Zarf Updates: Advent Window: a very small IF puzzle game

Advent Window: a very small IF puzzle game

Friday, December 27, 2024

Comments: 8 (plus live) (latest 4 days later)

Tagged: zarf, if, interactive fiction, inform 7, advent window

My game Advent Window is today's entry in the Counfounding Calendar Advent calendar!

Yes, it's a followup to Advent Door and Advent Mirror. The games form a tiny trilogy. But you don't have to play the other two to solve this one.

Like its predecessors, Advent Window is a snack-sized IF puzzle written in Inform 7.

I really enjoyed the Counfounding Calendar this year, by the way. I solved quite a few of the puzzles (not all, ha ha no). Some standouts: Sunset Swim (Jack Kutilek); X Passage (MikanHako); Bring Your Pet To School Day (G.C. Katz); Purrradox (SevanSevan); Stick Stack (Notan).

Comments from Mastodon

Andrew Plotkin (December 28, 2024 at 10:20 AM):

It's always funny to look back at my notes for a puzzle game. When I started this, I was sure the puzzle was going to be "the sun is setting in the west, and you have to get it to be rising in the east so it can shine in through the window and illuminate a dark room."

That wasn't productive enough for a full game -- not even a tiny game -- so I dropped it. Maybe some other time.

Comments from Andrew Plotkin

Andrew Plotkin (December 31, 2024 at 3:39 PM):

I've posted the source code for Advent Window. (Or plain text source, if you prefer.)

Comments from Bluesky

marcmagus (December 28, 2024 at 11:29 AM):

If I have reached the ending but there are possibly not poked in every single corner is there more to the game?

Andrew Plotkin (December 28, 2024 at 12:06 PM):

A little more, maybe.

David Goldfarb (December 28, 2024 at 4:54 AM):

Took me two sessions. In the first I got the important mechanisms but missed one application and got stuck. Second time through I solved it. (Although, there was one item I ended the game with, in my inventory, and if there was anything useful to do with it, I missed it. You can probably guess.)

Andrew Plotkin (December 28, 2024 at 10:14 AM):

I did not have anything in mind for it, but I should add a line to the endgame text acknowledging that you are holding it.

David Goldfarb (December 28, 2024 at 4:45 PM):

BTW, did I ever mention to you that I hold the unbreakable (though certainly tied) record for shortest time spent in the opening scene of SPIDER AND WEB? I was expecting a "game aborted" message like you can get in SO FAR or A CHANGE IN THE WEATHER....

Andrew Plotkin (December 29, 2024 at 11:34 AM):

I am quite sure that I had that one-turn ending of Weather in mind when I set up the opening of Spider and Web.

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