Chapter 3: Heidi: our first adv3Lite game

In this chapter we'll write our first adv3Lite game together.

Each of the three games in this tutorial is created step by step; you’ll get most benefit (especially to begin with) if you take an active part, typing in the source code on your computer. Our first game, described in this chapter and the two which follow, is borrowed directly from the "Inform Beginner's Guide" by Roger First and Sonja Kesserich. As they describe it, it tells this sentimental little story:

“Heidi lives in a tiny cottage deep in the forest. One sunny day, standing before the cottage, she hears the frenzied tweeting of a baby bird; its nest has fallen from the tall tree in the clearing! Heidi puts the bird into the nest, and then climbs the tree to place the nest back on its branch.”

It’s a very simple tale, but even so we’ll cover quite a lot of ground before we have a finished adv3Lite game. We’ll get there in stages, first making a very rough approximation of the story, and then successively refining the details until it’s good enough for an initial attempt (there’s time later for more advanced stuff).