Actually Aprone simply relying on screen readers to read windows is a rather good idea sinse it's not based on direct output, which is th thing Hal has issues with (one reason I use sapi a lot).

For other ideas though the chaps over at 7-128 have setup a site with various things including coding examples about screen reader support and audio games which can be found Here on the blind computergamessite

This is actually very much what it was made for, to help programmers include support and access in games.

No my idea wasn't involving either frames or tabs (for one thing, tabs tend to get on my whick though this is purely personal rather than any sort of screen reader related thing).

I was simply thinking of automating another common functio in gamebooks into the program's creation process, namely creating a choice on a page which goes to a second page with only a single back link to the first page.

like the bac to start thing, this is a fairly common situation I tend to come across in gamebooks, but one which at the moment requires a deel of tooing and froing to create in terms of coppying pages and moving back and forth.

There are afterall Various situations in a gamebook where you will have a page with many links to single pages leading back to the main page, for instance a contents pae with several articals about the bacground of the world, or a shop with pages describing each item for sale.

This is all I'm suggesting, a single keystrroke to provide a choice leading to one page with a back to previous page choice.

I hope this makes sense.

Btw, I've jus written up my first multiple page conversation with multiple page choices, ---- yee gods it's amazing how much these things gro once you start!

Hi,

I've been following the thread with interest, but I don't think I'm creative enough to make a gamebook, I struggle for ideas.

Anyway, you could probably use cookies for your Javascript stats.  A quick script call in the header could set up "set" and "get" cookie functions.  you could write javascript mid-page, using a "get" then an "if" to check the value of a cookie, I don't see why that wouldn't work.

There's a very easy-to-follow tutorial on JavaScript and cookies at Elated.com here

Hope that's an idea!  I don't know where you'd draw the line between story and RPG.  There are script libraries to do all sorts of things and the appeal  of not having to host your game on a site requiring PHP or whatever is interesting.

Ah thanks, that will be useful, also the stability thing is always welcome sinse I did run into a runtime error today (though not sure what triggered it), though the program kept running.

Yes, Grues are cool! while I'm not a huge fan of the gameplay in original zork, I love! the idea of the grue, one might have even got into this rather weerd gamebook of mine too.

Anyhow, I've only got one more objective to right then I can be on to the final few obstacles and the last dramatic battle.

Sounds like your not hitting right arrow on the choice to go to the next section and right it.

Also, note that you don't have to look up numeric codes and muck about anymore, now you can just press shift enter on  section to open the text file to write in.

So the process now goes:

1: press shift enter to open the text file and write your intro.

2: press pluss to create a choice and give it the name you want to appear in that text such as "open left door" or "fight the horrible troll"  (you hit delete on a choice to rename it).

3: press right arrow on the choice you want to write a section for and you'll be taken to a blank section (you can use the up and down arrows to scroll betwene choices in a given section as well).

4: hit backspace to write a section summary, (quite optional though I've found it handy as a memory aide), then hit shift enter to open the text file of the new section to write in.

Rince and repeat.

The basic principle is that you have sections linked by choices. Each new choice creates a new section to right in and pressing right or left arrow will go through the sections.

There are a couple of special commands, like ctrl c to copy a section and create a choice going to that section, and ctrl s  to create a "back to start" choice which goes back to your intro section.

Hth.

Hayden, while you're in the introduction section press the backspace key and it will let you rename it to whatever you'd prefer.  I was going to make an audio walkthrough of the program, but I forgot.  It seems like most people's questions are being answered pretty well now though, so it might not be all that useful to hear me chatter on about how the program works lol.  If you guys would still like me to make one, just let me know and I will. 

I'm ok also. Working on this game book, just adding sections as I feel, and not knowing where the gamebook will be going.

i'm afraid I haven't been keeping track of version numbers, but the latest version seems fne over here (I just downoaded it again), so if you haven't already got the latest you could ry that.

hi,

i'm running Xp (Sp3) with JAWS 11 (though the same things happen with no screen reader loaded). 

I extracted the archive - my folder has an output folder, 6 dll's, 2 executables, 4 txt's, a wav and a tlb making a total of 14 files. 3 of the text files came from running the program.

Aprone,

Thanks, that's sorted it. Every other app works fine with SAPI on my system, but I do have a huge voice loaded so if I changed to a smaller one it may work better.  I'll just tweak JAWS to read the info as it changes in the title bar and  that should make things much quicker than SAPI for me.

Cheers!

Hmmm, i'm running scansoft daniel over here which is pretty big, and I'm also on xp, ---- most odd.

Ick, my internet was down for a couple days, so I couldn't respond sooner.

Yeah, my sollution for saving stats was cookies. I've had issues with overloading cookies when I've tried to use them forRPGs in the past, so I haven't sorted out exactly how I'd want to use them yet.
I might write something that tries to be versatile and put it up for use if anyone wants it. For handling stats and such. Could expand it more if it turns out useful.
(Of course, if you've already got this under control, don't mind me. ^^)

Hm, don't have time right now to do much, but I do have the basics thrown into a .js file. Includes methods for reading/writing cookies, writing to layers, and Filesystem IO (though I doubt that will be necessary) (I didn't edit either of those much myself), and then an ArrayList class and some methods for adding/setting stats and random numbers. Trying to work out a good method for scripting comparisons that is simple. Hmm.

Eh, here's the script file; I'll probably update this link as I work on it:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/16520690/rpgscript.js