7.3. Reactive Characters

| Chapter 7: Other Characters |

| 7.3. Reactive Characters

As we observe characters, so they observe us. Those who seem to have no awareness of what the player is doing often come across more like waxworks than like people. Zodiac demonstrates a scenario where the watchful presence of a dangerous criminal keeps the player from doing what he otherwise might, while Police State expands on this idea with a policeman who reacts to entire types of behavior in his presence, regardless of whether the culprit is the player or a third party. Noisemaking has a crow who will fly away in response to any loud noises the player makes.

And, of course, we definitely want to have characters react to being looked at or otherwise interfered with. Search and Seizure implements a smuggler who reacts when we try to confiscate his possessions. Pine 1 gives us a sleeping princess who can be woken by a variety of methods.

We wrap up this section with two complete puzzle scenarios that demonstrate what can be achieved by giving characters reactions to the player's behavior. A Day For Fresh Sushi has a fish who watches the player's actions and comments on them, while the live furnishings in Revenge of the Fussy Table instead comment every turn on the current state of the world, until the player has successfully sorted out all their complaints.

96
| Example Zodiac Several variations on "doing something other than...", demonstrating different degrees of restriction. |
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186
| Example Police State Several friends who obey you; a policeman who doesn't (but who takes a dim view of certain kinds of antics). |
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"Police State" Seventh Avenue is a room. "The bars are all closed now, and there aren't any good clubs to go to, so you're on your own for open-air entertainment." Persuasion rule for asking the policeman to try doing something: persuasion fails. Persuasion rule for asking someone to try doing something: persuasion succeeds. Note that the policeman will never get to the second persuasion rule, so he will always refuse to do the player's nefarious bidding. Charles, Thomas, and Larry are men in Seventh Avenue. Patricia is a woman in Seventh Avenue. And here's an unnecessary aesthetic touch from a later chapter, which will round up the descriptions of your friends into a single paragraph: Rule for writing a paragraph about someone who is not the policeman: let X be the number of visible people who are not the policeman; say "It's just [X in words] of you now: [a list of visible people who are not the policeman]. But it sure has been a rip-roaring evening." The policeman is a man in Seventh Avenue. "A policeman with a very guarded expression is watching you." Smelling a person is disorderly conduct. Tasting a person is disorderly conduct. Jumping is disorderly conduct. Singing is disorderly conduct. Instead of someone trying disorderly conduct in the presence of the policeman: say "The policeman arrests [the person asked]!"; remove the person asked from play; the rule succeeds. Instead of disorderly conduct in the presence of the policeman: end the story saying "The policeman arrests you!" Test me with "charles, look / charles, jump / look / policeman, sing / thomas, taste policeman / patricia, sing / look / jump". Notice the difference between the two rules about disorderly conduct: the one for other people says 'the rule succeeds' to make sure that the action is counted as a success and not (as normally happens with instead rules) a failure. Most of the time we don't care whether actions are judged successes or failures, but it matters here, because if we type CHARLES, JUMP and the result fails, then text such as 'Charles is unable to.' will be printed - which would get in the way. So we declare the action a success.

196
| Example Noisemaking Creating a stage after the report stage of an action, during which other characters may observe and react. |
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36
| Example Search and Seizure A smuggler who has items, some of which are hidden. |
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154
| Example Pine 1 Pine: Using a scene to watch for the solution of a puzzle, however arrived-at by the player. |
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112
| Example A Day For Fresh Sushi A complete story by Emily Short, called "A Day for Fresh Sushi", rewritten using Inform 7. Noteworthy is the snarky commenter who remarks on everything the player does, but only the first time each action is performed. |
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82
| Example Revenge of the Fussy Table A small game about resentful furniture and inconvenient objects. |
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