@~This review first appeared in Red Herring

              CAW - Creative Adventure Writer
  (Adventure Writing utility for ST (v2.7 on SynTax PD 660)
              and PC (v1.2 on SynTax PD 661)

                      Reviewed by Sue

There are a lot of text adventure creators available for the PC as
PD and shareware. AGT and TADS get the most mentions but there's
also GAGS, CAT, Adventure Writer, Adventure Compiler, ADVSYS,
Adventure Maker, Gamescape, Gamescape Lite, Levy Adventure System,
Figment and HIF.

Now there's another one for budding adventure writers - CAW:
Creative Adventure Writer, which is available for the PC and ST.
It was programmed by Red Herring reader Richard North and he
kindly sent copies in for the SynTax library, together with some
sample adventures which he has written using the system.  This
review covers the PC version which was written using MicroSoft's
Quickbasic 4.5 but the PC and ST versions are 100% compatible. The
ST version can also have a window display and the addition of
graphics in the form of compressed STOS screens.

The author has based CAW on a program called Imagen which was
written by Peter Voke for the BBC and it is intended to be used to
produce small, simple adventures - the sort that would take about
30 minutes to complete and would be ideal for the PD market.
Essentially, it uses the concept of 'triggers', where a command or
phrase is used to carry out an action eg opening a door or getting
an item.  More on triggers in a moment.

When using CAW, you can switch between normal (play) mode and edit
mode by typing the word edit. You can then add a new room, exits,
objects and triggers, or edit data which has already been entered.
This means it is easy to test out the game while writing it - no
need to wait while it complies and so forth.  Incidentally, you
can also create a CAW adventure in ASCII format with a word
processor, which explains its portability between the two systems.

All rooms are numbered and a new location is added in two parts by
inputting !edit; type in the location description (the program
takes care of the formatting), press ENTER, then add objects and
triggers. These are in the form (Object 1:Object 2:Description
1:Description 2)Trigger 1:Trigger 2(End Game Object:End Game
Message). Objects can be prefixed with the symbols & ^ # or @.
Each of these gives a different effect eg #object means the object
will be picked up automatically after the trigger, ^object results
in the object being picked up automatically when the player enters
the location.

Okay, let's look an example from one of the sample games given on
the disk, Crown.

The location description for the first room is:

You are in King George's throne room. He asks you to accept his
offer of a reward if you find his crown.

The trigger string for this location is:

(@offer:#permit:#You are in King George's throne room. The king is
here.:)accept offer`He thanks you and hands you a permit:@get
permit(:)

Calm down! It isn't as complicated as it looks, honest!

In the above string there are two objects (offer and permit), one
description (a replacement location description), an empty
description slot (signified by the :) and two triggers.  The final
bracket is empty showing that this isn't the end of the game ...
lucky really, as it's the first location!

The @ prefix means an object is invisible.  So in that room, the
parser knows the noun 'offer' even though there's no such object
mentioned in the text. If the player types 'accept offer', there's
a short message (the ` in front of the text causes it to be
printed on the screen), the permit is put in the room and the room
description is changed to take away the bit about the King asking
you to accept the offer. The player can then 'get permit'.

Exits are added using the commands !n or !s etc when in edit mode.
You're then prompted for the (1) destination room number and (2)
exit type - normal, visible, hidden, revealed after one or two
triggers etc ... 10 types in all, each of which has a number eg a
normal, visible exit is 0 and a normal, hidden exit is 5.

There are other commands such as !go (jump to a location), !wipe
(erase a location) and !bring or !remove (an object). There are
limits of 200 movable objects and up to 200 locations depending on
available memory. Prefixes are also allowed with triggers; in the
above example 'get permit' will only be allowed after you 'accept
offer'.

There are a few drawbacks with the system.  You can't amend text.
It's necessary to check it very carefully before pressing ENTER
as, if you make a mistake, you'll have to retype the whole thing.
You can only have two objects, descriptions and triggers per
location so the system isn't suitable for a complex game.
Generally you can also only carry out commands once as well.
There's a good manual on the disk, almost 20K in length, though I
would have preferred more examples for some aspects of the
program.

All in all, though, CAW is a neat little program and ideal for the
smaller, less complex adventure and, using it, you can certainly
see your adventure taking shape quickly. The ease of testing is a
bonus too.











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