what tools do you use for mapping interactive fiction games

Seriously, I expect you are already doing it with your rolex replica.

I usually don’t, but when I need to, I find pen and paper still better than any computer program I’ve used.

Definitely pen and paper.

However, with games that have a lot of names or other factual details to keep track of, I make sure to always keep scripting on, and use vi to extract relevant bits from the transcript and store them in a notes file.

my mind

This could be embarrassing, it will be the first time I admitted it, heh. When necessary (though I prefer when it’s not), I tend to make IF maps with my handy old text editor, kind of like capmikee’s backup plan only it’s my only plan, like so…

[code]End of Road
W Hill
E Inside Building
N Forest
S Valley

Valley
S Slit in Streambead
N End of Road

etc.[/code]
Faster than pen and paper, for me anyway, and way easier to adjust for mistakes. (Nothing more annoying than having to wedge in rooms where they don’t seem to fit.) There have been times when I loved a game so much, that I took my text ‘map’ and drew an actual map based on it, afterwards, but that was purely out of youthful fannish exuberance and free time, and I don’t do it much anymore.

Paul.

Wow. If it helps you, sure, but… wow. I don’t think that method would orient me in the least.

namekuseijin, I once pulled your leg about mapping the old Eamon adventures in you head. I’ve got a better one for you - Level 9 games, such as Emerald Isle, or their version of Adventure called Colossal Cave, or the Silicon Dreams trilogy. Would you map those in your head? :wink:

I used Laroquod’s method for doing SWEDUN (from the TWIFcomp); otherwise I use my head or game-supplied maps if available (the maps in Byzantine Perspective and Resonance were really helpful), and then I use the walkthrough. I don’t like having to take notes.

[ETA: Oh, and I do scroll up to review things sometimes, which is an on-the-cheap version of capmikee’s “keep scripting on” approach I guess.]

I use a text editor and a rather strange notation. Here an example from Zork 1:

 * Cellar
  *n: troll room
   *e: East-West passge
    *e: Round room
     *se: Engravings Cave
      *e: Dome room
     *e: Loud room