Adding a short message as the player approaches a room, before the room description itself appears.

Sometimes when a player moves from one room to another, we want to imply that a considerable amount of time elapses, or that something interesting occurs on the way. In that case, we might want to print more than just the room description itself. Here is how we might define a couple of rooms that are far apart:

"Up and Up"
The Plain of the Skull is below the Endless Tower. The description of the Plain of the Skull is "A vast and trackless plain, enlivened only by the bones of those who have previously tried and failed to cross. Above you is the Endless Tower, which rises half-way to the moon."
The description of the Endless Tower is "From up here the Plain of the Skull seems only a small bald patch: the world is round and most of it is covered with trees. Far off to the southwest is a shimmering surface that might be water; but there are no signs of cities or civilizations, only the lizard-skeletons."

And now we borrow from the instructions on Actions to create our actual message. "Before…" introduces a rule that occurs when the player tries to do something; in this case, we will make a Before rule for going to the tower.

Before going to the Endless Tower:
   say "You climb... and climb... and climb... The sun sets. The moon rises. The wind begins to blow. You continue to climb..."
The player carries a bit of harness. The description of the harness is "A strip of worked leather and a loop of metal, scavenged from one of the skeletons on the plain. Without it, you might think your entire quest was in vain."
Test me with "look / up".
Test me with "look / up".
Plain of the Skull
A vast and trackless plain, enlivened only by the bones of those who have previously tried and failed to cross. Above you is the Endless Tower, which rises half-way to the moon.

>(Testing.)

>[1] look
Plain of the Skull
A vast and trackless plain, enlivened only by the bones of those who have previously tried and failed to cross. Above you is the Endless Tower, which rises half-way to the moon.

>[2] up
You climb... and climb... and climb... The sun sets. The moon rises. The wind begins to blow. You continue to climb...

Endless Tower
From up here the Plain of the Skull seems only a small bald patch: the world is round and most of it is covered with trees. Far off to the southwest is a shimmering surface that might be water; but there are no signs of cities or civilizations, only the lizard-skeletons.