The 2003 Interactive Fiction Competition Introduction ------------ What began eight years ago as an effort to encourage the development of short works of interactive fiction has grown into a competition involving some thirty authors and over two hundred judges. Each year people from around the world write text adventures that can be played in two hours or less. In recent years the definition of what interactive fiction is has changed, as each year more games with graphics and sound are entered in the competition. Whether you've never played a text adventure before in your life, or you've judged in every competition since 1995, we're glad you're taking part. Welcome to the 2003 Interactive Fiction Competition. Playing The Games ----------------- (Note: for the latest information and possible updates to games, please visit the competition web site at http://www.ifcomp.org/) You may play the competition games in any order you choose. However, if you don't think you'll have time to play all of the games before the end of the voting period, you are encouraged to use Comp03.z5. Comp03 is a front end for the competition which is designed to look like a text adventure. It has information about all of the games, and will present them to you in random order. That way, even if you don't play all of the games you will have played a random sampling of them. Comp03 can also keep track of the scores you give each game. You don't have to use Comp03, but if you decide to give it a try, load it using a Z-machine interpreter (more on Z-machine interpreters in a moment) and type ABOUT for more information. There are two types of competition games: interpreted games and platform-specific executables. Interpreted Games Interpreted games are written using a computer-independent language, and can thus in general be run under many different operating systems. To play an interpreted game, you need an interpreter. There are several types of interpreted games in the competition. TADS GAMES. TADS games are found in the tads2 and tads3 folders of the competition directory. The filenames of TADS games end in .gam (for TADS 2) or .t3 (for TADS 3), and they are run using a TADS interpreter. You can find TADS interpreters at http://mirror.ifarchive.org/indexes/if-archiveXprogrammingXtads2Xexecutables.html and http://mirror.ifarchive.org/indexes/if-archiveXprogrammingXtads3Xexecutables.html There are single interpreters that can run both TADS 2 and TADS 3 games. If one exists for your operating system, use it. Z-CODE GAMES. The z-code games are in the zcode folder of the competition directory. The filenames of z-code games end in .z5 or .z8, and are run using a Z-machine interpreter. Z-machine interpreters can be found at http://mirror.ifarchive.org/indexes/if-archiveXinfocomXinterpreters.html ALAN GAMES. The ALAN games are found in the alan folder of the competition directory. ALAN games consist of two files, one ending in .acd, the other in .dat, and are run using an ALAN interpreter. You can find one at http://mirror.ifarchive.org/indexes/if-archiveXprogrammingXalanXexecutables.html ADRIFT GAMES. The ADRIFT games are found in the adrift folder of the competition directory. ADRIFT games run only on Windows systems. You can get the ADRIFT Runner at http://www.adrift.org.uk/ AGT GAMES. The AGT game is in the agt folder. The filenames of AGT games end in .agx, and are run using a program called AGiliTy. You can find a copy of AGiliTy at http://mirror.ifarchive.org/indexes/if-archiveXprogrammingXagtXagility.html HTML GAMES. The HTML game is in the html folder of the competition directory. The filename of HTML game ends in .html. To run it, load it from within your favorite web browser. Platform-Specific Games There are three platform-specific games in the competition. WINDOWS GAMES. The Windows-specific games are in the windows folder of the competition directory. They are playable only under Windows or under an emulator. Rating The Games ---------------- Rate each game you play by giving it a whole-number score from 1 to 10. Larger numbers are better. Your rating must be based on no more than two hours of cumulative playing time. If, after playing a game for two hours, you want to keep playing it, you must give it a score *and not change that score later if you resume play*. Comp03 can keep track of your scores for you, which will make submitting them easier. You must submit them by 11:59 P.M. EST on November 15th, 2003. Submitting Your Scores ---------------------- Once you have played and rated as many games as you can before the November 15th deadline, you need to submit your scores. You do not have to play all of the games to vote; however, you must play at least five games. There are three ways to vote. The first is to use the web-based interface located at http://ifcomp.org/vote/. The second is to use Comp03. Comp03 will create a file called rating.txt with all of your ratings. You can e-mail that file to the vote-counter, Mark Musante, at vote@ifcomp.org. The third is to put all of your ratings in an e-mail message and send that to Mark. You may submit different ratings, and only the last one you send in will be counted. If you choose to e-mail your votes to Mark and you do not use Comp03's rating.txt file, use the following format for your e-mail. In the subject line of your message, put "VOTE". In the body of the message, put the name of each game you are rating followed by its rating, with one game name and rating per line. Send your message as plain ASCII. Do not use HTML or send your votes as an attached non-ASCII file like a Microsoft Word document. Remember, you must vote before 11:59 P.M. EST on November 15th, 2003. Votes submitted after that date will not be counted, so if you won't have access to the Internet around that time, be sure to vote early. You can always change your votes at a later date.