Message-ID: <3B530680.3B28E991@csi.com>
Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 11:21:36 -0400
From: John Colagioia <JColagioia@csi.com>
Organization: No Conspiracy Here...
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Subject: Re: [Announce] Exposition in IF -- draft in progress
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"Dennis G. Jerz" wrote:

> "John Colagioia" <JColagioia@csi.com> wrote in message
> news:3b50ca08_2@excalibur.gbmtech.net...
> > Dennis G. Jerz wrote in message <9im7el$664$1@wiscnews.wiscnet.net>...
> > >I'm working on a draft of a commentary on exposition in interactive
> fiction,
> > >and would welcome feedback from any interested parties.  The opening is a
> > >little choppy... so far what I've worked on the most is the three parallel
> > >versions of the exposition to an imaginary game called "Crack of Noon."
> > I like it--article and game.
> > About the only constructive thing I can say that hasn't already been
> > mentioned more eloquently than I could put it is that the article, when
> > describing "Crack of Noon" v2, it discusses the announcement of "you
> > realize" and so forth--oddly, I can't get that to happen.  It may make sense
>
> > to show the partial transcript, thereby showing the action needed to produce
>
> > the message (since I, apparently, couldn't dig deeply enough to find it).
> Sorry -- that was my fault.  Those lines actually refer to V.1, but there is
> a "you realize" in the opening screen of V. 2.  (I've added a "press any
> key" to the opening screen of V2, and am revising the article in another
> window as I write this note.)

Ah...OK.  Heh.  That's much less frightening.  I was starting to get something
of a complex.  "Come on, there are only like five objects here,  and I've done
pretty much everything.  When am I going to realize stuff!?"


> > As to the note, I think that the concept is sound in this case, but the
> > "delivery" is slightly off-balance.  That is, being "Slacker Man," it would
> > actually be sensible for our protagonist to only realize that he's
> > cat-sitting upon reading the note he's been carrying.
> True... but in V3 the protagonist has already spent $47 from the $50 that
> Auntie left.  I imagine that Auntie would have put the money and the note
> together.

True.  I don't know that the character would keep the change and note together,
though.  I'd like to consider myself more organized than the protagonist, but I
don't keep my grocery list with my money after said groceries have been
purchased.


> If this were a real game, and the characters and situation
> continued to evolve, perhaps I would have addressed that.

Oh, I don't doubt it.  I'm just sort of brainstorming at random.  Don't mind me.



> However, this might
> > be a better place to tell, rather than show, scanning over the contents of
> > the letter in a slightly emotional, "omigod-I-forgot" kind of way.
> >
> > Oh.  And the bed is takeable.  But that's hardly relevant.  I just found it
> > amusing that the bed was easy to grab, but the nightstand was heavy.
> Uh... it's an air mattress.  Yeah.

Given the characterization, that or a sleeping bag actually wouldn't surprise
me.  I was actually somewhat surprised in v3 to find out that the home was the
protagonist's, rather than his parents'.


> > I won't mention that I tried "gonear hector" in v2, just to see what
> > happens.  That'd be too embarassing for me...
> Eh.  I thought I'd leave debug on, just for fun.

I tried to make some use of it when I was floundering for the "you realize"
message, fixed above.  And it was actually kind of amusing to magically end up
in the third version of the game...

[...]


