nemowrites

[nemowrites]

Heyyyaaa. Welcome.. or welcome back is more accurate. I don't think i ever read your IFs, but the message on your pinned post made me want to follow. I look forward to seeing your writing!!! ❤️

thank you so much! so glad to have you here and i'm grateful for all the positive support so far. I'm super excited to share my writing again.

[nemowrites]

Welcome back and congrats on figuring some things out for yourself 💖

thank you so much! even tho university and full stack development are eating my soul alive i'm happier than i have been in a while, i hadn't realized how much i wanted to come back until i did.

[nemowrites]

well, hello?

yeah, it is i, the writer of frostford's mystery and miscalculated. well, back from the grave of inactivity. a decision to do a complete rewrite (everything other than main premise) both of my main IFs is in action, very slow action.

it was a decision I was so hesitant to make, in a way i wanted to just not touch them again, make a new blog and start over but those IFs meant a lot to me, even back at the time, and still to this day, and i hate having abandoned them so much.

the reason for abandoning them for quite sometime, other than having a job and a demanding major that i frankly don't even enjoy studying, is that i started writing those IFs and being in the interactive fiction community at the age of 16, and now, i'm on the way to turning 20. time truly does fly fast lmao, so somewhere in the writing i started noticing how my posts/writing of a yeah before (for example when i was 17 looking back at my demo i wrote at 16) i felt like there's a huge gap between how i think, speak and write than i did a year back (which makes sense), but now that i'm at an age where things are moving slower than the 16 to 19 growing up gap, i felt the strong urge to go back to writing, and a complete rewrite is in order, it's a 99% fresh start while maintaining the original stories i was (and am on my way) very passionate about.

another element is the drastic change in my beliefs in three years, when i started writing my IFs at 16, i was still religious (which there's absolutely nothing wrong with but i knew for a fact i was lying to myself out of fear), mostly in the closet and all in all hesitant to actually include elements that the people around me view as immoral or taboo, that was a scary thought to 16 year old me. i became an atheist and came to terms of being bi, trans and asexual and how i want those things to actually impact my writing and overall presenting.

so yeah, i'm reintroducing myself as sul, 19, he/him.

things are coming and i'm very ecstatic for them, right now rewrites, redesigns are being made and i'm deleting old blog posts that no longer encompass my IFs and mainly posts that make me cringe.

[nemowrites]

Musical Shenanigans Are Back - Project Hadea

After a long ass thyme, trials tribulations and new instruments, I'm finally back into making musical shenanigans posts!! Now, musical shenanigans are when i imagine IF characters as music, I compose it and I play it.

Now this time I'm back with something exciting, I play oud now!! If you don't know what oud is check the description out right here. Music-wise a oud doesn't have frets and has quarter notes, for between a natural note and a flat. playing notes you cannot play on most stringed instruments, that being said might redo some of the characters I covered before just because oud opened up a lot of experimental space.

Now onto the important stuffs, if you don't know what project hadea is you're missing out big time, go check it out right here!

Without any further ado, here's the mess I came up with:

Nash:

"some of their tactical brilliance has probably rubbed off on you - and some of your impulsiveness on them"

I decided to use/highlight the element of impulsiveness and decided to compose as my hand plays the oud, without much planning, and this is what my brain came up with, I'm honestly very happy with it, would defo play that progression again.

Imxa:

"you’ll have to work hard to impress her"

I decided to play the first thing I ever composed on the oud, since (for me at least) it symbolizes just that, working hard to impress (myself, if no one else) and starting at some point, we all started somewhere after all.

That about sums it up, @nyehilismwriting i do hope i did not butcher your characters with my oud playing, and i hope you enjoy it, and to everyone else I hope y'all enjoyed listening to the lute's grandpa.

[nemowrites]

How to Keep Your Twine Project Safe

It is a tale as old as time. The app crashes, your cache is cleared, your laptop breaks, and hours or days or weeks of work is lost. It's a terrible experience, and you never think about what to do in that situation until it happens to you- and by that time, it's already too late. So here's your prompt to get ahead of things and keep your project protected before something goes wrong.

So here, I'll be going over some layers of security you can use...

1. NEVER use the web app

I know this one's gonna be controversial. I know, a lot of people use the web app! It exists for a reason! But if you do, you're leaving your work very vulnerable.

When you use a local installation of Twine, your files are being saved to local storage. That means that everything is saved on your hardware, and with the exception of a freak event, it's not going anywhere. Don't get me wrong, those freak events aren't rare enough to dismiss (we'll talk about that later), but it's not quite as bad as the web app.

Instead of saving your files locally, the web app saves your progress to your browser's cache- the same thing that saves your cookies and keeps you logged in on websites. If your cache is cleared for any reason, your games will be gone.

2. Write your documents in a separate program

Chances are, if you're using Twine, there's a lot of stuff you can do outside of Twine before moving it into the program itself. A common practice is to write prose in a separate program, and then move it all into Twine when you're finished and write the code in Twine. This is a great way to back up your work, because if Twine has an error, you'll still have all the source files to reconstruct what you had before.

I'd recommend trying to use a stable program to write in. That means something that saves locally and doesn't frequently crash. In other words, do not use Google Docs. Instead of Docs, try one of these:

Microsoft Word (expensive, subscription, but stable)

LibreOffice (free, stable)

Scrivener (one time purchase, stable)

3. Back EVERYTHING up

I can not stress this enough. Back up your damn work. Back it up in multiple places if possible.

"Oh, but I'm using Google Docs, it's already backed up!" NO. No it is not. To keep your work truly safe, you need multiple copies hosted on multiple pieces of hardware. If one of those is a Google server, great! But if it's just one, that means that one single failure in that hardware (or the software associated) will mean everything is lost.

You can back up your files from the Twine program by going under the Build tab and selecting Publish to File or Export as Twee. Saving that to your device is already better than having it saved by the Twine app, but you'll be even safer if you back that file up to an external hard drive (or just a cheap USB drive) and a cloud hosting service like Dropbox or Google Drive. To make it extra safe and minimize lost progress, make sure you replace these files regularly.

That seems like a lot of work though, right? Yeah. So here's my final piece of advice...

4. Use Git

Git is how I've been backing up my latest project, Signal Hill. It's intimidating at first, but there are simple and easy ways to use platforms like Github to keep your work safe and fix big errors. To teach you how, I've created a whole separate tutorial, which you can find here.

[nemowrites]

I cannot fucking believe how much I'm losing my mind right now over soy sauce history. I'll tell all of you about it after I finish this essay because I need to un-distract myself enough to finish it but what the fuck? What the fuck is going on? I'm losing my fucking mind.

[nemowrites]

Interactive Fiction - Twine Resource Megalist

This Resource Megalist is intended to centralise the resources for the IF Tumblr community to create Interactive Fiction with Twine. While most will focus on the Twine formats, other useful resources will be included.

I don’t know much about other Interactive Fiction programs or format aside from Twine. Even then, I tend to only use Sugarcube. Though this list may try to cover all Twine formats in its resources, my bias for the SugarCube format will be obvious.

If you have a resource I should include, send it to me and I’ll add it !

Official Twine Links

Official Website : Twinery (you can download Twine or use it online) Official Discord: Twine Games, the creators of Twine and most formats, as well as Twine wizard hang out there to help. Official Reddit: Twine Games, answers Twine related questions too.

Twine Formats

Harlowe: Current version: 3.3.3 Repository, Documentation. Creator: Leon Arnott

SugarCube: Current version 2.36.1 Repository, Documentation. Creator: Thomas M. Edwards/TheMadExile/TME (Patreon) also created the Tweego Compiler (all format).

Chapbook: Current version 1.2.2 Repository, Documentation. Creator: Chris Klimas (Patreon), who also created Twine!

Snowman: Current version 2.0.2 Repository, Documentation. Creator: Chris Klimas, but currently maintained by Dan Cox.

Many other formats have been created for Twine, and a non-exhaustive list can be found on this page. Please note that some formats may not be complete or available anymore.

Aside from Tweego, there are also other compilers. A non exhaustive list can be found here.

Forums and Guides

The Twine website has a guide to help with the Twine interface here, as well as Cookbook to help you choose the format you may want to use. The Cookbook includes explanation and tutorials on the ways the different formats operate. There is also the old Twinery Forum where many questions were solved before it closed in 2017 and the Twine Q&A (similar fate). Please note: Due to the Forum closure and the lack of update for the Cookbook, some examples/code may be out of date (though the logic may still be good).

If you are looking for a Forum style-community for help (or discuss Twine), you should go instead to the IntFiction Forum!

Other Guides, Tutorials and Communities

The documentation for each formats may still not be quite easy to get, as it often use very technical description. Below are some guides and tutorials with maybe easier explanations. There might be more (please let me know!).

Guides and Tutorials non-official

YouTube Channels:

Dan Cox

Adam Hammond

Yi Weng

Note: The Twine interface changed in 2022, some aspects of these tutorial may be outdated.

Written Guides:

The Twine Grimoires (Harlowe and SugarCube - focus on visual) by @gcbaccaris (Patreon)

Introduction to Twine (Harlowe 2.1)

Narroscope Chapbook Talk

Kira’s SugarCube Guide (code)

@townofcrosshollow SugarCube Beginner Tutorial &  Tutorial 1.02

Guide for ChoiceScript to Sugarcube/Twee Transition by @manonamora-if

Tumblr coders

Below is a list of IF creators using Twine and having created tutorials/answered asks. Please check the creator’s FAQ before sending an ask/contacting them. There might be coders for other formats making tutorials, but I do not know of them.

SugarCube

@manonamora-if : I have #coding support masterlist

@idrellegames also answered a lot of Twine questions over the years (coding asks) (Patreon - Ko-Fi)

@cerberus-writes answered asks here. (Ko-Fi)

@nyehilismwriting has a coding tag. (Patreon - Ko-Fi)

@townofcrosshollow made some tutorials too.

@ramonag-if Tutorials (Patreon - Ko-Fi)

@outoftheblue-if coding/tutorials posts (Ko-Fi)

Harlowe:

@heart-forge used to answer asks. (Ko-Fi)

Coding Communities

Below you will find Discord servers focused on coding with Twine or Interactive Fiction where you can ask question. I am sure there are others Discords or Forums out there (especially with other languages) !

Decoding Twine Discord - run by multiple IF Creators on Tumblr.

Interact-If Discord - mainly an IF discord, but coding questions can be asked there too.

Fiction Intéractive - similarly to the one above, this one is mainly an IF community but Francophone.

Other Twine Resources

Custom Macro (GitHub + Patreon/Kofi links)

There are A LOT of people who created custom macros for Twine (SugarCube especially).

SugarCube:

Official Add-ons

Akjosch (GitHub) : Modules

Chapel (Website - GitHub - Ko-Fi): Macros.

Cycy (GitHub) Macros. Also created the T3LT extension for VSCode (syntax highlighter and macro checker-ish)

Greyelf (Forum + Forum) : Harlowe style animations + Right-Sidebar

Gwen (GitHub) Macros.

HiEv (Patreon): Macros, Inventory System

Hogart (GitHub) Macros.

Mike Westhad (GitHub) Macros and some StyleSheets

SjoerdHekking (GitHub - Patreon) Macros.

TME (GitHub) : Language Setting

Harlowe:

Chapel: Audio Library, Macro API

Inventory System

Greyelf (Forum + Forum): CSS styles

Templates (Visual or Code)

Note: I have not tested all of these below.

SugarCube

100% Good Twine Sugarcube Templates by @manonamora-if (Visual, 2 templates as of now)

Sugarcube Template & Twine - Sugarcube Template by @nyehilismwriting (Visual)

twine sugarcube template by @cerberus-writes (Visual)

ChoiceScript-like SugarCube template (code for copy-pasting) by brushmen (Visual & Code)

Twine/Sugarcube 2 Template by @innerdemons-if (Visual)

Fallen London Twine Template by thesharkwrites (Visual)

Tutorial: Coding Pronouns and Verbs in Twine SugarCube by Sylveranty (Code)

Twine Template and Twine Template II by @outoftheblue-if (Visual)

Simple Visual Novel Template for Twine by Sun Labyrinth (Visual)

PC98 Layout for Twine by fia glas (Visual)

A Quick Guide to Character Pages by @gamesbyalbie (Code)

Coding Pronouns and Verbs by @sylveranty (Code)

Harlowe:

Twine 2 (Harlowe) CSS Pack #1 by Candy✩Giants (Visual)

Custom Pronouns - Twine Tutorial by chewiethedoggo (Code)

Gender Inclusive Twine 2 Harlowe Code Tutorial by autistmouse (Code)

Harlowe Stylesheet (Github, Visual)

Twine 1:

Twine Texting Project by shindigs (Visual & Code)

Other Twine Resources

Tweego

Tweego Installer from Chapel

Ready-To-Use Tweego Folder + Guide by @manonamora-if

Other

Turning a Twine Game into a Google App

Interact-If Twine Resources Tag (you may find some of the resources above there) : #twine #twine resources #twine templates 

Other Coding/IF Resources

Knowing a bit about other coding languages can help you with customising the visual or the gameplay of the project. CSS/HTML are most helpful when understanding templates or how to build/edit the visual size; JavaScript for the gameplay/animation.

W3Schools is more accessible to new users and the explications tend to be easier to understand overall. However, MDN is thought to have the superior code and will let you know more easily if a code/rule is compatible between browsers. Both websites will include explanation for JavaScript, HTML and CSS.

If you want to learn JavaScript, you may want to start on this website.

Accessibility Resources

An important point that should be included is how to make your project accessible (for screen-readers, colour-blind, visual sensitive, etc…). While the way Twine/Tweego compiles the project into an HTML file already takes some of these into account (especially for screen-reader use), but the way one codes may hinder this accessibility.

Colour Contrast Check

ARIA-rules (used by Twine)

Firefox Accessibility Inspector

Misc Stuff

Codepen is useful to test HTML/CSS/JavaScript. There are also some cool code out there (but edits are required to work on Twine).

Pattern of CYOA Games is more of an IF Planning resource than a coding one, but is always useful to have.

Interact-If has also reblogged some resources (see the Platform Ref Tag Subsection).

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Again, this list is non-exhaustive. I’ve only added what I know/have seen around the internet. If you have Twine resources not included in this post, please let me know so I can add it.

If I have forgotten Patreon/Ko-Fi links for any of the people mentioned above, please let me know ask well!

[nemowrites]

I’ve been getting a lot of asks and tags about how to support Palestine and Palestinians during this so here’s ways allies can support us (other Palestinians are welcome to add on): 

Spread Awareness: 

Taking a moment out of your day to spread awareness of the oppression Palestinians face is crucial to supporting our cause. You don’t need to be an expert on Israeli settler colonialism to speak out. Israel relies on media ignorance to enact most of it’s bombings and settler violence against Palestinians, silence equals Israeli violence - reblogging, retweeting and posting in Palestine hashtags (#freePalestine, #savesilwan, #savenaqab, #savesheikhjarrah etc) helps, please do not underestimate how much just interacting with our posts and sharing information helps us. 

Support BDS: 

BDS is a Palestinian-led movement to apply global pressure to Israel to comply with international law, part of the reason Israel maintains a regime of settler colonialism, apartheid, and military occupation over Palestinians is because of international support - so BDS calls for non violent boycotts, divestment, and sanctions on corporations and brands that are complicit with Israel’s oppression - this includes brands such as AXA, HP, Puma, Sodastream, Ahava cosmetics, Sabra, and Pillsbury. If you want to know more about BDS and other ways to support please check out their website here: x

Donate (if you can): 

Al-Shabaka 

Electronic Intifada 

Adalah Justice Project

IMEU 

Medical Aid for Palestinians 

Palestine Children’s Relief Fund

Addameer 

Muslim Aid 

Palestine Red Crescent 

Decolonize Palestine: 

Decolonize Palestine is an excellent resource for anyone wishing to know more about Palestine, Palestinians, myths and deconstructing over 70 years of Israeli propaganda. It goes into detail of Israeli propaganda methods including pinkwashing, bluewashing, greenwashing etc and includes reading sources and frequently asked questions about Palestine from Palestinian voices, please check it out if you haven’t: x

[nemowrites]

you are trans enough. your transness doesn’t depend on how well you pass, or how far through your transition you are, or how much dysphoria you have. Your transness is defined by you and only you. don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

happy trans day of visibility! x

[nemowrites]

Hey gang! Quick update to say that I’m planning to update the demo to the twine one at the weekend. Specifically on Sunday the 27th. So… 6 days until twine demo!

I’m excited for you all to see it!

[nemowrites]

Hey, I miiight have missed something because I'm half asleep, but it seems the character creator is missing an option of not growing facial hair! Playing as a woman, the only option without facial hair says she shaves. If it's actually there, or there's a reason for it, please ignore this! Loving the game, btw 💕

HEYOOO, i’m really sorry anon, you haven’t missed anything, i forgot to add that option in, thank you for letting me know and it’ll be in the next update!! :3

[nemowrites]

Hello! I started reading Frostford's mystery but their is no way to progress in the game when it asks about the favourite song. This isn't meant to be pressuring in any way I just thought you might like to known.

heyo anon, thank you so much for letting me know, i’m omw home now and will check it out immediately!! :3

[nemowrites]

The pictures of bird headed people just made me think of this

https://youtu.be/wYxhOWDeLcI

I- LMAO OML- YOU UNLOCKED A MEMORY OF ME WATCHING THIS YEARS AGO OMG

[nemowrites]

If we were not all afraid, we would surely have another evil. Indoor Ornithology by José Luis Ágreda

[nemowrites]

Alejandra Pizarnik, tr. by Yvette Siegert, from “[...] of The Silence”, Extracting the Stone of Madness: Poems 1962 - 1972

[nemowrites]

“Israel-Palestine conflict” 🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩

“both sides are wrong” 🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩

“it’s complicated” 🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩

“I don’t know enough about it to comment”🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩

1. it’s a genocide

2. Israel is wrong

3. it’s actually very simple you’re just racist and islamophobic

4. I know DAMN WELL you’ve seen posts about it on tumblr, Facebook, instagram, tik tok, etc. and I know DAMN WELL you chose to scroll right past them

[nemowrites]