Ryan Veeder began writing interactive fiction in 2011, when he was supposed to be focusing on grad school. His works in parser IF have been nominated for several XYZZY Awards, and his game Taco Fiction took first place in the 17th Annual Interactive Fiction Competition. In 2012 he wrote "Motorcyclus" and Other Extremely Scary Stories, and he will have to live with that decision for the rest of his life.

The Gothic Tower & Assorted Interactive Fiction (Plus Bonus Book Motorcyclus!) by Ryan Veeder

The Gothic Tower & Assorted Interactive Fiction includes five interactive fiction 'text adventures' by Ryan Veeder, including two exclusively commissioned works debuting for the first time anywhere in StoryBundle:

  • The Ascent of the Gothic Tower, a brand-new story of distance and elevation, exclusive to StoryBundle
  • So, You've Never Played a Text Adventure Before, Huh?, a brand-new tutorial for the uninitiated to the frustrating and sometimes rewarding world of text parser-based interactive fiction
  • The XYZZY Award-nominated They Might Be Giants tribute The Statue Got Me High, in which a dinner party ends in disaster
  • Nautilisia, a symbolic journey deep into the mind of a person who has played Link's Awakening many times
  • Wrenlaw, a vignette about geocaching while alone

[NOTE: To play these interactive fiction works, please download and unzip the collection on your Windows, Mac, or Linux PC - and open the index file in any web browser. You can also play these games in any mobile app that loads the Z-Machine format.]

BONUS BOOK: Motorcyclus & Other Extremely Scary Stories

Game designer and IFComp author Ryan Veeder was kind enough to give us copies of his debut short story collection Motorcyclus, a collection of horrifying (but somehow amusing!) vignettes of terror, also included with your StoryBundle purchase.

CURATOR'S NOTE

Thought-provoking, elegiac (and sometimes cheeky!) interactive stories from one of the very best writers in the world of interactive fiction right now. –Simon Carless

 

REVIEWS

  • "I loved this game. I am aware that knowing the opera in advance gave me a bit of an advantage, I could appreciate it a bit better, so I don't know how it would appear to someone who never heard of Don Giovanni's finale. But for me? It was a blast!"

    –Peter Pears on The Statue Got Me High

  • "The puzzles are just simple pacing devices and the story is almost nonexistent, what motivates the player to completion is the quality of the writing, which remains consistently witty throughout, and the extra little 'amusing' things that reward light experimentation."

    –Joey Jones on Nautilisia

  • "I'm pretty enchanted by the piece. A little game about the power of memory, synaesthesia, loss. Without much of an introduction, the player starts wandering around a park scenery near the highway looking for -yeah, what exactly?, deciphering pieces of a romantic backstory. Beautifully written, as was to be expected from Veeder, and not without its genuinely funny moments despite the emotional topic. Highly recommended!"

    –Colin Djukic on Wrenlaw

 

BOOK PREVIEW

Preview

You aren't really obsessed.

 

You do have other things going on in your life. You have other goals. But isn't it best, with any goal, to give it your complete focus, at least for as long as you're focusing on it? Yesterday you had something else to take care of, so you took care of it. Tomorrow there will be yet another thing to worry about, and you will worry about it, exerting one hundred percent of the concern that the issue merits.

 

But tonight, you are going to get to the top of that tower.