17 replies to this topic

[LazicfulLazi]

Where you can type something and it happens? Like "man attacks box" and then the man would attack the box...

Cool idea, eh?

[dannyjenn]

I don't understand... like you type it and then it shows an animation of a man attacking a box?
Otherwise it's really no different than a generic text game.

[icymx]

Interesting, perhaps, but definitely hard to program, and it would require a heck of a lot of animations.

[Markonicus]

That's basically a text adventure game but one which graphically shows what is usually on typed and displayed in text. I don't know if there are any such games as I'm not a fan of the genre.
Or if you're asking if it's possible to make one, I think it shouldn't be too much of a problem to adapt a text adventure engine to also play animations when certain actions are executed.

[psycho666]

And the quantity of animations is just half of the problem. Consider this:
Man attacks box
man atacks box
men ataks box
men atax boks
men atak bocks
man atac boks
etc.
I'm not even gona mention guy slaps box or dude hit box...

[dannyjenn]

And the quantity of animations is just half of the problem. Consider this:
Man attacks box
man atacks box
men ataks box
men atax boks
men atak bocks
man atac boks
etc.
I'm not even gona mention guy slaps box or dude hit box...

You don't have to make the game accept typos / misspellings / textspeak or other such nonsense, lol

[PetzI]

There's a game called Scribblenauts, where you can type something and it appears. What you're suggesting would be way too complex to be doable, though, since as of now, computer software that can fully interpret natural language isn't very good. I'm sure there's a lot of great progress being made, but I'm sure it's going to take a while.

[Markonicus]

Guys, he's not suggesting a game that can fully understand what you're typing. You don't seem to even know that there's a whole genre of games called text adventures where all you do is type words and sentences in some case. But such games are made to accept only correctly written text so as dannyjenn already explained it wouldn't have to recognize every stupidity a bored gamer would type, it would only recognize a limited number of things that it's meant to recognize in the first place.

[DJDazstar]

Guys, he's not suggesting a game that can fully understand what you're typing. You don't seem to even know that there's a whole genre of games called text adventures where all you do is type words and sentences in some case. But such games are made to accept only correctly written text so as dannyjenn already explained it wouldn't have to recognize every stupidity a bored gamer would type, it would only recognize a limited number of things that it's meant to recognize in the first place.

Actually, I had an idea for creating a Zork like game after I learnt Zork didn't work on windows 64 bit, and it isn't that hard get the user input right: (It's abit messy :/)

Spoiler

var get,command,object,command_check,object_check; get=string_lower(get_string("Enter Command",""))
command=""
object=""
command_check=0
object_check=0
if string_pos("attack",get) {command="Attacked" command_check+=1}
if string_pos("pickup",get) || string_pos("pick up",get) {command="Picked up" command_check+=1}
if string_pos("hello",get) {command="Said hello to" command_check+=1}
if string_pos("troll",get) {object="Troll" object_check+=1}
if string_pos("letter",get) {object="Letter" object_check+=1}
if string_pos("table",get) {object="Table" object_check+=1}

switch (command_check)
{
case 0:show_message("Please enter a command");exit;break;
case 1:/*do nothing*/;break;
default:show_message("Only enter one command");exit;break;
}

switch (object_check)
{
case 0:show_message("Please enter an object");exit;break;
case 1:/*do nothing*/;break;
default:show_message("Only enter one object");exit;break;
}

show_message(command+" the "+object)

With something like that, you don't need to take capitals into account. So as long as the word is there, you can follow the commands like in Zork. And with that bit code, "Attack troll" does the same as "Please attAck Mr.TrOlll my little sidekick" And just by turning

if string_pos("attack",get) {command="Attacked" command_check+=1}

to

if string_pos("attack",get) || string_pos("atk",get){command="Attacked" command_check+=1}

you can quickly fix typos. You can also say hello to the troll, pick up a letter and so on. Of course, making it so that you can only interact with certain things a certain way in certain areas is just a matter of adding a few arrays and some more variables.

In fact, I think this is a very intriguing subject

[Lune]

I think the novelty would wear off too quickly.

[Slinky]

It does have some nostalgia value for people who remember text adventures.

I myself am a fan and I was not alive. I was the N64 generation.

[Spyro Conspiracy Theorist]

I personally have quite a fondness for text-based adventure games, for two major reasons: the interesting and unique ways you can interact with your environment, and the potential for good writing. I'm assuming, since you only mention using text as an input device, that the latter is going to be irrelevant (it doesn't have to be, though). I'll say right off the bat that if you intend to just use this to give players a different way to "attack" and "walk," don't. There's no point. Otherwise, read on.

When I was really hooked on IF games, I actually tried to implement an idea much like this. It was sort of a dungeon crawler/text-based adventure game, if that makes any sense. It was 3d, with tile-based movement and an interface just like your favorite interactive fiction games. Of course, I was far, far too noobish with GM at the time to get anywhere with it. I thought a string was something you tied to a needle! Anywho, these are some thoughts I accumulated when trying to design that game:
Text-based interface hinders movement. Simple actions like moving and attacking should be as simple and quick as possible. If the player has to hit more than one button to take a single step, they are going to be unhappy. As well they should be. For all the standard actions, there should be one-key (or one-click) shortcuts. Unfortunately, once this is in place, you're barely playing a text-based adventure game. You've shifted from IF to just a regular game! You need to be very aware of your game's identity. Making sure that it has the extensive world-interaction options that make text-based adventure games fun, without bringing in the element of writing a dissertation just to get through a dungeon, is going to be a very difficult trick to pull off.
Text-based worlds exist on a special plane of reality. This one's probably already occurred to you, but I'll mention it anyway because it's very important: you can't have a realtime IF game. There needs to be a "turn" system constantly in place. If you try to make a real-time text-interface game, you're going to get something like "Typing of the Dead" or "Typershark," where the obstacle is your typing speed. Unless you really want to go in this direction, you're going to have to implement different difficulty settings based on how fast they can type ("easy" becomes "30 wpm," "medium" becomes "55 wpm," etc). It could be fun, but now instead of trying to get better at the in-game challenge curve, they're going to be trying to get better at typing. So unless that's where you want the challenge to be, turn-based combat is a must.
New technology has rendered IF games nearly obsolete. There used to be a time when typing "attack the box" into a little textbox was the only way to do so. Not anymore! This is a system of interaction that will, by its nature, hinder the player. If the only use you're going to get out of it is "attack" and "talk," you might as well skip the text-based interface entirely. If you don't provide a deep, extensive, unique library of actions with which to interact with the world, you're just wasting the player's time making them type "attack the box" instead of hitting Z to attack the box.
The world needs to be WORTH interacting with. Just because you give a player the ability to interact with the world in unique ways doesn't mean they're inherently going to want to. The world itself has to be incredibly detailed, stimulating, and variant. There needs to be an element of mystery, that makes the player think "can I do [x]?" and "is there something hidden here?" You have to keep your environment's cards close to its chest, so to speak. This is very difficult with a fully visually rendered gameworld, however. That is why, in my game, it was going to be somewhere around the graphical complexity of DOOM. The world is vividly rendered, with lots of implied detail, but if you interacted with a wall and something happened, you wouldn't be too surprised. This is because in the player's imagination of the gameworld there is something more there, and the lower level of detail provides the opportunity for the player to retroactively fill in the blanks on things like that. That's the way I thought of solving this problem of keeping some level of ambiguity about the environments without frustrating the player. There are other ways to do this as well, of course; basically any low-fidelity aesthetic is going to involve a lot of filling in the blanks on the player's part. The trick here is that you want the visuals to be compelling and detailed enough that closer inspection is plausible and interesting. If you want to make your own ideas, this might be a good starting place. It's a fun little video about the potential of intentionally excluding information.
That's all I really have for the input aspect of text-based games. If you were to provide more information on the basics of your game, that might be helpful.

In short, the only reason to use text-based input is to give the player unique and deeper ways to interact with the game. Think of ways to interact with the world that the player can't in most games, and you'll probably be able to do that. There is the small might text-based input still has over modern methods.

Edited by Spyro Conspiracy Theorist, 17 June 2012 - 04:06 AM.

[LazicfulLazi]

You guys assume I don't know Scribblenauts?

And btw, I wouldn't make so many animations, I would just let the man execute a script (like scr_attack) where the argument2 (for instance) is the box!

[LazicfulLazi]

You guys assume I don't know Scribblenauts?

And btw, I wouldn't make so many animations, I would just let the man execute a script (like scr_attack) where the argument2 (for instance) is the box!

[cantavanda]

It will be impossible to make, or if you do it it will take years!

[Spyro Conspiracy Theorist]

No it wouldn't. Text-based interfaces were some of the earliest video-game interfaces, dating back to the 70s. And it wouldn't require any more work on graphical resources than any other game, except perhaps animating a few more actions than typical ("look at," "drop," etc). The only tricky part is creating a program for parsing text, and even that's not terribly difficult unless you're allowing the player to use complex sentences.

[KidFisto]

IF = Interactive Fiction
of course
just started reading from the bottom
was searching for how to make IF's :]

Oh and yo Spiro wzub? :D

[LazicfulLazi]

No it wouldn't. Text-based interfaces were some of the earliest video-game interfaces, dating back to the 70s. And it wouldn't require any more work on graphical resources than any other game, except perhaps animating a few more actions than typical ("look at," "drop," etc). The only tricky part is creating a program for parsing text, and even that's not terribly difficult unless you're allowing the player to use complex sentences.

Someone with proper sense. :D *highfive*