The 2025 Spring Thing Festival of Interactive Fiction features thirty-four new interactive stories submitted by authors working across the spectrum of text games. Participants chose
When the Spring Thing Festival of Interactive Fiction opens in spring 2026, you'll be able to find all the entries submitted here. Participants choose
Archive of all 2025 entries (757 MB zip): Download from itch.io
Festival Readme and Changelog of updated games
Anyone is welcome to submit to Spring Thing. The organizer reserves the right to not show a submission they feel is inappropriate for the festival, but entries are not otherwise vetted, and their contents and opinions reflect the views of the original author, not the Thing as a whole.
Spring Thing features all kinds of text games, but two of the major divisions are between what are sometimes called choiced-based games (where you interact by clicking links) and parser-based games (where you interact by typing commands).
To those unfamiliar with the parser, it can seem confusing or intimidating. Here are some resources for getting started:
To play some parser IF offline, the downloaded story file needs to be opened with a program called an interpreter, much like a .doc file needs Microsoft Word to open. Clicking on the story format (next to the download link) will take you to instructions for finding the right interpreter to play a particular game.
A week after the festival opens, players can nominate games for two kinds of prize ribbons:
Players of the 2025 festival could nominate games for two kinds of prize ribbons:
- A Best in Show blue ribbon, for Main Festival entries. The top two nominees each year win a Best in Show ribbon to display by their game.
- Audience Award ribbons, for all participants, which are suggested by nominators and can be anything they like: “Best Story,” “Best Parser Game,” “Personal Favorite,” “Alumni's Choice,” “Cutest Vampires”... you get the idea.
When the festival closes, the organizer curates Audience Award suggestions to cull anything not in the celebratory spirit of the Thing before sending them to each author. The author may choose up to three Audience Awards to display on their game. Authors may choose to opt-out of receiving Audience Awards.
After the festival closes, nominations also close and ribbons are awarded. The games will remain permanently available on the festival site and at the IF Archive, along with any supplemental material of the author's choosing (walkthrough, source code, etc).
