A hybrid IF engine, lightyears ahead.
We're working on a new class of interactive fiction engine: something modern, sleek, and empowering. Every human being is creative, everyone can tell stories, and technology should enhance their vision, not get in the way. The LightYear engine makes it very easy for anyone to create an immersive, enveloping interactive fiction, and provides a comprehensive API for experienced developers to create something truly unique. LightYear is currently in development, please contact us for pre-release testing opportunities, or compile and build yourself.
#0. Table of Contents 0. What is 'IF' * a. Explanation * b. Advantages
- Why IF
- Play with LightYear
- Develop with LightYear
- LightYear Roadmap
- a. Overview
- b. Tracking Resources
Interactive fiction is a story in which you are an active participant. In traditional cases, short passages of text will precede a text field. After reading, you'd decide on an action, type it, then repeat the cycle. How do you know what to type, you ask? Anything. Type anything. Really. What separates IF from other text-based entertainment is that as the reader, you get to define the story.
Does our hero check that cupboard before continuing onwards? Maybe they find a tin of beans. They examine the tin, and find it contains magical beans. A warning on the side prompts that they're prone to grow into a giant beanstalk. You -the hero- decide not to take the tin, and instead go south.
Or, maybe, you're a space captain, with a whole fleet at your disposal. However, are all of those ships -those people's lives- really yours to toss away? How would you face yourself after knowingly sending these brave soldiers to their doom? Surely, many innocent civilians will perish if you hold your soldiers back, but can you really justify this suicide mission? All I know is, your choices would probably lead to a resolution different from mine. The freedom in IF games can lead to very creative outcomes, some which you might not expect, and others which you may have worked very hard for.
Interactive fiction isn't about controlling a rogue mage in their magical tower, nor is it about making tough moral choices on the bridge of an A3-12 Falcon-class command ship, it's about exploring a new space, realizing yourself there, and seeing what kind of tale the author has in mind for you, and how you'll make it your own.
The best thing about IF as a genre, and LightYear as an engine, is that it allows anyone to craft a story, a game. No programming knowledge, modelling expertise, or level-design skills are required, and the turn around time is nearly immediate. Absolutely everyone has indulged their creativity at one time or another, pretending they were in a different situation, making up stuff as they went along. Developing an IF is just like that, although you might want to put a little planning into it.
We're being ambiguous about what can be created here on purpose. Sure, you can produce a dungeon to explore, replete with deviously trapped containers and trip wires at every other passage, or a fully decked-out spaceship with hundreds of rooms, but you're not limited to those common tropes. Want to write a mystery about some little town near Arizona, USA, in which aliens have crashed? A horror adventure where the player is trapped in a snowed-in cabin? Or, how about a secondary school drama? Maybe a trilogy? LightYear gives you the tools to create whatever you can dream up, empowering you to let your imagination loose, share your games with the world, and experience new and unique situations, which are only possible through the medium of interactive fiction.
Return to Top #2. Why IF
We're living in a golden age of technology; as Moore has observed, every year hardware components double in power, or half in size or cost. This is an unprecedented time when the people who created the original computers are seeing their wildest dreams achieved, and the video game industry is readily keeping up with this outstanding pace. Computer graphics are starting to fool even the most astute, and the marriage of psychology and game design has kept some players cooped up in their homes for months on end. Improvements made to our network infrastructures are allowing mass-multiplayer like never before, and with the advent of affordable virtual reality looming in what's left of this decade, certainly, why play interactive fiction?
Strict interactive fiction saw the height of its popularity in the early eighties, and a sharp decline into the twenty-first century. Niche communities have persisted, but interactive fiction has not been mainstream again since graphics were able to sweep people away. One might assume that 4k gaming or VR would deal the finishing blow, but we believe that the opposite is true; as games become more visual, they also become more restrictive, and players will desire the freedom that high-budget graphical standards naturally inhibit. Interactive fiction, with next to no graphical requirements, allows developers to add, for example, a beautifully shaded luxury car by simply informing you of its existence: 'the new Volinni's polished hood reflects this evening's sun with an almost unreal sparkle'.
Do note, we're not talking about game design restrictions, but immersion restrictions. Of course, the higher the resolution, the higher the quality (right, guys?), but also the less a player is able to 'put themselves into the game' –the distinction is, rather than the player projecting onto the game, the game projects onto the player. What colour was that car I described earlier? I didn't specify, making what you imagined probably different from me. Anyway, what even is a Volinni? By taking away one of the senses, we can heighten the others (in this instance, imagination gets to be a sense). When an IF developer puts in the time to write a story bursting with content and character, the player is naturally immersed, and they fill in the details on the own, ultimately leading to a more intimate and personal experience.
This concept of allowing players to create details is not unique to interactive fiction, and even if you've never played an IF game before, odds are good that you've experienced it at some point. It can most commonly be found in books, which have not failed to steal many hours from eager readers since the inception of human script. How many times, however, have you wished you could exist in the composed place of a great book?
While video games give players experience, and books draw their readers along on a distinctive narrative trail, interactive fiction combines the two. Some interactive fiction is more of one than the other, perhaps more about exploration than traditional storytelling, or focusing more on a main quest or plot than the actions taken while inside it, but the unique experience of IF is something that is rarely found elsewhere. Whether you're looking for a deeper experience than what can be found in AAA shooters, or you'd like to more freely exist in a fantastical narrative world, interactive fiction, powered by the LightYear engine, can astound you with both its breadth and depth.
Return to Top #3. Play with LightYear (Section Incomplete) ###a. What Makes LightYear Fun
Main Points: LightYear is modern (has modern features, continuity). LightYear builds off of what makes older engines great (what you already love, and then some).
Main Points: Unlimited possibilities; sci-fi, fantasy, modern, abstract, historical, steampunk, literally anything.
Main Points: Find them on our website/forum (to be created), or anywhere around the web.
Main Points: Type your commands, role play, be immersed, ???, profit.
Return to Top #4. Develop with LightYear (Section Incomplete) ###a. Streamlined Development
Main Points: Develop using refined tools that let you focus on creating immersive stories. Everything you need in one place. Use included standard systems so all you have to do is write. Don't worry if you're new, our object-oriented design is logical, and simple.
Main Points: Use our localization system, and outsource translation to the community. Optionally distribute the client along with your game to make it easy for users (built-in update system means you don't have to worry about keeping up-to-date with the latest client releases).
Main Points: Standardized systems, lower-level functions automatically taken care of, understandable format, access to API for more complex ideas, and simple, clear, object-oriented designer. Currently in development, doesn't carry years of 'old baggage', or ineffective systems for compatibility's sake. Also, prettier?
Main Points: Core written in C++, OS-level window in native style (macOS, Windows, Linux). API in C++. Git repo location (pro tip: you're already there), contributions welcome (get in touch before you submit a pull request).
Return to Top #5. LightYear Roadmap ###a. Overview
We're officially in-development, functional preview builds will be distributed every once-in-a-while for feedback and testing.
###b. Tracking Resources Follow the Trello board for all updates, the official page (link) for important updates, and our News+Blog for significant updates only.