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2 Appendix A -- How to play an IF game
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7 .. image:: /images/picP.png
14 laying IF requires just a bit of instruction. All you have to do is read
15 the descriptions and situations that appear on the screen and then tell the
16 game what you'd like to happen next. Imagine that you're saying "I WANT TO
17 ..."; you don't actually type those three words, but you *do* type what
18 follows, instructing the game to do something on your behalf. Commands
19 usually take the form of a simple imperative sentence, with a verb and a
20 direct object (for example, typing EXAMINE THE KETTLE will display a
21 description of the kettle, TAKE KETTLE will make it one of your belongings,
22 and so on). If there's more than one kettle around, you can be specific
23 (TAKE RED KETTLE); otherwise, the game will ask you something like "Which
24 do you mean, the red kettle or the rusty kettle?" Answering RED is enough
25 in a case like this. Some commands refer to two objects, like: PUT KETTLE
28 To make them stand out on the page, we're showing the words that you type
29 in capital letters. You can actually use upper-case or lower-case letters
30 -- it makes no difference -- and you can usually omit words like THE
31 (though TAKE A BATH and TAKE THE BATH may have different effects, as will
32 TAKE A COIN and TAKE THE COIN if there are several to choose from).
34 To move around, use the verb GO and one of the cardinal points: GO NORTH
35 will move you in the desired direction. Movement happens quite a lot, so
36 you can shorten that to just NORTH, and you can even use the initial(s) of
37 the direction in which you want to travel (easier and faster to type): N,
38 S, E, W, NE, NW, SE and SW. Also available are UP (U), DOWN (D) and,
39 occasionally, IN and OUT. There is quite an impressive stock of standard
40 actions which can generally be relied upon to do something, even if only to
41 tell you that you're wasting your time:
105 You don't have to play IF with a list like this open in front of you; the
106 idea is that a good game should understand whatever seems logical for you
107 to try next. Sometimes that will be a standard action, sometimes a verb
108 like SALUTE or PHOTOGRAPH which, although less common, makes perfect sense
111 You'll discover that usually many of these actions are fairly irrelevant.
112 Try logical things first (if you have a torch, BURN may be promising, while
113 EAT probably not). Of special interest are LOOK (or just L), to print a
114 description of the current location; EXAMINE (or X) *object*, which gives
115 you a detailed description of the object; INVENTORY (INV or I) lists the
116 objects you are carrying. You may combine some of these verbs with
117 prepositions to expand the possibilities: LOOK THROUGH, LOOK AT, LOOK IN,
118 LOOK UNDER all perform different actions. Remember that we're mentioning
119 only a selection of the possible verbs; if you feel that something else
120 ought to work, try it and see.
122 You can change the way the game offers descriptions of locations as you
123 arrive in them. The default setting is usually BRIEF, which provides you
124 with long descriptions only the first time you enter a new location. Some
125 people like to change this to VERBOSE, which *always* gives you long
126 location descriptions. Here are some other special commands and
127 abbreviations you should know:
129 | AGAIN (G) repeats the action you've just performed.
130 | WAIT (Z) skips one turn of action while you loiter and see what happens.
131 | QUIT ends the game.
132 | SAVE saves your current position in the game.
133 | RESTORE reloads a previously saved position.
134 | RESTART starts again from the beginning.
135 | SCORE tells you the current state of progress.
136 | UNDO goes back one turn so that your most recent action never happened.
138 Often, there will be characters that you'll have to interact with. Let's
139 suppose you find your cousin Maria: you may ASK (or TELL) MARIA ABOUT
140 something, GIVE (or SHOW) object TO MARIA or ASK MARIA FOR object.
141 Characters may be willing to help you, when you can indicate your wishes
142 with: MARIA, GO NORTH or MARIA, TAKE THE GUN. If you are really fond of
143 Maria, you may want to KISS her and if she offends you beyond measure, you
144 might like to ATTACK her.
146 Once you've referred to an object or a character by name, you may use the
147 pronouns IT, HIM or HER to simplify the typing process. These pronouns
148 will remain set until you refer to any other object or character. If you
149 wish to check the current pronoun assignments, type PRONOUNS. As a rule of
150 the thumb, try to keep your actions simple. Most games will actually
151 understand long commands like TAKE ALL FROM THE BAG EXCEPT THE GREEN PEARL
152 THEN THROW CAMEMBERT CHEESE AT UGLY MATRON, but such things are hard to
153 type without mistakes. Also, you'll find that other inputs don't work as
154 well: GO BACK TO THE KITCHEN or GET NEAR THE SINGING PIRATE or READ
155 NEWSPAPER OVER THE SHERIFF'S SHOULDER will all give you error messages of
156 some kind. Understanding the conventions of command typing is fairly
157 intuitive and you'll quickly master it after a little experimentation.
161 We're talking here about the core capabilities that most Inform games
162 provide (though much of this is equally applicable to other IF systems).
163 Often the designer will have extended these capabilities by defining
164 additional commands appropriate to the nature of the game; either you'll
165 be told about these, or they'll come naturally to mind during play.
166 Less frequently, some designers like to tamper with the default
167 behaviour of the parser, the interface, or with the way that commands
168 work -- maybe even disabling some of the standard ones completely. When
169 this happens, it's common and polite practice for the game to let you