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Gothic Meter: Computer Analysis of Gothic, Horror, Science Fiction, and Dark Fantasy

March 1, 2021

If all this sounds familiar, you’re right! I’ve talked about this before, but there’s a crucial difference now. I’m giving you a chance to try it for yourself! Introducing Gothic Meter, a program that takes a text and not only tells you whether it falls within the wider Gothic sphere (Gothic, horror, dark fantasy, or science fiction), but also how and why.

This is an invaluable tool for an author, for reasons that will become evident in this post.

In a nutshell, Gothic Meter is a result of my academic-level familiarity with and knowledge of the Gothic. Everything I know about the Gothic, from the role of the supernatural to ambiguity, and from the sublime to the role of time, has found its use in this program.

Let’s see how; and let’s see why you should care.

gothic meter
Gothic Meter, among other things, helps us see how the elements contributing to a text evolve during the narrative
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A Modern Text Adventure Game: Mansion Escape v2, in Your Browser!

February 8, 2021

Yes, I’ve got some really important news! As a name, Mansion Escape might be familiar to you, if you’ve played its first iteration on Android. But I decided to take this to a whole new level. Mansion Escape is dead, long live Mansion Escape! A modern text adventure game, in the style of the early computer-game era, but updated for modern audiences, with attractive visuals, immersing sounds, and enhanced playability.

More importantly, this is no longer just an Android app. This is a game you can play in any modern browser, be it on mobile, desktop, PC, Mac, or Linux. You can save on your mobile and continue from your PC. Is that cool or what?

But what does a modern text adventure videogame include? What is it about? And where can you try it?

Read on to find out!

modern text adventure
What should a modern text adventure look like? Well, like Mansion Escape of course!
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BardBot, a Shakespearean Chatbot

December 28, 2020

Remember my Shakespearean sonnet mixer? I was thinking, wouldn’t it be great if we could actually talk to the Bard and have him respond in his unique way to our questions? Well, of course it would have been, but alas, he’s dead. The next best thing – aren’t I modest? – is this BardBot; a JavaScript Shakespearean chatbot that takes the user input and returns a relevant line from the Bard’s sonnets.

The program takes the last word provided and returns either a direct reference (if the word exists in the sonnets database) or a rhyme (if it doesn’t).

In fact, I attempted to use more than just the last word (and I may attempt again in the future), but I wasn’t happy with the result. But even in this basic implementation, the BardBot results are pretty funny!

bardbot
Would the Bard approve? Probably not, but who cares!
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