6 Comments

1. TDog Said, July 16, 2009 at 1:08 PM

   A shout out to the TI and Citadel BBSes! Great episode.

2. Madaracs Said, July 16, 2009 at 1:26 PM

   Glad you enjoyed it. We had a good time with this one.

3. Hammi Said, July 19, 2009 at 8:39 PM

   Jason’s voice as always is magical. Never wanted to play Zork more in my life.

4. Jason Scott Said, August 28, 2009 at 6:02 AM

   Several corrections.

   Zork (whether the original mainframe version or the later home computer version) was not based on any real cave system – Jason is conflating Zork and the original Adventure, which was based off the bedquilt system at Mammoth Cave, Kentucky. (The original Adventure game called it “Colossal Cave”, another system at Mammoth Cave.)

   Zork was not at all based on the original Adventure, although it did share ideas like having a light source and collecting treasures. On a pedantic note, it did split up the mainframe version among the home computer versions, but the ratio of mainframe puzzles to what ended up in the final version was a little more unbalanced. (Zork III was almost entirely new material.)

   The packaging with Infocom games were not an attempt to justify the cost – computer games could cost significant money regardless. Scott Adams adventures in 1983 cost between $24.95 (Atari Tapes) to $39.95 (Atari and Apple Disks), and there’s no feelies or over-elaborate packing there.

   Copy Protection most definitely was cared about by the time Hitchhiker’s Guide comes out (1984). Most Infocom games have some sort of dependency on the manual or packaging, preventing further access to the other parts of the map without referencing color lists in the manual, the use of an “infotater”, or other such approach.

   No home computer games had vector graphics.

   Ultima IX:Ascension was the last numbered Ultima released.

   Activision purchased Infocom in 1987.

   Scott Adams, when I interviewed him, let me know that Adventure International released a game or two with full-sentence parsing, but the company went under and the games didn’t get wide release.

   The reason the manuals were so large, in some cases, were because the actual disks/tapes could not possibly hold this information (most were 48k in size), so the books could do the heavy lifting of introduction and description. (Mindwheel, for example, had a story to be read before the game began, as did A Mind Forever Voyaging.)

   Mike Wallace, not Tom Wallace.

5. Commander Tim Said, August 28, 2009 at 3:43 PM

   I’m officially scared.

   Seriously, I need an adult.

6. Madaracs Said, August 29, 2009 at 9:29 PM

   Thanks for the input.

   I don’t take issue with any of your corrections. Thanks for writing them down. This show is often about discovery for many of us–so we appreciate the interest.

   I do have one question though… I don’t recall anyone saying that there were vector graphics in home computer games? More likely someone was trying to recall a game that was ported from a vector arcade game to a home computer game. At any rate, there were home vector games… not for the computer but there was the Vectrex. I don’t think that was mentioned in this episode though.

   Interesting that Hitchhiker’s Guide has copy protection via the manual. I hope I don’t get stuck when I play it as I only have the disk.

   If we do another show on text adventure gaming, I should give you a call.

   Thanks again,

   Adam & The Gang