1. Interactive Fiction You find yourself yawning as the professor drones on at the front of the room. You think to yourself, “Another Powerpoint lecture, give me a break!” > Leave classroom You find yourself unable to rise from the chair. In fact, your legs are ducttaped to the chair legs. Frances Van Scoy Associate Professor - CSEE Gregory Gay Research Assistant - Virtual Environments Lab

2. In the Beginning… ► Limited graphics, what can you do to make it more immersive? ► Written text allows the imagination to form the graphical basis of the game

3. Advent(ure) ► First IF game ► Created by Will Crowther in 1976 for the PDP-10 ► Renamed Advent due to file limitations ► Expanded and traded over the ARPANet ► Based on a cave system in Kentucky

4. Structure You stumble out of bed, nearly tripping over a pile of clothing and last week’s pizza. The person reflected in the mirror looks almost nothing like you. You think to yourself, “How much did I have to drink last night.. and where are my pants?” > Wash face. You splash water on your face. It helps wake you up. > Find pants. After some searching, you find your pants in the refrigerator. You’re not sure that you want to know how they got there. > Examine pants. You find $2 in loose change, an ID, a phone number belonging to a “Bob,” and the remains of a sandwich. ► Basic setting information ► Commands based on natural language ► Command is parsed and a result is displayed on the monitor ► Interaction with items and the environment around you

5. Tools Used ► Most use Infocom’s virtual machine, the “Z-Machine.” ► Z-Machine accepts “story files” ► Inform is an SDK that compiles to Z-Machine story format ► Many custom engines ► This class – Lax/Yacc

6. Important Games ► Zork ► Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy ► A Mind Forever Voyaging ► I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream ► Slouching Towards Bedlam

7. Today ► Reached peak in the 80’s ► Dozens released for free every year by the IF community ► Three competitions - IF Competition (short works), Spring Thing (long works), Xyzzy Awards ► IF Archive (http://www.ifarchive.org) is a good resource http://www.ifarchive.org