Intelligent Adventures For The Electron And BBC Microcomputers
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Introduction
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Adventures and artificial intelligence

"This book is about the intelligence of computers, and about the intelligence
of people who play computer games. On the one hand, it aims to show some of the
basics of artificial intelligence and how it can be used in games. On the other
it shows you how you can go about writing games that require some intelligence
to play. Of course, the two things go together."

This is how Noel Williams introduces his book. Writing a good adventure game is by
no means a trivial job, and using some of the most recent techniques, it can form an
ideal introduction to artificial intelligence - the design of a program that makes
the computer appear to react intelligently, learning from past mistakes. The book
assumes a knowledge of BBC Basic, implemented on the Electron or on the BBC
Micro. All aspects of the design and writing of an adventure game are covered,
including techniques of data compaction, sentence processing, and semantic
databases.

As a final illustration of the techniques described, there is a listing of a full-sized
81-room adventure, The Opal Lily, occupying practically all of the Electron RAM.
Other illustrations - with full listings - are Mernar Keep (a simulation/war game)
and Dilemma, an original computer board game.

For the serious Electron or BBC Micro programmer, games writer, or student of
artificial intelligence, this book is a 'must'!



First Sentence
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You obviously know something about intelligence because you just done a highly 
intelligent thing - you began to read this book.