Blog post for Admiral Jota, Lost Pig and Andrew Plotkin, Shade
In certain interactive fiction (IF) I find a subtle variation in response time, which I believe is an important aspect of IF. For example, the Eliza interpreter link off the course syllabus responds instantaneously but with normal human interaction this normally does not occur, people have to think before speaking; whereas with Eliza there is a full response in less a few seconds. With Lost Pig, I have not checked the source code to this piece of IF, but there is definitely a 1-2 second delay when performing actions. The computer I am using not slow, nor is the server, it is most likely a delay put into the piece by the author. This is very peculiar, I wonder if different pieces of IF use different delays based on the actions performed by the characters to make the interactivity seem more realistic? In addition, I like to keep track of the code types used for each piece of IF we read in class; in this case they are both javascript-does the software used-java, javascript or flash affect interactive fiction differently? I ask as different functions and capabilities are available in the code bases that may allow some things to occur in java and others in flash.
Admiral Jota, Lost Pig
In Lost Pig, on the top, a “menu-like” bar informs the user of location or subject that is presented in the text on each screen. In addition, there is also a numerical score on the top right of the bar. The Grunk character reminds me of an oricish-like figure; in the Release information presented on the first slide the serial number appears to be a date code, 08/04/2006. When I typed help, the web page had errors so I referred to the e-mail Prof. Sample had sent out for assistance. Following the help page I moved around exploring the bushes, climbing the wall and eventually ended up burning the forest. The pig started squealing, Grunk grabbed it, and the game was over.
Andrew Plotkin, Shade
The serial number also appears to be a date code, according to Wikipedia this piece was written in 2000 so the year begins in the beginning of the date code; I miss the help feature as was given to us in Lost Pig. There is a menu bar like there was in Lost Big, but in this case, only the location is given, there no score. Incase anyone was curious the hyacinth refers to a plant which are “bulbous herbs formerly placed in the lily family Liliaceae but now regarded as the type genus of the separate family Hyacinthaceae” (Wikipedia). The “help” option does work in this piece of IF; however, it is not too useful. After about 30 minutes, trying to figure out what was going on I looked for help and found http://waxy.org/2003/03/shade_and_inter/. Apparently, I am not alone in my trouble with this piece. Overall, I prefer the “Lost Pig” type of IF where one can traverse multiple pathways and has more leeway in terms of where one can visit. I felt like I was in a box in this game and without a substantial help page it makes it difficult to figure out the main idea behind this piece of IF.