Adaptive Spaces: a text adventure by Emmet Connolly.

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"Poetry is in the streets" - May 1968 graffiti, Paris.
"There ought not to be such things as streets; we have to create something that will replace them" - Le Corbusier.

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You are in a small room. There is a table here with a written abstract on it, and a door to the north.

> pick up abstract
You have the abstract.

> read abstract
The abstract reads: "Adaptive Spaces is a framework that aims to facilitate a literary imageability of the urban environment. By encouraging the submission of the urban walker to constraint and chance, and by combining traditional psychogeography with collaborative online systems, the framework aims to allow for the emergence of creativity and engagement in the participant. The framework takes the medium of the text adventure as it's starting point."

> look around
You are in a small room. There is a table here, and a door to the north.

> go north
You emerge into a bustling city street. Like many urban environments, it teems with life and history. People walk quickly past you, seemingly unaware of the richness of their surroundings, but rather intent on reaching their destinations as quickly and passively as possible. Some wear headphones, to better mediate their sensory environment, others bow their heads as they walk.

To your right, Guy Debord stands alone, thoughtfully surveying his surroundings. The street continues to the east and to the west.

> talk to debord
What would you like to talk to Guy Debord about?

> thesis
Guy Debord addresses you: "The city street is a thing to be savoured, not ignored. These people have chosen to move away from the space that they inhabit, and retreat into the compartmentailsed version of the everyday life that the modern world has served to them."

Guy Debord leans in closely and speaks with a hushed urgency.

"There are many layers of stories beneath our feet; traces of times past are etched into these streets! Engage viscerally with the city, and form your own image!" Upon finishing his short oration, Guy Debord strolls away slowly.

> walk west
Le Corbusier is here, sneering disdainfully at the streets around him. There are exits to the east and south.

> talk to le corbusier about antithesis
"Don't listen to Debord, the man is of the past! Why should we continue to live in these broken systems, these monuments to antiquity? The contemporary image of a city must embrace deliberate changes to it's foundations, not merely an attempt to live passively within that which we have inherited. Only by embracing the contemporary, by creating brave new structures that replace tired old ones, can we become truly modern."

Le Corbusier rises to his feet, becoming more animated by the second.

"Do you ever sense that the city exerts too much of herself on your actions? Do you ever feel as if there is only one permitted route to a destination, only one correct answer to a question that you cannot deviate from if you wish to progress any further? Do you sometimes wish to break free of the traditional dialect of the city, and engage in a new dialogue, and perhaps a new framework of understanding? Do you think that the language we have is sometimes not enough to be truly understood?"

> all the time!
I'm sorry -- I don't understand that command.

Le Corbusier sits down on a bench, regaining his composure. There are exits to the east and south.

> go south

You are in the main street. It runs east-west. The library is in front of you, to the south. Marshall Berman is here. Before you have a chance to act, he speaks to you.

"You have heard both thesis and antithesis, both sides of the dialectic that attempts to futher our understanding of the city and it's people, and of the shared experience that encompasses them all, that of modernity. The idea of how modernization of an environment should be managed, how progress should be metered and mapped out -- if at all -- is difficult to synthesise."

"The great upheavals of the twentieth century leave us with difficult decisions on how to approach living, and how to appreciate and create art. Do we seek out beauty in the debris of the past, or do we create new forms of virtue? To determine answers may be dangerous; perhaps we should allow the traffic to carve out the streets of it's own accord."

"By remembering the modernisms of the past, by speaking in a language that may now seem antiquited by modern standards, we can create the modernisms of the future. As I myself once wrote: 'This act of remembering can help us bring modernism back to its roots, so that it can nourish and renew itself, to confront the adventures and dangers that lie ahead. To appropriate the modernities of yesterday can be at once a critique of the modernities of today and an act of faith in the modernities - and in the modern men and women - of tomorrow and the day after tomorrow.' (All That Is Solid Melts Into Air)"

"Write within the constraints of an old technology to find new paths."

"Build something within these structures, while also building upon the existing structures of today."

> so what exactly will I build?

"You are reluctant to define exactly what it will eventually be, as with definintion comes determinism. Instead create a framework that allows for adaptability, both during it's design and after it's completion. Base the system on now-extinct MOOs (Multi-user-dungeon, Object Oriented) text adventure games (an artifact of now-past moderinty), and extend it. Create collaboratively constructed virtual spaces that people can not only interact in, but effect lasting change upon. Invent within the constraints of the medium, but also build upon it. The system could allow players to:


Most importantly, players can undermine the system to create their own rules and routes, and generate their own image of the city."

With that, Berman leaves.

You are in the main street. It runs east-west. The library is behind you, to the south.

> enter library
You enter a great hall, lined from floor to ceiling with bookshelves. Dusty leatherbound tomes sit snugly alongside thin volumes, the spines inviting you to inspect them. One shelf of books to your right is labeled 'References'.

> look at references
The bookshelf holds the following books:


> exit library
You are in the main street. It runs east-west. The library is behind you, to the south.

> walk in a random direction
You get lost in a maze of twisty arcades, all alike.