#spider and web andrew plotkin

[toto-dreamer]

you made a difference

Last year I wrote a little story inspired by Andrew Plotkin's Spider and Web (which is totally just a funny way of saying I wrote fanfiction for a 1997 video game). The original story is posted on ao3, but I don't want to edit it because it is posted exactly a year after the first fic in the fandom is published, and I don't want to fuck with that, yk? So here's an edited version of that original story, just to keep the fandom alive (if it's ever existed to begin with) <3

You’ve failed

Bring the plans back. That’s what you’re meant to do. Wasn’t it? Even now, you’re not sure. There’s a ghost – you, except not you – that you’re meant to follow. You’re retracing their steps, except you don’t know what it wants, except you don’t know what else to do, except you don’t know what they’ve done, and who they are. A recipe for disaster, you know that, and now you’re here. Papers held tight in your hands, the edges burning and crumbling. You can still save it. You can argue it was an accident. You didn’t mean it. Save what’s left, win the war, and go back, go back home, except – 

Then what? The past is smokey haze of half-remembered memories and overflowing questions. There must be a family to return to, because everyone has a family. There must be friends waiting for you to return, because everyone has friends, right? Or perhaps it’s just the war. It’s always been the war. The frozen, ice-cold war that’s ingrained itself into your blood. 

You remember the man. Knives at each other’s throats, yes? How long till that turns to literal knives. The end of the world. Could you swear, honestly, that anyone left on your side wouldn’t keep using it against anyone left on ours? 

“No,” you said, because you’ve always been honest, because you’ve been nothing but honest. No, I can’t swear, please, I don’t understand, I don’t know why I’m here, I don’t know anything, I don’t understand please just stop — 

You let go of the papers. The table and wall behind it are already a blanket of flames, and the fire climbs up the drapes like monkeys. You watch them crumble and collapse against the cabinet door, like the twin towers. You feel so old. You feel like a child. You don’t want to die. What else can you do?

The fire burns through your skin to your bones. Smoke fills your lungs and you cough, slumped against the cabinet door, the wires exposed and open above you The logic plate is in the wires. You can go home. Hit the buttons and enter the cage. Go wherever that machine takes you. 

You deserve to go home. You deserve to return to your life. You do not remember if you have a life. Perhaps you never did. Perhaps you have always been in this facility, in that steel chair with the bands that wrapped around your wrists and head. Perhaps you were always meant to be a tool manoeuvred and sacrificed by people you don’t even know. 

You don’t remember if you have a name. 

It’s so hot. Your bones are crumbling. You are dust, you are ash, you were dust and you will be dust again. Meaningless, expendable, insignificant. This changes nothing. They will build another teleporter. They will find another you. They will enter this facility and lose their mind and tear open their brain following a ghost that’s them and not quite them, either.

Except it will take time. Except it will make the angry man behind the desk angry, and maybe that’s enough. Except there’s a chance someone better, someone stronger, someone with more significance than you will find something, change something. 

So you crumble, into dust and shards of bone, and you let your soul fly out between your fingertips, a phoenix escaping the confines of ash and skin that is your body. You’re free, it says, you’re free. You have made a difference. 

Original story is here on ao3! Feel free to check it out and the other story in the fandom if you have a change ^^

[crustaceousfaggot]

I lied. I actually don't like sex. Put your clothes back on, we're playing Andrew Plotkin's classic 1998 text adventure spy thriller Spider and Web. I hope you like non-conventional story structures and commentary about the futility of war.

[squorttle-pox]

CALLING ALL FANFIC WRITERS to write for the Spider and Web fandom please please pretty please with four cherries on top 🙏

[builtlikeastickofcelery]

suffering rn how the xxxx do I advance in spider and web I'm stuck in the white hallways I got the package I'm trying to figure out the tools I'm tweaking out do I crawl in the vents? how???? should I start taking notes????????

[squorttle-pox]

see look it's entertaining. everyone go play it now

IF you show up somewhere in the soviet union barehanded and butt naked, were told this city had a certain charm but found it a total wash, have the slowest lockpick in the universe, and are regularly threatened with an autism laser, you may be the guy from Spider and Web

[symbianosgames]

“You are standing in an open field west of a white house, with a boarded front door. There is a small mailbox here.”

If you’re of a certain age, you may remember this opening line and have many fond memories of that house, the vast underground cavern beneath it, and the grue waiting for you in the dark. Zork is one of the most memorable examples of a text-based adventure game or interactive fiction, a genre that peaked in the 1980s.

But, it’s enjoying a bit of a resurgence today thanks to studios like Failbetter Games and Inkle. With that in mind, here are seven IF games that can still teach developers of any genre a lesson or two about narrative and design.

Interactive fiction writer Andrew Plotkin’s Spider and Web is a very difficult and brilliant game, but telling you why would spoil it, says Inkle co-founder Jon Ingold. And it’s this sense of mystery that makes it worth studying.

“[It] does do a completely wonderful thing, a thing that was entirely revolutionary at the time,” Ingold says,” and -- while attempted by a few big franchises -- it’s never been bettered."

"The game presents an impossible challenge, and requires you to think outside of its own frame to solve it, while at the same time never breaking its narrative or its world. It's like what The Stanley Parable does, without any goofiness or any whiff of surreality.”

Takeaway: Don’t be afraid to think outside the box and make your game challenging.

The 1983 Infocom game Planetfall is about a lowly ensign who crash lands on a desolate planet. It’s notable for its sense of humor and for Floyd, a robot who helps the stranded adventurer find a way home. Game designer Bob Bates says it’s amazing that creator, Steve Meretzky, was able to craft such a unique character so economically.

“Like the Wicked Witch of the West, who appeared onscreen for only 12 minutes in The Wizard of Oz, Floyd and our emotional reaction to him dominates our memories of Planetfall, despite his limited role in the game,” says Bates.

Takeaway: A memorable character, even a small one, can elevate your narrative.

Brian Moriarty’s Trinity is considered to be one of the best titles in Infocom’s catalog. Its name refers to the Trinity test, where a nuclear weapon was detonated for the first time. As a London vacationer, the player escapes a pending Soviet attack via a strange door hovering in mid-air. Bates says the game is notable for its unwavering determination to depict the specter of nuclear holocaust that hangs over us to this day. 

"Trinity is a wonderful example of what a passionate writer in the grips of a strong idea can create,” he says. “Although the game has some unfair puzzles (you must sometimes die in order to gain needed information and then restore to a previous save), it is still eminently playable. What developers should study is the depth of realism that Brian brought to a work of fantasy, and the cohesion of the philosophical outlook that governs the game from start to finish.”

Takeaway: Any narrative, even a fantastical one, needs to have some realism in order to be believable.

The way you tell a story is just as important as its content, says MIT associate professor and IF author Nick Montfort, and a good example of this is Dan Shiovitz’s Bad Machine. The game’s mechanical protagonist experiences an unexpected failure in its programming that leads to autonomy. This change in its perspective is represented through glitches, database query results and error messages. Learning to decipher this text is part of the game play.

“Dan Schmidt's For a Change is another example, where the text is uncanny and metaphorical, and also full of personification,” says Montfort. “In both cases, the underlying game … would be much less compelling without the unusual style.”

Takeaway: Presentation matters. 

Emily Short’s Galatea is a take on the ancient Greek myth about a sculpture that comes to life. Unlike most IF games, it takes place in a single room and focuses on the player’s interaction with a single character.

Interactive fiction author Adam Cadre says one of the biggest issues developers face with any narrative is juggling the hundreds of possibilities player decisions create. This leads many devs to use a braiding structure where they spin out a few different paths then tie them all back together before offering the next set of options. 

“What Galatea demonstrates is that there is an alternative: you can actually just DO THE WORK,” Cadre says. “It's not impossible to keep track of hundreds of possibilities, or to model complex emotional states, or to allow a player to raise any topic in a conversation and judge how relevant it is to the discussion up to that point. It's just very difficult.”

Takeaway: Sometimes, you just gotta buckle down and create lotsa story branches.

This 1985 Infocom game is perhaps the most determined effort to create a game about politics, says Her Story creator Sam Barlow. As the sentient computer PRISM, the player is tasked with running a simulation called the Plan for Renewed National Purpose. As they attempt to build a better America through deregulation and unilateralism, the country descends into chaos. [NOTE: All three of the Infocom games mentioned in this list can be played on iOS as part of the Lost Treasures of Infocom compilation.]

Steve Meretzky created AMFV during the Reagan administration, and it was critical of the right-wing and populist policies of that time. It specifically focused on the government’s aggressive military stance, the cutting of social welfare benefits, and an emphasis on religious values. Barlow believes the game is particularly relevant given the current political climate. “It's a great example that games can tell and explore narratives that have an overt political message,” he says.

Takeaway: Don’t be afraid to tackle a hard topic in your narrative if it’s something you feel passionately about.

Although it’s technically considered an adventure game instead of interactive fiction, Jordan Mechner’s The Last Express deserves a spot on this list, Ingold says. “Is this interactive fiction?” he says. “Yeah, I'd say it is, because the most important thing here is the writing.”

As an American doctor fleeing a murder charge, the player boards the Orient Express and heads toward Constantinople, meeting a colorful cast of 30 characters. The Last Express’ narrative takes place in real time. It’s subtle, witty, and intelligent, but that’s not why you should play it, Ingold says. Instead, you should study the way it uses time as a meaningful variable.

“Because it breathes with life. Because there's a full violin concerto in the middle of it, which is optional. In fact, it's probably inadvisable to listen to it. The Last Express has more to say about character in games, about opportunity cost from minor decisions, than any other game ever made.”

Takeaway: Time-sensitive decision-making can help bring your narrative to life and provide some replay value.

[toto-dreamer]

TIL that this janky ass 1998 choose your own adventure game not only has two fics on ao3, but the two fics are uploaded exactly a year after one another, and if that's not somewhat dramatic and or poetic i don't know what is

[magnetictapedatastorage]

On the whole, it was worth the trip. The plains really were broad and grain-gold, if scarred with fences and agricultural crawlers. The mountains were overwhelming. And however much of the capital city is crusted with squat brick and faceless concrete hulks, there are still flashes of its historic charm. You've seen spires above the streets -- tiny green parks below tenements -- hidden jewels of fountains beyond walls. Any bland alley can conceal balconies wrought into iron gardens, fiery mosaics, a tree or bed of flowers nurtured by who knows who. This alley, however, is a total washout. It ends in flat bare dirty brick, and you've found nothing but a door which lacks even the courtesy of a handle. Maybe you should call it a day.

-- Spider And Web, by Andrew Plotkin

[magnetictapedatastorage]

Anyways play spider and web by andrew plotkin

[toto-dreamer]

I’m one of the two :DD Go read my predecessor South of Denial

(And mine, too, I guess, if you want to. It’s not very good.)

CALLING ALL FANFIC WRITERS to write for the Spider and Web fandom please please pretty please with four cherries on top 🙏

[squorttle-pox]

i have a dream that someday there will be hundreds...

TIL that this janky ass 1998 choose your own adventure game not only has two fics on ao3, but the two fics are uploaded exactly a year after one another, and if that's not somewhat dramatic and or poetic i don't know what is

[blogcanary]

i haven't finished the game, but will definitely read the spoilery one of these after I do

I've read the shorter of these; it's quite evocative

if anyone reading this has the slightest interest in text-adventure/interactive-fiction games, please play or read about Spider and Web by Andrew Plotkin

TIL that this janky ass 1998 choose your own adventure game not only has two fics on ao3, but the two fics are uploaded exactly a year after one another, and if that's not somewhat dramatic and or poetic i don't know what is