NPC Dialogue in Interactive Fiction / Robb Sherwin (2002)
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My edits are noted inside square brackets, like this: [EDIT:...]. 
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At the risk of sounding overly critical, I offer my thoughts in the hope that a few of them will be helpful. Please take what you can use. I've long admired your gutsy dialogue, and your raw writing style. I'm pleased to see your ideas here, and I'd like to see some more. 
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This is an article that is full of good ideas. Unfortunately, it seems to ramble, and there are a lot of untied ends. I think it would benefit from being divided into some specific sections that cover the following major topics: 
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1) The article talks about the three conversation systems: ask/tell, menu-based, and talk-to. This is good. I like the description of which kinds of games benefit from each conversation style. 
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2) The article talks about the advantages of first-person dialogue, and how the point-of-view character can talk directly to the player. This is an interesting point. There is really no discussion of the 2nd-person or 3rd-person options (Okay, some about 2nd person, but I'd like to see it discussed in a little more depth.). Both of these have been used, the 2nd-person being most common writing style in IF, but how does it figure into the dialogue? 3rd-person is what we usually see in static fiction. How can it be used in dialogue in IF, where the tendency is to always include the player in the conversations? The article talks about the disadvantages of the conversation with Saied, but are there advantages to this style? 
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3) What the article misses completely is how the words and sentences the characters use help to build character and advance plot. Does an NPC speak in a particular dialect or voice? (think Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn, for example). How can the author make characters that are distint from one another, and how does their dialogue and speaking style contribute to that? How does the dialogue contribute to the game's (or story's) sense of place or time period? 
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I refer to a book called "Writing and Selling Your Novel" by Jack M. Bickham from Writer's Digest Books, which my wife handed to me as I was discussing this article with her. There is a chapter that discusses dialogue and narrative. From the book, some important points are: 
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a) Dialogue contains the spoken words, the attributions (the "he said"s), the stage actions, and the internal thoughts of the viewpoint characters. It discusses in some detail each of these points. 
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b) Discusses putting each character's dialogue in a separate paragraph. The response from the next character would be in the next paragraph. There are some good tips on how to structure those paragraphs. 
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c) Body language is important. 
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There are many other points, but these are basic. IF has a lot in common with static fiction on this topic. 
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The opening paragraph is huge and should be simplified and broken up. 
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The paragraphs are large and not always focused. They need to be split so each one covers one topic. 
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The article makes extensive use of parentheses, and the sentences would be better if they could be rewritten to minimize the parentheses. 
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The article uses first-person a lot to tell the reader what the author does. I think it would be better if the author told the reader what he should be doing.
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All comments are intended to be helpful. Please take what you can use from what I've said. I look forward to seeing the final version. 
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[EDIT: Numerous double spaces - search and replace with a single space. Too many to note.] 
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Text adventures, unlike many other kinds of computer games, are [EDIT: Reduce double space to single.] really well positioned [EDIT: well-positioned]when it comes to creating rich and memorable non-player characters. Examples abound from both the old school ("Floyd," from "Planetfall," "Trent/Tiffany" from "Leather Goddesses of Phobos") and the new (The alien from "Fail-Safe," "Galatea" from the release of the same name). However, one tactic that today's IF author can employ to both create deep and rich NPCs that both compare favorably to Infocom's and the average character in a commercial release is dialogue. The extreme disk size limits that Infocom and others faced twenty years ago no longer really apply to modern authors, and many more characters within professionally developed computer games are more concerned with selling you additional data crystals or getting out of the way of your rocket launcher than they are in holding any kind of meaningful or entertaining conversation with you. [EDIT: New paragraph]Several different types of conversation systems are available for programmers in TADS, Inform and Hugo, allowing today's IF author more time to create quality NPC content than iron out technical details. More, the nature of the text adventure's gameplay affords both authors and players a chance to engage in some "what if?" scenarios within dramatic scenes, thus making IF's potential for solid dialogue easily the match for static fiction and film, and really exceed other fellow games [EDIT: What is a fellow game? Change to "other types of computer games"]. I have found the medium to be the most rewarding one in which to develop the characters and stories that I have been able to imagine, and the major reason for this is due to the fact that IF has allowed my characters to best[EDIT: Remove "best"] simply talk to one another. What follows are some insights that I have gained on interactive NPC dialogue over the course of the last few years. 
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[EDIT: This note applies to the entire article, not just the next paragraph. I would suggest trying to tell the reader what HE should do instead of what YOU do. For example: "Before coming up with new ways for your characters to speak and verbally insult one another, choose a conversation system..." There are times when you are discussing Yehoweh Porn that you are specifically speaking about how you developed FoD, and that's fine. In other places, however, I think the tone of the article would be improved if you try to instruct the reader directly.] 
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Before coming up with new ways to depict my characters verbally insulting one another, I do try to choose a particular conversation system. There are three kinds that have seen most of the usage in modern-day IF where people are going to be speaking to one another at length: "ASK / TELL," menu-based conversations, and "TALK TO." While ultimately it should fall on the game's author to pick a style that he feels most comfortable with, it is has been my impression that two of those systems tend to work best with games in development that fall into particular categories, with the third option a good catch-all. These systems are: 
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o The larger, "open-ended" game. (This includes dungeon romps, mystery and detective ventures and those attempting an old Infocom or Magnetic Scrolls feel.) With these games, the player may be finding new information scattered throughout the landscape at various times. The "ASK / TELL" system really works well for these kind of games, because as an author you may not know exactly when the player will encounter the suspicious widower or the wandering riverside Boggit-Man. Being able to question various characters about each other, or present information ala the "TELL" command lets the player work out those "a-ha" moments so often to be found in detective stories themselves. "ASK / TELL" probably requires a bit less effort on the part of the programmer when compared to using menus, as the topics a character can talk about can be more-or-less always "available" and accessible. The primary pitfall is in regards to player versus player character knowledge. In Level 9's 1987 release "Knight Orc," one can ask the Rainbird about any object or character in the game, regardless if [EDIT: "of whether" instead of "if"]you've actually encountered it in that particular session. While the status of that being a bug or a feature is up in the air due to the supposed omnipotence of the Rainbird, most authors will want to ensure that the scope of player character knowledge is enforced. 
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o The smaller, more "scripted" game, or game with a very strong player character. Here, using menus would provide an advantage. With the player being shuttled between scenes rather quickly, there is less of a likelihood that the player will need to "pick the brain" of the different people and creatures that are encountered. With a strong player character, using menus allows an author to present the exact questions or sentences that the PC will state. Menus also provide an easy way for authors to implement something resembling "free" attitude or conversational tone modeling. Menus probably ask the most of the author, in terms of proper attention paid if nothing else. The sentences that are eligible to be used need to be properly turned managed[EDIT: turn-managed], and should bugs exist here it could have catastrophic results -- something I saw with my original release of "Chicks Dig Jerks" where it was possible to replay the first scene in the game towards the end by talking to a character that was encountered in both scenes[EDIT: This last sentence lost me. Can you rephrase?].(While the opposite effect -- not properly turning on a topic -- can bring your game to a screeching, unfinishable halt, natch.)[EDIT: naturally.]   
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o The last common system for dialogue-heavy games -- "TALK TO" -- proved to be extremely effective in Ian Finley's 2000 release "Kaged," and I am of the opinion that it can work for, really, either type of game previously listed. With this particular method, the player simply types in ">talk to character" and the appropriate topic is chosen automatically. This does demand that the author keep track when "fresh" bits of conversation are able to be used by the NPCs.  
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(Further exploration of these and additional methods can be found in Chapter xx: NPC Conversation Systems.) 
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[EDIT: Start a new section here.] 
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After selecting a conversational style based on the kind of game you are writing, it will eventually come time to place some words in your characters' mouths. Dialogue is a facet of writing that intimidate [EDIT: intimidates]some authors who are otherwise quite adept at illustrating their games within a text-based medium. It's common enough where[EDIT: "Difficulty with writing dialogue is a common enough problem that the jobs of plotter..."] thejobs of plotter and scripter are sometimes split in other mediums: for instance the first sixty issues of the old "Justice League America" comic book run had Keith Giffen plotting the books, and J. M. DeMatteis just handling the dialogue: 
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                     "Y'see, Keith Giffen loves to plot.. but tell him to put the words in a character's mouth and the man just freezes up. It's not that he can't do it -- I suspect someday
                    he will -- but at the time, dialogue was the area newest to Keith, and he didn't want to risk drowning the project with a false start. Either that or he wanted to 
                    spread the blame around a bit more. Just in case (Helfer, 6)." [EDIT: Fix formatting of the quote.] 
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Giffen indeed did get better, to the point where he was receiving compliments and his dialogue was credited by reviewers for "producing some very amusing exchanges that nicely reflect the personalities of this cast (Cornwall)." Additionally, even Douglas Adams had expressed some self-doubt as to whether the women he wrote came off as genuine (Gaiman, xx). While general tips in [EDIT: "for" instead of "in"]making your characters sound real include a lot of listening at[EDIT: "to" instead of "at"] real conversations and the devouring of books known for their characters' interactions (I can certainly recommend the novels of George Alec Effinger, Gregory McDonald and Elmore Leonard, and the screenplays of Kevin Smith as good launching points) there is really no substitute to spending time with your characters and getting to know them (and what they are likely to do) as people, as friends. If you've only got a few character traits to start with, I have found that it helps to[EDIT: "it may help to" instead of "I have found that it helps to"]"model" characters after people you know quite well while beginning your game. The character of Yehoweh Porn in "Fallacy of Dawn" was graphically depicted by [EDIT: "modelled after" instead of "graphically depicted by"]my friend Brian Gramling. I knew, before starting the game, that I wanted the character of Porn to be someone who had Brian's energy for watching and following professional sports, only mapped instead to video games. (This is indeed evident the first time we meet Porn; he refers to being given "the Heisman" by an unnamed girl, referring to the pose that is depicted upon the NCAA Football Heisman Trophy, which has its model extending one arm to keep would-be tacklers away.) As the player character in "Fallacy of Dawn" doesn't have much to do when first meeting Porn than to [EDIT: "except" instead of "than to"]talk to him, I then attempted to reveal and embellish certain characteristics about the player character himself through speaking with Porn -- all while trying to keep the rants and diatribes that both Porn and Delarion (the player character) engaged in funny enough to provide incentive to the player to keep typing in ">talk to porn". But while I would eventually find mannerisms that belong solely to Porn (I certainly know no-one [EDIT: no one]in real life who could make it through "Aquanaut's Holiday," rainy day or no) I was able to depict a scene of two old friends to my satisfaction in the game, though I was only just beginning to get to know one character as an author by using memories and a real-life friend as the basis.[EDIT: ...though, as an author, I was only just beginning to get to know one character by using memories...] 
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After [EDIT: "When" instead of "After"]the first "wave" of conversation choices with Porn were about to be exhausted, I had the player character's would-be girlfriend, Clara, arrive in [EDIT: on the scene]the scene. I still wanted to develop the character of Porn some, so I had him engage in his own conversation with an "arch-nemesis" of his own, totally separate and without specifically requiring input from the player. Ideally in IF, our characters would always [EDIT: delete "always"]start speaking on their own during idle times, but at the time I just had the technical skill to hard-code some running back-and-forth between Porn and his programmer adversary. This allowed the player to make a new friend of Clara while still getting to know more about the one he just made [EDIT: he had just made].  
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While getting the player to (hopefully) like the same characters designated as Delarion's friends in "Fallacy of Dawn" through the act of speaking to them, I also took the opportunity to let the NPCs make the player character look good as well. Delarion sometimes makes comments exclusively to the player while he's engaged in conversation with somebody. As FoD is written in the first person, it allowed me the chance to make those bit come off easily and unforced:  
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                    "He was a teaching assistant for one week in one of my classes," says Clara. "He wasn't around for very long, but he left an impression. Then I saw him out here a few weeks ago."
                    "What, did he quit?" I ask. 
                    "Mmm-hmm. They make us all take a few computer classes in art history because a lot of us end up taking jobs where we are archiving pictures and scans onto DVD. [EDIT: remove the carriage return]
                    Using 'Toast' or some program like that."
                    My instinct is to tell her that I was the guy who broke the copy protection on the original PC release of "Adaptec Toast", but I ignore it for two reasons. First, we [EDIT: remove carriage return]
                    probably had a similar conversation thread last week, and I already mentioned it. Secondly, if this conversation is being mimicked in an alternate dimension where[EDIT: remove carriage return] 
                    everyone speaks like they do in "The Sims," my factoid would come off under the 'bragging' icon. And as I hate using that in a virtual Sim's life, I hate doing that in mine.
                    "Anyway," Clara continues, "he found out what TAs make, and put out a tip jar. I think that's how he lost his job there." 
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Though I confess to being a proponent of using the first-person narrative in text adventures on knee-jerk general principle alone, being able to do things like that through dialogue would be a precise [EDIT: "a good" instead of "a precise"]reason why. While wanting to let the player know that Delarion is actually going out of his way to not make a video game reference in front of this girl that he fancies, his mind is still working as it always is. Delarion is essentially still talking, just to us when he makes a mental note like that. However, use of the first person simply wasn't considered during the 80s and even today is sometimes criticized for coming off as awkward. There is still much flexibility and power when merging the first person narrative with good dialogue for those games with strong player characters. Following are two scenes relating to the characters of George Alec Effinger, an author whose novel "When Gravity Fails" was the basis for the 1990 Infocom release "The Circuit's Edge." First, the [EDIT: "The first-person character Marid Audran is depicted..."]character Marid Audran is depicted having his own back within [EDIT: What does "having his own back" mean?]"When Gravity Fails" during an attempt to get hustled:  
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                    "I have the whole sum, Abdoulaye," I said, "but you're going to write me out a receipt. I don't want you claiming that I never paid you."
                    He looked angry. "You dare imagine I'd do such a thing?"
                    I glared back at him. "The receipt. Then you get your money."
                    He called me a couple of foul names, then ducked back into the room. He scrawled out the receipt and showed it to me. "Give me the fifteen hundred kiam," he [EDIT: remove carriage return]
                    said, growling.
                    "Give me the receipt first."
                    "Give me the accursed money, you pimp!"
                    For a second I thought about hitting him hard with the edge of my hand across the flat of his nose, breaking his face for him. It was a delicious image. "Christ, Abdoulaye![EDIT: remove carriage return]
                    Get Karim back here. Karim!" I called. When the gray-bearded old man returned, I said to him, "I'm going to give you some money, Karim, and Abdoulaye is going to[EDIT: carriage return]
                    give you that piece of paper in his hand. You give him the money, and give me the paper" (Effinger 56). 
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Indeed, Effinger's depiction of Marid's terse speech patterns when talking to those he is disgusted with compares nicely when he shifts towards talking right to us -- Marid feels alright[EDIT: all right] with going on at a bit greater length and confiding with us. Compared to a similar scene in "The Circuit's Edge," this sense of intimacy is lost. While the shift to second person is no doubt done due to tradition and in an attempt to get players thinking they had a personal stake in the game, it may have been folly considering the game took place over 200 years in the future in an Arabic city with many southern-Louisiana influences. [EDIT: Folly to try to give the player a stake in the game? What does the future Arabic city with many southern-Louisiana influences have to do with that?]Comparing text in "The Circuit's Edge" we see that we aren't given access to what Marid thinks, nor much of a chance to come off as wry or terse ourselves: 
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                    Saied snatches it from your hands, muttering his thanks and asking you what took so long. Hastily he unwraps it. What was so important that he sent[EDIT: carriage return (CR)]
                    you chasing around half the Budayeen for it? "Orgasmic!" he exclaims, holding the small glass bottle aloft like a trophy. "The most expensive cologne this [EDIT:CR]
                    side of the Sahara. You know you have to get this stuff specially made? Here, take a whiff." He squirts some Orgasmic your way. Instantly you are[EDIT:CR]
                    overwhelmed by a cloying flowery scent. "Incredible, isn't it?"
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Certainly there is nothing wrong with the writing, and Saied the Half-Hajj comes off as well as he does in the novel the game is based on. But by not allowing us to see Marid verbally play off his friend, to not have him confide in the player / reader makes him a weaker and less realized character in the game than he is shown to be in the accompanying books. Without access to high polygon models, facial expressions, rendered cut-scenes or a third person camera perspective, the interaction between a text adventure author's player character and the others whom he encounters is critical in making that PC memorable. Not allowing that PC to speak his mind can be crippling. 
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Although we only have words at our command to really present our characters, as developers of interactive fiction, we do have two distinct advantages over more traditional gaming fare: 
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o Our players are already in a mindset to read. Two of Bethesda's recent role playing [EDIT: role-playing (also below)]games, the 1996 release "Daggerfall," and 2002 release "Morrowind," include many tester and fan-made books (in-game) detailing the myths and legends that make up the lands and people described in the Elder Scrolls trilogy. However, while the quality of the scripts are fine, as players we are in the mindset that we will soon be stealing or fighting. That we will be running or flying to a new locale and casting magic missile at the darkness. The action vibe that these games are trying to put forth comes to a bit of a screeching halt when you [EDIT: "the player enters" instead of "you enter"]enter a library full of many several-page novels. The "Baldur's Gate" series of games suffer from this as well, at least in multiplayer: the conversations that you find yourself in with various other denizens are looked upon as either leading up to another fight or as a way to get your opponent to back down from one. And in a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy, there are very few situations in modern role playing games where NPCs can be interacted with without being the player getting the feeling that they are just talking to human-looking stores [EDIT: What is a human-looking store?]or quest activators. A ware such as "Fail-Safe," where the entire gameplay concerns talking to and instructing another creature until the game's resolution could not exist in any present commercial form[EDIT: Incomplete sentence]. Our players have already made the decision to accept the continual display of text on the screen long before they have started our game -- it behooves us to use this strength to tell the character-based stories, and write the dialogue-driven games that would otherwise go untold and unwritten. 
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o Allowing the player to choose the exact response, the best quip or put-down with which to reply to NPCs is alien to not only novels and cinema, but most graphic adventures as well. Games that proceed like the beginning of Omikron: The Nomad Soul (where the player is given the 'choice' between clicking on a "Yes" response and nothing at all) are altogether too common (Eidos, 1999). We can let our players share in the telling of our stories through the choices they make in text adventures as well as through how they choose to respond to our characters. Offering a variety of responses to those antagonists the player will face through the course of an adventure can be a daunting, expansive task, but those games that have employed such means -- among them award winning [EDIT: award-winning]games like Adam Cadre's 1999 release "Varicella" and Emily Short's 2001 release "Pytho's Mask" -- offer multiple angles and threads of continuity to enjoy depending just on how you decide to interact with the NPCs in the game.                    
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  [EDIT: Article needs some kind of conclusion or summary to bring this all together. The last paragraph is a bulleted part of the last section, even though it reads somewhat like a summary.]
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Cornwall, Jason. Suicide Squad #6. 22 Feb. 2002. Silver Bullet Comic Books. 27 May 2002  <http://www.silverbulletcomicbooks.com/reviews/101439315283890.htm> 
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Neil Gaiman, Don't Panic (need exact page for quote) 
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Helfer, Andrew, et al. Justice League: A New Beginning. New York: DC Comics, Inc., 1989. 
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Effinger, George Alec. When Gravity Fails. New York: Bantam, 1986.
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