Buster Hudson

Life and work

He is drawn to the special power of parser games and sees writers pushing storytelling possibilities in that style.^[1] Hudson noted that a character connected to a puzzle might act more as a key or a door than a fully developed person.^[1] He said puzzles help the player spend time with characters.^[1] Hudson was proud that The Wizard Sniffer drew from both parser and hypertext modes of interactive fiction.^[1]

He described interactive fiction as a different experience that lets you explore a world through text.^[1] Hudson used his games to talk about being gay, though he said he is not sure anyone noticed.^[1] According to Hudson, puzzles that rely on a text parser can serve to manage the story's rhythm or flesh out a character.^[2] After stumbling upon interactive fiction accidentally, Hudson began authoring his own works in the medium.^[1]

What the cited sources add

The Atlas Obscura article reports that Hudson's The Wizard Sniffer is a slapstick comedy with bumbling heroes and marriages of convenience.^[1] The same source states that Hudson sees interactive fiction combining the best of text and video games.^[1] It also notes that Hudson's games address his experience of being gay, but so subtly he doubts anyone noticed.^[1] Montfort, not Hudson, stated that parser-based interactive fiction excels at enabling a player to decipher a hidden puzzle.^[1]