Counterfeit Monkey

Counterfeit Monkey
Developer: Emily Short Platform: Glulx Released internationally: December 31, 2012 This game has unused areas. This game has unused code. This game has a hidden developer message. This game has unused text.

Counterfeit Monkey is a linguistics-focused work of interactive fiction revolving around using tools to transform words into new objects.

Unused Areas

Act 1

[The Postcard Stalls are north of the Park Center, east of the Food Corner, and west of Outdoor Cafe. The description is "It is astonishing how exactly alike all postcard vendors are. It is the usual thing: white wire racks with pictures of the harbor, the city walls, the ancient fortifications."

Rule for listing exits when looking in Postcard Stalls: do nothing.

]

[Northwest of the Park Center is the Food Corner.

The description of the Food Corner is "In this corner of the park, a sausage stand has been set up. This is partly for the benefit of the people enjoying the park and partly for the patrons of the cinema to the north, which has no food counter of its own."

The sausage stand is scenery in Food Corner. The initial appearance is "An ingenious invention able to keep several dozen Italian sausages, bratwurst, and Kosher hot dogs simultaneously at the ideal heat for serving."

The sausage-seller is a man in Food Corner. The description of the sausage-seller is "He looks suspicious [--] I mean, he looks as though he suspects us of something. It's true that I passed him earlier a few times when I came up here to stash my things before our operation. I even contemplated buying a Kosher hot dog from him, and changed my mind at the last minute because I was afraid of missing our appointment.

But since I was a tall blond male at the time, I don't think he can remember the incident." Understand "sausage" or "seller" or "man" as the sausage-seller.]

Two different areas, the Postcard Stalls and Food Corner. They were intended to connect to the Church Forecourt, too:

The Church Forecourt is [south of Food Corner,] northwest of Fair, west of Park Center, [southwest of Postcard Stalls,] and north of Midway. The Monumental Staircase is east of Park Center and north of Heritage Corner [and south of Outdoor Cafe]. Fair is southwest of Monumental Staircase. [Postcard Stalls is northwest of Monumental Staircase.]

[The Questionable Chinese Restaurant is southeast of the Bus Station. The description is "Thanks to the limitations of space, the kitchen is actually kept in the basement, down a steep flight of stairs."

The steep flight of stairs is a backdrop. It is in the Restaurant Kitchen and the Questionable Chinese Restaurant. Instead of entering or climbing steep flight of stairs in the Restaurant Kitchen: try going up. Instead of entering or climbing steep flight of stairs in Questionable Chinese Restaurant: try going down.

The Restaurant Kitchen is below Questionable Chinese Restaurant. The Restaurant Kitchen is a kitchen.

The Two-Star Hotel is north of the Bus Station. The description is "This is a very different place from the Fleur D'Or, and different, too, from your backpacking hostel. There is a carpet, which is clean but old. The lobby features a single sofa, which has thin cushions and does not promise comfort or luxury. The front desk is veneered in fake walnut. It is unmanned."

Some carpet is in the Two-Star Hotel. It is scenery. The description is "It is deep red, a color likely chosen for its capacity to hide stains, and there is a pattern on it of tiny grey diamonds, so that it looks rather as though someone's tie had been made the basis of an entire room design."

A hotel sofa is an enterable supporter in the Two-Star hotel. It is scenery. The initial appearance is "No one has to sit there at the moment, which is the key point."

The front desk is a scenery supporter in the Two-Star hotel. The description of the front desk is "No one is sitting there now; but this entire time of year must be a bit of a slump for the hotel, since there is not a busy tourist trade running through on its way to buses out of town."

Rule for listing exits while in Two-Star hotel: say "To the east, through an archway in which an ineffective curtain hangs, is the room by which the hotel actually makes the majority of its easy money: there it rents out luggage-storage space to persons using the bus station."

The ineffective curtain is east of Two-Star Hotel. The Luggage Consignment is east of the ineffective curtain. The ineffective curtain is a door. It is open and not openable. It is scenery. The description is "Printed with a print of moon and stars." ]

Various unused areas placed in the Roundabout Access part: the Questionable Chinese Restaurant, Restaurant Kitchen, and Two-Star Hotel. The Luggage Consignment mentioned does not have any other references, nor does the Bus Station. However, there are two references to a bus station in the final game's Guidebook to Anglophone Atlantis: "The island is not overprovided with public toilets, but there is a building near the bus station." and "The book is forthright about the absence of public transportation, and recommends that visitors bent on vehicular travel should bring their own cars, since none are available locally for rent. A bus station with long-distance service cross-island to the town of Maiana can be found near Monument Green, though routes are not always served on holidays."

Unused Code

Act 1

[After going northeast from the Back Alley for the first time: let N be the number of entries in the path so far of the player; if N is greater than 1: say "[path-walked so far]"; otherwise: clear the path-walked for the player; say "After the relative quiet and shelter, it's a bit shocking moving out into the open: suddenly there is sunlight, and crowds, and a wide open space, and seeing it all through your/our eyes instead of my own, I feel dizzy again."; continue the action. ]

Code for the tutorial section. This line of dialogue does not exist in the final game.

[The worst is over. The operation was a success: we are now one person, unrecognizable. If you're a little disoriented at the moment, that is no surprise. I feel a little sick myself.

Fortunately, we prepared for this eventuality. Before the change, that is. We should have everything we need to leave the country.

Me, I've been wandering around a bit aimlessly, waiting for you to come to. Here, I'll let you get your bearings...]

What seems to be an alternate version of the initial opening dialogue, considering its placement.

[The teach thinking rule is listed before the teach meta-features rule in the instructional rules.] An unused line of code determining the order of two rules.

[Before printing the name of a direction (called way) while listing exits: if the player is in Park Center, say "[room way from the location] to the "

Procedural rule when listing exits: if the location is Park Center, ignore the append room names rule.

Rule for listing exits when looking in Park Center: do nothing instead. ]

Code for handling exits in Park Center.

[[And now we need to special-case these, because otherwise they will fall on the ground. In general we want letter-conversion to move things that are part of other things, but here it's funnier and also more persuasive if the changed items stay part of the fountain.] To gel-convert (item - hoses): now everything which proffers the item is part of the marble fountain; now the item is in the repository; [play the sound of gel splort;] say "[The item] [become] [a list of things which proffer the item], redecorating the fountain."; repeat with secondary running through things which proffer the item: abide by the dangerous construction rules for the secondary.

To gel-convert (item - hoe): now everything which proffers the item is part of the marble fountain; now the item is in the repository; [play the sound of gel splort;] say "[The item] [become] [a list of things which proffer the item], redecorating the fountain."; repeat with secondary running through things which proffer the item: abide by the dangerous construction rules for the secondary.]

Early code for handling the ability to transform the hoses into different items so they will stay as part of the fountain.

[Some spectators are a person in the Midway. They are scenery. The description is "They wander and hover and point and gawk and then move on." Understand "crowd" or "players" or "people" as the spectators. ]

Spectators intended for the Midway.

[Some salespeople are an alert person in Church Forecourt. The description is "They are all male, somewhat scruffily dressed in bright-colored clothing. This is amateur hour: the real smugglers and counterfeiters and inventors, the [i]pidgitiers[/i], work down by the docks, or in concealed places around town; when you see them out of doors they are always respectable, and their wares are proof against authentication scopes." The initial appearance is "Several enterprising salespeople have set out [blankets] on the sidewalk and are hawking wares almost guaranteed to be linguistic counterfeits." [The introduction is "The salespeople are particularly daring because they are only a few hundred feet from the front door of the Rotunda. Nonetheless, no one has the right to arrest these characters except a special branch of the police, the black-caped Authenticators. The Authenticators ride around the city [--] slowly [--] on horseback. Notably, they never speed up enough to outpace the lookouts."]

Report the salespeople saying hello to the player: say "[one of]'Buy a nice [random thing which is on the blankets]?' wheedles one of the salespeople. I fix them with a practiced cold stare.[or]'Bargains,' says one of the salespeople in a dull voice.[or][one of]The salespeople, recognizing us again, do not bother with another sales pitch.[or]There is a perfunctory nod from the salespeople.[or]The salespeople acknowledge us with a small nod.[at random][stopping]" instead.

The blankets are a supporter in the Market. The description is "Synthetic fleece, grubby from being spread on many sidewalks." Understand "blanket" or "cloth" as the blankets. The scent-description is "hot polyester".

Instead of putting something on the blankets: try the salespeople discussing warning about blankets.

Instead of buying something which is on the blankets: say "[The noun] [are] certainly fake."

On the blankets is a watch. The description of the watch is "A valuable watch with diamonds set in the face and a chunky metal band."

Instead of taking the watch when the watch is not handled and the watch is on the blankets: say "Dubious though it is, the watch is being offered for sale: the salespeople would hardly permit us to walk off with it."

Rule for disclosing contents of the blankets: say "Laid out on the blankets carefully as though precious merchandise [is-are a list of mentionable things on the blankets]. " ]

Unused interactions for a set of buyable objects in the Church Forecourt.

[say "None of these are any use just now."]

An alternate veto for trying to take an item out of the girl's pack. In the final game, it says "The girl may be a bit foolish, but she doesn't deserve to be robbed on the first day of her trip."

[Instead of taking the postcards, say "Buying souvenirs is not the current objective."]

Related to the unused Postcard Stalls area.

[Instead of going to Old City Walls when the backpack is not handled: say high-street refusal instead.

Instead of approaching Old City Walls when the backpack is not handled: say high-street refusal instead.]

[ Instead of going to Monumental Staircase when the backpack is not handled: say high-street refusal.

Instead of approaching Monumental Staircase when the backpack is not handled: say high-street refusal.]

[ Instead of going to Monumental Staircase when the secret-plans are not handled: say plans-search refusal.

Instead of approaching Monumental Staircase when the secret-plans are not handled: say plans-search refusal. ]

"high-street refusal" is the text where you are asked not to leave the theater before collecting your belongings.

[Before printing the name of a direction (called way) when in Roundabout: if looking, say "[room way from the location] to the " ]

[Procedural rule when listing exits: if the location is Roundabout, ignore the append room names rule.]

Room name handling for the Roundabout.

[Rule for deciding the concealed possessions of the farmer: if buying something from someone, no; yes.]

[A description-concealing rule: now every thing which is carried by the farmer is not marked for listing.]

Code for handling buying items from the farmer.

Sanity-check doing something other than acting fast during parental appearance: [I don't know how this worked in 6G60, or what changed. Now the behavior at least matches that version.] [let through all actions if the allow-action flag is true]

Commentary related to an Inform update.

[Instead of facing northeast in Webster Court: say "[We] could go that way around behind my parents' house and enjoy their garden. They " ]

Unused code as part of the direction handling in Webster Court.

[Every turn when the player carries the dirt: move the dirt to the location; say "The dirt is more than we can contain, and spills out onto the ground instead." ]

Code for carrying the dirt near the farmer's stall.

[Instead of looking in Roget Close when Private Beach is visited and lexicon-tick is 0: do nothing instead.]

Developer Comments

The code is full of comments by Short herself, annotating various lines of code, the intent behind certain puzzles, and bits of backstory unseen in the final game. Any text enclosed in brackets is a comment, and some regular code is added for context.

Act 1

[Because the temporary barrier is the first real puzzle the player faces, it is especially important to handle all attempts at interaction as clearly as possible. In addition, the point of the puzzle is to figure out how to get the code, not to make the player do fiddly things -- so anything that could reasonably be construed as an attempt to use the code once it's been discovered should be redirected towards opening.]

[Turn off tutorial mode if you've already done it...]

[The fountain itself is similar to one in a plaza in Carcassonne. The horses-to-hoses business was a late-game addition, thanks to Jim Munroe trying to amuse the children.]

[* I wanted to give the sense in the first portion of the game that Alex and Andra are really disoriented by what has happened to them. Some of their sensations are borrowed from what it's like to have a migraine on a hot, sunny day amid a crowd: everything is simply too present to endure, and smells and noises become distinct and offensive even if normally they'd be quite pleasant.]

In-direction of Heritage Corner is east. [Into the hostel] In-direction of Cinema Lobby is west. [Into screening room] Out-direction of Cinema Lobby is south. [To church forecourt] Out-direction of Screening Room is east. [Back to cinema lobby] In-direction of the hostel is up. [Into the dormitory] Out-direction of the hostel is west. [Back out to Heritage Corner] In-direction of Church Garden is east. [Back into the church] In-direction of Roundabout is inside. [In from the roundabout is the traffic circle] In-direction of Old City Walls is east. [Into the old hexagonal turret] Out-direction of Old Hexagonal Turret is west. [Back to old city walls] In-direction of Webster Court is north. [Into my parent's house] In-direction of Roget Close is north. [Through the spinner gate] Out-direction of Winding Footpath is south. [Through the spinner gate]

[ The projection booth is here chiefly for easter egg purposes: if the player (much later on) manages to create the abstract LEER, run it through the mirror, and bring the resulting REEL back to the projection booth, the result is this curious movie -- an achievement reward. ]

[The reel here is a little bit like the tale, in that it produces a partially randomized story. This time, however, instead of going for a plot, we juxtapose a series of unexplained images and leave it up to the reader to try to imagine a connection between them -- a fires in the desert approach a la Wilmot's End, to borrow the language of Echo Bazaar.

The intention is to suggest an encounter with a slightly inexplicable film that deals with emotional reactions towards the Atlantean threat and all that goes with it.

The filmmaker is Lucius Quagmire, whose manifesto can also be found in the Aquarium Bookstore by the determined searcher.]

now the projector-switch is switched off. [if we go away for a while and come back, we'll find that the story has progressed in our absence]

if N is 3: [conclusion] say "[on screen] [climactic event].

[We want to be set up by the girl's prior complaint, but we don't want the attendant to seem to come in response to said complaint.]

[Something I wanted to do was try to break down the sense that NPCs are attached to single locations and never move around or interact with one another. On the other hand, scenes where NPCs move freely or converse in groups are harder to engineer, so I wanted to be sparing with those. So there are assorted intermediate effects where we get a little 'fake' interaction, a one-turn-only moment where one NPC addresses another or a character moves around.]

[Andra's backstory was based in the idea that she was an extraordinarily good speller, and I imagined a whole history for her, in which she had been a homeschooled spelling champion who ran away from home when she was disappointed by her parents' reaction to her coming in second place nationally. Slango had seen her on television and so when he recognized her on a street, he picked her up and inducted her into his smuggling gang.

There wasn't room to tell that whole story in Counterfeit Monkey, and eventually I spun that story off as Bee, a Varytale novella which takes place in more or less the real world.

Nonetheless, Andra retains some pointers to that history.]

[We need these variables to keep track of the smuggled plans across several transformations, in particular when synthesized with other items, in order to print (really the smuggled plans in disguise) after the correct object in the inventory.]

[Understand "window" or "windows" or "inscription" as the model when the model is the prior named object.]

now the statue of Noah Webster is not marked for listing. [after its first introduction it becomes scenery, since it's not really interactive and we want to emphasize other things]

[Because we need to stop you so that you can see the scene with Dad if you were otherwise just going to be passing through:]

unless final destination is Webster Court: now approach-destination is Winding Footpath; [Tricks the approaching verb into stopping here even if you're trying to reach someplace really far away.]

[Because it requires several levels of examination, it's likely that many players will miss the gum entirely -- which is fine, because there are several other, more prominent solutions to the spinner puzzle. The aim here is to provide a reward to people whose first instinct is deep rather than broad exploration when they're faced with a new puzzle.

Once they *have* seen the gum, it becomes more prominently visible in the room description to hint that they could interact with it if they want.]

[The shrine is an easter egg to begin with; but easter eggs are the most fun if they are toys as well. The shrine offers the opportunity for some expressive play, as the player can try inserting different items. Mostly it's up to the player to roll his own meanings for this, but there are special responses for a few of the most pointed donations.]

[holding the god and the pita and the roll of bills and the as and the cross and the army and the members and the yellow sign and the Guidebook in the Winding Footpath.]

[holding the funnel and the apple in Park Center].