want to create text adventure (not gamebooks)

Question

I use chrome, so I don't use Windows, Mac, or Linux and can't download a lot of the programs I've already seen for making text adventure games. I would use Quest, but unfortunately it's blocked on my computer (I use a restricted wifi). Does this site allow me to create text adventure games (such as Zork or the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy)? I'm just a beginner but I would like very much to learn. If I can't use this site for this specific type of game, what can I use? thanks :)

Answer 1

What you're looking to create is usually referred to as a parser game to distinguish it from choose-your-own-adventure games / hypertext games / cybertext. While Twine is just built on JavaScript, and its theoretically possible to build or import a parser system / library in JavaScript, Twine is not well suited to this type of game, and none of the story formats have any meaningful functionality for it built in. 

If you can't use Quest, Inform 7 and TADS are some other possible engines you could take a look at if you haven't already. I'm not sure if any of them will work on ChromeOS, so I can't really help there. 

Comments

Thanks! After a period of searching, I don't think I'll be able to find a program that really makes the process "easy" (like Quest or any other website that doesn't require me to learn code). So... I've got "scribe text editor" and "vertex code" (and I still don't quite understand how I'm supposed to use it) downloaded as chrome apps.

I've come to the hesitant conclusion that if I want to create text adventure games I need to find myself a slight "beginner" library (if such a thing exists) and use it to code on my own. Which wouldn't be such a problem if I could figure out how to test my work. Am I going about this wrong?

*edit* I just found "codecademy" and that may be what I'm looking for? I'm still fiddling with it.

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Learning the basics of programming and how to build a web application is a good idea. I suggest getting a basic understanding of it under your belt and then looking for libraries and frameworks you can use. I would not recommend trying to build your own engine completely from scratch unless you're really in it for the long haul (i.e. years, potentially, assuming you're starting at square one with learning programming).

The apps you mentioned are text editors, and they're a good place to start. They're just like any other plain text editor, and you just use them to write code. You'll write various files, a main html file, one or more CSS files, and then some JS files, some of which will likely be libraries, while others will be your code. In the main html file, you'll "link" to the other files using html elements like <link> (for CSS) and <script> (for JS).

To test your code, you'll run the html file in a browser. I recommend downloading some examples to show you how to fit everything together.

All that said, the simplest solution would be to get your hands on a computer that can run a more standard OS. I don't think you'd need to break the bank, either, but I don't know how feasible that'd be for you. Reinventing the wheel doesn't seem like the more cost effective solution to me; I think you'd be surprised how much work goes into even a simple text-game engine.

Getting your feet wet with some general programming in the meantime is probably still a good idea, though.

Answer 2

You really oughta look into Adrift. It's exactly what I would use for a game with rooms to navigate and objects to interact with. It's perfect for your purposes, and really easy to use.

Answer 3

Import this archive into twine 2 for the browser.

<tw-storydata name="Basic" startnode="1" creator="Twine" creator-version="2.1.3" ifid="862CEFF7-6F75-4AC4-B38D-34F3D47339EA" format="SugarCube" format-version="2.18.0" options="" hidden><style role="stylesheet" id="twine-user-stylesheet" type="text/twine-css"></style><script role="script" id="twine-user-script" type="text/twine-javascript"></script><tw-passagedata pid="1" name="Untitled Passage" tags="" position="620,297">&lt;&lt;textbox &quot;goto1&quot; &quot; &quot; &quot;1/1&quot;&gt;&gt;</tw-passagedata><tw-passagedata pid="2" name="1/1" tags="" position="510,297">&lt;&lt;if $goto1 is &quot;Up&quot;&gt;&gt;Loction/up&lt;&lt;/if&gt;&gt;
&lt;&lt;if $goto1 is &quot;Down&quot;&gt;&gt;Location/down&lt;&lt;/if&gt;&gt;
&lt;&lt;if $goto1 is &quot;Left&quot;&gt;&gt;Location/left&lt;&lt;/if&gt;&gt;
&lt;&lt;if $goto1 is &quot;Right&quot;&gt;&gt;Location/Right&lt;&lt;/if&gt;&gt;
Text
</tw-passagedata><tw-passagedata pid="3" name="Untitled Passage 1" tags="" position="400,297">Double-click this passage to edit it.</tw-passagedata></tw-storydata>