Have you ever tried Inform 7?

[kizor]

I was looking around this forum and someone posted some renpy resources, which included Inform 7.

I downloaded it and while I like the idea of it, my experience with text adventures is limited.

I've only completed one project with Renpy and it was more a test/lighthearted attempt, with a new idea for a story coming through I initially started it in Renpy, the trouble is in that I just feel like I lack too many resources, pictures, backgrounds, sounds etc.

Inform 7 seemed perfect for me. Only text meant I could expand the story and not feel like the game was lacking because people only expected text.

While I struggled through renpy initially now I feel I can do most things I would like, but this inform 7 seems impossible to use. For a start the manual is really complicated, no tutorials that I can find, I don't have any sample games and there doesn't seem to be a dedicated board!

I just wondered if anyone had any experiecne with it, how did you find it? Did you enjoy using it?

Also how much do you need from Renpy games, what order would you rank these in importance..

Story
Graphics
Sounds
Music
Multiple endings
Length

[Alessio]

Hm, maybe it was me posting that resource link. Inform is not that hard to learn really, as long as you stick to the basics - in that respect, it's a bit like RenPy. The biggest difference is the community's standards IMHO - Text-based stories à la Inform should allow you to do a lot of things - exploring, carrying objects, experimenting, and will have the odd puzzle or two(thousand), whereas Visual novels à la RenPy tend to have more linear stories you can virtually "click through". The target group (i.e., players) will also be different.

If you follow these (admittedly clichéd) standards, my feeling is that making an Inform text story requires much more work, because the environment should feel real. You have a (story-wise irrelevant) flower pot in the room? The player can take it, drink the water, refill it, eat the flowers etc. In a Visual novel, there's just a background picture with the pot and that's that. So in short: No, I don't think you save resources/time by using Inform instead of RenPy. But Inform does give you possibilities RenPy has not (a very good parser and inventory system, for example).

For your ranking of essential elements, I'd say the single most important thing is the story. You can make a good short game without music and without multiple endings, and get away with a bare minimum of graphics. But that's only IMHO.

[gekiganwing]

I tried using Adrift, which is meant for the sort of interactive fiction that has...

- "room to room" movement
- the option for time to pass every time the hero acts

I *think* that it might have been used to create "The PK Girl," which is a cute game with some creative puzzles.

Even so, Adrift wasn't super-easy to use.

[papillon]

I preferred TADS to Inform, as it was more C-like and easier for me to jump right into. afaik most Inform users started by working their way through a very long programmer's manual doing all its exercises until they understood it from the inside out.

[PyTom]

I also liked tads, back in the day. It was fairly easy to get something simple working, and then extend it.

[kizor]

Yeah, I can see what you mean about different audiences. The game I made for a friend would not have worked as the images and music really set the mood, a text adventure would of been awkward.

I think I read somewhere that a text adventure is one of the first games that people make in C++, which makes sense.

I think I just need to settle down and learn it gradually, RenPy was difficult at first but once the basics were done you could make a game that looked and played quite well.

I just wish I knew how to program. I've tried bits and pieces but I don't seem to have the patience. Plus I often feel like I'm just copying and typing out, but none of it seems to make sense. Interestingly I've just installed Linux on an old PC and I'm debating whether to put it on this one, but I see some of the command prompts and my brain melts.

I was planning to do a Java module...but, I'm undecided, I do love computers and I do want to learn programming but my word do things really have to be so complicated? maybe I'm just too ADD, wanting quick results for less work, which seems to be the current trend with RenPY, RPG Maker, Stencyl etc.

[Doc_Odd]

I'm not really a fan of the IF format; the mini-game of figuring out exactly which weird option the programmer had in mind for you to do and figuring out exactly how to phrase it irritates the heck out of me. But I do like a lot of interactivity and game-like elements. It seems to me that it's easier to add interactivity to Ren'Py (by using a lot more menus and making them more meaningful and branchy) than to do the interactivity without the irritating parsing games in most of the IF engines; most of them can be modified to do menu selections, but interpreting typed commands is where most of the work went into them, so they're generally not rich in features for making other kinds of games.

[monele]

I tried the last Inform and it's rather easy to get into with its human-like language. I thought about doing some Magical Boutique game with it but then abandoned that... (and now that I've found a way to do it with Ren'Py... it's really not useful anymore).

[kara24601]

I disagree that Adrift isn't super easy to use....but if you mean that you are trying to do more advanced stuff and include ways to be polite in the game...yeah...it's a downright pain in the rear when it comes to those things. If you stick to the basics of IF and only put in a few "fancy" things...there is stuff that can be done easily while at the same time something I'd consider a bit fancy....anyway...when it comes to that....easy.
For some reason , there seems to be no way to make your own "please" command override the default "please" command/response. Other things, like xyzzy or curse words, are easily replaced.

Especially in comparison to trying to learn TADS or any Inform / Z code , Adrift is much easier.
Unfortunately, it's also the most put down/rejected by everybody else involved with IF.
Really, I'm sometimes surprised that Adrift has a userbase/fanbase at all with the fact that most people seem to be set against it.
I'm not quite sure exactly why this is....if it's because Adrift is so easy or just so different that non-Adrift users/enthusiasts refuse to really give it a chance. Sigh.

I think people who dislike the "guess the verb" feature - (I hate this too..so my games should be easier than many in that respect) - just haven't gotten to play the right games. There are many games where the author does include good hints on what things you should try
http://www.wurb.com/if/

Hmm....The Ritual of Purification is one of my fave games that has a good help system.
http://www.wurb.com/if/game/256