28 |
29 |
30 |
31 |
38 |
39 |
40 |
41 |
42 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/htdocs/archives/reviews.txt:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 | Hi, folks...
2 |
3 | SPAG Issue #50 is drawing near. I don't have any great celebrations planned for this milestone, but I do have a couple of very nice features already in the hopper. What I don't have, though, is reviews. That's where I was hoping you might help me out.
4 |
5 | This issue will be coming out just AFTER the Competition concludes, which means the Comp games will be fair game. If you have something to say about anything you played this year, or feel the urge to flesh out some of your capsule reviews into longer pieces, please think about submitting your work to SPAG.
6 |
7 | There are also lots and lots of games from earlier this year needing attention. Here's a list to give you some ideas:
8 |
9 | Suburst Contamination
10 | Spring Thing 2007 games (any, some, or all)
11 | Adventurer Consumer's Guide
12 | IF Art Show 2007 games (any, some, or all)
13 | Lovecraft Commonplace Book Project games (any, some, or all)
14 | Blighted Isle
15 | Ghost Town: The Lost Treasure
16 | IntroComp 2007 games (any, some, or all)
17 | Crystal and Stone and Beetle and Bone
18 | Lydia's Heart
19 | Weishaupt Scholars
20 | The Beast of Torrack Moor (Inform 7 version)
21 |
22 | There's been a lot of activity this year, and SPAG is way behind in keeping track of it. Please think about helping out.
23 |
24 | The deadline for submissions will be November 20, 2007.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/templates/issue.html:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 | {% extends "page.html" %}
2 |
3 | {% block content %}
4 |
5 |
50 |
51 |
52 |
53 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/comsnarf.py:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 | import sys
2 | import re
3 |
4 | from html_sanitizer import Sanitizer
5 |
6 | pat_headstart = re.compile('')
7 | pat_head = re.compile('(.*).*')
8 | pat_btag = re.compile(']*>(.*)]*>')
9 | pat_linktag = re.compile(']*>(.*)]*>')
10 | pat_comstart = re.compile('')
11 | pat_comend = re.compile('')
12 |
13 | sanitizer = Sanitizer({ 'add_nofollow': True })
14 |
15 | fl = open(sys.argv[1])
16 |
17 | comments = []
18 |
19 | dat = None
20 | body = None
21 |
22 | for ln in fl.readlines():
23 | ln = ln.strip()
24 | if pat_headstart.match(ln):
25 | dat = {}
26 | body = None
27 | continue
28 | match = pat_head.search(ln)
29 | if match:
30 | dat['timestamp'] = match.group(2)
31 | dat['timestr'] = match.group(3)
32 | val = match.group(1).strip()
33 | match = pat_btag.match(val)
34 | if match:
35 | val = match.group(1)
36 | match = pat_linktag.match(val)
37 | if match:
38 | val = match.group(2)
39 | dat['authorurl'] = match.group(1)
40 | dat['author'] = val
41 | continue
42 | match = pat_comstart.match(ln)
43 | if match:
44 | body = []
45 | continue
46 | match = pat_comend.search(ln)
47 | if match:
48 | body = '\n'.join(body)
49 | body = sanitizer.sanitize(body)
50 | dat['body'] = body
51 | comments.append(dat)
52 | dat = None
53 | body = None
54 | continue
55 | if body is not None:
56 | body.append(ln)
57 |
58 | if comments:
59 | print('\n----')
60 | for dat in comments:
61 | for key, val in dat.items():
62 | print('%s: %s' % (key, val,))
63 | print('\n----')
64 |
65 |
66 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/templates/front.html:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 | {% extends "page.html" %}
2 |
3 | {% block content %}
4 |
5 |
Welcome to SPAG, the Society for the Promotion of Adventure Games.
6 |
7 |
8 | SPAG was an Internet magazine dedicated to criticism, reviews, and the
9 | preservation and furthering of the art of Interactive Fiction.
10 | Founded in 1994, SPAG was a pillar of the IF community for more than
11 | two decades.
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 | SPAG was founded by G. Kevin Wilson and published regularly through
16 | 2011 by Magnus Olsson, Paul O'Brian, Jimmy Maher, and David Monath.
17 | It was then revived from 2013 to 2016 by Dannii Willis, Matt Carey,
18 | and Katherine Morayati. Since 2016 it has been dormant.
19 |
20 |
21 |
22 | As of 2025, the SPAG web site is maintained by the
23 | Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation.
24 | This site is no longer updated.
25 | Some links (to obsolete versions of
26 | IFDB and the
27 | IF Archive)
28 | have been modernized, but many other links are out of date and
29 | do not work.
30 |
31 |
32 |
33 | If you have questions, please contact
34 | info@ifarchive.org
35 | rather than any of the addresses listed in SPAG back issues.
36 |
37 |
38 |
Most recent issues
39 |
40 | {% for issue in issues %}
41 |
42 |
43 |
44 |
Yes, that’s right — your Valentines are finally* in! (Love has no season, why’s there gotta be a separate day for it, grumblegrumpexcuse.) Thanks for the response! We have three entries, and befitting the broad nature of modern-day IF, they are all in different forms: one in Twine, one in Inform, and one in text. They are below:
12 | TO: Graham Nelson; FROM: Rowan Lipkovits:
13 |
14 |
15 |
Valentines are hosted via Dropbox [ed: now hosted on the SPAG site], except [one] which is in sonnet form, and below:
16 |
Bravo to the scribes of Inform 7:
17 | like Prometheus’ theft of fire,
18 | such a gift could be sent down from heaven —
19 | advent crowed by troubadour and crier.
20 |
Thinking thoughts out loud is all one’s needing
21 | to create a universe uniquely
22 | yours — and all your furtive fruitful seeding
23 | blooms in others’ gamboling obliquely.
24 |
Now must I kowtow upon the floor. You
25 | gave us all the tools for work and playing
26 | freely and without a catch, therefore: to
27 | Mister Nelson’s crew, here’s much hooraying!
28 |
For a gift, you see, that keeps on giving;
29 | text adventures’ triage back to living.
30 |
Thanks everyone! We hope to see you again next Valentine’s Day, with even more author and developer love.
85 |
86 |
87 |
88 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/htdocs/archives/index-2011.html:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 |
2 | SPAG - Society for the Promotion of Adventure Games
Society for the Promotion of Adventure Games
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 | SPAG is an e-zine covering textual interactive fiction and other types of interactive narrative through reviews, interviews, and articles. It is published on a roughly quarterly basis. If you would like to automatically be notified when a new issue of SPAG is published, feel free to subscribe to our mailing list. The latest issue of SPAG is #60, published on April 25, 2011.
7 |
8 |
9 | SPAG was founded by G. Kevin "Whizzard" Wilson, and is currently edited by Dannii Willis. The SPAG website was designed by Felix Pleşoianu.
10 |
11 |
If you'd like to contribute to SPAG, thank you! Check the latest call for submissions for topics we are particularly interested in.
Hello! At long last, Issue 63 of SPAG is upon us, at quite a prolific time IF events-wise — the XYZZY Awards just opened first-round voting, and a new crop of quite good IF works are available via Spring Thing. We’ve been at this IF thing for over a decade; we’ve come a long way from a spate of IF content in October then nothing. May it continue to flourish.
2 |
First, a little disclaimer about this issue. As many of you know, I was an entrant in 2015’s comp with Laid Off from the Synesthesia Factory. 2015’s comp also saw an unusual amount of inter-author discussion and collaboration, and I’ve since come to consider many of my fellow entrants friends. Therefore, I’ve made the difficult decision that it would be a conflict of interest for SPAG to review the comp, as has been traditional in previous years. (To my knowledge, this situation has not previously come up for several years, if not a decade.)
3 |
That said! Spring Thing 2016 is now upon us, and CoI-free! Therefore, I’m soliciting reviews of Spring Thing entries, Back Garden and otherwise; as always, extra points for succinct and/or diversionary takes.
4 |
As always, I’m soliciting pitches as well! There’s no formal theme this time around, but always welcome are:
5 |
6 |
SPAG Specifics on stories of your choice. This issue features a Specifics entry on Slammed! by Paolo Chikiamco and Choice Of Games, but be more (Issue 64, for instance, will feature an entry on interactive film.) (To be clear, this includes IFcomp entries. Except maybe mine. Unless you really want to.)
7 |
Interviews and/or reviews of figures in the IF world and/or adjacent to it. I define this broadly; if you’re wondering whether someone counts, it can’t hurt to get in touch!
8 |
Live coverage, if you live in an area with a significant live interactive fiction presence. This can range from exhibits, to conference coverage, to performances.
9 |
Essays of any kind. The more unexpected, the better.
10 |
Basically anything you can think of will be considered!
11 |
12 |
As always, I welcome pitches by and about women, people of color, LGBT and otherwise underrepresented writers.
13 |
Send pitches to spag.mag.if@gmail.com. There’s no deadline, but I’d love to hear from you! ETA for Issue 64 is late summer to fall.
14 |
In addition, SPAG is also seeking an artist! This primarily entails cover art — you can see past examples in back issues — but if you have something else in mind, I’d love to hear from you about this as well.
15 |
(Payment for all of the above can be negotiated.)
16 |
Thanks for reading as always! I hope you enjoy this issue.
17 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/htdocs/archives/index-2006.html:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 | SPAG - Society for the Promotion of Adventure Games
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 | Society for the Promotion of Adventure
19 | Games
20 |
21 |
22 |
SPAG is an informative e-zine designed primarily to keep the
23 | gaming
24 | public aware of textual interactive fiction and other types of
25 | interactive
26 | narrative available today. Most of the space is devoted to reviews. A
27 | new edition of SPAG is published each quarter. Generally, you can
28 | expect a new issue in January, April, July, and
29 | October of each year. If you would like to automatically receive each
30 | new issue of SPAG in your email box shortly before it appears on this
31 | site, feel free to subscribe.
32 | The latest issue of SPAG is
33 | #46,
34 | published on October 17, 2006.
35 |
36 |
SPAG was founded by G. Kevin "Whizzard" Wilson, and is
37 | currently edited by Jimmy
38 | Maher. The SPAG website was designed by Felix Plesoianu.
The IF world, like most artistic fields, is seasonal, and as in music and (to an extent) film, August is a slower month, full of what David Rakoff called “the opposite of hanging out.” If fall and spring are full of new content, awards and the occasional conference or two, late summer is that in-between season, one that looks languid on the surface but conceals a lot of hard work. Dozens of authors, as you read this, are preparing competition entries for the September deadline, or solidifying commercial pitches, or — for those really ahead of schedule — getting their work playtested.
2 |
If you’re like me, you’re taking a lot of breaks from being hard at work for such edifying pursuits as playing Minesweeper ripoffs and looking at online auctions for swing coats. But if you’re not like me, you’re using that time to read Issue 64 of SPAG — one I’m especially proud of!
3 |
For Issue 64, we’re taking an especially broad view of interactive fiction and its connections, both obvious and not, to other fields. This issue features the dubious, beyond-spotty history of interactive film, the evolution of storytelling in hidden-object games, and the applications of parser games to artificial intelligence research. Of course, we’ve got plenty of more traditional coverage as well, including a Specifics entry on Caelyn Sandel’s episodic piece Bloom and an interview with Brendan Patrick Hennessy, whose Birdland flew away with an entire gaggle of XYZZY Awards, as well as other, less forcedly metaphorical praise.
4 |
After you’re done reading, perhaps you’d like to contribute to our next issue? Issue 65, like this one, has no formal theme (as we’ve seen, these things tend to come together organically), but as always, welcome are:
5 |
6 |
SPAG Specifics on stories of your choice. These are less traditional reviews and more in-depth critical pieces on how a particular piece does what it does.
7 |
Interviews and/or reviews of figures in the IF world and/or adjacent to it, defined broadly.
8 |
Live coverage, if you live in an area with a significant live interactive fiction presence. This can range from exhibitions to conference coverage to performances to whatever the world dreams up. (Free pitch idea: if you’re a reader in the Toronto area attending the 2016 Wordplay Festival in early November who is not me, I’d like to hear from you.)
9 |
Essays of any kind. The more unexpected, the better.
10 |
Basically anything you can think of related to interactive fiction will be considered!
11 |
12 |
As always, I welcome pitches by and about women, people of color, LGBT and otherwise underrepresented writers. Also: there is payment commensurate with standard online writing rates.
13 |
Send pitches to spag.mag.if@gmail.com. There’s no deadline, but I’d love to hear from you! In keeping with our rough quarterly schedule, Issue 65 will likely arrive around late fall or winter. (What this means for you: anything related to 2016’s competition entries is probably best suited to #66.)
14 |
Thanks for reading as ever! We hope you enjoy this issue, and send us the makings of another great one.
Call for Submissions for SPAG Issue #55 (Deadline: June 30, 2009)
76 |
77 |
Hi, folks...
78 |
79 |
The time has come to start putting together SPAG Issue #55. As usual, I am eager to receive original articles on just about any aspect of IF craft, theory, culture, or history, in-depth SPAG Specifics analyses of specific games, and even interviews with IF luminaries. In addition, good old reviews are also more than welcome. If you are having trouble choosing a title to review, here are some worthy suggestions:
80 |
81 | Dead Like Ants
82 | La Seine
83 | A Flustered Duck
84 | The Milk of Paradise
85 | Realm of Obsidian
86 | Vague
87 | Make It Good
88 | GDC: The Game
89 | Inside Woman
90 |
91 |
I'd like to have all submissions in by June 30, 2009, for publication very shortly thereafter. You can send your submissions to me at maher@grandecom.net in whatever format suits you best, or you can use the handy form on the home page of the SPAG website.
Welcome to SPAG, the Society for the Promotion of Adventure Games magazine. Founded in 1994 by G. Kevin Wilson, SPAG has been a pillar of the Interactive Fiction community for almost two decades, and we’re proud to still be doing our part for this vibrant art form.
20 |
Interactive Fiction (IF) is one of the oldest forms of computer entertainment, and every year pushes its boundaries further; although the first IF works were indeed games about adventurers, today most are not, and it makes much more sense to talk about IF stories or works rather than IF games. Instead what binds the community together is a love for words and a curiosity to explore interactivity in a way traditional genres cannot.
21 |
To get started with IF we recommend the People’s Republic of IF playlist, a list of award-winning IF stories, all of which can be played in your web browser. To find further stories, check out the Interactive Fiction Database. Many stories discussed in SPAG cannot be played online, so for them we recommend Gargoyle. To discuss the stories you’re playing, or the one you’re attempting to write yourself, visit the IF Community Forum.
22 |
Issues of SPAG are published on a roughly quarterly basis. Sixty issues of SPAG were published before the shift to this website. Find our older issues at the archives. In the past SPAG had a big focus on reviews, but as there are now many websites hosting reviews (such as the IFDB), we want to focus on articles that analyse and synthesise the ideas of the IF world. If you like the sound of that and would like to write for SPAG, please contact us, we’re always looking for more authors!
23 |
24 |
MASTHEAD (2016)
25 |
26 |
Editor-in-Chief: Katherine Morayati
27 |
Katherine Morayati is an IF author and critic; her credits include Broken Legs (second place, 2009 IF Competition) and a swath of other, smaller works and reviews. In her other life, she’s a music critic who writes as Katherine St. Asaph and helps run a mini-constellation of blogs.
28 |
Managing Editor: Matt Carey
29 |
Matt Carey is a longtime IF follower and the author of a number of acclaimed (pseudonymous) works, both parser and Twine; he’s also the former editor of the science-fiction zine Labyrinth Inhabitant.
30 |
Senior Editor/Webmaster: Dannii Willis
31 |
Dannii Willis is the previous editor of SPAG, the maintainer of Parchment and the developer of Kerkerkruip. He hopes to one day produce a work of IF himself, but for now his creativity is directed toward the ones and zeros of technology.
32 |
Artist: J. Robinson Wheeler
33 |
J. Robinson Wheeler is a freelance author, graphic designer and writer from Austin, Texas, and the author of IF works including Being Andrew Plotkin, Four in One and First Things First.
34 |
35 |
EDITORS EMERITUS
36 |
37 |
38 | G. Kevin Wilson, Magnus Olsson, Paul O'Brian, Jimmy Maher, David Monath.
39 |
Call for Submissions for SPAG Issue #58 (Deadline: May 21, 2010)
Hi, folks...
72 |
73 |
74 |
75 | The time has come to start pulling together content for the next issue
76 | of SPAG (http://www.sparknet.com/spag), and I could use your help.
77 |
78 |
79 |
80 | In particular, we have a whole lot of games to review from the Jay Is
81 | Games competition (http://jayisgames.com/cgdc7/) -- 30, to be exact.
82 | I'd like to put a team together to tackle these, as I've done with the
83 | big fall Comp the last couple of years. Therefore, if you are willing
84 | and able to review a handful of randomly assigned short, presumably
85 | casual text adventures, please let me know.
86 |
87 |
88 |
89 | And Raising the Flag on Mount Yo Momma, by Juhana Leinonen, needs a
90 | review. Reviews of other games, old or new, are of course also welcome,
91 | as are articles, interviews, and films (that sort of thing being
92 | popular in IF circles these days). Drop me a line if you have a
93 | proposal to discuss.
94 |
95 |
96 |
97 | The deadline for submissions is May 21, 2010.
98 |
99 |
100 |
101 | Thanks in advance,
102 |
103 | Jimmy
104 |
105 |
Yes, that’s right — your Valentines are finally* in! (Love has no season, why’s there gotta be a separate day for it, grumblegrumpexcuse.) Thanks for the response! We have three entries, and befitting the broad nature of modern-day IF, they are all in different forms: one in Twine, one in Inform, and one in text. They are below:
52 | TO: Graham Nelson; FROM: Rowan Lipkovits:
53 |
54 |
55 |
Valentines are hosted via Dropbox [ed: now hosted on the SPAG site], except [one] which is in sonnet form, and below:
56 |
Bravo to the scribes of Inform 7:
57 | like Prometheus’ theft of fire,
58 | such a gift could be sent down from heaven —
59 | advent crowed by troubadour and crier.
60 |
Thinking thoughts out loud is all one’s needing
61 | to create a universe uniquely
62 | yours — and all your furtive fruitful seeding
63 | blooms in others’ gamboling obliquely.
64 |
Now must I kowtow upon the floor. You
65 | gave us all the tools for work and playing
66 | freely and without a catch, therefore: to
67 | Mister Nelson’s crew, here’s much hooraying!
68 |
For a gift, you see, that keeps on giving;
69 | text adventures’ triage back to living.
70 |
Thanks everyone! We hope to see you again next Valentine’s Day, with even more author and developer love.
68 | E-mail the editor, Jimmy Maher
69 | or the SPAG Website maintainer,
70 | Joe DeRouen,
71 | with comments and questions.
72 |
73 |
74 |
75 |
Thank you for helping to keep text adventures alive!
76 |
77 |
78 |
79 |
80 |
81 |
82 |
83 |
90 |
91 |
92 |
93 |
94 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/massage.py:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1 | import sys
2 | import os, os.path
3 | import re
4 | import ftfy
5 |
6 | def scrape_file(bdat, filename):
7 | dat = guess_encoding(bdat)
8 | if filename in ('spag43.html', 'SPAG43'):
9 | dat = ftfy.fix_text(dat, unescape_html=False, uncurl_quotes=False, fix_line_breaks=True)
10 | dat = dat.replace('Ranma ˝', 'Ranma ½')
11 | dat = dat.replace('Muńz', 'Muñiz')
12 | dat = dat.replace('Muñz', 'Muñiz')
13 | else:
14 | dat = dat.replace('\r\n', '\n')
15 | return dat
16 |
17 | def guess_encoding(bdat):
18 | try:
19 | dat = bdat.decode('utf-8')
20 | #print('...utf-8')
21 | return dat
22 | except:
23 | pass
24 | try:
25 | dat = bdat.decode('windows-1252')
26 | #print('...windows-1252')
27 | return dat
28 | except:
29 | pass
30 | raise Exception('decoding failed')
31 |
32 | pat_ftpgmdhead = re.compile('ftp[:]?/+ftp.gmd.de[:]?/')
33 | pat_ftpprefix = re.compile('ftp.(gmd.de|ifarchive.org)[:]?[/]+')
34 | pat_ftpifhead = re.compile('ftp[:]?/+[a-z.]*ifarchive[.]org[:]?/')
35 | pat_altif = re.compile('/(mirror|www).ifarchive.org/')
36 | pat_ifdbhead = re.compile('http[s]?://ifdb.tads.org/')
37 | pat_sparkylink = re.compile('href="http://[a-z.]*sparkynet.com/spag/')
38 |
39 | footer = '''
40 |
47 | '''
48 |
49 | def massage_text(dat):
50 | dat = pat_ftpgmdhead.sub('https://ifarchive.org/', dat)
51 | dat = pat_ftpifhead.sub('https://ifarchive.org/', dat)
52 | dat = pat_ftpprefix.sub('https://ifarchive.org/', dat)
53 | dat = pat_altif.sub('/ifarchive.org/', dat)
54 | dat = dat.replace('http://ifarchive.org/', 'https://ifarchive.org/')
55 | dat = pat_ifdbhead.sub('https://ifdb.org/', dat)
56 | return dat
57 |
58 | def massage_html(dat):
59 | dat = dat.replace('', '')
60 | dat = dat.replace('', '')
61 | dat = dat.replace('', '')
62 | dat = dat.replace('', '')
63 | dat = pat_ftpgmdhead.sub('https://ifarchive.org/', dat)
64 | dat = pat_ftpifhead.sub('https://ifarchive.org/', dat)
65 | dat = pat_ftpprefix.sub('https://ifarchive.org/', dat)
66 | dat = pat_altif.sub('/ifarchive.org/', dat)
67 | dat = dat.replace('http://ifarchive.org/', 'https://ifarchive.org/')
68 | dat = pat_ifdbhead.sub('https://ifdb.org/', dat)
69 | dat = pat_sparkylink.sub('href="/archives/', dat)
70 | dat = dat.replace('
62 |
63 |
64 |
65 |
66 |
67 |
68 |
69 |
70 |
71 |
72 |
Call for Submissions for SPAG Issue #57 (Deadline: February 15, 2009)
Hi, folks...
73 |
74 | So, among my New Years Resolutions this year is a resolution to try
75 | like hell to return SPAG to a regular quarterly publication schedule.
76 | You can help me with that by sending some content that is so great I
77 | just can't bear to delay in publishing it. (Perhaps some longtime
78 | readers even have resolutions of their own to help out a bit more.
79 | Well, an editor can dream...)
80 |
81 | Reviews of any of the following would be hugely appreciated:
82 |
83 | Awakening
84 | Love is as Powerful as Death, Jealousy is as Cruel as the Grave
85 | The Lighthouse
86 | Shadow in the Cathedral
87 | Backup
88 | Walker and Silhouette
89 | Ghost Town
90 |
91 | Also welcome are reviews of any other IF, old or new, as well as more
92 | in-depth SPAG Specifics Analyses and feature articles on any aspect of
93 | IF experience, craft, history, or theory. The deadline for content
94 | will be February 15, with the issue following shortly.
95 |
96 | You can send those submissions straight to me at
97 | maher@filfre.net in any reasonably portable format you desire, or
98 | visit the SPAG website at http://www.sparkynet.com/spag and use the
99 | handy form. And if you have questions or wonder if a particular article
100 | idea is suitable, by all means drop me a line.
101 |
102 | Thanks in advance!
103 | Jimmy
104 |
Welcome to SPAG, the Society for the Promotion of Adventure Games.
6 | 7 |8 | SPAG was an Internet magazine dedicated to criticism, reviews, and the 9 | preservation and furthering of the art of Interactive Fiction. 10 | Founded in 1994, SPAG was a pillar of the IF community for more than 11 | two decades. 12 |
13 | 14 |15 | SPAG was founded by G. Kevin Wilson and published regularly through 16 | 2011 by Magnus Olsson, Paul O'Brian, Jimmy Maher, and David Monath. 17 | It was then revived from 2013 to 2016 by Dannii Willis, Matt Carey, 18 | and Katherine Morayati. Since 2016 it has been dormant. 19 |
20 | 21 |22 | As of 2025, the SPAG web site is maintained by the 23 | Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation. 24 | This site is no longer updated. 25 | Some links (to obsolete versions of 26 | IFDB and the 27 | IF Archive) 28 | have been modernized, but many other links are out of date and 29 | do not work. 30 |
31 | 32 |33 | If you have questions, please contact 34 |
37 | 38 |info@ifarchive.org35 | rather than any of the addresses listed in SPAG back issues. 36 |Most recent issues
39 | 40 | {% for issue in issues %} 41 | 42 |43 | 44 |
Issue {{ issue.showindex }}
46 | 47 |48 | {% for art in issue.articles %} 49 |-
50 | {% if art.author %}{{ art.author }}, {% endif %}
51 | {%- if art.quoted %}“{% endif -%}
52 |
53 | {%- autoescape false -%}
54 | {{ art.showtitle }}
55 | {%- endautoescape -%}
56 |
57 | {%- if art.quoted %}”{% endif -%}
58 | {% endfor %}
59 |
60 | 61 | {% endfor %} 62 | 63 |64 | 65 |
Older Issues (1-60)...
66 | 67 | {% endblock %} 68 | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- /articles/issue-61-5/spag-valentines: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 |Yes, that’s right — your Valentines are finally* in! (Love has no season, why’s there gotta be a separate day for it, grumblegrumpexcuse.) Thanks for the response! We have three entries, and befitting the broad nature of modern-day IF, they are all in different forms: one in Twine, one in Inform, and one in text. They are below:
2 |3 |-
4 | TO: Daniel Stelzer; FROM: Hanon Ondricek!
5 | [original dropbox link]
6 |
7 | -
8 | TO: Melvin Rangasamy; FROM: Andrew Schulz!
9 | [original dropbox link]
10 |
11 | -
12 | TO: Graham Nelson; FROM: Rowan Lipkovits:
13 |
14 |
15 |Valentines are hosted via Dropbox [ed: now hosted on the SPAG site], except [one] which is in sonnet form, and below:
16 | 30 |Thanks everyone! We hope to see you again next Valentine’s Day, with even more author and developer love.
31 |* Your editor is clearly the Gretchen Weiners in this scenario.
32 | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- /css/style.css: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 | 2 | body { 3 | background: #EEE; 4 | margin: 0px; 5 | font-family: "Open Sans", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; 6 | } 7 | 8 | #maincol { 9 | background: white; 10 | box-shadow: 0px 0px 8px #00000040; 11 | color: #333; 12 | max-width: 800px; 13 | box-sizing: border-box; 14 | margin: 0px auto; 15 | padding-left: 40px; 16 | padding-right: 40px; 17 | } 18 | 19 | #header { 20 | position: relative; 21 | width: 100%; 22 | padding-top: 40px; 23 | } 24 | 25 | #header .HeaderImage { 26 | width: 100%; 27 | border-radius: 3px; 28 | box-shadow: 0px 0px 4px #00000040; 29 | } 30 | 31 | #header #navbar { 32 | margin-top: 20px; 33 | margin-bottom: 40px; 34 | padding-top: 10px; 35 | padding-bottom: 10px; 36 | border-top: 1px solid #DDD; 37 | border-bottom: 1px solid #DDD; 38 | font-size: 80%; 39 | } 40 | 41 | #header .NavItem { 42 | display: inline-block; 43 | margin-left: 20px; 44 | margin-right: 20px; 45 | } 46 | 47 | #header .NavItem:first-child { 48 | margin-left: 0px; 49 | } 50 | 51 | .NavItem a { 52 | color: #555; 53 | } 54 | 55 | #footer { 56 | position: relative; 57 | width: 100%; 58 | border-top: 1px solid #DDD; 59 | padding-bottom: 20px; 60 | font-size: 80%; 61 | } 62 | 63 | h2 { 64 | font-size: 120%; 65 | } 66 | 67 | h3 { 68 | font-size: 100%; 69 | } 70 | 71 | .IssueList { 72 | list-style: none; 73 | padding-left: 20px; 74 | } 75 | 76 | .IssueContents { 77 | list-style: none; 78 | padding-left: 10px; 79 | } 80 | 81 | .IssueItem { 82 | font-weight: bold; 83 | margin-top: 10px; 84 | margin-bottom: 10px; 85 | } 86 | 87 | .IssueComments { 88 | margin-left: 2em; 89 | } 90 | 91 | .CommentHead { 92 | font-weight: bold; 93 | font-size: 90%; 94 | } 95 | 96 | .ArticleComments .CommentHead { 97 | margin-top: 2em; 98 | } 99 | 100 | .CommentDate { 101 | font-size: 80%; 102 | color: #888; 103 | } 104 | 105 | .CommentBody { 106 | font-size: 90%; 107 | } 108 | 109 | .DateLine { 110 | float: right; 111 | display: inline-block; 112 | font-size: 90%; 113 | } 114 | 115 | .ImageCaption { 116 | font-weight: bold; 117 | font-size: 85%; 118 | } 119 | 120 | .AboutAuthor { 121 | font-size: 90%; 122 | } 123 | 124 | hr { 125 | height: 1px; 126 | border: none; 127 | border-top: 1px solid #DDD; 128 | } 129 | 130 | a { 131 | color: #20759A; 132 | text-decoration: none; 133 | } 134 | 135 | a:hover { 136 | text-decoration: underline; 137 | } 138 | 139 | .Center { 140 | text-align: center; 141 | } 142 | 143 | .FloatRight { 144 | float: right; 145 | margin-left: 1em; 146 | } 147 | 148 | .FullWidthImage { 149 | max-width: 100%; 150 | } 151 | 152 | .CenterImage { 153 | max-width: 100%; 154 | object-fit: contain; 155 | } 156 | 157 | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- /htdocs/reviews/index.html: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |SPAG Review Index
32 | 33 |34 | This index covers issues 1 through 60. For the contents of issues 35 | 61-64, see the front page. 36 |
37 | 38 |39 | You can browse through SPAG game reviews by 40 | game author, 41 | reviewer, 42 | or game title (starting with): 43 |
44 | 45 |46 | A 47 | B 48 | C 49 | D 50 | E 51 | F 52 | G 53 | H 54 | I 55 | J 56 | K 57 | L 58 | M 59 | N 60 | O 61 | P 62 | Q 63 | R 64 | S 65 | T 66 | U 67 | V 68 | W 69 | X 70 | Y 71 | Z 72 |
73 | 74 | 75 |SPAG is maintained as a historical archive by the 78 | Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation. 79 | Pages are no longer updated and links may no longer work. 80 | All articles and reviews are copyright by their original authors. 81 |
82 | 83 |Society for the Promotion of Adventure Games
5 | 6 | SPAG is an e-zine covering textual interactive fiction and other types of interactive narrative through reviews, interviews, and articles. It is published on a roughly quarterly basis. If you would like to automatically be notified when a new issue of SPAG is published, feel free to subscribe to our mailing list. The latest issue of SPAG is #60, published on April 25, 2011.
7 | 8 |9 | SPAG was founded by G. Kevin "Whizzard" Wilson, and is currently edited by Dannii Willis. The SPAG website was designed by Felix Pleşoianu.
10 | 11 |If you'd like to contribute to SPAG, thank you! Check the latest call for submissions for topics we are particularly interested in.
15 |- Frequently Asked Questions
16 | - How to run adventure games
17 | - How to play adventure games
18 |
19 |20 |- Latest issue
21 | - Back issues
22 | - Review index
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26 |27 |- RSS feed for this site

28 |
29 |30 |- Call for Submissions for Issue #61
31 | - Outside links of interest
32 | - E-mail the editor
33 |
34 |SPAG is maintained as a historical archive by the 39 | Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation. 40 | Pages are no longer updated and links may no longer work. 41 | All articles and reviews are copyright by their original authors. 42 |
43 |Hello! At long last, Issue 63 of SPAG is upon us, at quite a prolific time IF events-wise — the XYZZY Awards just opened first-round voting, and a new crop of quite good IF works are available via Spring Thing. We’ve been at this IF thing for over a decade; we’ve come a long way from a spate of IF content in October then nothing. May it continue to flourish.
2 |First, a little disclaimer about this issue. As many of you know, I was an entrant in 2015’s comp with Laid Off from the Synesthesia Factory. 2015’s comp also saw an unusual amount of inter-author discussion and collaboration, and I’ve since come to consider many of my fellow entrants friends. Therefore, I’ve made the difficult decision that it would be a conflict of interest for SPAG to review the comp, as has been traditional in previous years. (To my knowledge, this situation has not previously come up for several years, if not a decade.)
3 |That said! Spring Thing 2016 is now upon us, and CoI-free! Therefore, I’m soliciting reviews of Spring Thing entries, Back Garden and otherwise; as always, extra points for succinct and/or diversionary takes.
4 |As always, I’m soliciting pitches as well! There’s no formal theme this time around, but always welcome are:
5 |6 |- SPAG Specifics on stories of your choice. This issue features a Specifics entry on Slammed! by Paolo Chikiamco and Choice Of Games, but be more (Issue 64, for instance, will feature an entry on interactive film.) (To be clear, this includes IFcomp entries. Except maybe mine. Unless you really want to.)
7 | - Interviews and/or reviews of figures in the IF world and/or adjacent to it. I define this broadly; if you’re wondering whether someone counts, it can’t hurt to get in touch!
8 | - Live coverage, if you live in an area with a significant live interactive fiction presence. This can range from exhibits, to conference coverage, to performances.
9 | - Essays of any kind. The more unexpected, the better.
10 | - Basically anything you can think of will be considered!
11 |
12 |As always, I welcome pitches by and about women, people of color, LGBT and otherwise underrepresented writers.
13 |Send pitches to spag.mag.if@gmail.com. There’s no deadline, but I’d love to hear from you! ETA for Issue 64 is late summer to fall.
14 |In addition, SPAG is also seeking an artist! This primarily entails cover art — you can see past examples in back issues — but if you have something else in mind, I’d love to hear from you about this as well.
15 |(Payment for all of the above can be negotiated.)
16 |Thanks for reading as always! I hope you enjoy this issue.
17 | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- /htdocs/archives/index-2006.html: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |
20 | 21 |17 | 18 | Society for the Promotion of Adventure 19 | Games
SPAG is an informative e-zine designed primarily to keep the 23 | gaming 24 | public aware of textual interactive fiction and other types of 25 | interactive 26 | narrative available today. Most of the space is devoted to reviews. A 27 | new edition of SPAG is published each quarter. Generally, you can 28 | expect a new issue in January, April, July, and 29 | October of each year. If you would like to automatically receive each 30 | new issue of SPAG in your email box shortly before it appears on this 31 | site, feel free to subscribe. 32 | The latest issue of SPAG is 33 | #46, 34 | published on October 17, 2006.
35 | 36 |SPAG was founded by G. Kevin "Whizzard" Wilson, and is 37 | currently edited by Jimmy 38 | Maher. The SPAG website was designed by Felix Plesoianu.
39 | 40 |44 | 45 |- Frequently Asked
46 | Questions
47 |
48 | - How to run Interactive
49 | Fiction
50 |
51 | - How to play
52 | Interactive Fiction
53 |
54 | - Demonstration of
55 | Interactive Fiction
56 |
57 |
58 | 59 |60 | 61 |- Play Interactive Fiction
62 | Online
63 |
64 | - Discussion
65 | Groups
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68 | 69 |70 | 71 |- Latest issue
72 |
73 | - Back issues
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75 | - Review index
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79 | - Subscribe
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82 | 83 |84 | 85 |- New release shelf
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87 | - Outside links of interest
88 |
89 | - E-mail
90 | the editor
91 |
92 |
93 | 94 |SPAG is maintained as a historical archive by the 101 | Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation. 102 | Pages are no longer updated and links may no longer work. 103 | All articles and reviews are copyright by their original authors. 104 |
105 |The IF world, like most artistic fields, is seasonal, and as in music and (to an extent) film, August is a slower month, full of what David Rakoff called “the opposite of hanging out.” If fall and spring are full of new content, awards and the occasional conference or two, late summer is that in-between season, one that looks languid on the surface but conceals a lot of hard work. Dozens of authors, as you read this, are preparing competition entries for the September deadline, or solidifying commercial pitches, or — for those really ahead of schedule — getting their work playtested.
2 |If you’re like me, you’re taking a lot of breaks from being hard at work for such edifying pursuits as playing Minesweeper ripoffs and looking at online auctions for swing coats. But if you’re not like me, you’re using that time to read Issue 64 of SPAG — one I’m especially proud of!
3 |For Issue 64, we’re taking an especially broad view of interactive fiction and its connections, both obvious and not, to other fields. This issue features the dubious, beyond-spotty history of interactive film, the evolution of storytelling in hidden-object games, and the applications of parser games to artificial intelligence research. Of course, we’ve got plenty of more traditional coverage as well, including a Specifics entry on Caelyn Sandel’s episodic piece Bloom and an interview with Brendan Patrick Hennessy, whose Birdland flew away with an entire gaggle of XYZZY Awards, as well as other, less forcedly metaphorical praise.
4 |After you’re done reading, perhaps you’d like to contribute to our next issue? Issue 65, like this one, has no formal theme (as we’ve seen, these things tend to come together organically), but as always, welcome are:
5 |6 |- SPAG Specifics on stories of your choice. These are less traditional reviews and more in-depth critical pieces on how a particular piece does what it does.
7 | - Interviews and/or reviews of figures in the IF world and/or adjacent to it, defined broadly.
8 | - Live coverage, if you live in an area with a significant live interactive fiction presence. This can range from exhibitions to conference coverage to performances to whatever the world dreams up. (Free pitch idea: if you’re a reader in the Toronto area attending the 2016 Wordplay Festival in early November who is not me, I’d like to hear from you.)
9 | - Essays of any kind. The more unexpected, the better.
10 | - Basically anything you can think of related to interactive fiction will be considered!
11 |
12 |As always, I welcome pitches by and about women, people of color, LGBT and otherwise underrepresented writers. Also: there is payment commensurate with standard online writing rates.
13 |Send pitches to spag.mag.if@gmail.com. There’s no deadline, but I’d love to hear from you! In keeping with our rough quarterly schedule, Issue 65 will likely arrive around late fall or winter. (What this means for you: anything related to 2016’s competition entries is probably best suited to #66.)
14 |Thanks for reading as ever! We hope you enjoy this issue, and send us the makings of another great one.
15 | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- /htdocs/archives/backissues/call55.html: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 |
69 |70 | 71 |
Call for Submissions for SPAG Issue #55 (Deadline: June 30, 2009)
76 | 77 |Hi, folks...
78 | 79 |The time has come to start putting together SPAG Issue #55. As usual, I am eager to receive original articles on just about any aspect of IF craft, theory, culture, or history, in-depth SPAG Specifics analyses of specific games, and even interviews with IF luminaries. In addition, good old reviews are also more than welcome. If you are having trouble choosing a title to review, here are some worthy suggestions:
80 | 81 | Dead Like Ants82 | La Seine
83 | A Flustered Duck
84 | The Milk of Paradise
85 | Realm of Obsidian
86 | Vague
87 | Make It Good
88 | GDC: The Game
89 | Inside Woman
90 | 91 |
I'd like to have all submissions in by June 30, 2009, for publication very shortly thereafter. You can send your submissions to me at maher@grandecom.net in whatever format suits you best, or you can use the handy form on the home page of the SPAG website.
92 | 93 | Thanks in advance,94 | Jimmy 95 | 96 |
SPAG is maintained as a historical archive by the 104 | Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation. 105 | Pages are no longer updated and links may no longer work. 106 | All articles and reviews are copyright by their original authors. 107 |
108 |About SPAG
6 | 7 |NOTE: This page describes SPAG as of its final issue. 8 | It has not been updated since 2016. Links may be out of date.
9 | 10 |11 | For more historical index pages, see: 12 | front page circa 2011; 13 | front page circa 2006; 14 | FAQ circa 2008 15 |
16 | 17 |18 | 19 |
Welcome to SPAG, the Society for the Promotion of Adventure Games magazine. Founded in 1994 by G. Kevin Wilson, SPAG has been a pillar of the Interactive Fiction community for almost two decades, and we’re proud to still be doing our part for this vibrant art form.
20 |Interactive Fiction (IF) is one of the oldest forms of computer entertainment, and every year pushes its boundaries further; although the first IF works were indeed games about adventurers, today most are not, and it makes much more sense to talk about IF stories or works rather than IF games. Instead what binds the community together is a love for words and a curiosity to explore interactivity in a way traditional genres cannot.
21 |To get started with IF we recommend the People’s Republic of IF playlist, a list of award-winning IF stories, all of which can be played in your web browser. To find further stories, check out the Interactive Fiction Database. Many stories discussed in SPAG cannot be played online, so for them we recommend Gargoyle. To discuss the stories you’re playing, or the one you’re attempting to write yourself, visit the IF Community Forum.
22 |Issues of SPAG are published on a roughly quarterly basis. Sixty issues of SPAG were published before the shift to this website. Find our older issues at the archives. In the past SPAG had a big focus on reviews, but as there are now many websites hosting reviews (such as the IFDB), we want to focus on articles that analyse and synthesise the ideas of the IF world. If you like the sound of that and would like to write for SPAG, please contact us, we’re always looking for more authors!
23 | 24 |MASTHEAD (2016)
25 | 26 |Editor-in-Chief: Katherine Morayati
27 |Katherine Morayati is an IF author and critic; her credits include Broken Legs (second place, 2009 IF Competition) and a swath of other, smaller works and reviews. In her other life, she’s a music critic who writes as Katherine St. Asaph and helps run a mini-constellation of blogs.
28 |Managing Editor: Matt Carey
29 |Matt Carey is a longtime IF follower and the author of a number of acclaimed (pseudonymous) works, both parser and Twine; he’s also the former editor of the science-fiction zine Labyrinth Inhabitant.
30 |Senior Editor/Webmaster: Dannii Willis
31 |Dannii Willis is the previous editor of SPAG, the maintainer of Parchment and the developer of Kerkerkruip. He hopes to one day produce a work of IF himself, but for now his creativity is directed toward the ones and zeros of technology.
32 |Artist: J. Robinson Wheeler
33 |J. Robinson Wheeler is a freelance author, graphic designer and writer from Austin, Texas, and the author of IF works including Being Andrew Plotkin, Four in One and First Things First.
34 | 35 |EDITORS EMERITUS
36 | 37 |38 | G. Kevin Wilson, Magnus Olsson, Paul O'Brian, Jimmy Maher, David Monath. 39 |
40 | 41 |ORIGINAL SITE DESIGNER
42 | 43 |44 | Felix Pleşoianu. 45 |
46 | 47 | {% endblock %} 48 | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- /htdocs/archives/backissues/call58.html: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 |
65 |66 | 67 |
Call for Submissions for SPAG Issue #58 (Deadline: May 21, 2010)
Hi, folks...72 | 73 |
74 | 75 | The time has come to start pulling together content for the next issue 76 | of SPAG (http://www.sparknet.com/spag), and I could use your help.
77 | 78 |
79 | 80 | In particular, we have a whole lot of games to review from the Jay Is 81 | Games competition (http://jayisgames.com/cgdc7/) -- 30, to be exact. 82 | I'd like to put a team together to tackle these, as I've done with the 83 | big fall Comp the last couple of years. Therefore, if you are willing 84 | and able to review a handful of randomly assigned short, presumably 85 | casual text adventures, please let me know.
86 | 87 |
88 | 89 | And Raising the Flag on Mount Yo Momma, by Juhana Leinonen, needs a 90 | review. Reviews of other games, old or new, are of course also welcome, 91 | as are articles, interviews, and films (that sort of thing being 92 | popular in IF circles these days). Drop me a line if you have a 93 | proposal to discuss.
94 | 95 |
96 | 97 | The deadline for submissions is May 21, 2010.
98 | 99 |
100 | 101 | Thanks in advance,
102 | 103 | Jimmy
104 | 105 |
SPAG is maintained as a historical archive by the 113 | Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation. 114 | Pages are no longer updated and links may no longer work. 115 | All articles and reviews are copyright by their original authors. 116 |
117 |Issue 61.5: 34 | SPAG Valentines!
35 | 36 | 37 |February 2, 2015
38 | 39 | 40 | 41 |Yes, that’s right — your Valentines are finally* in! (Love has no season, why’s there gotta be a separate day for it, grumblegrumpexcuse.) Thanks for the response! We have three entries, and befitting the broad nature of modern-day IF, they are all in different forms: one in Twine, one in Inform, and one in text. They are below:
42 |43 |-
44 | TO: Daniel Stelzer; FROM: Hanon Ondricek!
45 | [original dropbox link]
46 |
47 | -
48 | TO: Melvin Rangasamy; FROM: Andrew Schulz!
49 | [original dropbox link]
50 |
51 | -
52 | TO: Graham Nelson; FROM: Rowan Lipkovits:
53 |
54 |
55 |Valentines are hosted via Dropbox [ed: now hosted on the SPAG site], except [one] which is in sonnet form, and below:
56 | 70 |Thanks everyone! We hope to see you again next Valentine’s Day, with even more author and developer love.
71 |* Your editor is clearly the Gretchen Weiners in this scenario.
72 | 73 | 74 | 75 | 76 | 77 | 78 | 79 |SPAG is maintained as a historical archive by the 82 | Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation. 83 | Pages are no longer updated and links may no longer work. 84 | All articles and reviews are copyright by their original authors. 85 |
86 | 87 |88 | The text (but not images) of issue 61.5 is 89 | available under a 90 | CC BY-NC-ND license. 91 |
92 | 93 |15 |
16 |
19 | 20 |17 | Review index 18 |
Currently all issues have been indexed.
23 | 24 |25 | Click on the letter of the 26 | alphabet to see the reviews for games that begin with that letter. 27 |
28 |29 |
30 |
31 |
32 |
33 |
34 |
35 |
36 |
37 |
38 |
39 |
40 |
41 | 
44 |
45 |
46 |
47 |
48 |
49 |
50 |
51 |
52 |
53 |
54 |
55 |
56 |
57 | 58 |42 | 43 |
59 | 60 |
61 |- Reviews, Indexed by Author
62 | - Reviews, Indexed by Reviewer
63 |
64 | 65 |66 | 67 |
68 | E-mail the editor, Jimmy Maher 69 | or the SPAG Website maintainer, 70 | Joe DeRouen, 71 | with comments and questions. 72 | 73 |
74 | 75 |Thank you for helping to keep text adventures alive!
76 | 77 |SPAG is maintained as a historical archive by the 85 | Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation. 86 | Pages are no longer updated and links may no longer work. 87 | All articles and reviews are copyright by their original authors. 88 |
89 |SPAG is maintained as a historical archive by the 42 | Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation. 43 | Pages are no longer updated and links may no longer work. 44 | All articles and reviews are copyright by their original authors. 45 |
46 |