Since I expect to be working on this for quite some time, I thought it would be nice to let anyone interested know what exactly is being done. Probably the most interesting piece of information here is the posting of new versions, but for those of you who actually want to know what is being added, I will try to post interesting tidbits relating just what is being done to make it work better.
As always, any input you might have is very much welcome, and can be seen by myself via email.
If you have sent me a message in the last month or two that I have not answered (I was hoping to answer those with the news of an update, but I got a little distracted with this hardware problem), please resend the message. I was not ignoring anyone, I was making progress and really thought I might have something to show for it soon.
Please note that the email address that I will be answering to has changed. tgtads@hotmail.com is unaccessible to me at the moment (though I am trying to figure out what password I was using). I have a new one, tgtads@excite.com which should work for the time being, until I either give up with the hotmail one or finally figure out what my cryptic question meant.
As for news, I got several of the problems that seemed to have me stumped before. They turned out to be very simple, but were causing some weird things to happen. I have discovered that Mike Roberts has a new version (TADS v3) that he is working on that might have a lot of enhancements to make TGTADS work even better. I have spent several hours reading the documentation, and see some areas that would definitely make this a little more interesting. In the meantime, I plan to continue to plod through with what I have.
Currently, I feel that I am close to having the body completed, and will be able to start expanding things to bring the cloths and morphs (this new version will make it easy to create non-human actors). Once these are at a reasonable level, I can put a playable game for you folks out there. Don't expect to see anything until after Christmas, though. I do plan to spend a lot of time over the holidays getting this going once again.
As far as help goes, I have been dodging the many requests that have been made. Mostly because I am wrapped up in getting things cleaned up enough to be able to finish what I hope to do. My plan is to get the basic functionality down first, and then once that is done (with very dry descriptions) I can start getting help from writers who want to contribute. This way, I can just update the boring lines with the more interesting stuff from those helpers. I could be storing these....but I think my most recent HW experience shows why that isn't the most desirable situation.
Please bear with me. I do hope that there will be something new to play with soon.
Aug 12, 2000 - Sorry Folks, I have been busier than I thought with work. I have not given up with TG-TADS, nor have I died, but I have made practically zero progress over the last few months. I do plan to get back into the swing of things here over the next few weeks, now if I can only figure out how all this works ;)
Feb 18, 2000 - Been way too busy in real life to get anything done. I thought I would check in with who are those keeping up with things to make sure that everyone knows that I am still alive, and so is the development. Things are just going much more slowly than I had hoped.
At present, I am currently working on two things simultaneously. I am trying to build in help that will work similar to man pages (for those unix folks out there) The idea will be something like, "help key" and the response (if there is one) would be like "A key is a tool used to open locks. To use one, simply type 'unlock the door with silver key' etc...
This is good for beginners, and will let them explore things little by little, and not to have to scribble down which words can be used for certain things. I also plan to have a form of the verb which will refer to your location. If the location has any help it might respond with messages such as "You are standing on a platform which is at least a foot high. Perhaps you might consider stepping down using the phrase "down" -- or something like that. Of course this is not useful to everyone, and there should be a way to buffer the amount of information leaked by these sorts of inquiries.
The other thing involves redesigning body dimensions. I was looking into providing gradual changes and found some ugly behaviour with my present model. With that in mind, I have been avoiding staring at paper until I am satisfied with my formulas.
I am also in the process of creating structures for C++ or Java so that similar sorts of things can be done in a much broader environment.
As for suggested updates and releases, it will still be a while. But please keep checking, and by all means, let me know if you have any suggestions or comments (or requests!)
There are several folks who have expressed interest in helping, and I was wondering if anyone would use one of those bulletin board groups that can be easily set up these days. Let me know if a group for bouncing ideas around sounds interesting to anyone.
Jan 3, 1999 - We all seem to have survived the Old Y2K thing, so I guess it's time to get back into the important stuff! I've been talking with someone who mentioned some approaches to adding furry features. His approach was not one that I have previously thought about, and I have already got support, although for very different reasons, for such features in the version I am currently working on. I think that furry fans can rest assured that there will be some furry stuff soon. I need some suggestions as to what sort of stuff needs to be added, so let me know via email if you have any suggestions.
I also have been working with some of the age details and things are coming along, at slightly more than a snails pace. There have been some complaints about difficulties involving download and file compatibility. Please alert me to any troubles that you experience. I might never know about problems if you don't tell me about them.
Have I mentioned that there are well over 10,000 lines so far that I have written for this alone. I just hope there is room for games once the invisible stuff is complete;)
Dec 31, 1999 - I just got my machine back up and running again with a new, huge hard disk. The installation of that and all my software took more time that I planned, so I am nowhere near where I thought I would be. The good news is, there have been a lot of offers for help, and I was able to get all my tools working again, just like before, so things should start rolling along. I have received a number of comments on Bugs and fixes, so I will probably look into to doing a little work on the present game file. Anyone with comments (bugs or otherwise) regarding this particular game should send me those comments before the weekend following the new year. I hope to use that weekend to look into those issues.
Dec 7, 1999 - Things have changed quite a bit since I last updated this page. I have discovered some nice tools (including a newer version of the TADS compiler/debug tool) that have made things work a lot better.
At present, I am undertaking the task of designing the characters age-related appearance. This will allow players height, strength and physical appearance to be relative on their age. Race differences have been worked out to a very minimal degree, and I really could use some help filling out the enormous amount of text that I must have before everything is finished ( if anyone has too much time on their hands ;^) )
Some pretty cool features of the more recent developments include:
If you have suggestions, please let me know. I am still making changes to structures as I go! I hope to have a new prototype by the end of the year!
Oct 28, 1999 - I have just about finished the mechanics of the physical body. Tads now treats the various body parts just like any other tads object - for any valid player. This should also blend very easily once I get the non-human races built.
Oct 15, 1999 - I have discovered some problems with my most recent design and have began to rebuild the whole thing. Some benefits of the new design include: Easier approach to design the individual elements, Allowance for concepts like hair styles and more
Oct 1, 1999 - There seems to have been some problems with Yahoo/Geocities, so I have moved everything to tripod. I prefer not to have pop-up windows, so I might relocate if I can find a free site without them (until I am free from the poor lifestyle of a college student!) Downloads seem to work once again!
Sept 18, 1999 - I finally made a few badly needed changes to the website, including adding a new downloadable file. (This is still using the old, one person version. The new stuff needs a lot of work!)
Earlier in Sept - I have finally got the reworking of the multi-character basics( ver 2? ), and I am almost back up to the point where I was before. You can now see other actors and have their bodies modified just as your body was in the previous version!
Sometime in August -- (aren't these great dates?) -- I added some debug stuff ( which I left in the downloadable version of the prototype) which allow me to alter the players being using key words.