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Adventure Guidelines
====================
These guidelines reflect the author's personal philosophy to adventures,
so there is naturally a bias in favor of certain factors and against others.
This is not to say that some factors are "bad", since what one person finds
frustrating another would find challenging, and vice versa.
No adventure can include all the guidelines, especially when some of the
guidelines seem to contradict each other. Also, for every guideline
there will be numerous exceptions and special cases. What it comes down to
is this: be aware of the underlying issues, and follow or break the guidelines
according to your style. Your are the creator of the adventure.
Topics covered:
- Theme
- Plot
- Puzzles
- Locations
- Objects
- Mechanics
- Parser
Theme
-----
Be bold and inventive.
- Adventures can take place anywhere.
Use sub-themes.
- Add variety to adventure.
- Can be very different set of locations, or related sets (e.g. different
worlds, or just different stores).
The theme should permeate throughout the adventure.
Plot
----
An adventure can present several featrues to the player (listed in order
of decreasing importance):
- a goal to be accomplished
- puzzles to be solved
- interaction with the adventure world
- a story
- pictures
Have events happen to carry the story along.
- Events don't have to be linear in occurrence.
- An event could occur to sidetrack the player.
- The adventure world shouldn't be too static.
Have alternative plots, endings, or even objectives.
- Player selects which story line, or adv. randomly picks one.
- Player, as he plays, selects his own destiny, with some puzzles applying
to different scenarios.
Have a thorough background.
- Work out the history of the adventure world that explains each
object and character, and details the events before the adventure began.
- This background will provide the foundation and basis for the adventure's
puzzles and situations.
- Although the full history is available, don't have to explain
everything.
Have a step by step build up to some climax or high point. Something
exciting should happen at this point.
Puzzles
-------
Don't have irreversible puzzles.
- More than just one chance to do something.
- Important objects can not be destroyed.
- No irrecoverable situations.
Have several solutions to problems.
- Avoid the bad thinking "if I spend time putting it in, then everyone
must encounter it".
- If a player's action accomplishes something, or at least generates
a non-canned response, then the player is more satisfied than a
canned response or a "I don't know how to do that" message.
- In order of decreasing satisfaction, the type of responses are:
- action towards goal
- action irrelevant to goal
- non-canned response
- canned response
- unanticipated command
- not recognizing word
Have solutions with a moral quality or sense of purpose.
- Avoid bland do-it-because-you-can type of puzzles.
- Could have some emotions attached (e.g. rescue a fuzzy animal).
- The player should feel a sense of accomplishment.
Have fair and "logical" puzzles.
- Puzzles can be as different and wild as the imagination, but they
must be logically solvable given the circumstances that the player
is in.
- The puzzles should fit into the overall theme. Sometimes puzzles can
simply be reworded to fit into a particular theme.
Locations
---------
No illogical mazes, mixed-up directions, or un-mappable locations.
- A maze should be a real maze, not a set of impossible-to-map rooms.
- Even if the adventure consists of independent sets of locations,
there should still be a logical layout to the map.
No empty or useless rooms.
- A location just for the sake of completeness may add to the theme,
but from the player's point of view it is disappointing.
- This is especially true if the descriptions of the rooms are short,
since for long descriptions the location can significantly add to the
mood and feel of the adventrue.
Objects
-------
Have an info source.
- Gives backgound info on objects/characters.
- Gives hints / how to use objects.
- Plot development.
- Humour.
Have "helper" characters.
- act as an ally to the player
- e.g. The vendor in Intrepid, Thunderhawk in Gems
Have character interaction.
- Fake conversations.
- Puzzles involving other characters.
- Getting hints from characters.
- Characters which follow the player.
Mechanics
---------
No deaths.
- Use a warning message for experimental/avoidable deaths.
- No unavoidable dangers / always have warnings.
- "If the player can be killed, then he can be warned of the danger".
No dwindling vital resource constraints (battery, air, time).
- As part of a puzzle, having to refill a resource is alright.
- As a limiting factor which can halt an adventure and force a player
to restart, it is an unnecessary obstacle.
Have a high carry limit, or no limit at all.
- Object count dependent.
- Object size/weight dependent.
Have a narrator with a consistent personality and knowledge level.
- An all-knowing entity watching from above.
- Someone moving with the player.
- A puppet controlled by the player (uses 'I' in narrative).
Have some factors in the adventure that are random with each game.
- e.g. safe combination, color, a true maze
Parser
------
Have a large vocabulary.
- Provide synonyms for words, especially for verbs.
Have an appropriate parser.
- If the adventure requires many verb-noun-object constructs, then having
to use verb-noun commands with auxillary prompts becomes cumbersome.
- A more advanced parser can give more interesting puzzles and a more
natural feel to the adventure, but will require more work to handle
other responses.
- Parser types, in increasing order of complexity:
- "verb noun"
- "verb [article] noun"
- "verb [article] [ajective]* noun"
- "verb [article] [ajective]* noun [prep [article] [adjective]* noun]"
Further Reading
---------------
Articles about adventures, as oppose to reviews of adventures, are becoming
quite rare. Back issues of hobbyist-type computer magazines will be the best
place to look for them.
Betz, David. "An Adventure Authoring System."
Byte, May 1987, pp. 135-142.
Blank, Marc S. "How To Fit A Large Program Into A Small Machine."
Creative Computing, July 1980, pp. 80-87.
Bridge, Tony. Atari Adventures.
Sunshine Books, 1984.
Buckles, Mary Ann. "Interactive Fiction As Literature."
Byte, May 1987, pp. 135-142.
Crayne, Dian. "Do It Yourself Adventures."
PC Magazine, September 1983, pp. 266-276.
Dacosta, Frank. Writing BASIC Adventure Programs For The TRS-80.
TAB Books, 1982.
Grace, Mike. Commodore 64 Adventures.
Sunshine Books, 1983.
Hassett, Greg. "Writing Your Own Adventure."
Creative Computing, July 1980, pp. 88-90.
Lebling, David. "Zork And The Future Of Computerized Fantasy Simulations."
Byte, December 1980, pp. 172-182.
Liddil, Bob. "On The Road To Adventure."
Byte, December 1980, pp. 158-170.
Liddil, Bob. The Captain 80 Book of BASIC Adventures.
Northwest Publishing Inc., 1981.
McGath, Gary. Compute!'s Guide to Adventure Games.
Compute! Publishing Inc., 1984.
Plamondon, Robert. "Putting Adventure In Adventure Games."
Creative Computing, August 1981, pp. 70-76.
Prussing, Scott. "The Next Step: Introducing The Participant Novel."
PC Magazine, December 1982, pp. 296-300.
========================================================================
Summary of Adventure Readings
========================================================================
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Atari Adventures
----------------------------------------