Gaming, as a storytelling device, has the potential to be so much more than the graphics-based interfaces that commonly come to mind when we think of video games. Before home computers were powerful enough to run graphical adventure games, there was interactive fiction (IF) or text-based adventure games. These games are played with only words and writing as their medium.
Even in 2014 where games with increasingly sophisticated visuals dominate the gaming industry, an underground core of games and story enthusiasts have continued producing, playing, and discussing text-based adventure games online.
This Saturday, the Toronto Reference Library will be hosting WordPlay, a free one-day festival from the Hand Eye Society dedicated to games that use words and writing.
The festival will include talks from game creators who are already well-known within the niche IF community, such as Andrew Plotki, the author of 2000 IF classic Shade, who will be discussing his newly released Kickstarter-funded project, Hadean Lands.
“More and more people are looking to see stories and characters they haven’t seen before in games, and IF allows one single person to create unique work without having to have a whole team on board. The nature of prose also tends to allow for personal stories very easily,” said Jim Munroe, executive director of the Hand Eye Society.
However, the games at Wordplay will not be limited to just IF. The festival will also be attended by Brent Ellison and Tanya X. Short who will be talking about their game Dungeons of Fayte.
“[Dungeons of Fayte] looks like an RPG but has a really novel narrative system,” Munroe described.
Yet possibly the most novel and exciting thing that Wordplay has to offer is its multiple live performances of different games, which, in the spirit of interactive stories, will involve audience participation.
“We have a game that will be acted out by members of the audience, Coffee: A Misunderstanding — no one will be put on the spot, we’ll be asking for volunteers,” explained Munroe, adding, “One of the other games, Aisle, is a one-move game set in a grocery store, and we’ll be passing the mike around and getting commands from the audience!”
Finally, festival-goers will have a chance to work on their own game development. Workshops on how to use various tools for aspiring authors will guide them into writing their own games. Munroe encourages anyone who might be interested to attend.
“If people have writing interests and game interests, it’s a pretty great way to see the expanse and diversity of work being creative,” Munroe said, “There’ll also be a series of tool demos where people will be on stage building an interactive fiction game to show people that it’s easier than they think.”
