intfiction.org

Hi,

I'm currently developing an interactive fiction game engine with python. When it's all complete, it should be able to allow game development in XML and basic Python. It should also have the potention of GUI and even graphics!

However it's a lot of work to do it all by myself. So if there's anyone who's interested in helping out, please give me an request at https://sourceforge.net/projects/tagengine/

Thanks guys! =D

Edit: version 0.12 has been released. It's much more stable and capable now. Also, a GUI game maker is in the making

Are you familiar with the other Python systems such as Ren'Py, Pyf and PAWS? They may save you some work or give ideas. Pyf for example uses XML and Python scripts as well.

http://www.renpy.org/

http://code.google.com/p/pyf/

http://home.fuse.net/wolfonenet/PAWS.htm

While it may seem like a good idea to develop an IF system in a general purpose language like Python, there are a lot of problems specific to IF that most programming languages weren't designed to deal with. I'm curious what your thoughts are in this regard.

I'm not exactly sure on the problems that you are referring to. Maybe you can clarify on that regard?

Also the TAG Engine is not exactly an authoring system. Sure, it's a game development framework for developing text-based games, but it's really something that people who have a lot of experience in programming can build upon. For example, I have used the game engine to create an application that would generate the XML files for the game. It shows that the engine can be thoroughly customized to address many problems.

Also, the engine is not limited to text adventure games. With customization, it's certainly possible to build a text based RPG game out of it.

As to my thoughts about many of the problems I have encountered during the way of building this engine, I proposed different plans to solve them, write some pseudo-code down, and find the most efficient and effective way then translate them into python.

A little remark: I think "TAG" may not be the best choice of name, because there's already an IF authoring system (in German only, but there are several games made with it) called "T.A.G."

Stands for Text Adventure Game (definitely not creative), combined it makes Text Adventure Game Engine

Can't put this in source forge but it's actually the <TAG> Engine (<> for the XML tags =D)

Thanks, that clears things up; I did assume by 'game engine' you meant authoring system. I don't see your XML generator in SVN, is it available?

unfortunately the XML generator is no longer working due to enormous changes to the engine itself from the time that I created the xml generator as a proof of concept til now.

Basically the xml generator has a custom generator file that imports the main tag engine library. It has another class that inherits from the Player class and has customized actions like createnode, appenddata, save, and so on.

Example: (not generated from the xml generator as it's broken right now, this is what it should do)



I know it's not that intuitive, but it's just a concept.

I would create another one , but i have little time. There's still a lot of things to do with this engine, <cough>and that's why i'm asking for help =) </cough>

I saw a short todo list in main.py, but is there a more detailed list or roadmap somewhere that describes your vision for the engine?

I did made one sometime ago, just uploaded to google docs.

http://docs.google.com/View?id=dgjtkz7g_16chtfdjf8

A GUI XML generator is an interesting idea (I sure know I wouldn't want to hand-edit the XML! ). There are general purpose XML generators, and visual editors. There also are a few MUD area creation programs that output to XML. Here's one I can remember:

http://avae.sourceforge.net/

Perhaps it could be re-purposed or provide some ideas.

What would make a good GUI generator is a broader topic and it's been discussed some on the rec.arts.int-fiction list. Some people have made similar tools for other IF systems but it doesn't seem like any of them have ever caught on, maybe because most iF maps aren't that complicated. But if you're making more of a RPG, and it seems like you're going that direction, a GUI generator sounds like something that would be helpful.