text adventure

Welcome to WRITER’S QUEST!  
You are in a writer’s room. Exits are north and east.  The door leading north has “This Way to Fame, Fortune, and Free Beer!” painted over it.
There is a chair here.  

>inventory

You have a Hazy Idea for a story.
You have a Muse.
You have an Inner Editor.

>go n

You can’t go that way.

>what

I don’t know how to what.

>look chair

It’s just a chair. It doesn’t look very comfy.

>look muse

Your Muse waves at you.

>look editor

The Inner Editor glares at you and mutters.
Your Muse is trying to say something.

>listen muse

You can’t hear over the Inner Editor talking.  (It has some things to say about the implausibility of your Hazy Idea.)

> gag inner editor

You gag the little anthropomorphic personification. It glares at you and sulks.

>listen muse

Your Muse says, “Great! I can see where you’re going with this, only it needs something else here, and I have the perfect idea!”
It continues to talk at you.
Your Hazy Idea is getting clearer.
There is a chair here.

>go e

You are in a library. A bookshelf is against the south wall. 
There is a table against the north wall. Exits are west.
Your Hazy Idea is getting clearer.

>look table

There is a map on the table.
There is a flashlight on the table.

>take map

>take flashlight

You take the road map and flashlight. Congratulations! Now you can find your own ass.

>jerkwad

I don’t know how to jerkwad.

>look shelf

It is full of books.  You are likely to get distracted.
Do you wish to do research? Y/N

>y

You read your way through several books. Your Muse makes margin notes and, you suspect, writes some of the notes just before you get to them.
Your Hazy Idea is now a Clear Idea for a story.

>research

Your Clear Idea is now a Complete Outline.

>research

Any more and it’ll start to hurt.

>go w

There is a chair here.

>inventory

You have: a Complete Outline, a Muse, an Inner Editor, a Map, a Flashlight, and Your Ass.

>help

There is a chair here. 

>put ass in chair

You sit down in the chair, ready to write.

>write

Your Complete Outline becomes a Partial Manuscript!
You have gone up a level!

>write

Your manuscript looks healthier.

>write

>write

>write

Your manuscript looks almost finished!

>write, dammit

You have a Finished Manuscript!  A beam of light shines from above, a chorus of ethereal voices sing your acclaim, and the door to the north opens!

>go n

You take the manuscript and head north.
You are in a bright, sunny room. There is a table with snacks. Exits are N and S.
There is a Critique Group here. 

>go n

The Critique Group is blocking your way.

>eat snacks

The Critique Group stops you. “No snacks unless we get a manuscript.”

>give manuscript to group

The Critique Group examines your manuscript, then bursts into mass cacophony. Yelling about “flat characters” and “implausible setting,” the group tears your manuscript to pieces and leaves nothing but a Harsh But Insightful Critique in its place. “It’s got promise,” they say as they wander off. “But it really needs work.”
You take 99 points of ego damage!
Your manuscript is in shreds!
Continue? Y/N
Continue? Y/N
Continue? Y/N

>y

You have leveled up!

>wtf

You have received a harsh but insightful critique! You have chosen to continue! You have leveled up!

>ok whatever

Thought you’d feel that way.

>eat snacks

They’re tasty, but strangely unfulfilling.

>look crit

It’s got a lot of good points. In fact, it seems to catch all the stuff you were worried about when you wrote it. Some of it sounds like your Inner Editor.
As you read the crit, the door to the north swings open.

>go n

You go north.
You are in a small, cramped room. Dim light filters through cracks in the ceiling. 
There is a Revision here. It snarls and grins at you, sharpening its claws.

>ohshit

It doesn’t seem to be attacking you.

>cower

The Revision stays put.

>clean house

Your house gets marginally cleaner.
The Revision gets bigger.

>blog

You post to the Internet about your plight. 
The Revision gets bigger.

>wax furniture

The Revision gets bigger.

>wax cat

The Revision gets bigger. And uglier.

>write long involved joke about the writing process in the format of an infocom text adventure

Let’s not be silly now.

>attack revision

You attack the Revision! It immediately looks smaller — not nearly so bad as you thought.  It’s still pretty bad, though.
The Revision defends with Your Beautiful Deathless Prose. Your attack slides off and does no damage.

>attack revision again

But you spent so much time on that manuscript!  You can’t possibly change it!
Your Inner Editor is trying to say something.
Your Muse is trying to say something.

>listen muse

Your Muse shrugs. “Heck if I know,” it says. “I kinda liked how that turned out.  But I have a new and better idea. Want it?”
Take idea Y/N?

>y

You have a Hazy Idea for a story. Begin game from start Y/N?

>nnnnnn

Your Muse shrugs and goes back to knitting and juggling at the same time.  Muses are weird that way. 
Your Inner Editor is trying to say something.

>listen editor

You gagged it, remember?

>take off gag

Your Inner Editor glares at you.  “It took you this long?  Let me handle this.”

>attack prose with editor

Your Inner Editor rolls its eyes at your atrocious grammar, but it attacks.  
The Revision defends with Your Beautiful Deathless Prose.  It fails!  
The Revision takes damage!
The Revision defends with Plot Convolutions and Unnecessary But Beloved Characters.

>wtf

We don’t know.  You’re the one that put them into the story to begin with.

>attack revision with crit

You attack the revision with the insights from your critique.  It’s effective, but the Revision is still healthy.
Your Muse gives you a handful of Rice Krispies, a history of Antarctic exploration, two balls of yarn, and a teacup.

>use that shit

You make the Rice Krispies, the history, and the yarn into a Plot Patch. You put the teacup in your bag. It adheres to the Hazy Idea.

>attack revision with patch

The patch bypasses the Plot Convolutions and severs them from the story.  The Unnecessary But Beloved Characters wither away.  Your Muse puts a few of them in your inventory, and they curl up in the teacup.
The Revision defends with Last-Minute Problems and Fear of Failure!

>revise dammit

The Revision cowers and falls to pieces.  The wall behind the Revision crumbles, and you stand blinking in the light of day, with a completed story in your hand. 

Congratulations! You’re a writer! Would you like to play our sequel, PUBLICATION QUEST?

>aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

Yes, that’s the usual response at this point.