Fixing Time: A Hack & Makerspace Adventure

The year is 2025. Technology has advanced, but the spirit of hands-on creativity and innovation remains as strong as ever. You're a proud member of Doncaster Hack and Makerspace, a place where creativity and curiosity collide. Here inventors, tinkerers and problem solvers come together to build, repair and experiment with all forms of technology.

Today is different, adventure and puzzles await. You just have to find it! Somewhere within these walls, past the hum of 3D printers and the scent of sawdust and solder, something unusual has happened. It's up to you to explore, uncover secrets and piece together the mystery.

Where will you start?



This is a classic style text adventure created as an entry for the Text Adventure Literacy Jam 2025.

Step into the shoes of a curious member of a Hackspace as you uncover a mysterious machine, tinker with technology and travel through time itself.

Inspired by the golden age of interactive fiction and as a tribute this adventure deliberately avoids the use of location graphics, the aim to encourage players to visualise the world through the rich textual descriptions. Whether you're solving puzzles across time, meeting brilliant minds or uncovering lost knowledge, your imagination is the canvas on which this story unfolds.

The game is light hearted, filled with quirky characters, puzzling conundrums, several retro game 'easter egg' tribute references, combined with occasional tongue in cheek dialog.

This game is designed to be suitable for beginners and nostalgic for text adventure veterans. It includes an optional short interactive tutorial to gently introduce new players to the format. The game features a traditional two word parser e.g. 'GET TORCH', 'USE BENCH' and 'TALK GIZMO'.

Players are encouraged to explore, examine, collect and solve the puzzles. The game will automatically run when clicked on. You'll see a welcome screen and then be given the option to play through a short tutorial. You will be introduced to a guide named Gizmo - Try talking to him and he will set you on your way to being a seasoned adventurer. At any point of the game you can enter the command 'HELP' and an overview of the commands and their usage will be displayed. You also have the option to 'SAVE' and 'LOAD' if you want to save your progress or return at a later time.

This game is suitable for all ages, especially those curious about retro gaming and storytelling.


Movement

To move around, just type the direction you want to go, directions can be abbreviated: 'NORTH' to 'N', 'SOUTH' to 'S', 'EAST' to 'E' and 'WEST' to 'W'.

If you need to refresh the screen, type LOOK or L to redescribe the current location.

Object Interaction

Every item in this game can be EXAMINE'd ('EXAM' or 'X'), this will always provide you with a more detailed description of the object. In some cases it will also offer you with a clue to its usage. To see the list of objects you are holding, type 'I' or 'INVENTORY'.


Other Useful Commands

Other commands could include ASSEMBLE, CLOSE, COOL, DRINK, DISSASEMBLE, DROP, EAT, FILL, FIX, GET, HEAT, INSERT, INVENTORY, MAKE, LEVER, LOCK, OPEN, PRESS, PULL, PUSH, REMOVE, REPAIR, STATS, TALK, THROW, UNLOCK, USE and WEAR. This is not an exhaustive list of commands, some you will just have to figure out by yourself. Always examine objects and you will sometimes be given clues to other commands and how to use them.


Credits

This game is inspired by the growing global Hackspace movement and incorporates the ideas put forward by the members of Doncaster Hack and Makerspace. A special thanks to everyone for their support, inspiration and endless creativity.

This game will be made available on the Hackspace website once the Text Adventure Literacy Jam 2025 allows games to be publicly available.

https://www.doncasterhackspace.org.uk

This game was written using Adventuron - Thank you to Chris Ainsley for the development of such a great tool!

https://adventuron.io/

Copyright (C) 2025 Richard Pettigrew. All rights reserved.