===== How to Format Text =====

You'll notice that there aren't buttons to add bold or italic styles to your text in Twine, like in a word processor. Instead, Twine story formats use special characters to convey style information. The special characters you type are changed into styles when you play or test your story.

<WRAP tip>
The fastest way to see how what you enter will be interpreted as a style is by using the **Test From Here** item in the [[the_story_map#adding_moving_and_deleting_passages|passage menu]].
</WRAP>

**The exact characters to enter depend on which story format you're using. 
**
**Harlowe** (the default one) and **Snowman** both use [[http://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/|Markdown]], a commonly-used set of formatting instructions. **SugarCube** instead uses a convention similar to what's used on Wikipedia ((To be specific, it uses [[http://tiddlywiki.com/|TiddlyWiki]] formatting.)).

^ ^ Harlowe ^ Snowman ^ SugarCube ^
| **Bold** | ''<nowiki>**Bold**</nowiki>'' or ''<nowiki>''Bold''</nowiki>'' | ''<nowiki>**Bold**</nowiki>'' | ''<nowiki>''Bold''</nowiki>'' |  
| //Italics// | ''<nowiki>*Italics*</nowiki>'' or ''<nowiki>//Italics//</nowiki>'' | ''<nowiki>*Italics*</nowiki>'' | ''<nowiki>//Italics//</nowiki>'' |
| __Underlined__ | ''<nowiki><u>Underlined</u></nowiki>'' | ''<nowiki><u>Underlined</u></nowiki>'' | ''<nowiki>__Underlined__</nowiki>'' |
| For more information | [[https://twine2.neocities.org/1.html#markup_link|Visit here]] | [[http://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/|Visit here]] | [[http://www.motoslave.net/sugarcube/docs/markup.html#basic-formatting|Visit here]] | 

You can combine styles in any story format by combining them, so that ''<nowiki>***bold and italic***</nowiki>'' will be displayed as **//bold and italic//** in Harlowe ((In SugarCube, you'd write ''<nowiki>**//bold and italic//**</nowiki>'' or ''<nowiki>//**bold and italic**//</nowiki>'' -- both would work equally well.)).

===== Disabling Style Characters =====

Sometimes, you don't want to have special characters interpreted as styles. To help you out in this instance, story formats have special characters that note that any text between them should be displayed as-is. 

^ ^ Harlowe ^ Snowman ^ SugarCube ^
| <nowiki>*Boom!*</nowiki> | ''<nowiki>``*Boom!*``</nowiki>'' | ''<nowiki>\*Boom!\*</nowiki>'' | ''<nowiki>"""*Boom!*"""</nowiki>'' or ''<nowiki><nowiki>*Boom!*</nowiki></nowiki>'' |

But what if you want to use //these// special characters? You enter them twice in succession, ''<nowiki>````like this````</nowiki>''.