Adventure Creators revisited

[Elminster]

In the days post Acorn I had Professional Adventure Writer System (PAWS) (aka Quill 2) on the Spectrum, this was never ported to the BBC.

Now forward to the retro era and I am looking to write an adventure with my daughter on the BBC (she wants to write a game but I was never much of a games writer apart from PAWS).

- So I could go with Quill which is nearest to PAWS I just about remember.

- Or I could go GAC which is arguable better according to the details I have seen.

- Or i have come across Alpine's Adventure Language Programming System (ALPS) which I know little about.

- I have also come across Quest by AUCBE which might be a similar thing for the education market but not sure yet.

- Or I could just go with a modern equiv e.g. things like
Quest @ textadventures.co.uk/quest
TADS (Text Adventure Development System) @ www.tads.org

Thoughts, comments, advice, any good comparison articles?

[lurkio]

Well, here's my GAC-advocacy post:

• http://www.stardot.org.uk/forums/viewto ... 252#p88050

As I said there, I've only briefly dabbled with the Quill but it too has its charms. The disc version's now been found, and is certainly worth a look:

• viewtopic.php?f=32&t=7872&p=171401#p171401
  [EDIT (May 2017): Updated URL]

You'll get many retro points for using either of those! (Although, to be honest, a modern system like the ones you mention will probably be easier to use. Depends on how patient you and/or your daughter are!)

ALPS I've never seen. It seems to be RARE and missing in action... but watch this space..!

• EDIT: I've found and uploaded ALPS here: viewtopic.php?f=32&t=10578&p=128530

EDIT (July, 2017): See also Adventurescape:

• http://www.stardot.org.uk/forums/viewto ... 72#p175942

[Elminster]

Thanks. I did spot you post about GAC but didn't scroll to the bottom where you mention good bits and bad bits as it seemed to be discussing a GAC created game (shame on me)

[AndyF]

I've used both GAC and Quill on both the BBC and Spectrum. I've also briefly used PAWS on the Spectrum (the rare disc version)

The only issue with GAC appears to be a slight lack of memory it seemed.

I've done several conversions from Spectrum to BBC of Quill games a couple of years ago if you're interested. The image contains the source so you can load it back into Quill too:

Subsunk: viewtopic.php?f=32&t=5288

Galaxias: viewtopic.php?f=32&t=4618

Magic Castle: viewtopic.php?f=32&t=5318

Project X The Microman: http://www.stardot.org.uk/forums/viewto ... =32&t=4652

The O Zone (Microman 2): viewtopic.php?f=32&t=5274

[Elminster]

I did pickup a copy of GAC from ebay, mainly to get the manual as the online versions werent that good.

I shall probably pickup quill at some point.

I had the Tape version of PAWS but converted it to 3.5 disc from what I remember. Or maybe I had the disk version cant remember now.

[AndyF]

If you cannot find the disc version of PAWS let me know (via PM so I see it) and I'll try to find it for you. I do have it on a backup drive I know.

[Elminster]

Thanks but I got rid of all my spectrum stuff over 20 years ago.

[richardtoohey]

Thanks but I got rid of all my spectrum stuff over 20 years ago.

Oh, but I'm sure we can "help" here ...

There's this little site I know, called eBay ...

[Elminster]

Thanks but I got rid of all my spectrum stuff over 20 years ago.

Oh, but I'm sure we can "help" here ...

There's this little site I know, called eBay ...

No. I have no temptation in that dimension.

[nudelooney]

ALPS I've never seen. It seems to be RARE and missing in action... but watch this space..!

I spent a LOT of time on ALPS when I was a teenager. I suspect it contributed to my love of writing. Sadly, I sold the software years ago.

If you want to write adventures that could be played on quite a range of platforms, you could give Inform a look. That's a language that compiles into Z-code, for which there's interpreters on many modern operating systems.

http://www.brasslantern.org/writers/how ... orial.html

[lurkio]

ALPS I've never seen. It seems to be RARE and missing in action... but watch this space..!

Ah, yes. Sorry, this-space watchers! Here's what you were watching for!:

viewtopic.php?f=41&t=5594&start=2370#p111308

I'm still digesting it. I'll upload it soon.

[EDIT: I've found and uploaded ALPS here: viewtopic.php?f=32&t=10578&p=128530]

I spent a LOT of time on ALPS when I was a teenager. I suspect it contributed to my love of writing.

Interesting! There don't seem to have been too many games written with ALPS:

http://solutionarchive.com/list/system%2C22/

I don't suppose any of yours survive, nudelooney? How easy is ALPS to pick up and use? Seems more powerful than GAC, from what little I've seen of it so far.

[nudelooney]

ALPS I've never seen. It seems to be RARE and missing in action... but watch this space..!

Ah, yes. Sorry, this-space watchers! Here's what you were watching for!:

viewtopic.php?f=41&t=5594&start=2370#p111308

I'm still digesting it. I'll upload it soon.

I spent a LOT of time on ALPS when I was a teenager. I suspect it contributed to my love of writing.

Interesting! There don't seem to have been too many games written with ALPS:

http://solutionarchive.com/list/system%2C22/

I don't suppose any of yours survive, nudelooney? How easy is ALPS to pick up and use? Seems more powerful than GAC, from what little I've seen of it so far.

Good heavens! I didn't know ALPS existed for the Beeb! I used the Archimedes version (which obviously had heaps more space for text).

No, mine were never finished. I just learnt a lot about maps, and descriptions, and had fun making my own world. I suspect if I ever found my old games now, I'd find them excruciatingly embarrassing.

[Jalov]

If you cannot find the disc version of PAWS let me know (via PM so I see it) and I'll try to find it for you. I do have it on a backup drive I know.

Is there some difference between PAWS vs PAW? All versions of PAW can be downloaded here:
https://gilsoftpawreservoir.wordpress.com/2-paw-zero/

[Elminster]

It is PAWS they are just being lazy (I think, my memory a bit hazy now) and dropping the 'S'.

On that page it does say

The best. The beautiful. The one and only Professional Adventure Writing System by Gilsoft.

Edit: Sometime they say PAW and sometimes PAWS. Not sure if they are using them in the same context or different context. Slightly confusing. But yes it is the same thing. But as I only have Acorns these days I need someone to write the BBC version.

Edit2: In fact they dont even mention the BBC version of Quill.

[lurkio]

Just resurrecting this thread to mention something I discovered about Graphic Adventure Creator (GAC).

In his relentless quest to track down every Beeb game ever for bbcmicro.co.uk, Lee turned up the text adventure game Plane Crash by Michael Cowgill of Labyrinth Software in the StairwayToHell tape archive. It was originally written in GAC's little brother, Adventure Creator (AC), which can do multi-part games but only on cassette tape.*

I thought it would be interesting to see if the three-part tape game Plane Crash could be ported to the disc version of GAC for the Model B, and thus explode the myth that GAC can't do multi-part games -- which isn't really a myth at all but is in fact what the official documentation says, i.e. that only AC can do multi-part games (using the CHN command in the AC text adventure programming language), and GAC can't.

It turns out that you can take the three original data files for Plane Crash (created in AC), load them into the GAC game editor, tweak them slightly,** and then generate three separate self-contained games on disc. But then how can players carry their objects and score from Part 1 to Part 2 to Part 3 (I hear you cry)? Well, they can simply save their game after successfully completing one part and then reboot and load the savegame in the next part!

So it seems that with a little extra work, GAC could have natively supported multi-part disc games out of the box, with no need for inelegant workarounds like this. So why didn't it? No idea! It's baffling.

Here's the game, Plane Crash, converted with GAC to run on disc in a Model B:

• http://www.stardot.org.uk/forums/viewto ... 32&t=12068

A review of the original game:

• 

  Pendragon's review of Plane Crash, from Electron User magazine

* There is actually a disc version of Plane Crash on STH, but it's essentially just a straight tape-to-disc file-copy and only runs on an &E00 DFS, like the one for the Electron (or the ElectrEm emulator), or the one for the Master 128 (or BeebEm in M128 mode).

** i.e. a lot