are playing a devil, who is trying to prevent a global catastrophe. You cannot directly manipulate the world around you, but you can pluck motivations from the non-player characters head and implant it in others. Thus manipulating you have to steal secrets, negotiate a peace treaty and foil your heavenly counterpart’s plan for world domination. And just to show that not every text based game is a pure wall of text. This one is a hybrid visual-textual one: 80 days from Inkle [3]: It is a choose-your-own-adventure style story game. It is based on Jules Verne's 1873 novel Around the World in Eighty Days. You play as Phileas Fogg's manservant, who has to manage the whole travel. There are two different "screens" to this game. There is a globe interface where you can decide on your travel options. Do you take the Orient Express to Paris, or board a ship sailing southward? And then there are the "text" screens where you have to navigate all the unexpected adventures life throws at you. If you like a globe-trotting steampunk-ish adventure this game is for you. So why interactive fiction? These games were generally created by small teams or even by single creators. Such indies can invest their time making games which would be too risky for a big studio. So you will find many strange concepts and weird experiments. You can find many of the interactive fictions are off from the mainstream zeitgeist. Another point is the economics: A single writer can create a whole word if they want. Text is a very efficient medium that way. The core concepts of the first two game in this list is a perfect fit for the textual medium. Would be very hard to transfer their mechanics into a visual game. The third one in theory could be a fully visual game. It would have just cost a lot more to create. All scenes would have an associated hefty development price tag, which in turn would have meant that the developers would have had to design the game much more economically. Because of their medium the developers of 80 days can afford to have a crazy branching story structure. You literally can go anywhere on the globe and find different adventures! If each of those "scenes" were fully developed 3d game elements this would be impossible. Not even an AAA studio could afford to do that. 1: https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=aearuuxv83plclpl https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=aearuuxv83plclpl 2: https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=o2ghqa7oal5f3y0z https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=o2ghqa7oal5f3y0z 3: https://www.inklestudios.com/80days/ https://www.inklestudios.com/80days/

muzani 5y ago

It's like the difference between a movie and a book, or photorealistic animation and pixelated ones. It's not that one is better than another, but changing styles is fun.