Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "Jigsaw (video game)" in English language version.
...attention to scholarly detail [in Nelson's 1997 interactive fiction videogame The Tempest] recalls some of the finer moments of Nelson's epics, especially Jigsaw.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)[in the videogame Colossal Cave Adventure the command-word] XYZZY was a spell that could instantly transport a spelunking nerd from one part of the cave to another. ...Mr. Nelson is a British mathematician who played Advent as a child in the 1970's, created his own text game programming language, and in the last few years, has written two acclaimed games -- Curses and Jigsaw (http://www.pond.com/russotto/zpletx/jigsaw.html) -- each freely available on the Internet. He is also one of the more ornately literate creators of interactive fiction. His guide begins with an invocation of Tom Stoppard. The epigram for Jigsaw is from T. S. Eliot. And any player who manages to solve its problems will find untranslated Latin mottos and puzzles involving Proust and Lenin. Mr. Nelson seems to love the intricate machinery of a text game, the way no object is superfluous to its unfolding and nothing required is missing. It is a mathematician's construction, a tightly knit universe of text and symbol. But he also has high ambitions -- that in this weird, stilted form of prose broken by puzzle, there may also be a sense of something more powerful and as-yet rarely realized in interactive fiction, the powers of language to magically transport or transform. Something like XYZZY.
{{cite web}}: External link in |quote=[in the videogame Colossal Cave Adventure the command-word] XYZZY was a spell that could instantly transport a spelunking nerd from one part of the cave to another. ...Mr. Nelson is a British mathematician who played Advent as a child in the 1970's, created his own text game programming language, and in the last few years, has written two acclaimed games -- Curses and Jigsaw (http://www.pond.com/russotto/zpletx/jigsaw.html) -- each freely available on the Internet. He is also one of the more ornately literate creators of interactive fiction. His guide begins with an invocation of Tom Stoppard. The epigram for Jigsaw is from T. S. Eliot. And any player who manages to solve its problems will find untranslated Latin mottos and puzzles involving Proust and Lenin. Mr. Nelson seems to love the intricate machinery of a text game, the way no object is superfluous to its unfolding and nothing required is missing. It is a mathematician's construction, a tightly knit universe of text and symbol. But he also has high ambitions -- that in this weird, stilted form of prose broken by puzzle, there may also be a sense of something more powerful and as-yet rarely realized in interactive fiction, the powers of language to magically transport or transform. Something like XYZZY.
{{cite web}}: External link in |quote=Nelson -- who created the IF programming language Inform, and also some of the best IF of the 90s, is Marlowe (of the 'mighty line') and Shakespeare rolled into one. (His online persona also shares elements of Dr. Johnson, Lewis Carroll, and, of late, J.D. Salinger.) His epic works Curses (a delirious mythological and genealogical romp, 1993) and Jigsaw (a time-travel romance, 1995), did much to rekindle interest in 'serious' IF. While Nelson's IF stories are in and of themselves notable, even more remarkable is Nelson's creation of the programming language Inform, an authoring system for IF, which he has generously donated to the worldwide gaming community. ...the plots of most IF works are tightly constrained, such that the story does not advance until the player-reader has solved certain puzzles. The puzzles can range from uttering a magic word, to finding the right key, to successfully mastering a complex simulation of a World War II 'enigma machine' (from an extremely challenging chapter in Graham Nelson's Jigsaw); but owing to the technical difficulty of coding such puzzles, and the aesthetic difficulty of integrating such puzzles into the fabric of the story, the plots of most IF works are tightly constrained.
Forgiveness Rating: Cruel
...sort of a sprawling, mystical version of Carmen Sandiego. It is New Year's Eve 1999, and as the celebration culminates you find yourself wandering away from the party and into a mysterious chamber outfitted with a long table and an Ormulu clock. Your nemesis/love interest is a sinister yet attractive character named Black (cleverly written so as to be whatever gender you prefer), and it becomes your goal to Gump your way through the highlights of the twentieth century and ensure history unfolds correctly. ...be prepared to save and restore often....
...attention to scholarly detail [in Nelson's 1997 interactive fiction videogame The Tempest] recalls some of the finer moments of Nelson's epics, especially Jigsaw.
...sort of a sprawling, mystical version of Carmen Sandiego. It is New Year's Eve 1999, and as the celebration culminates you find yourself wandering away from the party and into a mysterious chamber outfitted with a long table and an Ormulu clock. Your nemesis/love interest is a sinister yet attractive character named Black (cleverly written so as to be whatever gender you prefer), and it becomes your goal to Gump your way through the highlights of the twentieth century and ensure history unfolds correctly. ...be prepared to save and restore often....
[in the videogame Colossal Cave Adventure the command-word] XYZZY was a spell that could instantly transport a spelunking nerd from one part of the cave to another. ...Mr. Nelson is a British mathematician who played Advent as a child in the 1970's, created his own text game programming language, and in the last few years, has written two acclaimed games -- Curses and Jigsaw (http://www.pond.com/russotto/zpletx/jigsaw.html) -- each freely available on the Internet. He is also one of the more ornately literate creators of interactive fiction. His guide begins with an invocation of Tom Stoppard. The epigram for Jigsaw is from T. S. Eliot. And any player who manages to solve its problems will find untranslated Latin mottos and puzzles involving Proust and Lenin. Mr. Nelson seems to love the intricate machinery of a text game, the way no object is superfluous to its unfolding and nothing required is missing. It is a mathematician's construction, a tightly knit universe of text and symbol. But he also has high ambitions -- that in this weird, stilted form of prose broken by puzzle, there may also be a sense of something more powerful and as-yet rarely realized in interactive fiction, the powers of language to magically transport or transform. Something like XYZZY.
{{cite web}}: External link in |quote=