Creative Writing Using Interactive Fiction

In this one-year course, the student will create interactive fiction stories using the Inform programming language along with good writing techniques. There are two overarching aspects to this course:

• How to build an interactive story
• and how to write that story well.

These two facets will be intertwined over the course of 2 semesters, co-taught by a professional author and by a retired NASA engineer.

How to build an interactive story ... taught by Mr. John Kelly

• The student will learn a short history of interactive fiction (IF) and will "play" several IF games throughout the course.
• The student will learn how to setup the Inform 7 integrated development environment and will learn several features of the Inform language, including:
• Things, Kinds, Text, and Descriptions
• Basic Actions, Change, and Time
• Scenes, Phrases, and Relations
• Adaptive Text and Responses
• Numbers and Equations
• … and more!

How to write the story well … taught by Mrs. Annie Nardone

Have you ever imagined writing interactive fiction for an online game? Do you enjoy playing computer games, but you want a unique story that you can’t find anywhere? It’s time to write your own interactive computer story! As a professional author, I can guide your writing to help you compose an immersive adventure, mystery, or puzzle using the programming language you learn in this class. Once you have written and designed your story, you will be encouraged to submit it to The Interactive Fiction Competition (ifcomp.org) and may choose to publish it on the Interactive Fiction Database (ifdb.org).