We’ve been running a series of Sunday afternoon demonstrations of computer programming using Inform 7, which is a programming language for creating stories that you can play like a game. Visitors learned about using nouns and verbs to navigate story games, then about how to write code to make their very own story worlds. We used an online version of Inform 7 called Playfic, which allows you to write and play games right in your web browser.
So far, we’ve had three very productive sessions, each resulting in a playable game. One of the games has a tricky puzzle with a dog that can move on its own throughout the space — an impressive bit of coding, especially from a visitor who’d never even seen a text adventure game before! We even got a chance to beta-test the game with several nearby visitors, and changed the game a bit based on their input. I won’t say any more, to avoid spoiling the game: you can play it yourself at playfic.com.