When one opens the usual source for their gaming apps there seems to be a plethora of text-based gaming role-playing-games, beyond what we once were seeing. Is this simply due to the ease of making such games versus a visual game? Or is there actually a rise in the market for such game play? Has this then replaced the popularity of the choose-your-own-adventure book? Many questions, does anyone have the answers?
The following article on The Artifice could be a great source of history on text-based gaming: https://the-artifice.com/text-adventure-gaming-history/
– Misagh7 years ago
I think this is actually a super interesting topic, that I haven't seen anywhere near enough people write about. I think you're absolutely right that the ease of making a "visual novel"/text-based video game is remarkably easy, compared to some AAA titles we see coming out with big money and big assets behind them. We can see this over-abundance in this genre by looking up the tag "visual novel" on Steam and seeing the complete nightmare that is the "newest releases" section of that tag... However, one doesn't need to look far to see that there is a demand in the market. One of the biggest best games of the last year on Steam was the visual novel/horror mix game "Doki Doki Literature Club." Now, this game may have gained infamy because of the fact that youtubers played it cause it had good jump-scares and whatnot, but this is through and through a game that is 90% scrolling text and reading. And people loved it. This game would not have been noticed or made anywhere near as much of an impact if it weren't for the fact that the text and writing in the game was PHENOMENAL. And people recognized this! Then there are other recent releases like Undertale and Persona, whom have heavy JRPG elements attached to them, but have hours of cut-scenes and text to delve into as a player. This market has always been around, with releases such as the Fate games, the Ace Attorney franchise, and Danganronpa to name a few, but the popularity is rising by the day. Especially as we begin mixing genres and incorporating large blocks of genuinely engaging text more and more into our "normal" games! It's a very exciting time to be engaging with visual novels and text-based games! :) Er... sorry this note got so long. I hope it was at least kind of helpful! Good luck working on this topic, I look forward to reading about it! :) PS: You should absolutely check out "Valhalla" on steam. It's a visual novel about working at a bar in a cyberpunk dystopian future. It's a MUST play! – BioLizard7 years ago
What really helps with the rise of text based games, at least based on my casual research, is the amount of time people have to play games anymore. Even with few graphics, text-based gaming allows for more freedom with which to play a game. It is obviously usually pretty story driven, but gives the player something more to do than simply read something. Even the thought of ebooks helps lend to this. People enjoy interaction, and text-based gaming is a simple enough interaction that helps even the most casual gamer find the time to play a game throughout their busy schedules. – VideoGameProf7 years ago