After talking with a few people at the Chicago IF Group, it’s clear we have opportunities to spread the word. The one nagging issue is that we need the promotional CD to be a dual boot (MAC/PC) disc.
Is there anyone that can volunteer to develop a run-from-cd MAC image that we can marry to the PC one?
It looks like we could simply create a bootable image that opens Zoom.
The required work from an interested volunteer would be to create a zoomrc configuration file that had the list of games on the current promotional CD. (The idea is to promote, not overwhelm).
Anyone?
List of games with approval to be promoted and shared:
9:05 Adam Cadre
Adventure Will Crowther and Don Woods
Ad Verbum Nick Montfort
Alabaster Emily Short and Company
All Roads Jon Ingold
All Things Devours Half Sick of Shadows
ASCII and The Argonauts J. Robinson Wheeler
At Wit's End Mike Sousa
Babel Ian Finley
Bad Machine Dan Shiovitz
A Bear's Night Out David Dyte
Being Andrew Plotkin J. Robinson Wheeler
Blue Chairs Chris Klimas
Blue Lacuna Aaron A. Reed
Bronze Emily Short
Broken Legs Sarah Morayati
Centipede J. Robinson Wheeler
A Change in the Weather Andrew Plotkin
Child's Play Stephen Grenade
Curses! Graham Nelson
The Dreamhold Andrew Plotkin
Dungeon (Mainframe Zork) Tim Anderson, Marc Blank, Bruce Daniels, and Dave Lebling
Earth and Sky Paul O'Brian
Earth and Sky 2: Another Earth, Another Sky
Paul O'Brian
Earth and Sky 3: Luminous Horizon
Paul O'Brian
The Edifice Lucian P. Smith
Fallacy of Dawn Robb Sherwin
The Fire Tower Jacqueline Lott
For a Change Dan Schmidt
Fragile Shells Stephen Grenade
The Frenetic Five versus Sturm und Drang
Neil deMause
Galatea Emily Short
Guilty Bastards Kent Tessman
Heroes Sean Barret
Hunter, In Darkness Andrew Plotkin
I-O Adam Cadre
Jigsaw Graham Nelson
Kaged Ian Finley
Losing Your Grip Stephen Grenade
Lost Pig Admiral Jota
Metamorphoses Emily Short
The Meteor, The Stone And A Long Glass of Sherbert
Graham Nelson
Moments Out of Time L. Ross Raszewski
The Mulldoon Murders Jon Ingold
The Mulldoon Legacy Jon Ingold
Muse: An Autumn Romance Christopher Huang
Necrotic Drift Robb Sherwin
Photopia Adam Cadre
Pytho's Mask Emily Short
Risorgimento Represso Michael J. Coyne
Savoire Faire Emily Short
Scavenger Quintin Stone
Shade Andrew Plotkin
Shrapnel Adam Cadre
So Far Andrew Plotkin
The Space Under the Window Andrew Plotkin
Spider and Web Andrew Plotkin
Square Circle Eric Eve
Sting of the Wasp Jason Devlin
Sunset Over Savannah Ivan Cockrum
Textfire Golf Adam Cadre
The Traveling Swordsman Mike Snyder
Varicella Adam CadreWhat are the kinds of organizations/people these would be given out to? Also, will the games be framed or categorized in any way, with a booklet or something like that?
Well Ed talked about handing them out at the Printer’s Row Book Fair in Chicago.
I think having the ability to make a “packet” from online materials (flyers, books, CD’s) and dropping them off at libraries is an excellent idea.
I’d like to get to the point where we can get it all in a single provider where you pay $X and they send Y bundles to you or anyone you want.
David C.
I would definitely categorize the games and suggest ones to begin with. Despite their historical place, Dungeon or Adventure would be a daunting start for new players.
In terms of permission, I’m certainly happy for you to use my games on the CD, though note that my last name is spelled “Granade”.
If you’re going to hand them out at libraries, you should definitely consider putting Varicella (and perhaps one or two others, I haven’t played them all) in a “Parental Advisory” folder.
–JA
Yeah, in typing up that list from the current CD, I find the whole thing daunting. I would want to make a hierarchical menu that starts with the simpler games. The user can drill down into other games as they wish.
Sorry - I swear I double-check your name-spelling all the time and always get it wrong. My bad.
David C.
so hey, i’m ed, the guy dave mentioned in an above post.
i’m currently working on a sort of brief pamphlet(or zine, depending on which side of the gap you’re on) attempting to act as a sort of manual for the CD in question. brief history of IF, brief general guide to playing, and maybe some more in-depth stuff on a couple of “intro” games. maybe couple of annotated transcripts, stuff like that. the plan is to hand this out at the printer’s row book fair in chicago as a sort of first-wave of IF outreach, with a more polished package being made for libraries and suchlike.
can we divide the games into different sections, and create a menu that doesn’t overwhelm the first time user before the book fair? i’m no techy, so i’m afraid i haven’t the faintest where to start with that, but it seems like that’s a really good idea.
I’m trying to organize the games into buckets. I’ve also started reworking the web page from which the games are launched on the Windows side of things. I need help though…I have not played all of these games. The list at the top are unorganized. The buckets I’ve come up with are at the bottom. If anyone wants to bucket some games, please do so.
Thanks,
David C.
9:05 Adam Cadre
Ad Verbum Nick Montfort
Alabaster Emily Short and Company
All Roads Jon Ingold
All Things Devours Half Sick of Shadows
ASCII and The Argonauts J. Robinson Wheeler
At Wit’s End Mike Sousa
Being Andrew Plotkin J. Robinson Wheeler
Blue Chairs Chris Klimas
Blue Lacuna Aaron A. Reed
Bronze Emily Short
Broken Legs Sarah Morayati
Centipede J. Robinson Wheeler
A Change in the Weather Andrew Plotkin
Curses! Graham Nelson
The Dreamhold Andrew Plotkin
Earth and Sky Paul O’Brian
Earth and Sky 2: Another Earth, Another Sky
Paul O’Brian
Earth and Sky 3: Luminous Horizon
Paul O’Brian
The Edifice Lucian P. Smith
Fallacy of Dawn Robb Sherwin
The Fire Tower Jacqueline Lott
For a Change Dan Schmidt
Fragile Shells Stephen Granade
The Frenetic Five versus Sturm und Drang
Neil deMause
Galatea Emily Short
Guilty Bastards Kent Tessman
Heroes Sean Barret
Hunter, In Darkness Andrew Plotkin
I-O Adam Cadre
Jigsaw Graham Nelson
Losing Your Grip Stephen Granade
Metamorphoses Emily Short
The Meteor, The Stone And A Long Glass of Sherbert
Graham Nelson
Moments Out of Time L. Ross Raszewski
Muse: An Autumn Romance Christopher Huang
Necrotic Drift Robb Sherwin
Pytho’s Mask Emily Short
Risorgimento Represso Michael J. Coyne
Scavenger Quintin Stone
Shade Andrew Plotkin
Shrapnel Adam Cadre
So Far Andrew Plotkin
The Space Under the Window
Andrew Plotkin
Spider and Web Andrew Plotkin
Square Circle Eric Eve
Sting of the Wasp Jason Devlin
Sunset Over Savannah Ivan Cockrum
Textfire Golf Adam Cadre
The Traveling Swordsman Mike Snyder
Thriller
Babel Ian Finley
Kaged Ian Finley
Puzzlefest
Savoire Faire Emily Short
Mystery
The Mulldoon Murders Jon Ingold
The Mulldoon Legacy Jon Ingold
Whimsical
A Bear’s Night Out David Dyte
Child’s Play Stephen Granade
Lost Pig Admiral Jota
Narrative
Photopia Adam Cadre
Classic
Adventure Will Crowther and Don Woods
Dungeon (Mainframe Zork) Tim Anderson, Marc Blank, Bruce Daniels, and Dave Lebling
Difficult
Bad Machine Dan Shiovitz
Varicella Adam Cadre
I definitely agree with the comments above of providing a short-list of recommended introduction games. Some of the games on the list, while very good, are not going to give the best first impression. A good starting game will provide in game hints, a more modern standard of parser flexibility, and simple goals. If I were to pick my top three recommendations, they would probably be Lost Pig, Bronze and Dreamhold - in that order.
It’s difficult to fit some games into a single bucket, but here are some of my recommendations:
9:05 -> Slice of Life
Alabaster, Galatea-> Conversation-based
Being Andrew Plotkin -> Whimsical
Curses!, Jigsaw -> Puzzlefest/Difficult
Earth and Sky 1/2/3 -> Whimiscal? (These are also very good beginner recommendations)
Fire Tower -> Narrative
I-O -> Narrative (sorta)
If it can be avoided, I don’t think games should be restricted to a single bucket. That does a disservice both to the game and to the person perusing the games–for example, if the user is more interested in a given category, such as “fantasy”, and Lost Pig is in “beginner”, they’ll miss that game.
–Erik
I agree that some games will fit in more than one bucket. I wanted to come up with buckets that were not strictly genre based to avoid this, but that seems impossible. Here’s take 2:
Still 35 uncategorized.
Ad Verbum Nick Montfort
All Roads Jon Ingold
All Things Devours Half Sick of Shadows
ASCII and The Argonauts J. Robinson Wheeler
At Wit’s End Mike Sousa
Blue Chairs Chris Klimas
Blue Lacuna Aaron A. Reed
Broken Legs Sarah Morayati
Centipede J. Robinson Wheeler
A Change in the Weather Andrew Plotkin
Fallacy of Dawn Robb Sherwin
For a Change Dan Schmidt
Fragile Shells Stephen Granade
The Frenetic Five versus Sturm und Drang Neil deMause
Guilty Bastards Kent Tessman
Heroes Sean Barret
Hunter, In Darkness Andrew Plotkin
Losing Your Grip Stephen Granade
Metamorphoses Emily Short
The Meteor, The Stone And A Long Glass of Sherbert Graham Nelson
Moments Out of Time L. Ross Raszewski
Muse: An Autumn Romance Christopher Huang
Necrotic Drift Robb Sherwin
Pytho’s Mask Emily Short
Risorgimento Represso Michael J. Coyne
Scavenger Quintin Stone
Shade Andrew Plotkin
Shrapnel Adam Cadre
So Far Andrew Plotkin
The Space Under the Window Andrew Plotkin
Square Circle Eric Eve
Sting of the Wasp Jason Devlin
Sunset Over Savannah Ivan Cockrum
Textfire Golf Adam Cadre
The Traveling Swordsman Mike Snyder
Introductory
Lost Pig Admiral Jota
Bronze Emily Short
The Dreamhold Andrew Plotkin
Earth and Sky Paul O’Brian
Earth and Sky 2: Another Earth, Another Sky Paul O’Brian
Earth and Sky 3: Luminous Horizon Paul O’Brian
Philisophical
The Edifice Lucian P. Smith
Spider and Web Andrew Plotkin
Slice of Life
9:05 Adam Cadre
Conversational
Alabaster Emily Short and Company
Galatea Emily Short
Thriller
Babel Ian Finley
Kaged Ian Finley
Mystery
The Mulldoon Murders Jon Ingold
The Mulldoon Legacy Jon Ingold
Whimsical
A Bear’s Night Out David Dyte
Child’s Play Stephen Granade
Lost Pig Admiral Jota
Being Andrew Plotkin J. Robinson Wheeler
Earth and Sky Paul O’Brian
Earth and Sky 2: Another Earth, Another Sky Paul O’Brian
Earth and Sky 3: Luminous Horizon Paul O’Brian
Narrative
Photopia Adam Cadre
The Fire Tower Jacqueline Lott
I-O Adam Cadre
Classic
Adventure Will Crowther and Don Woods
Dungeon (Mainframe Zork) Tim Anderson, Marc Blank, Bruce Daniels, and Dave Lebling
Difficult
Bad Machine Dan Shiovitz
Varicella Adam Cadre
Curses! Graham Nelson
Jigsaw Graham Nelson
Savoire Faire Emily Short
IFDB will save you some work here.
I don’t know what the timeline is for this project:
inthecompanyofgrues.com/?p=123
…but it might be worth checking in with them to see whether it might be available to put on the CD.
–Erik