Channel Surfing

My latest interactive fiction game, Channel Surfing, placed 21st in IFComp ’08. I’m working on fixing the bugs for Release 2.

I wasn’t really surprised with how things played out in the contest. I know I didn’t do nearly enough beta testing. I had some of my friends beta test it, and they were great sports about it, but we only did it for a few days before the contest and none of them had ever played IF before. Despite this, I got some very kind words from a bunch of reviewers in addition to a lot of constructive criticism, and more than a few players have claimed to have enjoyed the game.

As I was reading the numerous reviews of Channel Surfing, I mentally wrote up a list of things I wanted to say to the reviewers — correcting their misunderstandings, etc — but as time went on I decided it’s better to let the game speak for itself. Sure, there’ll be some people that don’t understand it, but that’s to be expected. There were also several reviewers that came up with alternate interpretations that I hadn’t considered.

Anyway, I’m glad I wrote the game and glad I entered it. I have a bunch of ideas for more games, and I know a lot more about Inform now than I did when I started working on Channel Surfing, but I kinda get the feeling that there’s no point in releasing an Interactive Fiction game that isn’t entered in a competition. So, I’ll hold on to my ideas for some upcoming IF competition.