CaveDraft

About this project

CaveDraft is a browser-based editor for creating interactive fiction using CAVE — the Contextual Adventure Verbose Engine. It's the tool I wished existed when I started writing text adventures: visual editing, instant preview, and one-click export to a playable game.

Traditional interactive fiction tools have steep learning curves or dated interfaces. CaveDraft brings modern editor design to the genre, letting writers focus on story and puzzles rather than wrestling with syntax or compilers.

The CAVE markup language sits at the heart of the project. It's designed to be readable as plain text while encoding all the logic needed for rooms, objects, conversations, and puzzles. Write in CAVE, preview instantly, export a complete game.

Features

• Visual editor with syntax highlighting for CAVE markup
• Real-time game preview as you write
• Room and object management with visual connections
• Dialogue tree editor for character conversations
• One-click export to standalone HTML runtime
• No installation — runs entirely in your browser

The CAVE Language

CAVE balances human readability with parser power. A room description looks like prose, but embedded tags define exits, objects, and triggers. The syntax stays out of your way until you need it.

# Kitchen
A small kitchen with yellow wallpaper peeling at the corners. 
A [wooden table] sits beneath the window.
> north: Hallway
> examine table: The table wobbles on uneven legs.

The goal is writing interactive fiction that reads like writing fiction — with interactivity woven in naturally.

Games in Development

CaveDraft powers my own pipeline of eleven CAVE games currently in production: Signal, Wake, Three Days, Haven, Through Your Eyes, The Reading, The Last Sunrise, Broken Routine, Drink Bottle, Brainshop, and Blackout.

Building the editor and games together ensures the tool actually serves writers. Every friction point I hit becomes a feature improvement.

Part of the Ecosystem

CaveDraft connects to CaveFormat.com for documentation and Blackout-Game.com as the flagship playable demo. NextRoom.io will eventually review games created with the platform. Each piece supports the others.