Re: Why so little Puzzleless IF?

["Avrom Faderman" <Avrom_Faderman@email.msn.com>]

Doeadeer3 wrote in message <19990302203744.23492.00002525@ng-fu1.aol.com>...
>Exactly, IF has to be interactive to be more interesting than reading a
book.


I do agree with you about this (although, certainly, IF doesn't have to be
*more interesting* than reading a book;  I assume you mean *differently
interesting*).

>>But I would think that a few of the recent IF stories that have come out
>>should disprove the above.
>
>Nope, not necessarily. After all, few of the game authors in this group are
as
>good a writer as Adam Cadre. (And I mean FEW.)


But, well, the existence of Adam Cadre is at least a proof that it's
*possible* for an IF game to have a lot of merit purely in its writing.

And, well, I agree that Photopia was pretty remarkably well-written, but I
certainly think it's *far* from the *only* well-written game we've had.

And that includes lots of games with classic puzzles.

So Far, IMO, was brilliant, both in puzzles and in writing (*especially* in
the latter, actually).

Kissing the Buddha's Feet was *wonderfully* witty--in the way only writing
can be.

Muse was maybe not *quite* at that level, but at times, I thought, it got
pretty darn close.  (And, again, the virtue is all in the writing here--I
didn't even *like* all the puzzles.)

Spider and Web...well, I don't know if Zarf knows that Agatha Christie did
that [IYKWIMAITYD] first;  but it was a brilliant device when she did it and
it's still brilliant if executed as well as he did (and the interactiveness
of it--and the shifting from first person to second person--does add
something new).

I think, even though it doesn't contain a single sentence of coherent human
language, Bad Machine is not just an excellent game, but has to qualify as
excellent writing:  it makes you think--about important issues--and does so
eloquently, in its own way.

I'm not overly fond of Anchorhead's genre, but it is, without question,
among the better-executed examples of that genre I've encountered.  The
writing is *good*, at least in that it admirably accomplishes what it tries
to do.

>Most great writers are being published, most VERY GOOD writers are probably
in
>other newsgroups, not trying to write computer games. They are writing
short
>stories, novels and plays and trying to get them pulished and produced.


Most, probably, since the audience is bigger.  But, of course, some very
good writers are very good programmers and want to do both at once.  Some
writers enjoy experimenting with new media.  Some writers are,
fundamentally, *participatory* storytellers.  All those writers may be drawn
to IF.

>Doe :-)  Frankly I am tired of people equating writing/programming an IF
game
>with WRITING, period. It really isn't the SAME.
>
>Speaks a non-writer...


Oh that's *certainly* true.  One can easily tell a good story without
writing a good (or even bad) piece of IF (if one can easily write good
stories, period).  And one can easily write a good piece of IF without
writing a good story, or any but the most rudimentary of stories at all:
witness Enchanter, or The Magic Toyshop, or 99% of the great I-F out there.
But *some* great I-F, a not-insignificant and ever growing amount, has lots
of at least very good writing, writing that at its best brushes against
greatness.

Avrom