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I think my favourite free-as-in-zero-dollars computer game of all time is Curses. This game will keep you up late at night and get you up at all hours of the morning. Eventually you'll find yourself searching google groups (rec.games.int-fiction) for solutions to some of the trickier bits. (Like that %$#! flashlight battery hidden right under your nose where you can't get it without the [spoiler ommitted].)

You'll also need a z-machine to play it. For the classic MacOS, the obvious choice is MaxZip, though there are of course numerous others.

OS X can probably run frotz (though you may have to compile it). Anyway, whatever platform you need it for, you should be able to find something here. They've got z-machines for everything, including certain brands of pocket toasters, or so it seems. (The z-machine was originally developed for Zork.)

• Curses!, a zork-like puzzle romp;
• Jugsaw, a chase through the 20th century;
• Photopia, an interactive bedtime story;
• Spider and Web, a spy thriller;
• Anchorhead, a Lovecraft hommage.

• Curses!, a zork-like puzzle romp;
• Jugsaw, a chase through the 20th century;
• Photopia, an interactive bedtime story;
• Spider and Web, a spy thriller;
• Anchorhead, a Lovecraft hommage.

...aka "text adventures".

Go to the Interactive Fiction Archive and look around. My personal favorites include Spider and Web (a really excellent game -- starts out beginner-friendly but with a healthy but not impossible challenging bit near the end), Photopia (more of a story than a game), Varicella (beautifully written, and hard to get right within the allowed time -- but short, so replaying is possible, and even intended), and The Meteor, The Stone And A Long Glass of Sherbet.

Most of these are written for Infocom's Z-Machine (remember them?) so they'll run on any platform which has a Z-Code interpreter available (which is darned near anything, down to almost every major palmtop). For that matter, if you're willing to deviate from the "free" thing, many of Infocom's originals (remember the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy computer game?) are also still available.

Have fun!

The Interactive Fiction Archive already has some useful links if you search for SoftPorn... As IANAL, I can't speak for the legal ramifications of the Apple II version, or the DOS executible, Inform remake, or other variations you might find there, but it is avaliable.

Actually, there are plenty of "Infocom-like" games still being made, though the games I'm talking about range from the traditional to the not so traditional.

If you're interested in finding out more, I'd suggest reading reviews of recent text adventures from a site or two and then downloading the games from the Interactive Fiction Archive.

Infocom ``z-machine'' version 5. Interpreters are avilable for just about any platform you can think of. As usual, Google has a fairly complete list of what's out there.

Frotz and Zip are popular choices. I personally use Malyon in XEmacs...

no. A z5 is zcode. It runs on the Z-machine: the imaginary computer that Infocom created for their games. The z-machine has emulators for just about every platform in existance, many of which are downloadable from (iirc) here. Frotz is probably a good bet unless you're on some funky platform.

no. A z5 is zcode. It runs on the Z-machine: the imaginary computer that Infocom created for their games. The z-machine has emulators for just about every platform in existance, many of which are downloadable from (iirc) here. Frotz is probably a good bet unless you're on some funky platform.

Here, for example, are a bunch of interpreters for the InfoCom games (Zork, etc.) Check out the Emacs one! :)

Here, for example, are a bunch of interpreters for the InfoCom games (Zork, etc.) Check out the Emacs one! :)

Hi. I'm the competition organizer for this year. I suspect the competition web server is going to get hammered, so I'll give a rundown of what's going on and what you can do to enter.

Zeroth, your source for most everything I'm going to talk about is the IF Archive. Reach it at http://ifarchive.org, or at the mirror http://mirror.ifarchive.org.

First, you'll need interpreters, since most of the games are written for specific interactive fiction virtual machines. I'm guessing plenty of you have Linux boxes; I'll try to get my old article on Linux interpreters up at my personal IF site, Bras Lantern, later today. It should have more bandwidth than the competition site.

Second, the games. This directory on the IF Archive has all of the games, either unpacked or in a big .zip file.

Third, choosing which games to play. You only have to play five of them to judge. If you think you'll only be able to play a handful of games, I ask that you play a random selection. There's a front-end to the competition, Comp01.z5, which is structured like a text adventure. It will randomize the list of games, sorted by which ones you can play, and even give you a nice voting form to fill out if you're so inclined.

Fourth, judge. You can play games for a maximum of two hours before giving it a rating. Note that you don't have to play for two hours. We only set a maximum play time, not a minimum one. To rate a game, give it a score from 1 to 10. 10 is good. 1 is not good. Use whatever criteria you wish.

Fifth, vote. You can mail your votes to the competition vote-counter or visit the web site to record your votes there.

Sixth, and optional, we've got competition t-shirts for your wearing pleasure.

All of this is detailed in the README which comes with the competition games packages. Enjoy.

Hi. I'm the competition organizer for this year. I suspect the competition web server is going to get hammered, so I'll give a rundown of what's going on and what you can do to enter.

Zeroth, your source for most everything I'm going to talk about is the IF Archive. Reach it at http://ifarchive.org, or at the mirror http://mirror.ifarchive.org.

First, you'll need interpreters, since most of the games are written for specific interactive fiction virtual machines. I'm guessing plenty of you have Linux boxes; I'll try to get my old article on Linux interpreters up at my personal IF site, Bras Lantern, later today. It should have more bandwidth than the competition site.

Second, the games. This directory on the IF Archive has all of the games, either unpacked or in a big .zip file.

Third, choosing which games to play. You only have to play five of them to judge. If you think you'll only be able to play a handful of games, I ask that you play a random selection. There's a front-end to the competition, Comp01.z5, which is structured like a text adventure. It will randomize the list of games, sorted by which ones you can play, and even give you a nice voting form to fill out if you're so inclined.

Fourth, judge. You can play games for a maximum of two hours before giving it a rating. Note that you don't have to play for two hours. We only set a maximum play time, not a minimum one. To rate a game, give it a score from 1 to 10. 10 is good. 1 is not good. Use whatever criteria you wish.

Fifth, vote. You can mail your votes to the competition vote-counter or visit the web site to record your votes there.

Sixth, and optional, we've got competition t-shirts for your wearing pleasure.

All of this is detailed in the README which comes with the competition games packages. Enjoy.

Hi. I'm the competition organizer for this year. I suspect the competition web server is going to get hammered, so I'll give a rundown of what's going on and what you can do to enter.

Zeroth, your source for most everything I'm going to talk about is the IF Archive. Reach it at http://ifarchive.org, or at the mirror http://mirror.ifarchive.org.

First, you'll need interpreters, since most of the games are written for specific interactive fiction virtual machines. I'm guessing plenty of you have Linux boxes; I'll try to get my old article on Linux interpreters up at my personal IF site, Bras Lantern, later today. It should have more bandwidth than the competition site.

Second, the games. This directory on the IF Archive has all of the games, either unpacked or in a big .zip file.

Third, choosing which games to play. You only have to play five of them to judge. If you think you'll only be able to play a handful of games, I ask that you play a random selection. There's a front-end to the competition, Comp01.z5, which is structured like a text adventure. It will randomize the list of games, sorted by which ones you can play, and even give you a nice voting form to fill out if you're so inclined.

Fourth, judge. You can play games for a maximum of two hours before giving it a rating. Note that you don't have to play for two hours. We only set a maximum play time, not a minimum one. To rate a game, give it a score from 1 to 10. 10 is good. 1 is not good. Use whatever criteria you wish.

Fifth, vote. You can mail your votes to the competition vote-counter or visit the web site to record your votes there.

Sixth, and optional, we've got competition t-shirts for your wearing pleasure.

All of this is detailed in the README which comes with the competition games packages. Enjoy.

Hi. I'm the competition organizer for this year. I suspect the competition web server is going to get hammered, so I'll give a rundown of what's going on and what you can do to enter.

Zeroth, your source for most everything I'm going to talk about is the IF Archive. Reach it at http://ifarchive.org, or at the mirror http://mirror.ifarchive.org.

First, you'll need interpreters, since most of the games are written for specific interactive fiction virtual machines. I'm guessing plenty of you have Linux boxes; I'll try to get my old article on Linux interpreters up at my personal IF site, Bras Lantern, later today. It should have more bandwidth than the competition site.

Second, the games. This directory on the IF Archive has all of the games, either unpacked or in a big .zip file.

Third, choosing which games to play. You only have to play five of them to judge. If you think you'll only be able to play a handful of games, I ask that you play a random selection. There's a front-end to the competition, Comp01.z5, which is structured like a text adventure. It will randomize the list of games, sorted by which ones you can play, and even give you a nice voting form to fill out if you're so inclined.

Fourth, judge. You can play games for a maximum of two hours before giving it a rating. Note that you don't have to play for two hours. We only set a maximum play time, not a minimum one. To rate a game, give it a score from 1 to 10. 10 is good. 1 is not good. Use whatever criteria you wish.

Fifth, vote. You can mail your votes to the competition vote-counter or visit the web site to record your votes there.

Sixth, and optional, we've got competition t-shirts for your wearing pleasure.

All of this is detailed in the README which comes with the competition games packages. Enjoy.

You can download a Z-machine interpreter for PalmOS from here, and play all the Infocom and newer fiction, including more than half of the 2001 competition entries, anywhere. It's a treat.

Not an answer for the original poster, since it is definitely not appropriate for the illiterate, but there is actually a whole genre of games which might match your interests, Strog.

These are the seemingly archaic text adventures, sometimes called interactive fiction. They certainly don't have the slideshow feel of games in the Myst series, but they involve the exact same type of exploring and puzzle solving. Although there are traditional hack-and-slash dungeon games in this genre, there are also lots of nonviolent ones, with various themes and settings.

Most of the games are freely available (see the link above), and run on a virtual machine, so you can play them on the OS of your choice.

You can't get to the ftp.gmd.de archive because the archive site has moved to a new URL: http://www.ifarchive.org

http://www.ifarchive.org/indexes/if-archive.html

There's a plethora of independantly authored games, specifications for the Z-Machine, and a few programming languages and compilers (Inform and TADS being the most popular) for writing "interactive fiction" in a faily high level, object oriented manner. Plus, the Z-Machine has been expanded to have some pretty huge memory allowances, such that games the size of the entire Zork and Enchanter series combined can be written and played.

The Z-code file for the Hitchhiker's Guide is available off Douglas Adams' web site. Download this, and buy the Activision reissue of "Classic text adventure masterpieces" and you'll have pretty much everything Infocom ever did. If you have a Pilot, put a copy of Frotz on it and you can play on the move. Some of the games have mildly annoying copy protection which means you have to look something up in the PDF manual, but by and large it's fantastic. I paid about £25 or so I think -- unfortunately I can't remember the URL, but I do remember the page was a sort of pepperminty green. Oh, and check out if-archive.
--

Might be worth a look-into -- the bash version claims to be "ca 1984".

There's also a web-based form here for those who may not use Micros~1 products. I just submitted this URL to it, but I'm still waiting on a response. I guess it takes their server a while to process a 9 MB file...

...where the documents are:
http://ifarchive.org/if-archive/infocom/info/infoc om-paper.pdf and
http://ifarchive.org/if-archive/infocom/info/infoc om-presentation.pdf
(maybe a /. expert can tell me why those spaces are appearing in the text above? It's not in what I'm typing, and the links appear to work fine...)

But if that one goes away, it also has these alternates:

• Germany: ftp.gmd.de (ftp)
• USA: wuarchive.wustl.edu (http)
• USA: ftp.nodomainname.net (http)
• Finland: ftp.funet.fi (ftp)
• Australia: mirror.aarnet.edu.au (http) (ftp)

...where the documents are:
http://ifarchive.org/if-archive/infocom/info/infoc om-paper.pdf and
http://ifarchive.org/if-archive/infocom/info/infoc om-presentation.pdf
(maybe a /. expert can tell me why those spaces are appearing in the text above? It's not in what I'm typing, and the links appear to work fine...)

But if that one goes away, it also has these alternates:

• Germany: ftp.gmd.de (ftp)
• USA: wuarchive.wustl.edu (http)
• USA: ftp.nodomainname.net (http)
• Finland: ftp.funet.fi (ftp)
• Australia: mirror.aarnet.edu.au (http) (ftp)

...where the documents are:
http://ifarchive.org/if-archive/infocom/info/infoc om-paper.pdf and
http://ifarchive.org/if-archive/infocom/info/infoc om-presentation.pdf
(maybe a /. expert can tell me why those spaces are appearing in the text above? It's not in what I'm typing, and the links appear to work fine...)

But if that one goes away, it also has these alternates:

• Germany: ftp.gmd.de (ftp)
• USA: wuarchive.wustl.edu (http)
• USA: ftp.nodomainname.net (http)
• Finland: ftp.funet.fi (ftp)
• Australia: mirror.aarnet.edu.au (http) (ftp)

There is a fast mirror of ftp.gmd.de at www.ifarchive.org. Direct links to the papers are:
/if-archive/infocom/info/infocom-paper.pdf
and /if-archive/infocom/info/infocom-presentation.pdf

There is a fast mirror of ftp.gmd.de at www.ifarchive.org. Direct links to the papers are:
/if-archive/infocom/info/infocom-paper.pdf
and /if-archive/infocom/info/infocom-presentation.pdf

• http://www.ifarchive.org/ infocom-presentation.pdf and infocom-paper.pdf
• http://wuarchive.wustl.edu/ infocom-presentation.pdf and infocom-paper.pdf

• http://www.ifarchive.org/ infocom-presentation.pdf and infocom-paper.pdf
• http://wuarchive.wustl.edu/ infocom-presentation.pdf and infocom-paper.pdf

• GMD ifarchive of new and old interactive games
• Frotz, infocom game player for all machines (including Windows and Linux)
• Nitfol, an even better infocom game player
• About.com guide to IF
• unofficial Infocom page with some freebie Zork downloads
• Most of the Infocom games (Amiga games site, but the data files work on all platforms with Frotz)

• GMD ifarchive of new and old interactive games
• Frotz, infocom game player for all machines (including Windows and Linux)
• Nitfol, an even better infocom game player
• About.com guide to IF
• unofficial Infocom page with some freebie Zork downloads
• Most of the Infocom games (Amiga games site, but the data files work on all platforms with Frotz)

Details about infocom and their game titles are available here, while more about Interactive Fiction (that's text based games usually) can be found here. The main IF archive can be found at IFArchive.org where you can download many of Infocoms games.
Richy C.

There's still a following for games built around craftily written descriptions and puzzles. In fact new textual interactive fiction pieces are developed by a small buy loyal fanbase. Some of the games are really good.

There's information about the current state of the (well, somewhat ancient in internet time) art of interactive fiction here.

The Palm is such a great platform for interactive fiction. Why limit yourself to just reading? Go get pilot-frotzfrobnitz and some text adventures.

I remember seeing the Zorks on sale for the Commodore 64, and wishing I had enough money to buy one :). Since then, I've played quite a few IF games acquired from a number of different source for several different platforms - most for free. I must say it is very cool now being able to play the Zorks and all other Infocom adventures (not to mention the frequently far superior productions of raif/rgif (note: rec.{arts,games}.int-fiction) regulars) on my Palm Vx. Ridiculously portable, these things are, and great fun.

Although it is easy to spend a lot of time with them... :)

It's encouraging to see /. mentioning the IF competition. I've wondered before how many slashdot regulars are likely to have been Infocom or general text adventure fans back in the eighties, and might not have known that there is still a very lively online presence of free (beer) IF authors and fans.

If any are interested, have a look at http://www.ifarchive.org/. There's also a few other useful links at the competition site given above.

Enjoy.

Actually, such a game exists. It's called FOOM and available from the Interactive Fiction Archive, which is still alive and kicking, and will be for many more years, what with the IF Competition 2000 coming up.

The text-adventure gaming world still exists, albeit in a more fan-driven form. Take a look at http://www.ifarchive.org, or even look up "interactive fiction" on about.com or any search engine.

The IF games newsgroup: news:rec.games.int-fiction - for discussion of IF games, hints, etc.
The IF writing newsgroup: news:rec.arts.int-fiction - for discussion of writing good IF
The IF archives: U.S. Mirror at http://www.ifarchive.org/, or Original FTP site (in Germany) at ftp://ftp.gmd.de/if-archive/

The folks on the IF newsgroups are very friendly and helpful and will be more than happy to help you. Start by downloading one of the IF starter packs if you've never played text adventures before, then try the excellent game Curses, by Graham Nelson. (Then try anything else written by Graham Nelson -- the man is a genius). Have fun!
-----
The real meaning of the GNU GPL:

The company is offering them royalties if they put their games under contract, and the authors aren't sure they want their games sold like that, since they're used to giving them away.

A few years ago, the interactive fiction community started doing annual competitions. This, combined with the availability of a language called INFORM, has helped to generate a variety of game s of exceedingly high quality. (There are, of course, some real stinkers.) I've seen a few comments to the effect that "Infocom is all anyone needs". The people who believe that haven't examined the current crop. The only thing Infocom (or Magnetic Scrolls, or Scott Adams :-) has on some of the current games is nostalgia.

These games have been available for free for years from here. This company wants to make these games available through their service, and pay the authors royalties. What should the authors watch out for? What should they keep in mind? Does /. have any real input for them?

If you're interested in this sort of thing:

• rec.arts.int-fiction
• rec.games.int-fiction
• textfire.com
• SPAG
• Stephen Granade's IF Page

That should get you started. There's a LOT of good stuff out there.

> They're catering this to *today's* cellphone
> crowd?
>
> >north
> You walk into the bathroom. Do your nails?
> (y/n)
> >n
> Yuk! You really look fat without your nails
> done. Do your nails? (y/n)

You mean like Common Ground?
This is somewhat like what you're describing;
it's by the author of the about.com article,
actually.

This is my third "your joke is actually reality"
post. People don't seem to realize that the
interactive fiction (text adventure) community
is actually very developed.

What, you mean The Infocom GameBoy intrepreter?

OK, so it isn't quite Ultima, but it runs all
ZMachine games up to version 3, which is a
lot of Infocom though few post-Infocom.

> You are in a maze of twisty little passages all > alike. There is a sign on the wall.
> >read sign
>
> "Pepsi. The choice of a new generation."
> >n

You thought you were kidding, right?

Oh, no.

Coke is it!

Fear.

In part of the game Jigsaw You have to break an enigma code, and can play with an enigma machine.

You need a Z-code interpreter to play it - I suggest frotz

In part of the game Jigsaw You have to break an enigma code, and can play with an enigma machine.

You need a Z-code interpreter to play it - I suggest frotz

I get *so* tired of the endless yapping about Quake IV, Monkey Island XIII, and other churn-out-a-rehash crap...

Anyway, there are plenty of Infocom interpreter knock-offs available. The IF (Interactive Fiction) Archive's main site is an FTP site in Germany that's bog-slow; a list of mirrors follows.

Go to the subdirectory "infocom" then "interpreters" and pick your poison -- my personal favorite is Frotz. Happy adventuring.

in the USA:
http://wuarchive.wustl.edu/doc/misc /if-archive/
http://ftp.nodomainname.net/pub /mirrors/if-archive/
http://ifarchive.org/
ftp://www.plover.net/pub/ifarchive/

in Finland:
ftp://ftp.funet.fi/pub/misc/if-archive/

in Australia:
http://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/pub/if-arch ive/

in the UK:
http://www.firedrake.org/if-archive/
or ftp://ftp.firedrake.org/if-arch ive/

Also check out the Interactive Fiction Archive at gmd.de -- but if you're in North America, use the U.S. Mirror instead.

Highly recommended FREE games to play: Jigsaw and Curses, both by Graham Nelson. The guy's a genius: not only did he write the Inform programming language, for creating text-adventures compatible with Infocom's format, but he also wrote two of the best text adventures out there. You must experience Curses for yourself! And no, it has nothing to do with the UNIX cursor-manipulation programming library.
-----
The real meaning of the GNU GPL:

I loved The Diamond Age, prolly because I like interactive fiction and it did it so well. The idea of phyles was also excellent, and the nanotechnology was cool, but some of the body-mods were just stupid. Skull-guns? Rumour has it Stephenson cut some of Purple's chapters dealing with sexuality... Adam Cadre who made the wonder piece of IF, Photopia, made a purple scene because of that cut. BTW, Adam just released a new game, and it's a doozie. But in the end, the ending was way to rushed and unexplained though I loved the Mouse Army, and the drummers, omigod, what a Beowulf cluster!

There are several mirrors of the ftp.gmd.de archive in the US -- you might try http://ifarchive.org for a nice web-based mirror.

Also, there are a variety of review sites for IF to help you choose a game you'd like. My favorite is Baf's Guide, which has nice capsule reviews and good subject indexes.

Second, I think s/he who writes the software can choose whatever license s/he wants.

But I'm just trying to understand this license. It's at best contradictory. From http://www. ifarchive.org/if-archive/programming/hugo/manuals/ manual.txt:

I.a. Legal Notes

...
The use of the Hugo library files and the distribution of the Hugo Engine are authorized so long as all transactions are non-commercial and free of charge (except in cases where any charge is to cover the cost of distribution), and that the library files and engine are not distributed in a modified form.

So, no distribution of modified versions, which means non-[libre-]free. But then there's section I.b., which says:

I.b. (Less Legal Notes)

...
The source to the Hugo Library, of course, cannot be distributed in modified form unless it is expressly indicated that it was a.) written by Kent Tessman, and b.) subsequently modified and distributed by someone else.

First, that "of course" is just a bit silly, given the huge amount of truly open source software in the world today, including the Linux kernel itself. But regardless, these two statements are contradictory. A clarification needs to be made.

And finally... I can't believe I'm the first person in this forum to even mention this. What has happened to /.? -sigh-

Flames to /dev/null.

If you like this kind of thing, run out to the archive and grab some interpreters and games.

If you want to play Infocom games, you can get all-but-two of them on the Masterpieces of Infocom CD. For more information, try http://www.geocities.com/TimesS quare/3177/infocom.htm. Comes with windoze binaries, but you can run most of the adventures under Linux (or anything else) by downloading an interpreter such as Frotz. 'Swhat I do.

For gobs of other information, go to Yahoo and search for "interactive fiction".

Plugh!