Victoriana - Steampunk CYOA Mobile App

I am here to announce my text adventure mobile app; Victoriana.
It is set in the 19th century, and I have given it a steampunk vibe with several kooky gadgets to use in the Victorian world.

It is free to play, available on both the Google Playstore and Appstore for iOS users.
The links to both versions are just here, and I hope you enjoy my game.

Yours cordially,

Cyril.

PlayStore/Android: play.google.com/store/apps/deta … tadventure

Appstore/iOS: itunes.apple.com/us/app/victori … 02848?mt=8

Interesting!

It looks like you decided to roll your own CYOA engine. How did you come to that decision? What are the advantages/disadvantages of your engine relative to other frameworks like Twine, Undum/Raconteur, or ChoiceScript? How did you like the experience of developing it? Would you recommend other folks roll their own engine? Do you think other authors will/would want to use your engine? (Does it have a name?)

The whole thing is in Cordova, right? Have you considered developing a web version? (And/or a progressive web app?)

Is there a way to restart the game once you’ve started playing?

Do you plan to make more apps? (Or just keep adding chapters to this one?)

BTW, it doesn’t fit the iPhone X screen, presumably because it lacks an iPhone X launch screen.

Submitted Victoriana over on Mobygames, Cyrill. Are you open to bug reports here or were you just making a cameo promotional appearance?

Thanks for the interesting set of questions.

I took a brief look at ChoiceScript, but instead decided to write it as a web app and use PhoneGap Build to port it to mobile devices.
My main reason is that I didn’t know anything about HTML, CSS or JS before starting the app and I saw it as a good opportunity to learn.
Whilst ChoiceScript would perhaps have been quicker to learn in the short run, the webdev skills I learned are applicable to almost everything.
I’m not sure if what I’ve made really counts as a game engine per se.
Most of it is amateur-level Javascript, with some custom functions to speed the scripting process along.

I’ve considered a web version, which wouldn’t take too long to publish as I’d essentially just need to change the CSS. However, I’ve been on this project since March of last year so I might come back to do that after taking a break!

Yes, the game can be restarted at any time. On the homepage, clicking the START button with a game in progress will allow you to overwrite the current ‘saved’ game if you wish.

I am currently studying more HTML gaming, and intend to knock out a silly arcade-style game over the next couple months. I’d never rule out another CYOA though, and would probably stick to expanding Victoriana rather than writing a separate tale.

Thanks for the heads-up on the iPhone X display issue too. Will get to that shortly!

Sorry, are you saying you’ve submitted it there on my behalf?
Or that you’re suggesting I submit it there?
If the former: Thankyou very much! Most kind of you.
If the latter: Thanks for the tip, I hadn’t thought of that and will get to it.

If you’ve found a bug, typo or anything odd, I’d be very happy to hear about it.

Cyril S.

Sorry, meant to express: I /did/ submit it to Mobygames. (Any game that ends up in the App Store or Steam libraries can be easily scraped and documented there.)

Bugs on Android: the app has a tendency to load new passages of text and then display only the last page of them, so not infrequently I make a choice, see the new situation and realise I need to scroll up to actually read it from the beginning.

When resuming old games I get a brief and distracting flash of a placeholder page telling me something along the lines of “under ordinary circumstances, you shouldn’t be seeing this page” before my resumed in-game location loads.

How do you get back to the home screen while playing?