Discussion in class

Analogy, simile and metaphor

• Simile: Your mother's like peanut butter (tenor -- vehicle)
• Metaphor: Your mother's a cow (metaphor is richer)
• Both Simile and Metaphor are Analogies. Analoigy is the generic term for comparisons

Eliza

Adventure/ Zork

• the protaganist is referred to in the second person; later the concept of avatar introduced the first person
• World Model
• In the final room of Avdenture, you must become meta-aware, aware that you are in a computer game in a computer
• Zork was programmed in one language, which the "Z-machine" could read. Then, they just had to write one Z-machine reader for each platform.

Hypertext Fiction

• allows for jumps in thought and time that static text has attempted
• life is not linear, why should fiction
• "non-linearity of consciousness couched in the linearity of time" - Peter
• clicking is more random chance than a decision
• change the content to make the format work, add some structure

Notes on Reading

Zork and Other Mainframe Works

in Twisty Little Passages, An Approach to Interactive Fiction, by Nick Montfort (2005)

"Janet Murray (1997) describes one way in which Zork presents a compelling "moment of experimental drama." early on: when the adventurer first enters the dungeon, the trapdoor is closed and the way out is barred by an unseen opponent (81-82). This moment... has no parralel at the beginning of Adventure... This improvement, one of several that made interactive fiction and new media more compelling, came about by improving the design of the IF world, not by simply programming more cleverly or writing better bits of text."