Recently on Neopoleon, the blog of one Rory Blyth, Betsy Aoki brought up writing a ‘choose your own adventure’ game back in the day.

We all think that ‘back in the day’ is something grand whether we’re in our twenties or seventies. I remember text adventures and think, “Wow, that was great… playing Guild of Theives on the Atari ST!”. I might even have the Bank of Kerovnia account card and Kerovnia Guild of Discret Entry And Removal Operatives contract pasted in an old jounal somewhere.

Video games are fun and recreation. Often times a video gamer thinks to themselves “I wish life were more like a video game”. You have multiple lives, the reset button, gain experience and gold for beating things, magic, and strange old women/men in huts who give you things. Yes, life would be better with these video game elements.

But would life be better as a text adventure?

Let’s find out.

“You find yourself in your bedroom, awake, but groggy. Exits are to the north.”
Go north.
“That’s kind of hard considering you’re laying down.”
Get up.
“I do not understand.”
Go up.
“Do you think you have the powers of flight?”
Go out of bed.
“Ok.”
Go north.
“Ok.”
Look.
“You are in the live-in-kitchen. Your cat runs north. There is a laptop sitting on the counter. An Ethernet cable dangles nearby. Exits are to the north.”
Get laptop.
“I do not understand.”
Use laptop with Ethernet cable.
“Okay.”
Use laptop.
“You must open it first!”
Open laptop.
“Okay.”
Use laptop.
“You must turn it on first!”
Turn on laptop.
“I do not understand.”
Turn on laptop.
“I do not understand.”
Look laptop.
“The laptop is OPEN. There is a blank screen, keys, a touchpad, and an on/off button.”
Use on/off button.
“Okay.”
Look laptop.
“The laptop is OPEN. There is something displayed on the screen, keys, a touchpad, and an on/off button.”
Look screen.

Sans nostalgia, text adventures were nothing more than an exercise in frustration. Though I was taught about synonyms, spelling, and thinking/writing like a programmer, I am very glad I can now simply point and click characters to their destination or use the d-pad on a controller.

If life were really like a text adventure…

Jump out window.

“You must first open the window.”

Open window.

“Okay.”

Jump out window.

“Why would you want to do that?”

Go window.

“I do not understand.”

Use self with window.

“I do not understand.”