<story><title>A Cabinet of Infocom Curiosities</title><url>http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/4834</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jordanpg</author><text>Earlier this year, when I realized that all of the old Infocom games were in the public domain, I spent some time playing Zork I, Border Zone, and HHGTTG -- the ones I played most often when I was younger.&lt;p&gt;There was some sentimental fun to be had, but these games take a tremendous amount of time to play and are difficult in a way that modern games are not.  Their puzzles are almost unsolvable in some cases, or can only be solved by combining every permutation of every verb with every noun in every place to get the right answer.&lt;p&gt;Relative to what&amp;#x27;s available in the modern gaming realm as well as conventional fiction, I&amp;#x27;ve also been pretty underwhelmed by what the Interactive Fiction community is putting out, especially the games that are purely web-based.  There are some authors, Andrew Plotkin comes to mind, that have picked up the Infocom torch, but the feeling that you are using 0.1% of what your computer can do at about 5% of the rate your mind can work is difficult to shake for me in our modern era.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>lambda</author><text>Why do you need to need to be using the full capacity of your computer, if you are having fun?&lt;p&gt;One of the real advantages of interactive fiction in the modern era is that it can afford to take more risks, narratively, than a AAA title. Since it can be the work of a single person as a hobby or small business, rather than needing mass-market sales to repay for its development, you can try out different things, some of which may not work out but some of which can be fascinating.&lt;p&gt;Beside Andrew Plotkin, I&amp;#x27;ve always loved the work of Emily Short, like Galatea which couldn&amp;#x27;t even really be considered a game but is quite fascinating.</text></comment>
<story><title>A Cabinet of Infocom Curiosities</title><url>http://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/4834</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jordanpg</author><text>Earlier this year, when I realized that all of the old Infocom games were in the public domain, I spent some time playing Zork I, Border Zone, and HHGTTG -- the ones I played most often when I was younger.&lt;p&gt;There was some sentimental fun to be had, but these games take a tremendous amount of time to play and are difficult in a way that modern games are not.  Their puzzles are almost unsolvable in some cases, or can only be solved by combining every permutation of every verb with every noun in every place to get the right answer.&lt;p&gt;Relative to what&amp;#x27;s available in the modern gaming realm as well as conventional fiction, I&amp;#x27;ve also been pretty underwhelmed by what the Interactive Fiction community is putting out, especially the games that are purely web-based.  There are some authors, Andrew Plotkin comes to mind, that have picked up the Infocom torch, but the feeling that you are using 0.1% of what your computer can do at about 5% of the rate your mind can work is difficult to shake for me in our modern era.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>mrob</author><text>None of the Infocom games are in the public domain. The copyright of most of them is held by Activision, which sells them as iOS ports.</text></comment>