IF ITALIA - Il sito Italiano sull'Interactive Fiction
INTERVISTA
>-Hello Kent
I'm 28 years old, and I live in Toronto. I'm a filmmaker, and most of my
>-Why the name Hugo?
"Hugo" comes from the title of a film project that I was developing several
>-When you created it?
I started it sometime in 1994 in a very rudimentary form, partly as a
>-why?
I looked into the two major existing systems at the time, TADS and Inform,
>-it was difficult to create a new language programming?
In retrospect, yes, because I didn't realize that's what I was going to end
>-can you tell me in few words the work of General Coffee?
The General Coffee Company Film Productions is a company owned by me, as
>-on what are you working now on Hugo?
Aside of maintenance work and some library experimentation, I'm actually
>-can you give me some previews of next release of Hugo? ;-)
I don't even know for sure right now. I've been exploring a number of
>-in the release 2.5b there was a preliminary version of Hugo for
It's been a very, _very_ long-standing ambition of mine to get a Macintosh
Ideally I'd love to see someone now do a native Mac port supporting the full
>-where you want to go with Hugo?
Wherever people want to take it, honestly. The pleasure I get from
I'm not a professional programmer, by any means. I'm self-taught, propelled
>-why do you like IF?
Blame Infocom, I think. When I was a kid I read about the detective game
>-in your opinion IF now is better than the "Infocom Age"? why?
Yes, I think so--but some of the Infocom games hold up incredibly well close
What makes modern IF so good is, largely, the sheer variety of games that
>-IF. What it means for you?
IF to me is entertainment; these are games, of course, and as entertainment
>-what is your favourite game of all times?
Deadline, probably. I'm not so much a fan of the fantasy milieu per se,
Of course this is in no way intended to suggest that there aren't a number
>-what do you think of this sort of revival, and all this interest in
Some certainly are. And some rightfully so--some of the new technology
I think interactive fiction sometimes appeals to people because it delivers
I had a lump in my throat at the end of Adam Cadre's Photopia (a recent and,
>-you also play with other videogames (I mean not only IF, but also modern
Quake. Around the time when I was writing getting Hugo v2.5 in shape, I
I also have a list of games that I've seen in demo form--notably Grim
During one screenwriting crunch period I remember blowing off steam by
>-IF in Italy has not a large diffusion. What would you say to invite
People have been interested in writing IF in Italian and other languages for
Finally, I'd simply suggest to anyone at all to give IF a try--regardless of
>-have you ever been in Italy?
Unfortunately, no.
>-do you like Italy? :-)
Yes--or, rather, I'm sure that I will when I eventually do get the chance to
>-thanks for the interview :-)
It's very much been my pleasure. Ciao!
>
>-Well, something about you :-) (only something on your age, job, interests)
time is dedicated to that. A lot of writing. I drink probably far too
much coffee, which may explain why it's almost 3:30 a.m. at the moment.
years ago. I thought that I would try to develop a game as an ancillary
product, incorporating the richness of content of classic Infocom games as
well as modern multimedia features. For some reason the idea of naming a
programming system "Hugo" appealed to me, and it stuck, even after the film
project was put on the shelf. It's a pretty cool name for a programming
language, I think. Beats FORTRAN.
diversion while I was in university. The v1.0 release was June 1995, but I
must have tinkered with it for months before that. (I mean, I had to learn
C in there somewhere, which I didn't know at all when I started out. Some
people may point out that the quality of my early code attests to that.)
and found that neither particularly suited my needs. I asked Mike Roberts
(the author of TADS) if TADS would be a good candidate for my project; he
suggested that my intent to incorporate multimedia would probably rule out
TADS as a choice. I also corresponded with Mark Howell (the original author
of the Zip Infocom interpreter) who explained that the understanding and
re-implementation of Infocom's Z-machine was largely the result of
reverse-engineering Infocom's software, which put it (i.e., a Z-machine file
produced by Inform) into hazy legal territory as far as any eventual
commercial distribution was concerned. So I decided to write my own system.
I must've optimistically figured: how hard could it be?
up doing! I originally set out to create just a template for defining the
elements of a text adventure: rooms, objects, characters, etc. At that
stage, much of the planned game was going to be hard-wired into the program
itself. Eventually, the need for design flexibility became apparent. If I
try to remember back, the transition probably went (quickly) from template
system to simple scripting language to complete programming language. Of
course it all seemed a lot more straightforward starting out. That's about
the only explanation I can think of for arriving at the conclusion: "Sure!
I'll just write my own programming language!"
well as the label under which Hugo and Guilty Bastards (written with Hugo)
are distributed. My film work consists at the moment of a number of
projects in development, ranging from completed scripts for larger pictures
to smaller projects that we hope to produce either here in Canada or in the
U.S.
hoping to be able to start on a new game in the near future, other work
permitting.
different things in terms of technology and extensions to the language.
What eventually makes it into Hugo will largely depend on where I see
interactive fiction going, what users are asking for, and what is reasonable
and practical to implement as part of the system. I don't want to get away
from the fact that I want Hugo--even the most advanced features--to be
available on as many different platforms as possible.
Machintosh.
>Why? Perhaps the 2.000.000 of IMac sold... ;-)
port done. We had ports for Windows, DOS, Amiga, Acorn, Linux, Unix, and
OS/2, but no Mac port. At various times in the past couple of years people
had shown interest in doing it, but nothing ever panned out. Andrew
Plotkin's Glk library provided a chance to get at least a preliminary
version of the Hugo Engine running on the Mac. While Glk isn't capable of
implementing the full Hugo display model, we've managed to make a
stripped-down version available for Macintosh to run basic Hugo games.
Hugo display model, as well as graphics, sound, and music. There's a fair
bit of source code out there as a roadmap (including several PC Windows/DOS
versions by me), so hopefully the availability of Hugo for the Mac will
encourage someone to give it a shot.
maintaining Hugo is in enabling both others and myself to make games. I
would be interested in seeing people explore the multimedia capabilities and
maybe take them further or in a different direction than I did with Guilty
Bastards. On the other hand, I'd be thrilled just to see people write some
great stories using Hugo.
along the road of learning about compilers and all sorts of other things I
never thought I'd learn about by the fact that, at the end of the day, Hugo
does what it's supposed to do, which is to enable people to write games.
Getting Guilty Bastards out the door was a milestone for me in that it was
really a step forward for modern IF languages at the time, bringing Hugo
closer to what I originally envisioned it could be, incorporating into a
major game graphics, sound effects, and music.
Deadline and couldn't wait to play it on the family computer. Years later
in university, I found the reissued games in the Lost Treasures of Infocom
package and got hooked all over again. That was around the time when the
idea for Hugo started percolating in my brain, and I discovered the
rec.arts.int-fiction and rec.games.int-fiction newsgroups. I was tickled
that there was a strong contingent of literate, intelligent people not only
still playing and discussing these games, but _making_ them, too! There are
far worse hobbies to have.
to twenty years after they were first published. (Although it's no surprise
when a novel is still readable twenty years later, so maybe the continuing
appeal of great IF shouldn't be quite so much of a surprise.)
exist, in so many different styles and genres. People have had the chance
to look back on the work done by Infocom (and other companies) and sometimes
build upon what they did, or sometimes go in entirely new directions. Plus,
I don't think it hurts that players today are much more demanding in terms
of the elements of a game: puzzles, character complexity, plot, etc.
Authors have to rise to those challenges. And some people writing today are
simply great writers--couple that with an ability to structure an
entertaining game and you can have a very satisfying piece of IF.
they can be a great way to spend leisure time. Even better, some of the
best IF truly approaches being literature, where the writing and story and
style and overall effect stand on their own as a creative work. Most IF
these days is free; people writing IF today are doing it out of a love of
the medium, of the craft of making a great game. The fact that the IF
community continues to exist and grow is impressive. Plus I get to play
some really cool games.
so I've tended to like more contemporary, "realistic" games. (Some people's
tastes are the opposite.) Plus Deadline was the game that initially and
forever impressed me with what IF could do: namely, the sense that at any
point in the game you as the hero could do almost anything you wanted.
of great games being made today: there are almost too many to mention
offhand, and there are more being produced all the time.
>emulation, interactive fiction... Perhaps new videogames (modern) are too
>concerned on graphical aspects?
really does blow my mind with how great it looks and sounds. But that only
works for certain types of games. Too many games--like too many
movies--have relied on technology to impress, leaving a big void where the
content should be.
something that flashier graphical games will _never_ be able to deliver, in
the same way that some books can affect us in a way that the same story told
visually in a movie or whatever never could.
deservedly, highly praised game). Try to tell that story with pictures or
video or even as static fiction and I don't think it would had the same
effect on me that it did.
>videogames)?
woke up more than a few mornings bleary-eyed after seeing the wee hours roll
around while chasing my brother Dean or my friend Alan around with a rocket
launcher over the internet.
Fandango and Half-Life--that I'd love to play when I get the time.
playing computer pinball a lot; I did a similar thing in L.A. by playing
speed solitaire on the computer during eighteen-hour writing sessions--but I
don't know if that counts.
someone
>to join the world of the IF?
years--very soon after Hugo's release I began working to improve its support
for non-English games. I would love to see the appearance of Hugo games
written in Italian. On the other hand, interactive fiction has often been
mentioned as a potentially very good way to improve one's English, for
non-English speakers.
language--if they think they might enjoy the chance to get really immersed
in a stimulating story.
go. I'm rather jealous of everyone I know who's been able to visit.
Torna alla Home Page
©2000 Simone Zanella e ©2000 IF Italia. E' vietata la riproduzione.