Newsgroups: rec.arts.int-fiction
Path: nntp.gmd.de!news.rwth-aachen.de!news.ruhr-uni-bochum.de!news.rhrz.uni-bonn.de!RRZ.Uni-Koeln.DE!news.gtn.com!osn.de!noris.net!blackbush.xlink.net!tank.news.pipex.net!pipex!arclight.uoregon.edu!nntp.primenet.com!netcom.com!erkyrath
From: erkyrath@netcom.com (Andrew Plotkin)
Subject: Free idea
Message-ID: <erkyrathDy1G7H.n4E@netcom.com>
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL1]
Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 15:54:53 GMT
Lines: 71
Sender: erkyrath@netcom.netcom.com

Just had this thought, which I don't have time to toss into a game:

Sublocations within a room. Instead of "Drawing Room" being a single 
location, or having "East side of Drawing Room" and "West side of Drawing 
Room", have a "Drawing Room" room but also extra variables stating which 
part the player is in.

> look
Drawing Room (west side)
You are standing by the fireplace of a richly appointed blah blah etc... 
A chandelier hangs in the center of the room.

> touch chandelier
The chandelier is out of reach to the east.

> e
You step to the center of the room.

> touch chandelier
You stretch up and bop it with your fingertips.

> look
Drawing Room (center)
You are standing beneath a chandelier in the center of a richly appointed 
blah blah etc... A fireplace dominates the west wall.

> ee
You walk to the east side of the room.

[First opening the dining room door]
You leave the drawing room.

Dining Room (west side)
...

Note the "ee", "nn", "ww", "ss" commands, which effectively repeat "e", 
"n", "w", "s" until you cross a room boundary.

Note that moving within a room doesn't trigger a print room name / full 
look event, but the room description does change slightly. (So "ee" 
always produces a full look (assuming verbose code), and "e" does so 
*sometimes*. If the last command input had been "e. e", the results would 
have been identical.)

Perhaps the chandelier thing is a bad example. Constant micromaneuvering 
is a nuisance, and we're not doing this just for nuisance value. Pretty 
much every object (including takeable ones) will be in a sublocation, so...

> touch chandelier
[First stepping east to the center of the room]
You stretch up and bop it with your fingertips.

> take lamp
[First stepping west to the fireplace]
Taken.

This is a lot of work, of course. I would use it to implement a *small*
number of rooms that I wanted to present with unusually rich detail. 

Why? (Other than unusually rich detail.) Hiding. Standing unnoticed in a 
ballroom to eavesdrop. Strategic position in a fight scene (If you're far 
from the door, you have enough time to shoot a sudden intruder. You can't 
swordfight unless you're in the same sublocation.) Trap doors and hidden 
pits in the floor.

--Z

-- 

"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the
borogoves..."
