INTERACTIVE FICTION: As Literature

Okay, so you probably don’t care, but I did find my way out of the crystal labyrinth with some assistance and now I’m facing a wolf.

I will likely spend a good few hours of this weekend exploring PHOTOPIA among other interactive fiction. Starting out with a writer’s attitude and a reader’s impatience, I quickly fell into the journey of this game, and I hesitate to call it a game. But it was exciting, frustrating, euphoric, funny; all the things that one hopes to achieve in writing a story in text. Engaging the reader to a point of real emotions, where he is immersed in the narrative to the point where preparing supper is out of the question and customers could bloody well beat down the door before he can tear himself away from the computer screen. (Okay again, change gender references and yes, it’s true.)

Barriers are being destoyed at the same time as bridges are being built within the literary community just as in almost every other field affected by the almighty computer. Arguments fly on all sides especially as to what constitutes art. Progress constantly changes the determination–even when it may be that it is a subjective view, after all. Time and experimentation move things beyond the established (to date) criteria and may improve, but certainly expand the categories. Homo’s red handprint on the cave wall can not remain the standard forever.

I’ll do more on this subject, but in the meantime, if you are curious, please check out John Timmons’ link to Interactive Fiction on this page. Play a bit. See what you discover.

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2 Responses to INTERACTIVE FICTION: As Literature

  1. I look forward to your other comments on IF. I definitely agree with what you wrote in an earlier post, about the trial-and-error technique of solving text adventure puzzles is very similar to the approach a programmer takes in tackling a coding problem.

  2. Susan says:

    Your comments would be most welcome–I have visited your site many times in trying to learn the basics prior to entering this new world of IF. I will regularly report my progress, and if watching a beginner learn a process that is second nature to you can add anything to your continuing exploration of this field, then a willing lab-rat I will be.

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