| Examples in Numerical Order |  |
Chapter 1: Welcome to Inform
§1.1. Preface
| ExampleAbout the examples An explanation of the examples in this documentation, and the asterisks attached to them. Click the heading of the example, or the example number, to reveal the text.
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Chapter 3: Things
§3.1. Descriptions
| ExampleBic Testing to make sure that all objects have been given descriptions.
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§3.2. Rooms and the map
| ExamplePort Royal 1 A partial implementation of Port Royal, Jamaica, set before the earthquake of 1692 demolished large portions of the city.
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|  ExampleUp and Up Adding a short message as the player approaches a room, before the room description itself appears.
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§3.3. One-way connections
§3.4. Regions and the index map
§3.5. Kinds
| ExampleMidsummer Day A few sentences laying out a garden together with some things which might be found in it.
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§3.6. Either/or properties
| ExampleTamed Examples of a container and a supporter that can be entered, as well as nested rooms.
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§3.7. Properties depend on kind
| ExampleDisenchantment Bay 1 A running example in this chapter, Disenchantment Bay, involves chartering a boat. This is the first step: creating the cabin.
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§3.8. Scenery
| ExampleReplanting Changing the response when the player tries to take something that is scenery.
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§3.9. Backdrops
§3.11. Two descriptions of things
|  ExampleLaura Some general advice about creating objects with unusual or awkward names, and a discussion of the use of printed names.
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§3.12. Doors
|  ExampleEscape Window that can be climbed through or looked through.
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§3.13. Locks and keys
§3.14. Devices and descriptions
§3.16. Vehicles and pushable things
| ExamplePeugeot A journey from one room to another that requires the player to be on a vehicle.
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§3.17. Men, women and animals
§3.18. Articles and proper names
| ExampleBelfry You can see a bat, a bell, some woodworm, William Snelson, the sexton's wife, a bellringer and your local vicar here.
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|  ExampleGopher-wood Changing the name of a character in the middle of play, removing the article.
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§3.20. Possessions and clothing
§3.21. The player's holdall
§3.23. Parts of things
§3.24. Concealment
§3.25. The location of something
|  ExampleVan Helsing A character who approaches the player, then follows him from room to room.
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§3.26. Directions
Chapter 4: Kinds
§4.1. New kinds
§4.3. Degrees of certainty
| ExampleOdin Replacing "You see nothing special..." with a different default message for looking at something nondescript.
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§4.4. Plural assertions
§4.7. New either/or properties
§4.8. New value properties
|  ExampleStraw Boater Using text properties that apply only to some things and are not defined for others.
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§4.9. Using new kinds of value in properties
| ExampleThe Undertomb 1 A small map of dead ends, in which the sound of an underground river has different strengths in different caves.
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§4.12. Values that vary
§4.14. Duplicates
§4.15. Assemblies and body parts
Chapter 5: Text
§5.4. Text with numbers
§5.5. Text with lists
| ExampleControl Center Objects which automatically include a description of their component parts whenever they are examined.
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|  ExampleTiny Garden A lawn made up of several rooms, with part of the description written automatically.
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§5.6. Text with variations
| ExampleWhen? A door whose description says "...leads east" in one place and "...leads west" in the other.
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§5.7. Text with random alternatives
|  ExampleCamp Bethel Creating characters who change their behavior from turn to turn, and a survey of other common uses for alternative texts.
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§5.8. Line breaks and paragraph breaks
§5.9. Text with type styles
§5.11. Unicode characters
§5.13. Making new substitutions
Chapter 6: Descriptions
§6.4. Defining new adjectives
§6.5. Defining adjectives for values
§6.9. Which and who
§6.13. To be able to see and touch
§6.14. Adjacent rooms and routes through the map
| ExampleAll Roads Lead to Mars Layout where the player is allowed to wander any direction he likes, and the map will arrange itself in order so that he finds the correct "next" location.
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|  ExampleHotel Stechelberg Signposts such as those provided on hiking paths in the Swiss Alps, which show the correct direction and hiking time to all other locations.
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§6.15. All, each and every
§6.16. Counting while comparing
|  ExampleYolk of Gold Set of drawers where the item the player seeks is always in the last drawer he opens, regardless of the order of opening.
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Chapter 7: Basic Actions
§7.2. Instead rules
| ExampleGrilling A grill, from which the player is not allowed to take anything lest he burn himself.
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§7.3. Before rules
§7.4. Try and try silently
| ExampleHayseed A refinement of our staircase kind which can be climbed.
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| ExampleFine Laid Making writing that can be separately examined from the paper on which it appears, but which directs all other actions to the paper.
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§7.5. After rules
| ExampleMorning After When the player picks something up which he hasn't already examined, the object is described.
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§7.6. Reading and talking
| ExampleLucy Redirecting a question about one topic to ask about another.
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| ExampleSybil 1 Direct all ASK, TELL, and ANSWER commands to ASK, and accept multiple words for certain cases.
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|  ExampleSybil 2 Making the character understand YES, SAY YES TO CHARACTER, TELL CHARACTER YES, ANSWER YES, and CHARACTER, YES.
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§7.7. The other four senses
§7.9. All actions and exceptional actions
| ExampleZodiac Several variations on "doing something other than...", demonstrating different degrees of restriction.
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§7.10. The noun and the second noun
§7.12. In the presence of, and when
| ExampleBeachfront An item that the player can't interact with until he has found it by searching the scenery.
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§7.13. Going from, going to
| ExampleVeronica An effect that occurs only when the player leaves a region entirely.
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|  ExampleA&E Using regions to block access to an entire area when the player does not carry a pass, regardless of which entrance he uses.
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§7.14. Going by, going through, going with
| ExampleNo Relation A car which must be turned on before it can be driven, and can only go to roads.
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|  ExampleOne Short Plank A plank bridge which breaks if the player is carrying something when he goes across it. Pushing anything over the bridge is forbidden outright.
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§7.15. Kinds of action
§7.16. Repeated actions
| ExampleY ask Y? Noticing when the player seems to be at a loss, and recommending the use of hints.
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Chapter 8: Change
§8.2. Changing the command prompt
§8.3. Changing the status line
§8.4. Change of either/or properties
| ExampleVitrine An electrochromic window that becomes transparent or opaque depending on whether it is currently turned on.
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§8.5. Change of properties with values
| ExampleThirst A waterskin that is depleted as the player drinks from it.
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| ExampleThirst 2 A campfire added to the camp site, which can be lit using tinder.
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§8.7. Moving things
|  ExampleMeteoric I and II A meteor in the night sky which is visible from many rooms, so needs to be a backdrop, but which does not appear until 11:31 PM.
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§8.8. Moving backdrops
§8.9. Moving the player
§8.10. Removing things from play
| ExampleSpring Cleaning A character who sulks over objects that the player has broken (and which are now off-stage).
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|  ExampleExtra Supplies A supply of red pens from which the player can take another pen only if he doesn't already have one somewhere in the game world.
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§8.11. Now...
|  ExampleHatless It's tempting to use "now..." to distribute items randomly at the start of play, but we need to be a little cautious about how we do that.
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§8.15. Calling names
| ExampleHigher Calling All doors in the game automatically attempt to open if the player approaches them when they are closed.
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§8.18. Randomness
| ExampleWeathering The automatic weather station atop Mt. Pisgah shows randomly fluctuating temperature, pressure and cloud cover.
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| ExampleLanista 1 Very simple randomized combat in which characters hit one another for a randomized amount of damage.
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| ExampleDo Pass Go A pair of dice which can be rolled, and are described with their current total when not carried, and have individual scores when examined.
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§8.19. Random choices of things
| ExampleCandy One of several identical candies chosen at the start of play to be poisonous.
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| ExampleZork II A "Carousel Room", as in Zork II, where moving in any direction from the room leads (at random) to one of the eight rooms nearby.
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Chapter 9: Time
§9.1. When play begins
| ExampleClueless A murderer for the mystery is selected randomly at the beginning of the game.
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§9.2. Awarding points
§9.4. When play ends
§9.5. Every turn
§9.6. The time of day
|  ExampleIPA Shops which each have opening and closing hours, so that it is impossible to go in at the wrong times, and the player is kicked out if he overstays his welcome.
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§9.7. Telling the time
§9.11. Future events
| ExampleMRE Hunger that eventually kills the player, and foodstuffs that can delay the inevitable by different amounts of time.
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|  ExampleEmpire A train which follows a schedule, stopping at a number of different locations.
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|  ExampleTotality To schedule an eclipse of the sun, which involves a number of related events.
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§9.12. Actions as conditions
| ExampleNight Sky A room which changes its description depending on whether an object has been examined.
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§9.13. The past and perfect tenses
| ExampleTense Boxing An overview of all the variations of past and present tenses, and how they might be used.
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|  ExampleElsie A door that closes automatically one turn after the player opens it.
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|  ExampleBruneseau's Journey A candle which reacts to lighting and blowing actions differently depending on whether it has already been lit once.
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§9.14. How many times?
| ExampleInfiltration A room whose description changes depending on the number of times the player has visited.
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§9.15. How many turns?
Chapter 10: Scenes
§10.2. Creating a scene
| ExamplePine 1 Pine: Using a scene to watch for the solution of a puzzle, however arrived-at by the player.
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|  ExampleEntrapment A scene in which the player is allowed to explore as much as he likes, but another character strolls in as soon as he has gotten himself into an awkward or embarrassing situation.
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§10.3. Using the Scene index
| ExampleAge of Steam The railway-station examples so far put together into a short game called "Age of Steam".
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§10.4. During scenes
§10.5. Linking scenes together
§10.6. More general linkages
§10.7. Multiple beginnings and repeats
| ExampleNight and Day Cycling through a sequence of scenes to represent day and night following one another during a game.
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§10.8. Multiple endings
§10.9. Why are scenes designed this way?
Chapter 11: Phrases
§11.3. Pattern matching
| ExampleAhem Writing a phrase, with several variant forms, whose function is to follow a rule several times.
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§11.5. Conditions and questions
|  ExampleProposal Asking the player a yes/no question which he must answer, and another which he may answer or not as he chooses.
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§11.7. Begin and end
| ExampleMatreshka A SEARCH [room] action that will open every container the player can see, stopping only when there don't remain any that are closed, unlocked, and openable.
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| ExamplePrincess and the Pea The player is unable to sleep on a mattress (or stack of mattresses) because the bottom one has something uncomfortable under it.
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§11.8. Otherwise
| ExampleNumberless A simple exercise in printing the names of random numbers, comparing the use of "otherwise if...", a switch statement, or a table-based alternative.
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§11.10. Repeat
§11.11. Repeat running through
§11.14. Phrase options
|  ExampleEquipment List Overview of all the phrase options associated with listing, and examples of how to change the inventory list into some other standard formats.
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§11.15. Let and temporary variables
§11.16. New conditions, new adjectives
§11.17. Phrases to decide other things
| ExampleWitnessed 2 A piece of ghost-hunting equipment that responds depending on whether or not the meter is on and a ghost is visible or touchable from the current location.
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§11.18. The value after and the value before
| ExampleEntropy All objects in the game have a heat, but if not kept insulated they will tend toward room temperature (and at a somewhat exaggerated rate).
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Chapter 12: Advanced Actions
§12.3. Giving instructions to other people
| ExampleVirtue Defining certain kinds of behavior as inappropriate, so that other characters will refuse indignantly to do any such thing.
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§12.4. Persuasion
| ExamplePolice 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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§12.5. Unsuccessful attempts
|  ExampleGeneration X A person who goes along with the player's instructions, but reluctantly, and will get annoyed after too many repetitions of the same kind of unsuccessful command.
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§12.6. Spontaneous actions by other people
| ExampleIQ Test Introducing Ogg, a person who will unlock and open a container when the player tells him to get something inside.
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§12.7. New actions
| ExampleRed Cross A DIAGNOSE command which allows the player to check on the health of someone.
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§12.8. Irregular English verbs
§12.9. Check, carry out, report
|  ExamplePaddington A CUT [something] WITH [something] command which acts differently on different types of objects.
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§12.10. Action variables
| ExampleRemoval TAKE expanded to give responses such as "You take the book from the shelf." or "You pick up the toy from the ground."
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|  ExamplePuff of Orange Smoke A system in which every character has a body, which is left behind when the person dies; attempts to do something to the body are redirected to the person while the person is alive.
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§12.11. Making actions work for other people
|  ExampleThe Man of Steel An escaping action which means "go to any room you can reach from here", and is only useful to non-player characters.
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§12.12. Check rules for actions by other people
| ExampleGet Axe Changing the check rules to try automatically leaving a container before attempting to take it. (And arranging things so that other people will do likewise.)
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§12.13. Report rules for actions by other people
§12.15. Out of world actions
| ExampleSpellbreaker P. David Lebling's classic "Spellbreaker" (1986) includes a room where the game cannot be saved: here is an Inform implementation.
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§12.16. Reaching inside and reaching outside rules
|  ExampleCarnivale An alternative to backdrops when we want something to be visible from a distance but only touchable from one room.
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§12.17. Visible vs touchable vs carried
|  ExampleEddystone Creating new commands involving the standard compass directions.
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§12.18. Changing reachability
| ExampleWaterworld A backdrop which the player can examine, but cannot interact with in any other way.
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| ExampleMagneto's Revenge Kitty Pryde of the X-Men is able to reach through solid objects, so we might implement her with special powers that the player does not have...
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|  ExampleDinner is Served A window between two locations. When the window is open, the player can reach through into the other location; when it isn't, access is barred.
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§12.19. Changing visibility
| ExampleFlashlight Visibility set so that looking under objects produces no result unless the player has a light source to shine there (regardless of the light level of the room).
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§12.20. Stored actions
| ExampleBosch Creating a list of actions that will earn the player points, and using this both to change the score and to give FULL SCORE reports.
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|  ExampleActor's Studio A video camera that records actions performed in its presence, and plays them back with time-stamps.
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|  ExampleAnteaters The player carries a gizmo that is able to record actions performed by the player, then force him to repeat them when the gizmo is dropped. This includes storing actions that apply to topics, as in "look up anteater colonies in the guide".
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Chapter 13: Relations
§13.2. What sentences are made up from
§13.4. To carry, to wear, to have
| ExampleInterrogation A wand which, when waved, reveals the concealed items carried by people the player can see.
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| ExampleCeladon Using the enclosure relation to let the player drop things which he only indirectly carries.
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§13.6. Making reciprocal relations
§13.7. Relations in groups
§13.9. Defining new assertion verbs
| ExampleUnthinkable Alliances People are to be grouped into alliances. To kiss someone is to join his or her faction, which may make a grand alliance; to strike them is to give notice of quitting, and to become a lone wolf.
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§13.10. Defining new prepositions
§13.11. Indirect relations
§13.12. Relations which express conditions
| ExampleWainwright Acts A technical note about checking the location of door objects when characters other than the player are interacting with them.
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§13.13. Relations involving values
| ExampleMeet Market A case in which relations give characters multiple values of the same kind.
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§13.14. Relations as values in their own right
§13.16. What are relations for?
|  ExampleWhat Not To Wear A general-purpose clothing system that handles a variety of different clothing items layered in different combinations over different areas of the body.
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|  ExampleMurder on the Orient Express A number of sleuths (the player among them) find themselves aboard the Orient Express, where a murder has taken place, and one of them is apparently the culprit. Naturally they do not agree on whom, but there is physical evidence which may change their minds...
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Chapter 14: Adaptive Text and Responses
§14.3. More on adapting verbs
|  ExampleVariety Suppose we want all of our action responses to display some randomized variety. We could do this by laboriously rewriting all of the response texts, but this example demonstrates an alternative.
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|  ExampleFun with Participles Creating dynamic room descriptions that contain sentences such as "Clark is here, wasting time" or "Clark is here, looking around" depending on Clark's idle activity.
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|  ExampleGreater Variety This builds on the Variety example to add responses such as "You are now carrying the fedora" that describe relations that result from a given verb, as alternate responses.
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§14.6. Adapting demonstratives and possessives
§14.9. Verbs as values
|  ExampleRelevant Relations An example of how to create room descriptions that acknowledge particular relations using their assigned verbs, rather than by the heavily special-cased code used by the standard library.
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|  ExampleHistory Lab We create phrases such as "the box we took" and "the newspaper Clark looked at" based on what has already happened in the story.
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§14.11. Changing the text of responses
| ExampleResponsive Altering the standard inventory text for when the player is carrying nothing.
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Chapter 15: Numbers and Equations
§15.2. Numbers and real numbers
§15.8. Units
| ExamplerBGH The player character's height is selected randomly at the start of play.
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|  ExampleWonderland Hiking Mount Rainier, with attention to which locations are higher and which lower than the present location.
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|  ExampleLethal Concentration 1 A poisonous gas that spreads from room to room, incapacitating or killing the player when it reaches sufficient levels.
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§15.12. Making the verb "to weigh"
|  ExampleDimensions This example draws together the previous snippets into a working implementation of the weighbridge.
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§15.15. The parts of a number specification
§15.16. Understanding specified numbers
§15.17. Totals
§15.18. Equations
| ExampleWidget Enterprises Allowing the player to set a price for a widget on sale, then determining the resulting sales based on consumer demand, and the resulting profit and loss.
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§15.19. Arithmetic with units
| ExampleFrozen Assets A treatment of money which keeps track of how much the player has on him, and a BUY command which lets him go shopping.
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§15.20. Multiplication of units
| ExampleDepth Receptacles that calculate internal volume and the amount of room available, and cannot be overfilled.
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|  ExampleFabrication A system of assembling clothing from a pattern and materials; both the pattern and the different fabrics have associated prices.
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Chapter 16: Tables
§16.3. Corresponding entries
§16.6. Repeating through tables
|  ExamplePort Royal 4 A cell window through which the player can see people who were in Port Royal in the current year of game-time.
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§16.9. Blank rows
§16.10. Adding and removing rows
|  ExampleOdyssey A person who follows a path predetermined and stored in a table, and who can be delayed if the player tries to interact with her.
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§16.11. Sorting
§16.12. Listed in...
§16.13. Topic columns
| ExampleMerlin A REMEMBER command which accepts any text and looks up a response in a table of recollections.
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§16.14. Another scoring example
§16.15. Varying which table to look at
|  ExampleFarewell People who respond to conversational gambits, summarize what they said before if asked again, and provide recap of conversation that is past.
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§16.16. Defining things with tables
|  ExampleSweeney A conversation where each topic may have multiple questions and answers associated with it, and where a given exchange can lead to new additions to the list.
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§16.18. Table continuations
§16.19. Table amendments
|  ExampleTrieste Table amendment to adjust HELP commands provided for the player.
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Chapter 17: Understanding
§17.1. Understand
| ExampleXYZZY Basics of adding a new command reviewed, for the case of the simple magic word XYZZY.
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| ExampleIndirection Renaming the directions of the compass so that "white" corresponds to north, "red" to east, "yellow" to south, and "black" to west.
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|  ExampleXylan Creating a new command that does require an object to be named; and some comments about the choice of vocabulary, in general.
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§17.2. New commands for old grammar
| ExampleAnchorite By default, Inform understands GET OFF, GET UP, or GET OUT when the player is sitting or standing on an enterable object. We might also want to add GET DOWN and DOWN as exit commands, though.
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| ExampleAlpaca Farm A generic USE action which behaves sensibly with a range of different objects.
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§17.3. Overriding existing commands
|  ExampleLanista 2 Randomized combat in which the damage done depends on what weapons the characters are wielding, and in which an ATTACK IT WITH action is created to replace regular attacking. Also folds a new DIAGNOSE command into the system.
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§17.4. Standard tokens of grammar
§17.5. The text token
| ExampleIsh. A (very) simple HELP command, using tokens to accept and interpret the player's text whatever it might be.
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§17.6. Actions applying to kinds of value
| ExampleTom's Midnight Garden A clock kind that can be set to any time using "the time understood"; may be turned on and off; and will advance itself only when running. Time on the face is also reported differently depending on whether the clock is analog or digital.
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| ExampleSafety A safe whose dial can be turned with SPIN SAFE TO 1131, and which will open only with the correct combination.
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|  ExampleIbid. A system which allows the author to assign footnotes to descriptions, and permits the player to retrieve them again by number, using "the number understood". Footnotes will automatically number themselves, according to the order in which the player discovers them.
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§17.7. Understanding any, understanding rooms
|  ExampleActaeon A FOLLOW command allowing the player to pursue a person who has just left the room.
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§17.9. Understanding kinds of value
| ExamplePages A book with pages that can be read by number (as in "read page 3 in...") and which accepts relative page references as well (such as "read the last page of...", "read the next page", and so on).
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|  ExampleDown in Oodville Offering the player a choice of numbered options at certain times, without otherwise interfering with his ability to give regular commands.
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§17.10. Commands consisting only of nouns
| ExampleMisadventure A going by name command which does respect movement rules, and accepts names of rooms as commands.
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|  ExampleSafari Guide The same functionality, but making the player continue to move until he reaches his destination or a barrier, handling all openable doors on the way.
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§17.11. Understanding values
| ExamplePalette An artist's workshop in which the canvas can be painted in any colour, and where painterly names for pigments ("cerulean") are accepted alongside everyday ones ("blue").
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§17.13. New tokens
| ExampleLies Commands to allow the player to lie down in three different ways.
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§17.15. Understanding things by their properties
| ExampleHymenaeus Understanding "flaming torch" and "extinguished torch" to refer to torches when lit and unlit.
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| ExampleAspect Understanding aspect ratios (a unit) in the names of televisions.
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|  ExamplePeers The peers of the English realm come in six flavours - Baron, Viscount, Earl, Marquess, Duke and Prince - and must always be addressed properly. While a peerage is for life, it may at the royal pleasure be promoted.
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|  ExampleTerracottissima The flowerpots once again, but this time arranged so that after the first breakage all undamaged pots are said to be "unbroken", to distinguish them from the others.
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§17.16. Understanding things by their relations
| ExampleWhither? A door whose description says where it leads; and which automatically understands references such as "the west door" and "the east door" depending on which direction it leads from the location.
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| ExamplePuncak Jaya When a character is not visible, responding to such commands as EXAMINE PETER and PETER, HELLO with a short note that the person in question is no longer visible.
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| ExampleCinco A taco shell that can be referred to (when it contains things) in terms of its contents.
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|  ExampleClaims Adjustment An instant camera that spits out photographs of anything the player chooses to take a picture of.
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§17.17. Context: understanding when
| ExampleQuiz Show In this example by Mike Tarbert, the player can occasionally be quizzed on random data from a table; the potential answers will only be understood if a question has just been asked.
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|  ExampleBibliophilia A bookshelf with a number of books, where the player's command to examine something will be interpreted as an attempt to look up titles if the bookshelf is present, but otherwise given the usual response.
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§17.18. Changing the meaning of pronouns
§17.19. Does the player mean...
| ExampleMasochism Deli Multiple potatoes, with rules to make the player drop the hot potato first and pick it up last.
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§17.20. Understanding mistakes
| ExampleQuery Catching all questions that begin with WHO, WHAT, WHERE, and similar question words, and responding with the instruction to use commands, instead.
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§17.21. Precedence
Chapter 18: Activities
§18.1. What are activities?
| ExampleAnt-Sensitive Sunglasses What are activities good for? Controlling output when we want the same action to be able to produce very flexible text depending on the state of the world -- in this case, making highly variable room description and object description text.
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§18.5. New activities
|  ExampleAARP-Gnosis An Encyclopedia set which treats volumes in the same place as a single object, but can also be split up.
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§18.9. Deciding the concealed possessions of something
§18.10. Printing the name of something
| ExampleShipping Trunk A box of baking soda whose name changes to "completely ineffective baking soda" when it is in a container with something that smells funny.
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|  ExampleTrachypachidae Maturin 1803 Bottles with removable stoppers: when the stopper is in the bottle, the bottle is functionally closed, but the stopper can also be removed and used elsewhere. Descriptions of the bottle reflect its state intelligently.
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§18.11. Printing the plural name of something
|  ExampleHudsucker Industries Letters which are described differently as a group, depending on whether the player has read none, some, or all of them, and on whether they are alike or unlike.
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§18.12. Printing a number of something
| ExampleProlegomena Replacing precise numbers with "some" or other quantifiers when too many objects are clustered together for the player to count at a glance.
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§18.13. Listing contents of something
| ExampleUnpeeled Calling an onion "a single yellow onion" when (and only when) it is being listed as the sole content of a room or container.
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§18.15. Issuing the response text of something
§18.16. Printing room description details of something
| ExampleRules of Attraction A magnet which picks up nearby metal objects, and describes itself appropriately in room descriptions and inventory listings, but otherwise goes by its ordinary name.
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§18.18. Printing a refusal to act in the dark
§18.22. Printing the description of a dark room
§18.23. Constructing the status line
| ExampleWays Out A status line that lists the available exits from the current location.
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|  ExampleGuided Tour A status line that lists the available exits from the current location, changing the names of these exits depending on whether the room has been visited or not.
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§18.24. Writing a paragraph about
| ExampleReflections Emphasizing the reflective quality of shiny objects whenever they are described in the presence of the torch.
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|  ExampleEmma Social dynamics in which groups of people form and circulate during a party.
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§18.25. Listing nondescript items of something
| ExampleRip Van Winkle A simple way to allow objects in certain places to be described in the room description body text rather than in paragraphs following the room description.
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|  ExampleThe Eye of the Idol A systematic way to allow objects in certain places to be described in the room description body text rather than in paragraphs following the room description, and to control whether supporters list their contents or not.
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|  ExampleHappy Hour Listing visible characters as a group, then giving some followup details in the same paragraph about specific ones.
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§18.26. Printing the locale description of something
| ExamplePriority Lab A debugging rule useful for checking the priorities of objects about to be listed.
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§18.27. Choosing notable locale objects for something
| ExampleLow Light An object that is only visible and manipulable when a bright light fixture is on.
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§18.28. Printing a locale paragraph about
| ExampleKiwi Creating a raised supporter kind whose contents the player can't see or take from the ground.
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§18.29. Deciding the scope of something
| ExampleFour Stars 2 Using "deciding the scope" to change the content of lists such as "the list of audible things which can be touched by the player".
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| ExamplePeeled Two different approaches to adjusting what the player can interact with, compared.
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|  ExampleRock Garden A simple open landscape where the player can see between rooms and will automatically move to touch things in distant rooms.
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|  ExampleGinger Beer A portable magic telescope which allows the player to view items in another room of his choice.
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§18.31. Asking which do you mean
| ExampleOriginals Allowing the player to create models of anything in the game world; parsing the name "model [thing]" or even just "[thing]" to refer to these newly-created models; asking "which do you mean, the model [thing] or the actual [thing]" when there is ambiguity.
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| ExampleApples Prompting the player on how to disambiguate otherwise similar objects.
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§18.32. Supplying a missing noun/second noun
| ExampleMinimal Movement Supplying a default direction for "go", so that "leave", "go", etc., are always interpreted as "out".
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| ExampleLatin Lessons Supplying missing nouns and second nouns for other characters besides the player.
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§18.33. Reading a command
|  ExampleNorth by Northwest Creating additional compass directions between those that already exist (for instance, NNW) -- and dealing with an awkwardness that arises when the player tries to type "north-northwest". The example demonstrates a way around the nine-character limit on parsed words.
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|  ExampleCloves Accepting adverbs anywhere in a command, registering what the player typed but then cutting them out before interpreting the command.
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§18.34. Implicitly taking something
| ExamplePizza Prince Providing a pizza buffet from which the player can take as many pieces as he wants.
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| ExampleThe Big Sainsbury's Making implicit takes add a minute to the clock, just as though the player had typed TAKE THING explicitly.
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§18.35. Printing a parser error
| ExampleWXPQ Creating a more sensible parser error than "that noun did not make sense in this context".
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§18.37. Printing the banner text
§18.38. Printing the player's obituary
| ExampleBattle of Ridgefield Completely replacing the endgame text and stopping the game without giving the player a chance to restart or restore.
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| ExampleJamaica 1688 Adding a feature to the final question after victory, so that the player can choose to reveal notes about items in the game.
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§18.39. Amusing a victorious player
|  ExampleXerxes Offering the player a menu of things to read after winning the game.
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§18.40. Starting the virtual machine
Chapter 19: Rulebooks
§19.2. Named rules and rulebooks
§19.3. New rules
| ExampleStone A soup to which the player can add ingredients, which will have different effects when the player eats.
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| ExampleThe Crane's Leg 2 A description text generated based on the propensities of the player-character, following different rulebooks for different characters.
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|  ExampleBribery A GIVE command that gets rid of Inform's default refusal message in favor of something a bit more sophisticated.
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§19.4. Listing rules explicitly
| ExampleUptempo Adjust time advancement so the game clock moves fifteen minutes each turn.
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| ExampleVerbosity 2 Making rooms give full descriptions each time we enter, even if we have visited before, and disallowing player use of BRIEF and SUPERBRIEF.
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| ExampleSaint Eligius Adding a first look rule that comments on locations when we visit them for the first time, inserting text after objects are listed but before any "every turn" rules might occur.
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|  ExampleSlouching A system of postures allowing the player and other characters to sit, stand, or lie down explicitly or implicitly on a variety of enterable supporters or containers, or in location.
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|  ExampleSwigmore U. Adding a new kind of supporter called a perch, where everything dropped lands on the floor.
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§19.5. Changing the behaviour of rules
| ExampleAccess All Areas The Pointy Hat of Liminal Transgression allows its wearer to walk clean through closed doors.
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§19.7. The preamble of a rule
| ExampleWe Replacing the standard action report rules to reflect our own design.
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§19.8. New rulebooks
|  ExampleSolitude Novice mode that prefaces every prompt with a list of possible commands the player could try, and highlights every important word used, to alert players to interactive items in the scenery.
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§19.9. Basis of a rulebook
| ExampleFlotation Objects that can sink or float in a well, depending on their own properties and the state of the surrounding environment.
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§19.11. Success and failure
| ExampleFeline Behavior A cat which reacts to whatever items it has handy, returning the result of a rulebook for further processing.
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|  ExampleKyoto Expanding the effects of the THROW something AT something command so that objects do make contact with one another.
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§19.12. Named outcomes
| ExampleBeing Peter A set of rules determining the attitude a character will take when asked about certain topics.
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§19.13. Rulebooks producing values
§19.15. Two rulebooks used internally
| ExampleElectrified Adding a rule before the basic accessibility rule that will prevent the player from touching electrified objects under the wrong circumstances.
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|  ExampleEndurance Giving different actions a range of durations using a time allotment rulebook.
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|  ExampleEscape from the Seraglio Replacing the usual response to TAKE ALL so that instead of output such as "grapes: Taken. orange: Taken.", Inform produces variable responses in place of "grapes:".
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Chapter 20: Advanced Text
§20.4. Upper and lower case letters
| ExampleCapital City To arrange that the location information normally given on the left-hand side of the status line appears in block capitals.
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§20.6. Regular expression matching
| ExampleAlpha Creating a beta-testing command that matches any line starting with punctuation.
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§20.7. Making new text with text substitutions
| ExampleMirror, Mirror The sorcerer's mirror can, when held up high, form an impression of its surroundings which it then preserves.
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| ExampleIdentity Theft Allowing the player to enter a name to be used for the player character during the game.
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|  ExampleThe Cow Exonerated Creating a class of matches that burn for a time and then go out, with elegant reporting when several matches go out at once.
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§20.8. Replacements
| ExampleFido A dog the player can name and un-name at will.
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|  ExampleNorthstar Making Inform understand ASK JOSH TO TAKE INVENTORY as JOSH, TAKE INVENTORY. This requires us to use a regular expression on the player's command, replacing some of the content.
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Chapter 21: Lists
§21.3. Saying lists of values
| ExampleOyster Wide Shut Replacing Inform's default printing of properties such as "(closed)", "(open and providing light)", etc., with our own, more flexible variation.
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§21.5. Building lists
| ExampleRobo 1 A robot which watches and records the player's actions, then tries to repeat them back in the same order when he is switched into play-back mode.
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§21.6. Lists of objects
§21.9. Accessing entries in a list
§21.10. Lengthening or shortening a list
| ExampleLeopard-skin A maze that the player can escape if he performs an exact sequence of actions.
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|  ExampleThe Facts Were These Creating a variant GIVE action that lets the player give multiple objects simultaneously with commands like GIVE ALL TO ATTENDANT or GIVE THREE DOLLARS TO ATTENDANT or GIVE PIE AND HAT TO ATTENDANT. The attendant accepts the gifts only if their total combined value matches some minimum amount.
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§21.11. Variations: arrays, logs, queues, stacks, sets, sieves and rings
| ExampleEyes, Fingers, Toes A safe with a multi-number combination, meant to be dialed over multiple turns, is implemented using a log of the last three numbers dialed. The log can then be compared to the safe's correct combination.
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| ExampleI Didn't Come All The Way From Great Portland Street In this fiendishly difficult puzzle, which may perhaps owe some inspiration to a certain BBC Radio panel game (1967-), a list is used as a set of actions to help enforce the rule that the player must keep going for ten turns without hesitation, repetition, or deviating from the subject on the card.
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| ExampleCircle of Misery Retrieving items from an airport luggage carousel is such fun, how can we resist simulating it, using a list as a ring buffer?
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Chapter 22: Advanced Phrases
§22.2. Descriptions as values
| ExampleCurare A phrase that chooses and names the least-recently selected item from the collection given, allowing the text to cycle semi-randomly through a group of objects.
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Chapter 23: Figures, Sounds and Files
§23.13. Writing and reading tables to external files
§23.14. Writing, reading and appending text to files
|  ExampleThe Fifth Body An expansion on the notebook, allowing the player somewhat more room in which to type his recorded remark.
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§23.15. Exchanging files with other programs
Chapter 25: Releasing
§25.23. Titling and abbreviation
| ExampleBaedeker Creating a floorplan of the cathedral using the locations from previous examples.
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Chapter 27: Extensions
§27.5. A simple example extension
§27.7. Extensions and story file formats
|  ExampleTilt 3 Displaying the card suits from our deck of cards with red and black colored unicode symbols.
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§27.15. Defining phrases in Inform 6
§27.19. Longer extracts of Inform 6 code
§27.28. Segmented substitutions
§27.30. To say one of
| ExampleBlink Making a "by atmosphere" token, allowing us to design our own text variations such as "[one of]normal[or]gloomy[or]scary[by atmosphere]".
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|  ExampleUncommon Ground Making a "by viewpoint" token, allowing us to design our own text variations such as "[show to yourself]quaint[to Lolita]thrilling[to everyone else]squalid[end show]" depending on the identity of the player at the moment.
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