Spectrum Computing

I just re-coded "SANDS OF EGYPT" 2001 free text adventure by Ambrosine in my Windows T.A.B. (retro text adventure maker for Windows)

Is currently being playtested; but if anyone interested would like to check it out or take a peek you can download here:

http://tab.thinbasic.com/sands.zip

Comments etc. appreciated.

Runs on Windows XP or above.



Regards,
catventure.

TAB site: http://tab.thinbasic.com/

Stefan plays a classic software 8bit text adventure in his man-cave den!

http://youtube.com/watch?v=-CtvpkOoBQM

A recent game I remade was "PiggeryJokery" text adventure.

This adventure game is text only and of the traditional sort. It is similar to the old Infocom/Magnetic Scrolls/Level 9 type which were popular in the mid 1980`s.

It is also similar to popular 80's 8-bit text adventures created with the QUILL, PAW or GAC adventure utilities.

In this game, because of your transgressions, you have become the victim of an enchantment and transformed into a little pink piglet.

Your quest, dear adventurer, should you decide to accept it, is to guide Peregrine Piglet through Tophole Wood, helping his fellow creatures who may be in need of his assistance and thus, completing the NINE noble tasks of kindness to lift the enchantment.
Peregrine will need to avoid woodland dangers, hostile beasts and humans. He must make new friends, overcome obstacles, solve problems, manipulate objects and act upon information to make progress. He must score 100 points to solve the game.
If the going gets a little tough remember you may type HELP for some ideas or INFO for system commands. Good Luck and Happy Adventuring!

The game was updated by catventure in December 2018 using the free TAB retro text adventure and interactive fiction maker for Windows. More information and download here:

https://catventure.itch.io/piggeryjokery

"Sands of Egypt" is an offline, parser-based interactive text adventure retrogame for Windows XP and above.
Game author: Ambrosine (c)2000. TAB version by catventure.

[media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHLJ5BMRdq4[/media]

This adventure game is text only and of the traditional sort. It is similar to the old Infocom/Magnetic Scrolls/Level 9 type which were popular in the mid 1980's. Also similar to popular 80's 8-bit text adventures created with the QUILL, PAW or GAC adventure utilities.

There are no pictures, sounds or animations in this particular TAB game. However there is a background music track.

Can you find the burial chamber in the nearby pyramid, get the treasure, and make it out of the pyramid alive within 24 game hours?

It was made with the T.A.B. for Windows adventure creation program by catventure.

For more info and to download the latest version of the game, please visit: http://tab.thinbasic.com

**Special Note: When starting the program(s) it's possible that some virus checkers may produce a "false-positive" warning**
**You may need to tell your antivirus software to create an 'exception' for the game app(s) in order to allow it to run**

Hi,

I recently moved the TAB text adventures games to:

https://catventure.itch.io/

Regards,
catventure.

catventure wrote: ↑Mon Mar 14, 2022 8:18 pm I recently moved the TAB text adventures games to:

Thanks for the update. I spent a day messing about with TAB in February and found it very easy to get into, especially with the tutorial.

R-Tape wrote: ↑Tue Mar 15, 2022 9:33 am Thanks for the update. I spent a day messing about with TAB in February and found it very easy to get into, especially with the tutorial.

@R-Tape I'm pleased you found the tutorial helpful and easy to understand

I posted a minor update to the TAB Adventure System Editor (PAW/Quill/GAC variant) on 15 Mar 2022
(Works on Windows XP and above)

http://tab.thinbasic.com/

Online tutorial updated too:
http://tab.thinbasic.com/QuickTutorial.html

Regards,
catventure.

catventure wrote: ↑Wed Mar 16, 2022 2:38 pm I posted a minor update to the TAB Adventure System Editor (PAW/Quill/GAC variant) on 15 Mar 2022
(Works on Windows XP and above)

I'm pretty sure the answer's "no", but is it possible to convert TAB games to the Speccy? (or could it be made possible?)

R-Tape wrote: ↑Wed Mar 16, 2022 8:41 pm I'm pretty sure the answer's "no", but is it possible to convert TAB games to the Speccy? (or could it be made possible?)

Hi R-Tape,

Alas, you cannot make a TAB game that will run on Spectrum. (unless you completely rewrote it using a Spectrum authoring tool)

I believe though that "Adventuron" can make adventure games that will do this - and for quite a few 8-bit formats too (including Spectrum and Spectrum Next)

https://adventuron.itch.io/

FYI, I know there's a guy currently working on a new text adventure creator for the Spectrum called "Lost Wurld":

https://mycomputerworld.co.uk/1_8_downloads.html

I mention TAB on this forum because it might be of interest to those Spectrum enthusiasts/authors who would enjoy the challenge of writing text adventures, particularly those who are or were familiar with using the Spectrum PAW/Quill makers and/or who may be seeking a medium to convert, rewrite or extend existing Spectrum adventures to run on Windows - without use of an emulator.
I would imagine they would most "feel at home" with the TAB language and more readily adapt to it.
Although the 'adventure language' is not precisely the same there are however corresponding conditions and actions that do the EXACT same thing - whilst in addition there are MANY, MANY other helpful new ones that were not present in the original PAW or Quill.
When you have the UNPAW'ed/UNQuilled game sources, and with a little work, many of these sorts of homegrown text adventures might be "transferred" to work with TAB for the PC without too much trouble, copy/pasting a lot of the text and whatnot, but inevitably some recoding would be necessary. However, the coding language cond/acts are very similar in that regard.
Previously, I have successfully made a couple of Spectrum to TAB conversions that way.

I realise this is a dedicated Spectrum forum so this probably will not be of interest to most members.

catventure.

catventure wrote: ↑Thu Mar 17, 2022 8:48 am I mention TAB on this forum because it might be of interest to those Spectrum enthusiasts/authors who would enjoy the challenge of writing text adventures

This applies in my case, and this is just the kind of thing this subforum is for. If I ever do make a text adventure, I would ultimately want to see it on the Speccy, but I like the cut of TAB's jib and it's a good tool for playing with ideas.

So what is the best tool for authoring a Spectrum text adventure?

RWAC wrote: ↑Thu Mar 17, 2022 11:43 am So what is the best tool for authoring a Spectrum text adventure?

I'd still recommend using PAWs, using inPAWs to develop on a PC-based text editor, with a set-up allowing almost instant testing in an emulated copy of the PAWs.

DAAD is great too, but I wouldn't recommend it to a newcomer to the Gilsoft-style systems.

Adventuron, with an export to Spectrum, will work as well (in the retro-mode) for small games as it will export to PAWs or DAAD.

Hi,

A quick announce that the 'TAB for Windows' text adventure creator system was updated to Version 70 on 24 May 2022.
http://tab.thinbasic.com/

Regards,
catventure.

Just keeping things up to date. The current/latest version of the TAB Retro Text Adventure System for Windows was posted on 02 Oct 2022.
(Works on Windows XP and above; 16/32bit)

http://tab.thinbasic.com/

Regards,
catventure.

The TAB for Windows adventure creator program was updated on 21 Aug 2023.
Here is a visual of the 3 graphicbox version:

Merry Christmas!
A snapshot of the text only version of TAB.