Prairie Fire Betatesting - new graphical interactive fiction

[JDev]

Hey folks,

I understand that this forum is primarily for AGS games, but I thought I might try to get some feedback here regardless. AGS games are practically the only games out there (besides interactive fiction) that still use a parser, so I thought there might be some interest.

In my new hybrid graphical adventure/interactive fiction project, you play the role of a reporter at UW-Madison who just wants to get one good story and get out. Prairie Fire is that story.

Prairie Fire is written in Inform7 (a common interactive fiction programming language), but relies on sounds and graphics to tell a lot of the story. If you've played interactive fiction (text adventures, Zork, Planetfall) or the really old Sierra games before, things should feel familiar. If not, all the better, as I'm hoping to reach an audience outside of the IF community.

Feedback

Feel free to post your comments here, but transcripts would really be great. When you begin play, simply type TRANSCRIPT and the game will output a file you can send me. If you want to go above and beyond, you can also comment in the game itself (by typing something like *THERE'S A TYPO HERE or *BUG WITH OPENING THE DOOR - just offset it by a rare character so I can search through the document easily). You can send the transcripts to me at my gmail account which is <my handle with 1984 at the end at gmail>

The game is playable (and somewhat tested) for the first third - the second third is playable, but not tested. I'm most interested in comments about the interface and communicating with the game. How often are your commands understood and how often is the parser totally off base?

Screenshots (edited - fixed links, thanks Chicky and Khris)






Links

Windows

https://rcpt.yousendit.com/1153437227/5301594589a3f0a6bfda515c3c5ed55e

Here's the complete package. Just drag the .glorb onto the .exe and it should be fine. It should adjust automatically, but if it doesn't try to adjust the size of the window to about 1000 x 700 - otherwise the interface will feel quite messed up.

Mac

https://www.yousendit.com/download/UnlEZm1YcVhOQnhFQlE9PQ

You'll have to install the interpreter (Spatterlight, included) first. Then just open up the .gblorb file. Try to adjust the size of the window to about 1000 x 700 - otherwise the interface will feel quite messed up.

Sounds and music don't seem to work for most Macs yet, so be sure to turn the sounds off when you start playing (this tells the program that sound is off, and sound effects will be written out).

Teaser Trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onfUYVx5iRQ

There's no gameplay in it. It's just for atmosphere.

[Chicky]

You need the image address for the screenshots to show:

[KamikazeHighland]

Sometimes you are locked out of being able to type, which means you cannot type 'yes' for restart.

Thought I'd mention that before I dive in further.  Love the map, by the way!

[Khris]

Had a quick go at it and it's very well done although I'm sort of a purist when it comes to IF and to be honest I'm not too fond of all the graphical stuff. Will play a bit more today and comment further.

[JDev]

Great, thanks everyone!

Kamikaze, I'm sorry you got stuck with that. The forced Yes or No bug is really frustrating. The interpreters don't account for different windows. I'll be sure to fix it.

Khris, thanks for uploading the pics - I've changed the links in the primary post, so hopefully they work now (although it still all looks the same to me for some reason). This is my first foray into graphics: all my other stuff has been in straight IF. Which is nice, and the community creates some great stuff, but it starts to feel very isolating when you've been with the same audience for so many years.

Hope you all are liking it!

Jason

[Khris]

(although it still all looks the same to me for some reason)

Until you preview the post, that is

The URL-difference is subtle, agreed; there are some image hosts though which don't allow hotlinkling due to ads and stuff. I gotta say though that the host you've used is exceptionally deceptive as it features a direct link field which is anything but. imageshack.us for instance used to be a popular hosting site until they decided to block the direct link field unless you are logged in. What should've tipped you off is the fact that the link they gave you ended with a "/" i.e. a directory as opposed to a file. Nevermind that now though; currently, imgur.com is the number one choice.

I can also recommend photobucket for a more permanent (and free) image hosting solution.