TADS

Description
TADS (Text Adventure Development System) is an Interactive Fiction development system by Michael J. Roberts. Plain text source code files are created using the TADS programming language, and then compiled into a system-independent game file. Compiled game files can be played on any system that has an appropriate interpreter.

The term "TADS", unqualified, generally refers to TADS version 2 and below. TADS 3, the current version, is a complete redesign of the system and is incompatible with previous versions. See the TADS 3 page for more information.

Extensions

 * .t: Source code
 * .gam: Compiled game file

Compilers

 * TADS 2 Author's Kit (Windows, freeware, website: the official TADS 2 implementation
 * FrobTADS (Unix-like, freeware, website: ports of TADS 2 and TADS 3 compilers for Unix systems (including Mac OS X)

Interpreters

 * HTML TADS Interpreter (Windows, freeware, website): the official TADS 2 and TADS 3 interpreter with full multimedia support. Despite the name, it does not run on the web.
 * Jetty (cross-platform, open source, website: a TADS 2 interpreter written in Java
 * QTads (cross-platform, open source, website): a TADS 2 and TADS 3 interpreter with full multimedia support

Other Tools

 * IF Archive: TADS 2 programming

Source Code

 * ditchday.zip: Ditch Day Drifter, by Michael J. Roberts. Source code and compiled .gam file included.
 * zeb3src.zip: Uncle Zebulon's Will, by Magnus Olsson. Full source code.

Compiled Games

 * 1893Demo.gam: 1893: A World's Fair Mystery (demo), by Peter Nepstad
 * grip.gam: Losing Your Grip, by Stephen Grande

Further Information

 * Cloak of Darkness: TADS
 * TADS 2 Author's Manual
 * TADS 2 Homepage