How To Play Interactive Fiction - ThePix/QuestJS GitHub Wiki

Most of this Wiki is about how to create interactive fiction, but this is about how to play. It is a general document to cover most Quest 6 games - and to some degree most parser-based interactive fiction.

We will assume the game allows text commands to be typed. Some games have a side pane, allowing some commands to be entered with mouse clicks, but that is fairly intuitive, and will not get addressed here.

Typing Commands

The basic concept here is that the user - the person playing the game - types commands, and the parser attempts to understand them, and apply them to the the character in the game world.

QuestJS tries to make it clear if it has understood the words. In the image below, user has first used a word the game does not understand, and gets a response from the parser saying so. Then the user has tried again, and this time the parser understands the text. If the text is red, that means QuestJS hit an internal error; hopefully you will not see that!

Even if a command has been understood, it may not be applicable right now. In the third try in the image above, we try to pick up the letter a second time. The game knows what we mean, but tells us it is not possible, because we already have it.

Generally, a turn will pass only if the command was understood and was also successful.

As you will see in the next section, I like to use full capitals for commands the user types in the documentation to make clear what they are; however, commands are actually case insensitive, and it is usual to just type in lower case.

Navigating the World

The standard convention in interactive fiction is to use the compass directions to move from one location to another. This includes the diagonals, so we have NORTH, NORTHEAST, etc. You can use abbreviations too, so N, NE, etc. You can also try UP and DOWN, IN and OUT (but note that I is short for INVENTORY, not IN).

If you are using a full keyboard for a Quest 6 game, when "Num-Lock" is on you can use the number pad for all eight compass directions. Also try - and + for UP and DOWN, / and * for IN and OUT.

Other One-Word Commands

You can also use LOOK (or just L or 5 on the number pad) to see the room description again, or WAIT (or Z or the dot on the number pad) to allow time to pass without the player doing anything. Type INVENTORY (or I or INV) to display your inventory, that is, a list of items you are carrying (or wearing). The EXITS command will tell you any obvious exits.

You can also go back a turn with UNDO.

Interacting With Items

Most commands are generally of the form verb-noun, such as GET HAT, but more complex commands may well be possible, such as PUT THE BLUE TEAPOT IN THE ANCIENT CHEST. Experiment and see what you can do!

You can use ALL and ALL BUT with some commands, for example TAKE ALL, and PUT ALL BUT SWORD IN SACK. You can also use pronouns, so LOOK AT MARY, then TALK TO HER. In Quest 6, the pronoun will refer to the last subject in the last successful command, so after PUT HAT AND FUNNY STICK IN THE DRAWER, 'IT' will refer to the funny stick (the hat and the stick are subjects of the sentence, the drawer was the object).

Some fairly standard commands to consider are USE x, GET x, DROP x, PUT x IN y, PUSH x, PULL x, PRESS x, TURN x, SWITCH ON/OFF x, CLOSE/OPEN x, LOCK/UNLOCK x, EAT/DRINK x, BREAK x, WEAR/REMOVE x.

You might also like to LOOK AT items (or EXAMINE or just X); for some you could LOOK UNDER, LOOK OUT or LOOK BEHIND them.

Characters

If you come across another character, you may be able to TALK TO her, to ASK her ABOUT something or TELL her ABOUT something - try TOPICS for suggestions on what to ask about. Or just SAY something. Different authors have different approaches to characters so any or none may work.

TALK TO LARA
ASK LARA ABOUT CARROTS
TELL LARA ABOUT THE MOLDY CARROT
SAY DO YOU WANT A CARROT

You may be able to ask a character to do something. Try things like LARA,PUT THE HAT IN THE BOX, or TELL LARA TO GET ALL BUT THE KNIFE. It might depend on how much the character likes you...

Meta-commands

Meta-commands are commands about the game itself, rather than the game world, and the details more often vary between game systems. This is for Quest 6, but most systems are not too different in the commands they recognise. Generally, no turn will be taken for a meta-command.

Use HELP (or ?) to see the help for the game. That may be a general guide - like this - or may be game-specific. If you are stuck, try HINT, though in many cases the author will not provide any help... Type ABOUT or CREDITS to find out about the author, or WARNINGS to see any applicable sex, violence or trigger warnings.

You can also use BRIEF/TERSE/VERBOSE to control room descriptions.

Use SILENT to toggle sounds and music. Use MAP to toggle/show the map. Use IMAGES to toggle/show the image pane. All of these depend on whether the author chose to implement the feature.

Save/Load

To save your progress, you can use SAVE and LOAD.

In QuestJS the SAVE command on its own gives instructions on how to save, so try that!

Transcript

The TRANSCRIPT or SCRIPT command can be used to handle recording the input and output. This can be very useful when testing a game, as the author can go back through it and see exactly what happened, and how the user got there. As with SAVE, in QuestJS just type SCRIPT on its own to see instructions on how to use this feature.

Accessibility

Type DARK to toggle dark mode or SPOKEN to toggle the text being read out (the latter is somewhat browser dependent). Use FONT to toggle all the fonts the author carefully chose to a standard sans-serif font.

Shortcuts

You can often just type the first few characters of an item's name and QuestJS will guess what you mean. If fact, if you are in a room with Brian, who is holding a ball, and a box, QuestJS should be able to work out that B,PUT B IN B mean you want Brian to put the ball in the box.

You can use T as a shortcut for TAKE and D for DROP.

You can use the up and down arrows to scroll back though your previous typed commands - especially useful if you realise you spelled something wrong. If you do not have arrow keys, use OOPS to retrieve the last typed command so you can edit it. Use AGAIN or just G to repeat the last typed command.

General Advice

Note that it is common for items to be mentioned in location description, rather than explicitly listed, so it is worth reading descriptions carefully, and seeing if there is anything there you can examine, or even pick up.

If you are stuck, use the INVENTORY command to see what you are carrying anything useful you have forgotten about (or even started with). EXAMINE everything. Try HINT.