The Incomparable

00:00:00 ◼   ► the incomparable part test number 75 [TS]

00:00:07 ◼   ► january 2002 [TS]

00:00:14 ◼   ► welcome back to the incomparable podcast [TS]

00:00:16 ◼   ► my name is Greg NOS your host Jason [TS]

00:00:18 ◼   ► smell is away on assignment today we're [TS]

00:00:21 ◼   ► going to be discussing text adventure [TS]

00:00:23 ◼   ► these are computer games that were the [TS]

00:00:25 ◼   ► most popular in the early to mid [TS]

00:00:26 ◼   ► eighties you run the game and it would [TS]

00:00:29 ◼   ► give you a description of the room that [TS]

00:00:31 ◼   ► you were standing in a textual [TS]

00:00:32 ◼   ► description just words on the screen and [TS]

00:00:35 ◼   ► would describe exits and objects in the [TS]

00:00:37 ◼   ► room and then you would use English [TS]

00:00:39 ◼   ► sentences often very very simple English [TS]

00:00:42 ◼   ► sentences like get lamp and inventory [TS]

00:00:46 ◼   ► and go north to interact with the [TS]

00:00:49 ◼   ► environment the goal of the games was [TS]

00:00:51 ◼   ► usually to collect objects and solve [TS]

00:00:53 ◼   ► puzzles with them you would be presented [TS]

00:00:56 ◼   ► with situations that required you to [TS]

00:00:57 ◼   ► think through how what you had in your [TS]

00:01:00 ◼   ► inventory and what in the room could be [TS]

00:01:02 ◼   ► used together there was often scoring [TS]

00:01:04 ◼   ► systems that would give you particular [TS]

00:01:05 ◼   ► points for how you accomplished each of [TS]

00:01:07 ◼   ► these solutions but more off the goal [TS]

00:01:09 ◼   ► was just to finish the game to get to [TS]

00:01:11 ◼   ► the end to find out how the story [TS]

00:01:13 ◼   ► concluded with me today are Monty [TS]

00:01:15 ◼   ► actually hello hello Monty and Steve [TS]

00:01:19 ◼   ► lots [TS]

00:01:19 ◼   ► Hello Sailor nothing happens here text [TS]

00:01:24 ◼   ► adventures have a long and distinguished [TS]

00:01:25 ◼   ► history they started in 1975 when will [TS]

00:01:29 ◼   ► crowler at built the game adventure [TS]

00:01:32 ◼   ► it was modeled on the actual colossal [TS]

00:01:34 ◼   ► cave but with fantasy elements a man [TS]

00:01:37 ◼   ► named on Woods took it and expanded it [TS]

00:01:39 ◼   ► and released it onto the ARPANET where [TS]

00:01:41 ◼   ► it spread like wildfire as it was [TS]

00:01:44 ◼   ► adapted and and rebuilt for new systems [TS]

00:01:48 ◼   ► those to the schools that had spread to [TS]

00:01:50 ◼   ► include MIT or a bunch of them [TS]

00:01:53 ◼   ► undergraduates discovered it and built [TS]

00:01:55 ◼   ► Zork his work was created in 1977 and on [TS]

00:02:00 ◼   ► a mini computer and it actually launched [TS]

00:02:02 ◼   ► the text adventure golden age in 1978 a [TS]

00:02:08 ◼   ► man named scott adams produce the game a [TS]

00:02:11 ◼   ► simple game called adventureland that [TS]

00:02:12 ◼   ► was also modeled on the original [TS]

00:02:14 ◼   ► adventure and then in 1979 infocomm was [TS]

00:02:17 ◼   ► formed by the same people who had made [TS]

00:02:18 ◼   ► Zork and they released it for basically [TS]

00:02:22 ◼   ► every computer system that existed at [TS]

00:02:24 ◼   ► the time [TS]

00:02:25 ◼   ► surprisingly the Golden Age of text [TS]

00:02:27 ◼   ► adventures only [TS]

00:02:27 ◼   ► lasted about five or six years before [TS]

00:02:29 ◼   ► infocomm went down in flames on the [TS]

00:02:33 ◼   ► wings of cornerstone first business [TS]

00:02:35 ◼   ► product scott adams folded a year [TS]

00:02:37 ◼   ► earlier activation bought the infocomm [TS]

00:02:40 ◼   ► brand and then didn't do anything with [TS]

00:02:42 ◼   ► it other than abused it and text [TS]

00:02:45 ◼   ► adventures kind of went by the wayside [TS]

00:02:47 ◼   ► they gained graphics for a little while [TS]

00:02:49 ◼   ► and then they kind of mutated into the [TS]

00:02:51 ◼   ► point-and-click adventures from [TS]

00:02:53 ◼   ► LucasArts and sierra on-line and today [TS]

00:02:56 ◼   ► they only exist as games produced in [TS]

00:02:59 ◼   ► amateur competitions but they are [TS]

00:03:02 ◼   ► well-loved and have a glorious history [TS]

00:03:05 ◼   ► that has very very few people actually [TS]

00:03:09 ◼   ► remember given the participation in this [TS]

00:03:12 ◼   ► podcast what I'd like to do first [TS]

00:03:16 ◼   ► actually guys is is talk to you about [TS]

00:03:18 ◼   ► your first experience with text [TS]

00:03:21 ◼   ► adventures I mean how did you discover [TS]

00:03:23 ◼   ► them what games did you play first [TS]

00:03:25 ◼   ► what struck you about it that that [TS]

00:03:26 ◼   ► brought you to this low point 25 years [TS]

00:03:30 ◼   ► later money why don't you start my first [TS]

00:03:34 ◼   ► text adventure was the original colossal [TS]

00:03:36 ◼   ► cave adventure i played it on a CPM [TS]

00:03:39 ◼   ► machine we headed home to that is some [TS]

00:03:42 ◼   ► street cred right there [TS]

00:03:43 ◼   ► my mother had a very high tech job she [TS]

00:03:46 ◼   ► wrote later than that she wrote [TS]

00:03:48 ◼   ► third-party manuals and how to program [TS]

00:03:51 ◼   ► in cobol so we had one of those eight [TS]

00:03:55 ◼   ► inch floppy dive CPM machines [TS]

00:03:58 ◼   ► it was an altos which I can't find any [TS]

00:04:00 ◼   ► information about on the internet at all [TS]

00:04:02 ◼   ► i love their minutes so my first game [TS]

00:04:07 ◼   ► was actually the first text adventure [TS]

00:04:09 ◼   ► mostly what I like about it i think was [TS]

00:04:12 ◼   ► that I didn't need anybody to play it [TS]

00:04:14 ◼   ► with me because I couldn't get a good [TS]

00:04:16 ◼   ► dnd group going and and and thus we [TS]

00:04:22 ◼   ► discover the first common element of [TS]

00:04:24 ◼   ► text adventure fandom a lonely lonely [TS]

00:04:26 ◼   ► childhood and my best friend and I [TS]

00:04:29 ◼   ► played it for months and months the [TS]

00:04:32 ◼   ► trick about classical cave is that you [TS]

00:04:34 ◼   ► can get all but one point and have no [TS]

00:04:38 ◼   ► idea where that last point is [TS]

00:04:40 ◼   ► and eventually we learned by reading the [TS]

00:04:44 ◼   ► help files over and over again they have [TS]

00:04:47 ◼   ► to take this magazine i think it's [TS]

00:04:49 ◼   ► spelunker monthly and carry it into this [TS]

00:04:52 ◼   ► specific other room and drop it to prove [TS]

00:04:54 ◼   ► you explored their Wow and figuring that [TS]

00:04:58 ◼   ► out was one of the high points of my [TS]

00:05:00 ◼   ► youth that that also brings us to the [TS]

00:05:03 ◼   ► common experience of really unfair [TS]

00:05:07 ◼   ► puzzles [TS]

00:05:08 ◼   ► oh yeah this was complete nonsense but [TS]

00:05:10 ◼   ► it was in the help file [TS]

00:05:12 ◼   ► well in the help file just said you get [TS]

00:05:15 ◼   ► points for killing things solving [TS]

00:05:17 ◼   ► puzzles and exploring and carrying [TS]

00:05:19 ◼   ► spelunkers monthly into room g well I [TS]

00:05:23 ◼   ► think there was a parenthetical about [TS]

00:05:24 ◼   ► you may have to prove that you've been [TS]

00:05:26 ◼   ► places with send was this randomly [TS]

00:05:30 ◼   ► generated maze so they could say you are [TS]

00:05:33 ◼   ► at wit's end [TS]

00:05:35 ◼   ► yeah and it didn't seem to have any [TS]

00:05:37 ◼   ► other purpose in the game other than [TS]

00:05:39 ◼   ► maybe you're supposed to drop something [TS]

00:05:42 ◼   ► there and the magazine was in the [TS]

00:05:43 ◼   ► waiting room that's all better man than [TS]

00:05:46 ◼   ► I am I had a lot of time on my hands I [TS]

00:05:50 ◼   ► could have been perfectly satisfied not [TS]

00:05:51 ◼   ► to have that last point personally [TS]

00:05:53 ◼   ► called colossal cave trivia microsoft [TS]

00:05:57 ◼   ► a.m estas five-point shift with a [TS]

00:06:00 ◼   ► version of it was like five versions of [TS]

00:06:02 ◼   ► that over there were dozens [TS]

00:06:04 ◼   ► yeah it with the source code actually [TS]

00:06:06 ◼   ► the original was written on a PDP and [TS]

00:06:08 ◼   ► Fortran and I got the source code in [TS]

00:06:11 ◼   ► she's 86 I think and it had been run [TS]

00:06:14 ◼   ► through an automatic conversion to see [TS]

00:06:16 ◼   ► and so I i thought well this is [TS]

00:06:19 ◼   ► interesting i'm gonna take a look and I [TS]

00:06:21 ◼   ► looked at the source and it was see [TS]

00:06:23 ◼   ► automatically translated from Fortran [TS]

00:06:25 ◼   ► and then I close up the fine and on with [TS]

00:06:26 ◼   ► my life with nick is that the [TS]

00:06:29 ◼   ► programming equivalent of something [TS]

00:06:30 ◼   ► that's been run through group [TS]

00:06:32 ◼   ► yes to chinese and back Steve what about [TS]

00:06:35 ◼   ► you what was your first game [TS]

00:06:37 ◼   ► well I actually didn't start with text [TS]

00:06:39 ◼   ► adventures when my parents bought the [TS]

00:06:41 ◼   ► Apple to instead of the trs-80 color [TS]

00:06:45 ◼   ► computer that i really wanted back in [TS]

00:06:48 ◼   ► 1979 they also picked up a couple of [TS]

00:06:51 ◼   ► assorted games [TS]

00:06:53 ◼   ► and among them with something called [TS]

00:06:55 ◼   ► mystery house also known as high res [TS]

00:06:58 ◼   ► adventure number one which was the first [TS]

00:07:02 ◼   ► of the online systems adventures made by [TS]

00:07:05 ◼   ► canon Roberta Williams which were became [TS]

00:07:08 ◼   ► sierra on-line it becames here online [TS]

00:07:11 ◼   ► eventually same team or at least Roberta [TS]

00:07:13 ◼   ► Williams produced King's Quest and you [TS]

00:07:17 ◼   ► know they may proceed on into adventure [TS]

00:07:19 ◼   ► history of the various games that I that [TS]

00:07:23 ◼   ► that we got when we purchased efforts [TS]

00:07:25 ◼   ► computer mystery house was the one that [TS]

00:07:27 ◼   ► really kind of sucked everybody in the [TS]

00:07:29 ◼   ► family in hand and took up all our time [TS]

00:07:31 ◼   ► and again it wasn't it wasn't text it [TS]

00:07:35 ◼   ► was a two-word parser there was a there [TS]

00:07:38 ◼   ► was some very rudimentary graphics at [TS]

00:07:41 ◼   ► the top rendered in lovingly in black [TS]

00:07:46 ◼   ► and white and green and purple which is [TS]

00:07:49 ◼   ► what the Apple produced in high res mode [TS]

00:07:52 ◼   ► I never quite figured out why that was [TS]

00:07:55 ◼   ► exactly but at least I had the white and [TS]

00:07:58 ◼   ► the purple and not just green that my [TS]

00:08:01 ◼   ► friend Mike across the street had and [TS]

00:08:04 ◼   ► then we had four lines of text at the [TS]

00:08:05 ◼   ► bottom was a two-word parser the the [TS]

00:08:09 ◼   ► images look like they've been drawn by a [TS]

00:08:11 ◼   ► two-year-old on a very rudimentary [TS]

00:08:13 ◼   ► digital pad of some kind [TS]

00:08:16 ◼   ► you're being generous yeah I really AM [TS]

00:08:18 ◼   ► they work they were pretty terrible and [TS]

00:08:19 ◼   ► they didn't really get much better over [TS]

00:08:21 ◼   ► the course of the next five high res [TS]

00:08:23 ◼   ► adventures they did improve a little and [TS]

00:08:26 ◼   ► then introduced color at one point but [TS]

00:08:28 ◼   ► my mom in particular really took to the [TS]

00:08:31 ◼   ► 22 mystery Allison to adventure games in [TS]

00:08:35 ◼   ► general and so she systematically [TS]

00:08:40 ◼   ► brought in all the various high res [TS]

00:08:42 ◼   ► adventures and lots of other graphic [TS]

00:08:45 ◼   ► adventures many of which are lost in the [TS]

00:08:48 ◼   ► mists of time and rightfully so and then [TS]

00:08:51 ◼   ► eventually from there I heard about Zork [TS]

00:08:55 ◼   ► in we had this massive volume of game [TS]

00:08:59 ◼   ► reviews which really I mean it was the [TS]

00:09:01 ◼   ► only place you found game reviews back [TS]

00:09:03 ◼   ► in the day it was either in some [TS]

00:09:04 ◼   ► magazine like soft talk [TS]

00:09:06 ◼   ► or I you know some sort of hobbyist [TS]

00:09:08 ◼   ► magazine or in this gigantic book of [TS]

00:09:12 ◼   ► reviews that you buy we didn't have no [TS]

00:09:15 ◼   ► highfalutin internet to go looking up [TS]

00:09:17 ◼   ► reviews on so hi Rayna crosses or can it [TS]

00:09:20 ◼   ► sounded fascinating and one day my [TS]

00:09:22 ◼   ► friend Mike had a copy and I borrowed it [TS]

00:09:24 ◼   ► and spent spent months with that game [TS]

00:09:30 ◼   ► kept finding excuses not to return it [TS]

00:09:33 ◼   ► until I solve the thing and it went on [TS]

00:09:36 ◼   ► from there the rest is history [TS]

00:09:38 ◼   ► you know if you use a hole punch to add [TS]

00:09:41 ◼   ► a write-protect notch to the other side [TS]

00:09:43 ◼   ► of the floppy you can store on both [TS]

00:09:44 ◼   ► sides [TS]

00:09:45 ◼   ► yeah that was pretty cool storage was [TS]

00:09:48 ◼   ► not it was not really an issue in my [TS]

00:09:50 ◼   ► early gaming in fact that mystery house [TS]

00:09:55 ◼   ► came in a ziploc bag with one blue sheet [TS]

00:09:59 ◼   ► of paper as the instructions and they [TS]

00:10:02 ◼   ► mentioned something like there's a [TS]

00:10:04 ◼   ► sentence fragment towards the end of [TS]

00:10:05 ◼   ► that that sheet of paper that said you [TS]

00:10:08 ◼   ► can save game as well and we know what [TS]

00:10:11 ◼   ► the hell that was all we do is that we [TS]

00:10:13 ◼   ► typed savegame that said something about [TS]

00:10:15 ◼   ► overriding previous games and that [TS]

00:10:17 ◼   ► freaking us all out and so we didn't we [TS]

00:10:19 ◼   ► never did it [TS]

00:10:20 ◼   ► we thought we were going to write over [TS]

00:10:21 ◼   ► the entirety of the game and and and and [TS]

00:10:24 ◼   ► that would be it for Mystery House the [TS]

00:10:26 ◼   ► CPM version of colossal cave i played [TS]

00:10:28 ◼   ► had a savegame system where you type [TS]

00:10:31 ◼   ► save game and it would quit the game [TS]

00:10:33 ◼   ► completely and then you were supposed to [TS]

00:10:35 ◼   ► save the core image of the computer i'm [TS]

00:10:41 ◼   ► still not sure what that meant [TS]

00:10:44 ◼   ► well we we played through mystery house [TS]

00:10:47 ◼   ► without ever saving the game which was a [TS]

00:10:49 ◼   ► massive pain because you had to visit [TS]

00:10:51 ◼   ► every room before you could find the [TS]

00:10:54 ◼   ► trapdoor in the Attic you actually have [TS]

00:10:56 ◼   ► to head with bed and every single room [TS]

00:10:58 ◼   ► in the game and there are several rooms [TS]

00:11:00 ◼   ► that were kind of off on you know [TS]

00:11:02 ◼   ► branching paths where there was just [TS]

00:11:04 ◼   ► nothing there at the end of that path so [TS]

00:11:06 ◼   ► after having played two or three times [TS]

00:11:08 ◼   ► we knew all you don't bother to go down [TS]

00:11:10 ◼   ► this hall on the second floor because [TS]

00:11:11 ◼   ► there's nothing there but a poorly drawn [TS]

00:11:13 ◼   ► bed and a window that looks more like a [TS]

00:11:16 ◼   ► refrigerator [TS]

00:11:17 ◼   ► and so it took us it must have been [TS]

00:11:22 ◼   ► weeks before somebody just accidentally [TS]

00:11:25 ◼   ► you know in desperation wandered all of [TS]

00:11:28 ◼   ► the room and then chose to look through [TS]

00:11:31 ◼   ► this telescope out in the forest and saw [TS]

00:11:33 ◼   ► suddenly there was a trapdoor in the [TS]

00:11:35 ◼   ► room so just the let's family finishes [TS]

00:11:37 ◼   ► dinner and gathers around the Apple to [TS]

00:11:40 ◼   ► and says I know let's play colossal cave [TS]

00:11:42 ◼   ► or excuse me hi res adventure number one [TS]

00:11:45 ◼   ► ok and they loaded up and they start [TS]

00:11:47 ◼   ► from the beginning every time it was not [TS]

00:11:50 ◼   ► a massive game so it wasn't a big deal [TS]

00:11:53 ◼   ► and as I said most of the family was [TS]

00:11:56 ◼   ► pretty driven to finish the thing we're [TS]

00:11:57 ◼   ► fairly competitive so everybody was [TS]

00:11:59 ◼   ► trying to finish it first so it really [TS]

00:12:02 ◼   ► was just considered kind of a minor [TS]

00:12:03 ◼   ► nuisance at the time I mean we didn't [TS]

00:12:05 ◼   ► know any better [TS]

00:12:06 ◼   ► how we hadn't seen computer games before [TS]

00:12:07 ◼   ► was a wild frontier back that you could [TS]

00:12:10 ◼   ► do anything strange and wonderful [TS]

00:12:12 ◼   ► technology that makes you start from the [TS]

00:12:14 ◼   ► beginning every time as yes well you [TS]

00:12:17 ◼   ► know i don't i don't remember what my [TS]

00:12:19 ◼   ► first game I have a vague memory of [TS]

00:12:21 ◼   ► going over to a friend's house in like [TS]

00:12:23 ◼   ► junior high and he had an apple to not [TS]

00:12:25 ◼   ► an apple to plus an apple too and i'm [TS]

00:12:28 ◼   ► playing some scott adams adventures [TS]

00:12:31 ◼   ► adventureland was the first but I I [TS]

00:12:34 ◼   ► couldn't tell you anything about it [TS]

00:12:36 ◼   ► the first game I really remember is orc [TS]

00:12:37 ◼   ► and the what we do is take a pirated [TS]

00:12:41 ◼   ► copy and punch a hole in the disk so you [TS]

00:12:45 ◼   ► can flip it over and store the games on [TS]

00:12:46 ◼   ► the other side and so you had one nice [TS]

00:12:49 ◼   ► little five and a quarter inch package [TS]

00:12:51 ◼   ► of the game on one side and all your [TS]

00:12:54 ◼   ► saves on the other I I completely fell [TS]

00:12:56 ◼   ► in love the first time I strides or it [TS]

00:12:58 ◼   ► was just amazing and I'm actually [TS]

00:13:01 ◼   ► surprised that that it's not what you [TS]

00:13:06 ◼   ► guys started with I mean it was such a [TS]

00:13:07 ◼   ► phenomenon as far as they went in 1980 [TS]

00:13:12 ◼   ► it was exciting to get sore because I [TS]

00:13:14 ◼   ► started before short came out so i had [TS]

00:13:18 ◼   ► to suffer through colossal k which was [TS]

00:13:20 ◼   ► fairly interestingly written but mostly [TS]

00:13:22 ◼   ► just a bunch of descriptions of caves [TS]

00:13:24 ◼   ► and random treasures and then the scott [TS]

00:13:28 ◼   ► adams adventures which are just whore [TS]

00:13:30 ◼   ► really written so with when Zork hit and [TS]

00:13:34 ◼   ► it was something that had a sense of [TS]

00:13:36 ◼   ► humor about itself it was tremendously [TS]

00:13:39 ◼   ► exciting [TS]

00:13:40 ◼   ► plus you could take more letters that it [TS]

00:13:41 ◼   ► would recognize words i remember [TS]

00:13:43 ◼   ► adventureland only recognize the first [TS]

00:13:45 ◼   ► three letters York 126 yeah that's my [TS]

00:13:50 ◼   ► the the first game i bought the first [TS]

00:13:52 ◼   ► infocomm game i bought and my favorite [TS]

00:13:54 ◼   ► to this day is deadline it was their [TS]

00:13:56 ◼   ► third game and it was the first one that [TS]

00:13:58 ◼   ► included Feelies you know the you would [TS]

00:14:00 ◼   ► buy the game and it came in a sealed [TS]

00:14:02 ◼   ► inspection envelope and you have to [TS]

00:14:03 ◼   ► slide a knife under it to break the seal [TS]

00:14:06 ◼   ► and inside were little pills that have [TS]

00:14:08 ◼   ► been found near the murder scene and all [TS]

00:14:09 ◼   ► the photographic evidence and in the [TS]

00:14:14 ◼   ► game there's a gazebo and I being 13 14 [TS]

00:14:18 ◼   ► years old I had never heard of a gazebo [TS]

00:14:22 ◼   ► this was a strange in new world for me [TS]

00:14:24 ◼   ► and so I knew however that the game only [TS]

00:14:27 ◼   ► our step 26 characters and so I thought [TS]

00:14:30 ◼   ► it was a bug and it was a gaze box that [TS]

00:14:34 ◼   ► had just left the X off and if I could [TS]

00:14:39 ◼   ► just briefly ask you what did you think [TS]

00:14:41 ◼   ► a gaze box was it was something in a [TS]

00:14:45 ◼   ► garden that you could walk into an [TS]

00:14:46 ◼   ► apparently look out of it was a boxy [TS]

00:14:50 ◼   ► structure like shake you could gaze it [TS]

00:14:51 ◼   ► was out of it [TS]

00:14:52 ◼   ► there you go that makes perfect sense [TS]

00:14:54 ◼   ► for today's box i learned lots of words [TS]

00:14:58 ◼   ► from from my early infocomm like many [TS]

00:15:00 ◼   ► here or plover from classical cave [TS]

00:15:04 ◼   ► there's a that's not actually a word [TS]

00:15:06 ◼   ► though is it's a bird [TS]

00:15:07 ◼   ► what is Steve still learning words today [TS]

00:15:10 ◼   ► I think it's an emerald the size of a [TS]

00:15:12 ◼   ► plover zeg which sounds all well and [TS]

00:15:15 ◼   ► good but I don't know how big the [TS]

00:15:16 ◼   ► plovers egg is a pole over zeg wow I [TS]

00:15:21 ◼   ► remember looking up men here just to [TS]

00:15:22 ◼   ► figure out what it was when they [TS]

00:15:24 ◼   ► standing stones in the description so if [TS]

00:15:27 ◼   ► you knew what those were you did no I [TS]

00:15:30 ◼   ► didn't slide look it up to have a lot of [TS]

00:15:32 ◼   ► experience with gays bows and standing [TS]

00:15:34 ◼   ► stones standing still adjust the to tend [TS]

00:15:36 ◼   ► to go together [TS]

00:15:37 ◼   ► my my gaze boxes full of men here's [TS]

00:15:41 ◼   ► and the I just I I mean for me playing [TS]

00:15:47 ◼   ► adventure games and sounds like for [TS]

00:15:48 ◼   ► Monty at least 20 and fractionated for [TS]

00:15:50 ◼   ► Steve as well was a really social [TS]

00:15:52 ◼   ► experience I mean we would sit around [TS]

00:15:54 ◼   ► and play like the atari VCS with [TS]

00:15:57 ◼   ► everybody in the neighborhood sitting [TS]

00:15:58 ◼   ► around but they were only one or two [TS]

00:16:00 ◼   ► really hardcore adventure gamers in my [TS]

00:16:02 ◼   ► neighborhood and we would sit around and [TS]

00:16:03 ◼   ► try and solve puzzles together taking [TS]

00:16:05 ◼   ► turns driving i remember planetfall one [TS]

00:16:08 ◼   ► of the later rape where I think infocomm [TS]

00:16:11 ◼   ► hit its peak really in that area [TS]

00:16:13 ◼   ► planetfall i played and my house on the [TS]

00:16:18 ◼   ► phone with a friend who lived two blocks [TS]

00:16:20 ◼   ► away he was playing it at his house and [TS]

00:16:23 ◼   ► we were just talking to each other the [TS]

00:16:25 ◼   ► whole time for three solid days saying i [TS]

00:16:28 ◼   ► found a circuit board i figured out how [TS]

00:16:31 ◼   ► to get that robot to shut up [TS]

00:16:32 ◼   ► oh my god have you done this and you [TS]

00:16:34 ◼   ► killed Floyd yes that was very very sad [TS]

00:16:37 ◼   ► faster that that's actually the that [TS]

00:16:41 ◼   ► that moment in in planetfall is a lot of [TS]

00:16:45 ◼   ► people site that is like the first time [TS]

00:16:47 ◼   ► a computer game made them cry i'm not [TS]

00:16:50 ◼   ► going to run up to it but I remember it [TS]

00:16:52 ◼   ► being an emotional moment that sounds [TS]

00:16:56 ◼   ► like spelunker is weakly would have made [TS]

00:16:58 ◼   ► me cry a little bit i was definitely [TS]

00:17:00 ◼   ► emotionally affected by it [TS]

00:17:02 ◼   ► by that point in the game I had spent a [TS]

00:17:04 ◼   ► lot of time with the innocent childlike [TS]

00:17:06 ◼   ► robot Floyd and when he sacrificed [TS]

00:17:08 ◼   ► himself to save me and then for no [TS]

00:17:13 ◼   ► reason saying a song that took up the [TS]

00:17:15 ◼   ► entire screen the ballad of the [TS]

00:17:19 ◼   ► star-crossed lovers yes which for no [TS]

00:17:22 ◼   ► reason [TS]

00:17:22 ◼   ► recap the plot of the previous info card [TS]

00:17:26 ◼   ► games star cross was a great moment I [TS]

00:17:30 ◼   ► think that was one of the one of the [TS]

00:17:31 ◼   ► earliest if not the first moment that I [TS]

00:17:34 ◼   ► remember the whole debate about whether [TS]

00:17:35 ◼   ► computer games can be art came up and it [TS]

00:17:38 ◼   ► still rages to this day [TS]

00:17:39 ◼   ► Roger Ebert is wrong is so add money [TS]

00:17:43 ◼   ► what what's your favorite game just [TS]

00:17:45 ◼   ► going back in history the games i [TS]

00:17:48 ◼   ► thought were the best were either [TS]

00:17:49 ◼   ► Trinity or lurking horror trinity is [TS]

00:17:54 ◼   ► this [TS]

00:17:54 ◼   ► weird almost plotless combination of [TS]

00:17:58 ◼   ► Alice in Wonderland and the development [TS]

00:18:01 ◼   ► of nuclear technology where you end up [TS]

00:18:04 ◼   ► having to go to different places in time [TS]

00:18:07 ◼   ► where nuclear bombs happened and make [TS]

00:18:11 ◼   ► sure that they do there's also an [TS]

00:18:13 ◼   ► overlay of Mary Poppins and Peter Pan [TS]

00:18:16 ◼   ► going on to it's very odd but very [TS]

00:18:20 ◼   ► evocative and the other one is lurking [TS]

00:18:22 ◼   ► horror which is the one that's very [TS]

00:18:24 ◼   ► loved crafty and set at what's in homage [TS]

00:18:27 ◼   ► to love em Brian Moriarty wrote Trinity [TS]

00:18:30 ◼   ► right and he went on to do a lot of [TS]

00:18:32 ◼   ► lucasfilm stuff like the dig in bloom [TS]

00:18:34 ◼   ► city [TS]

00:18:35 ◼   ► I don't think he was involved in the dig [TS]

00:18:37 ◼   ► but he definitely did loam I i remember [TS]

00:18:40 ◼   ► when it came out a lot of people are [TS]

00:18:42 ◼   ► talking about it like it was a turning [TS]

00:18:43 ◼   ► point that in mind forever voyaging were [TS]

00:18:45 ◼   ► like like planetfall was you know in an [TS]

00:18:48 ◼   ► emotional moment in interactive fiction [TS]

00:18:50 ◼   ► mfv and trinity were literary moments [TS]

00:18:55 ◼   ► where it wasn't just a a game anymore it [TS]

00:18:58 ◼   ► was it was a story I wasn't crazy about [TS]

00:19:02 ◼   ► a mind forever voyaging as a game there [TS]

00:19:05 ◼   ► was way too much of just walking through [TS]

00:19:08 ◼   ► the plot there really is only one puzzle [TS]

00:19:11 ◼   ► to speak of it yeah there's one puzzle [TS]

00:19:13 ◼   ► it [TS]

00:19:13 ◼   ► yeah like you had a whole lot of things [TS]

00:19:15 ◼   ► you are required to do but mostly your [TS]

00:19:17 ◼   ► job well it was a novel rather than a [TS]

00:19:21 ◼   ► game resisted a novel you interacted [TS]

00:19:23 ◼   ► with us [TS]

00:19:24 ◼   ► what text adventures became is [TS]

00:19:25 ◼   ► interactive fiction they started [TS]

00:19:27 ◼   ► experimenting with with things other [TS]

00:19:30 ◼   ► than just adventure games while they [TS]

00:19:33 ◼   ► were experimenting fairly early like [TS]

00:19:36 ◼   ► suspended is a crazy idea for a game [TS]

00:19:39 ◼   ► where you have to control six different [TS]

00:19:41 ◼   ► robots each of which interact with the [TS]

00:19:44 ◼   ► world in a different way so the only way [TS]

00:19:46 ◼   ► to operate things you have to fix irises [TS]

00:19:49 ◼   ► site because iris is the only one who [TS]

00:19:50 ◼   ► can see things and then once iris works [TS]

00:19:52 ◼   ► you can look around and use the feeling [TS]

00:19:55 ◼   ► robot to feel what's broken [TS]

00:19:57 ◼   ► that was written by michael Berlin who [TS]

00:19:59 ◼   ► is a set established science fiction [TS]

00:20:01 ◼   ► author yeah that was their first attempt [TS]

00:20:04 ◼   ► at really getting ambitious [TS]

00:20:07 ◼   ► it was also i think the first game to [TS]

00:20:10 ◼   ► feature an impossible mode right yeah [TS]

00:20:12 ◼   ► that which was genuinely impossible [TS]

00:20:14 ◼   ► yeah you started and the world would end [TS]

00:20:16 ◼   ► in six turns or so [TS]

00:20:18 ◼   ► hooray just like real life [TS]

00:20:22 ◼   ► what I liked about that game was when we [TS]

00:20:24 ◼   ► were trying to solve it [TS]

00:20:25 ◼   ► my friend Mike and I figured out that [TS]

00:20:28 ◼   ► you could use any robots description is [TS]

00:20:30 ◼   ► everything in the game each robot would [TS]

00:20:32 ◼   ► describe differently so iris would say [TS]

00:20:34 ◼   ► the blue thing whereas out o would say [TS]

00:20:37 ◼   ► the thing that goes being without it was [TS]

00:20:40 ◼   ► the listening robot but eventually [TS]

00:20:43 ◼   ► figured out that if you used wiz at who [TS]

00:20:46 ◼   ► was the cursor librarian robot you could [TS]

00:20:48 ◼   ► just call everything the LH one or the [TS]

00:20:51 ◼   ► PX 2 and that would save your typing a [TS]

00:20:54 ◼   ► lot but great thing infocomm ever did [TS]

00:20:57 ◼   ► with shorten inventory to I helices l [TS]

00:21:00 ◼   ► and again was G which we have huge just [TS]

00:21:03 ◼   ► before this podcast i was playing a very [TS]

00:21:05 ◼   ► early version of Zork to that did not [TS]

00:21:08 ◼   ► have g4 again and i asked i'm steve what [TS]

00:21:12 ◼   ► was your what's your favorite game [TS]

00:21:14 ◼   ► well it's a toss up for me I don't think [TS]

00:21:16 ◼   ► I'm quite as as experience with the [TS]

00:21:19 ◼   ► infocomm cannons youtube because I never [TS]

00:21:21 ◼   ► quite got around to doing Trinity I [TS]

00:21:22 ◼   ► think I move your ultimate by that point [TS]

00:21:24 ◼   ► good play it now no I was I had just [TS]

00:21:27 ◼   ► branched off onto a different path of [TS]

00:21:28 ◼   ► loser hood at that point I was I was [TS]

00:21:30 ◼   ► more into the ultimate wasteland other [TS]

00:21:33 ◼   ► RPGs by that point but of the ones that [TS]

00:21:37 ◼   ► i have played it's a toss up for me [TS]

00:21:39 ◼   ► between chanter which I just really like [TS]

00:21:43 ◼   ► the dynamic of collecting spells I think [TS]

00:21:46 ◼   ► they the OCD part of me which is like [TS]

00:21:47 ◼   ► ninety percent of me really enjoyed that [TS]

00:21:49 ◼   ► the whole experience of walking around [TS]

00:21:52 ◼   ► collecting spells and it was nice to be [TS]

00:21:55 ◼   ► in a fantasy environment where there was [TS]

00:21:58 ◼   ► less randomness than Zork and the [TS]

00:22:02 ◼   ► difficulty level wasn't just [TS]

00:22:04 ◼   ► over-the-top and unfair i think that was [TS]

00:22:07 ◼   ► probably the first infocomm game that I [TS]

00:22:10 ◼   ► played through without having to look at [TS]

00:22:13 ◼   ► any hint anywhere it resort kind of [TS]

00:22:15 ◼   ► suffers from the early adventure game [TS]

00:22:17 ◼   ► problem of we're just making puzzles up [TS]

00:22:20 ◼   ► as we go [TS]

00:22:20 ◼   ► rain another puzzle we need another [TS]

00:22:22 ◼   ► puzzle we need another puzzle and a lot [TS]

00:22:24 ◼   ► of it feels like they just came up with [TS]

00:22:26 ◼   ► puzzles and slam together and in a [TS]

00:22:28 ◼   ► totally haphazard way I mean there's not [TS]

00:22:30 ◼   ► really a lot of coherence in the fantasy [TS]

00:22:31 ◼   ► world there right [TS]

00:22:32 ◼   ► really the baseball diamond puzzle has [TS]

00:22:34 ◼   ► no context in a fantasy settings i have [TS]

00:22:37 ◼   ► played Zork probably 50 times by this [TS]

00:22:41 ◼   ► point and i can play the whole thing [TS]

00:22:42 ◼   ► without drawing a map [TS]

00:22:45 ◼   ► I still don't understand the baseball [TS]

00:22:46 ◼   ► puzzle at all [TS]

00:22:48 ◼   ► well there's there's a bat and it says [TS]

00:22:51 ◼   ► babe flathead right I you're supposed to [TS]

00:22:54 ◼   ► swing the bat goes to find the bat swing [TS]

00:22:57 ◼   ► it and then run in a diamond [TS]

00:23:00 ◼   ► yes I don't know what direction diamond [TS]

00:23:02 ◼   ► is supposed to go [TS]

00:23:03 ◼   ► I think you're only available directions [TS]

00:23:05 ◼   ► are northeast northwest southeast and [TS]

00:23:07 ◼   ► southwest right and you can't go north [TS]

00:23:09 ◼   ► south and everything says dymond I mean [TS]

00:23:12 ◼   ► it's like a diamond shape Iran angular [TS]

00:23:14 ◼   ► room with a diamond-shaped window even [TS]

00:23:16 ◼   ► even assuming you have the baseball [TS]

00:23:18 ◼   ► context that's required to understand [TS]

00:23:20 ◼   ► the puzzle explain why it's in a fantasy [TS]

00:23:23 ◼   ► setting again like it that I cannot do [TS]

00:23:26 ◼   ► well you see the flatheads were famously [TS]

00:23:28 ◼   ► eccentric and extremely rich so they [TS]

00:23:31 ◼   ► would do crazy things like hollow out of [TS]

00:23:33 ◼   ► volcano just store there one crowd and [TS]

00:23:36 ◼   ► build a flood control damn yes so [TS]

00:23:38 ◼   ► clearly babe flathead wanted to have an [TS]

00:23:42 ◼   ► underground baseball diamond [TS]

00:23:43 ◼   ► it was the Big Blue Ox flathead right [TS]

00:23:45 ◼   ► yes while Duncan Thrax was was [TS]

00:23:48 ◼   ► pioneering double fanucci babe flathead [TS]

00:23:52 ◼   ► was working out the rules for a [TS]

00:23:53 ◼   ► rudimentary version of baseball that's [TS]

00:23:56 ◼   ► that's one of the reasons i like [TS]

00:23:57 ◼   ► deadline so much it was outside of the [TS]

00:24:00 ◼   ► cannon that was dragged from you know [TS]

00:24:02 ◼   ► MIT when they were just throwing the [TS]

00:24:05 ◼   ► game together it was start to finish [TS]

00:24:08 ◼   ► written as a coherent experience [TS]

00:24:11 ◼   ► yeah that's that's that's exactly why I [TS]

00:24:13 ◼   ► liked enchanter because it flowed all [TS]

00:24:17 ◼   ► the rooms made sense they you can [TS]

00:24:19 ◼   ► understand why they were where they were [TS]

00:24:21 ◼   ► as a result and ended up kind of I think [TS]

00:24:24 ◼   ► a little bit more of a linear experience [TS]

00:24:26 ◼   ► but really enjoyed it for that for for [TS]

00:24:30 ◼   ► all those reasons [TS]

00:24:31 ◼   ► and then second which may or may not be [TS]

00:24:35 ◼   ► first I think I kind of go back and [TS]

00:24:37 ◼   ► forth what it [TS]

00:24:40 ◼   ► yes exactly would be leather goddesses [TS]

00:24:44 ◼   ► of Phobos oh you pervy little bastard [TS]

00:24:47 ◼   ► which had all of the humor of of [TS]

00:24:50 ◼   ► hitchhikers + tax 7-bit ascii sex+ far [TS]

00:24:56 ◼   ► less difficulty and more reasonable [TS]

00:24:58 ◼   ► puzzles and except for that stupid maze [TS]

00:25:01 ◼   ► where you had to hop every set seven [TS]

00:25:03 ◼   ► steps and every three steps or whatever [TS]

00:25:06 ◼   ► it was and I don't for some reason I [TS]

00:25:08 ◼   ► don't recall that maybe black that out [TS]

00:25:10 ◼   ► of my memory we we wrote that out yeah [TS]

00:25:12 ◼   ► you had to eventually you know just just [TS]

00:25:14 ◼   ► writing out the commands just so we [TS]

00:25:15 ◼   ► would make sure to hop and do everything [TS]

00:25:19 ◼   ► that was necessary every proper term [TS]

00:25:21 ◼   ► number okay yeah it's coming back to me [TS]

00:25:24 ◼   ► yeah that kind of sucked so what do you [TS]

00:25:27 ◼   ► like about it other than the the naughty [TS]

00:25:29 ◼   ► bits it was funny [TS]

00:25:31 ◼   ► I mean it's all the all the info con [TS]

00:25:33 ◼   ► games were funny on some level but I [TS]

00:25:35 ◼   ► always enjoyed moretz keys work and you [TS]

00:25:39 ◼   ► know I i suspect that he's largely [TS]

00:25:41 ◼   ► responsible for why Hitchhiker's Guide [TS]

00:25:44 ◼   ► was so entertaining as well [TS]

00:25:45 ◼   ► well on the douglas adams podcast there [TS]

00:25:48 ◼   ► we talked about how legendarily bad [TS]

00:25:52 ◼   ► adams was with deadlines ran they [TS]

00:25:56 ◼   ► eventually just kind of chuck the game [TS]

00:25:59 ◼   ► tumors etsy and and he finished it right [TS]

00:26:02 ◼   ► which is also why bureaucracy is [TS]

00:26:04 ◼   ► credited to the staff of infocomm and in [TS]

00:26:07 ◼   ► tiny little 8.5 douglas adams i'm [TS]

00:26:11 ◼   ► actually did the infocomm implosion you [TS]

00:26:15 ◼   ► know they were found it is as they were [TS]

00:26:18 ◼   ► going to write new software they were [TS]

00:26:19 ◼   ► just going to pour torque and continue [TS]

00:26:21 ◼   ► to do adventure games but it turned out [TS]

00:26:23 ◼   ► to be so profitable that they just kept [TS]

00:26:24 ◼   ► going gangbusters and then when they [TS]

00:26:26 ◼   ► actually did come out with a business [TS]

00:26:27 ◼   ► product which was their database [TS]

00:26:28 ◼   ► cornerstone in 1985 it fell flat on its [TS]

00:26:31 ◼   ► face one of the advantages they had when [TS]

00:26:35 ◼   ► with their adventure games was they [TS]

00:26:37 ◼   ► wrote a bytecode interpreter which is [TS]

00:26:39 ◼   ► nerd talk for something that could take [TS]

00:26:41 ◼   ► a very very compressed script and squash [TS]

00:26:44 ◼   ► it all [TS]

00:26:45 ◼   ► onto a single in the case of my Atari [TS]

00:26:47 ◼   ► 490 k floppy drive and still included a [TS]

00:26:51 ◼   ► reasonable amount of texts [TS]

00:26:53 ◼   ► um and then they could just pour the [TS]

00:26:55 ◼   ► bytecode interpreter to each of the new [TS]

00:26:57 ◼   ► architectures whether it's Apple to or [TS]

00:26:58 ◼   ► commodore 64 Monty's families CPM [TS]

00:27:02 ◼   ► machine by that point we had gotten [TS]

00:27:04 ◼   ► better computers at home [TS]

00:27:06 ◼   ► ok and and so they could release all [TS]

00:27:09 ◼   ► these games or all these different [TS]

00:27:11 ◼   ► platforms at the same time because the [TS]

00:27:12 ◼   ► same script run and ran on each of the [TS]

00:27:14 ◼   ► bike open code interpreters for each of [TS]

00:27:17 ◼   ► the machines but they tried the same [TS]

00:27:18 ◼   ► thing with Cornerstone where the the [TS]

00:27:22 ◼   ► product was written by code interpreted [TS]

00:27:24 ◼   ► which meant it was very very very slow [TS]

00:27:26 ◼   ► and around 95 you know it just the [TS]

00:27:32 ◼   ► function of computer games is very [TS]

00:27:33 ◼   ► different than the function of business [TS]

00:27:35 ◼   ► software and slowness doesn't help and [TS]

00:27:37 ◼   ► they never ported it to anything other [TS]

00:27:39 ◼   ► than the pc well there was no point [TS]

00:27:41 ◼   ► everybody was using pc for the [TS]

00:27:42 ◼   ► enterprise at that point so you just use [TS]

00:27:45 ◼   ► the word enterprise it not in a Star [TS]

00:27:47 ◼   ► Trek context yes i know i'm sorry their [TS]

00:27:50 ◼   ► whole their whole reason for in doing an [TS]

00:27:52 ◼   ► interpretive database was pretty much [TS]

00:27:54 ◼   ► out the window at that point the driver [TS]

00:27:55 ◼   ► stock so and they're stuck with the [TS]

00:27:57 ◼   ► overhead and they're charging five [TS]

00:27:59 ◼   ► hundred dollars for something that [TS]

00:28:00 ◼   ► didn't include a natural language parser [TS]

00:28:02 ◼   ► which is what they were known for and [TS]

00:28:04 ◼   ► the company just kind of crumbled at [TS]

00:28:07 ◼   ► that point and it's their greatest work [TS]

00:28:09 ◼   ► was behind them at that point i don't [TS]

00:28:12 ◼   ► know i think that they were still [TS]

00:28:13 ◼   ► putting out [TS]

00:28:15 ◼   ► trinity I think Trinity was a pretty [TS]

00:28:16 ◼   ► late one and lurking horror was in there [TS]

00:28:18 ◼   ► last year [TS]

00:28:19 ◼   ► Trinity was 86 but they were all they [TS]

00:28:22 ◼   ► were doing James Clavell shogun you know [TS]

00:28:25 ◼   ► they were they were grasping at straws [TS]

00:28:26 ◼   ► dated plundered hearts which nothing [TS]

00:28:28 ◼   ► against plundered hearts but it they [TS]

00:28:31 ◼   ► were looking for new markets the [TS]

00:28:33 ◼   ► cornerstones released in 85 and that [TS]

00:28:38 ◼   ► meant that Trinity leather goddesses [TS]

00:28:39 ◼   ► bureaucracy station fall which was [TS]

00:28:42 ◼   ► admittedly not as good as planetfall [TS]

00:28:43 ◼   ► lurking horror you know the two somewhat [TS]

00:28:48 ◼   ► lesser zor countries that those were all [TS]

00:28:51 ◼   ► post post cornerstone so they were still [TS]

00:28:53 ◼   ► putting together some decent games [TS]

00:28:54 ◼   ► towards the animated shogun and [TS]

00:28:57 ◼   ► a you know their their feeble attempt at [TS]

00:29:00 ◼   ► RPGs which was I think what quarter [TS]

00:29:02 ◼   ► staff but they also they did they'd like [TS]

00:29:06 ◼   ► border zone which was a fine game but it [TS]

00:29:09 ◼   ► was it wasn't a coherent story it was [TS]

00:29:11 ◼   ► just a bunch of little vignettes that [TS]

00:29:13 ◼   ► one they were trying to add graphics but [TS]

00:29:16 ◼   ► they weren't doing it well and it was a [TS]

00:29:17 ◼   ► ski graphics talent tell me that that [TS]

00:29:21 ◼   ► Nordenberg couldn't make heads or tails [TS]

00:29:23 ◼   ► of it is not a weird game [TS]

00:29:27 ◼   ► no I will not tell you that I still kind [TS]

00:29:30 ◼   ► of enjoy playing that although there are [TS]

00:29:32 ◼   ► a couple specific parts of that still [TS]

00:29:34 ◼   ► make me very angry [TS]

00:29:35 ◼   ► the spoonerism section still runs [TS]

00:29:37 ◼   ► through my head [TS]

00:29:38 ◼   ► some of those art spoonerisms keep tell [TS]

00:29:43 ◼   ► us how angry it makes you if they didn't [TS]

00:29:48 ◼   ► do it did [TS]

00:29:49 ◼   ► did anybody in the world play Sherlock I [TS]

00:29:52 ◼   ► played Sherlock know what Monty and then [TS]

00:29:55 ◼   ► nobody else [TS]

00:29:56 ◼   ► Sherlock is very unsatisfying what about [TS]

00:29:58 ◼   ► Arthur never played Arthur you can't [TS]

00:30:02 ◼   ► even get started in Sherlock unless you [TS]

00:30:04 ◼   ► know that dr. Watson keeps his [TS]

00:30:06 ◼   ► stethoscope in his hat it is had a [TS]

00:30:12 ◼   ► euphemism it could be I don't know [TS]

00:30:14 ◼   ► everything is written in this weird [TS]

00:30:16 ◼   ► British is to use the term bowler that [TS]

00:30:18 ◼   ► could be anything really i just did you [TS]

00:30:22 ◼   ► know it seems like they were grasping [TS]

00:30:24 ◼   ► for new markets like see starker was a [TS]

00:30:26 ◼   ► young person's game and that was earlier [TS]

00:30:29 ◼   ► admittedly but just they didn't maybe I [TS]

00:30:33 ◼   ► was growing up in and discovering at [TS]

00:30:35 ◼   ► least my interest in girls if not actual [TS]

00:30:37 ◼   ► girls and they didn't grab me the way [TS]

00:30:40 ◼   ► like deadline or starcross you're [TS]

00:30:42 ◼   ► suspended did well I feel like in that [TS]

00:30:45 ◼   ► later era while they were also doing [TS]

00:30:47 ◼   ► rich interesting games like Trinity and [TS]

00:30:49 ◼   ► learning or they're also trying to do [TS]

00:30:51 ◼   ► games that had multiple story options in [TS]

00:30:54 ◼   ► them the movement plundered hearts [TS]

00:30:56 ◼   ► cutthroats and I think Sherlock all had [TS]

00:30:58 ◼   ► three different possible plots you could [TS]

00:31:01 ◼   ► follow which [TS]

00:31:04 ◼   ► looks they were always chasing [TS]

00:31:05 ◼   ► replayability yeah I which they never [TS]

00:31:09 ◼   ► had in their early games you know once [TS]

00:31:10 ◼   ► you were done with his work you're [TS]

00:31:11 ◼   ► pretty much done in fact i played it [TS]

00:31:14 ◼   ► just out of sheer a nostalgia couple of [TS]

00:31:17 ◼   ► days ago and it took me two days and I [TS]

00:31:19 ◼   ► still remember exactly where everything [TS]

00:31:20 ◼   ► was it's been two decades since i last [TS]

00:31:22 ◼   ► touch the thing but then again i played [TS]

00:31:25 ◼   ► it again didn't I so replayability is [TS]

00:31:27 ◼   ► that's why I have all the infocomm games [TS]

00:31:29 ◼   ► on my iPad so i can play that whatever I [TS]

00:31:31 ◼   ► want and feel really really smart this [TS]

00:31:34 ◼   ► just out of curiosity what do you think [TS]

00:31:36 ◼   ► could be used in that space of your [TS]

00:31:37 ◼   ► brain that's taken up with infocomm [TS]

00:31:39 ◼   ► walkthroughs I don't know it probably [TS]

00:31:42 ◼   ► abba lyrics or something if it wasn't in [TS]

00:31:44 ◼   ► focus on something I'm going to find [TS]

00:31:45 ◼   ► myself west of white house and I'll know [TS]

00:31:47 ◼   ► if it's going to go in North up get egg [TS]

00:31:49 ◼   ► down south east open window West West [TS]

00:31:52 ◼   ► open case and so on but the damn thief [TS]

00:31:55 ◼   ► the randomness that was my most hated [TS]

00:31:58 ◼   ► thing about the early infocomm is the [TS]

00:32:00 ◼   ► random elements always drove me nuts [TS]

00:32:03 ◼   ► that you couldn't consistently kill the [TS]

00:32:05 ◼   ► troll or that the thief would pop up and [TS]

00:32:08 ◼   ► swipe something and make your game on [TS]

00:32:09 ◼   ► when we are you can save the game right [TS]

00:32:11 ◼   ► before you do that [TS]

00:32:12 ◼   ► what does explain this savegame thing to [TS]

00:32:14 ◼   ► was the first of all you're better at [TS]

00:32:16 ◼   ► killing things when you have more points [TS]

00:32:18 ◼   ► so you should get us i only just learned [TS]

00:32:19 ◼   ► that a couple of days ago pick and [TS]

00:32:22 ◼   ► second you can get everything back from [TS]

00:32:24 ◼   ► the thief after you kill him and he's [TS]

00:32:26 ◼   ► used the nasty knife against the thief [TS]

00:32:28 ◼   ► because that's better but the sword is [TS]

00:32:30 ◼   ► better against the troll yeah [TS]

00:32:33 ◼   ► do not use the rusty knife against [TS]

00:32:35 ◼   ► anything because it is cursed and will [TS]

00:32:36 ◼   ► kill you right you can throw it can you [TS]

00:32:39 ◼   ► can but it will the rusty knife will [TS]

00:32:41 ◼   ► turn around in midair and stab you in [TS]

00:32:42 ◼   ► the throat oh yeah there is that one of [TS]

00:32:45 ◼   ► the proudest moments of my young life [TS]

00:32:46 ◼   ► was figuring out that the dexterous [TS]

00:32:48 ◼   ► thief is going to be able to open the [TS]

00:32:49 ◼   ► egg where I fumble-fingered me cannot [TS]

00:32:52 ◼   ► you see you have to open the egg because [TS]

00:32:54 ◼   ► there's a beautiful clockwork canary in [TS]

00:32:56 ◼   ► it and then you have to use the canary [TS]

00:32:58 ◼   ► outside in the trees to get the ball [TS]

00:33:01 ◼   ► place feuding somebody picked him down [TS]

00:33:04 ◼   ► equipment and this is important [TS]

00:33:07 ◼   ► information anyway infocomm blew up that [TS]

00:33:11 ◼   ► it was acquired by activision they [TS]

00:33:13 ◼   ► spotted along for another couple of [TS]

00:33:15 ◼   ► years and then just started releasing [TS]

00:33:17 ◼   ► greatest [TS]

00:33:18 ◼   ► and I think that the reason info comms [TS]

00:33:21 ◼   ► hold up especially the early ones is [TS]

00:33:22 ◼   ► because they're not game so much as they [TS]

00:33:25 ◼   ► are novels they are experiences and you [TS]

00:33:27 ◼   ► have an experience and you can put on [TS]

00:33:29 ◼   ► the shelf and you can bring it down to [TS]

00:33:30 ◼   ► have the experience again that's why i [TS]

00:33:32 ◼   ► don't think the multiple storylines [TS]

00:33:33 ◼   ► worked you don't replay Zork they [TS]

00:33:37 ◼   ► replayed like minor 2014 einer to throw [TS]

00:33:42 ◼   ► in another mid-eighties videogame her [TS]

00:33:45 ◼   ► parents their anthologies the multiple [TS]

00:33:47 ◼   ► storyline ones isn't in their [TS]

00:33:50 ◼   ► neighborhoods is an anthology of three [TS]

00:33:52 ◼   ► fairly boring Pirates have read worse it [TS]

00:33:58 ◼   ► is there the airplane novels of the [TS]

00:34:01 ◼   ► interactive fiction world I think that [TS]

00:34:04 ◼   ► was one of the best stated goals of [TS]

00:34:06 ◼   ► infocomm early on in there there early [TS]

00:34:09 ◼   ► days was that they wanted their their [TS]

00:34:12 ◼   ► games to eventually be up on the shelves [TS]

00:34:14 ◼   ► in a bookstore you next great literature [TS]

00:34:17 ◼   ► so i think a lofty goal that perhaps [TS]

00:34:20 ◼   ► overstated the the reach of the computer [TS]

00:34:22 ◼   ► game industry in this those days well [TS]

00:34:24 ◼   ► they they continue I mean they're [TS]

00:34:25 ◼   ► they're games continued to sell long [TS]

00:34:28 ◼   ► after they were released which was a [TS]

00:34:29 ◼   ► rarity for the industry usually game [TS]

00:34:31 ◼   ► comes out those up big not big like [TS]

00:34:34 ◼   ► today but big for the time and then [TS]

00:34:36 ◼   ► would fade as people played it and got [TS]

00:34:38 ◼   ► used to it and moved on but if you come [TS]

00:34:40 ◼   ► to zork you can plays work the same way [TS]

00:34:42 ◼   ► today that you played it 20 years ago [TS]

00:34:45 ◼   ► that I think two is part of the rapid [TS]

00:34:48 ◼   ► destruction that Activision made on [TS]

00:34:51 ◼   ► financial com after they acquired them [TS]

00:34:53 ◼   ► was they take we're treated them like [TS]

00:34:55 ◼   ► regular video games with the other would [TS]

00:34:58 ◼   ► keep their their seven-year-old games on [TS]

00:35:00 ◼   ► the shelves because people were still [TS]

00:35:01 ◼   ► snapping them up i mean Zork popped up [TS]

00:35:03 ◼   ► on the soft talk you know top sellers [TS]

00:35:06 ◼   ► list for half a decade and then [TS]

00:35:09 ◼   ► activation came along and they they [TS]

00:35:11 ◼   ► treated infocomm games like they were [TS]

00:35:13 ◼   ► standard computer games where you know [TS]

00:35:15 ◼   ► that the next big thing would come along [TS]

00:35:16 ◼   ► with graphics that looked like you know [TS]

00:35:19 ◼   ► that the pictures look like people [TS]

00:35:20 ◼   ► instead of misshapen the two-dimensional [TS]

00:35:24 ◼   ► frogs of some kind and so they replace [TS]

00:35:27 ◼   ► the old with the new on the shelf and [TS]

00:35:28 ◼   ► and they try to do that with infocomm [TS]

00:35:30 ◼   ► and I [TS]

00:35:31 ◼   ► I think actually demanded after they [TS]

00:35:33 ◼   ► acquired them that they produce eight [TS]

00:35:34 ◼   ► games a year [TS]

00:35:35 ◼   ► yeah instead of the four they were [TS]

00:35:36 ◼   ► producing right which is which [TS]

00:35:39 ◼   ► meanwhile the quality went down big [TS]

00:35:41 ◼   ► surprise yeah shocking [TS]

00:35:43 ◼   ► that's a Zork is the Dark Side of the [TS]

00:35:44 ◼   ► Moon of interactive fiction of course of [TS]

00:35:47 ◼   ► Activision hadn't done that I strongly [TS]

00:35:49 ◼   ► suspect it would have happened shortly [TS]

00:35:52 ◼   ► afterwards anyway just because the at [TS]

00:35:54 ◼   ► compusa is of the world plus the the [TS]

00:35:57 ◼   ► computer game industry is changing i [TS]

00:35:59 ◼   ► mean people wanted graphics you know [TS]

00:36:01 ◼   ► infocomm had a famous ad where they say [TS]

00:36:03 ◼   ► we stick our graphics where the Sun [TS]

00:36:04 ◼   ► don't shine and it was a picture of a [TS]

00:36:06 ◼   ► brain and you can get away with that [TS]

00:36:09 ◼   ► with the fanboys like say three people [TS]

00:36:11 ◼   ► recording a podcast and yes 2012 but for [TS]

00:36:16 ◼   ► the most part people wanted their [TS]

00:36:17 ◼   ► computers to do pretty colored things [TS]

00:36:19 ◼   ► that moved around [TS]

00:36:22 ◼   ► well even as infocomm they become part [TS]

00:36:25 ◼   ► of activism still they did move into [TS]

00:36:27 ◼   ► graphics beyond orchid graphics and and [TS]

00:36:30 ◼   ► they weren't very good [TS]

00:36:31 ◼   ► well they were still trying to to to do [TS]

00:36:34 ◼   ► interpreted games so they had a limited [TS]

00:36:37 ◼   ► amount of simplistic graphics that they [TS]

00:36:39 ◼   ► could reasonably render on multiple zip [TS]

00:36:43 ◼   ► boxes machines which is what which is [TS]

00:36:46 ◼   ► what they called their interpreter still [TS]

00:36:48 ◼   ► in cases if still 0-0 was the [TS]

00:36:51 ◼   ► implementation language it was the [TS]

00:36:52 ◼   ► implementation program alright you win [TS]

00:36:54 ◼   ► these you just got told which was which [TS]

00:36:58 ◼   ► was later shortened to Z machine it's [TS]

00:37:01 ◼   ► actually probably worth noting that [TS]

00:37:02 ◼   ► stock scott adams who actually was first [TS]

00:37:05 ◼   ► to market with the adventure game room [TS]

00:37:07 ◼   ► and if you go to his website he proudly [TS]

00:37:09 ◼   ► announces himself as the progenitor of [TS]

00:37:11 ◼   ► the entire computer games industry [TS]

00:37:12 ◼   ► pointing out it is it not the dilbert [TS]

00:37:15 ◼   ► scott adams this is a different scott [TS]

00:37:17 ◼   ► adams no no this is the scott adams of [TS]

00:37:19 ◼   ► the scott adams adventure games he put [TS]

00:37:21 ◼   ► himself in the ads right get a big fro I [TS]

00:37:24 ◼   ► think he was in the ads along with some [TS]

00:37:27 ◼   ► very seventies looking people dressed up [TS]

00:37:29 ◼   ► in period costume anyway but what i was [TS]

00:37:32 ◼   ► getting too was that he actually wrote [TS]

00:37:34 ◼   ► an interpreter as well for his games [TS]

00:37:36 ◼   ► previous to the resort arrival on the [TS]

00:37:41 ◼   ► scene i'm clearly getting out nerd here [TS]

00:37:43 ◼   ► so I'm going to throw down my trump card [TS]

00:37:45 ◼   ► just that I've written adventure games i [TS]

00:37:46 ◼   ► wrote my own parser and my own lexer and [TS]

00:37:50 ◼   ► nothing ever happened with them but damn [TS]

00:37:54 ◼   ► that was fun [TS]

00:37:55 ◼   ► nerd and I think fifth grade or so I was [TS]

00:38:01 ◼   ► in a elementary school that had a [TS]

00:38:02 ◼   ► computer lab full of Apple tues and we [TS]

00:38:05 ◼   ► were told we had to write a complete [TS]

00:38:07 ◼   ► fancy computer program and i found this [TS]

00:38:10 ◼   ► whole thing boring and a little [TS]

00:38:11 ◼   ► insulting because I at eros ad at home [TS]

00:38:13 ◼   ► so naturally i hated apples so I wrote a [TS]

00:38:16 ◼   ► fake adventure game that looked like an [TS]

00:38:20 ◼   ► adventure game as long as you did [TS]

00:38:21 ◼   ► exactly the right move [TS]

00:38:23 ◼   ► each time if at any point you typed [TS]

00:38:26 ◼   ► anything other than the required input [TS]

00:38:29 ◼   ► it would just say I'm sorry I don't [TS]

00:38:31 ◼   ► understand that you realize that you've [TS]

00:38:33 ◼   ► liked anticipated demos at the Consumer [TS]

00:38:36 ◼   ► Electronics Show by a couple of decades [TS]

00:38:38 ◼   ► yep so when it came time to display it [TS]

00:38:41 ◼   ► to the teacher I said go ahead and try [TS]

00:38:43 ◼   ► it and she typed something I guess I [TS]

00:38:46 ◼   ► didn't anticipate that word here let me [TS]

00:38:47 ◼   ► show you how it works and then it worked [TS]

00:38:49 ◼   ► perfectly [TS]

00:38:50 ◼   ► I started out writing what amounted to [TS]

00:38:51 ◼   ► choose your own adventures where you [TS]

00:38:53 ◼   ► were presented with a situation you [TS]

00:38:55 ◼   ► could like you know one through four 22 [TS]

00:38:57 ◼   ► pick different options but then I [TS]

00:38:59 ◼   ► eventually did a little research and and [TS]

00:39:01 ◼   ► a lot of trial and error and started [TS]

00:39:03 ◼   ► parsing reasonably complex English [TS]

00:39:05 ◼   ► sentences and having reasonable puzzles [TS]

00:39:09 ◼   ► I you know had an inventory system and a [TS]

00:39:11 ◼   ► container system and this was all [TS]

00:39:13 ◼   ► without benefit of any sort of you know [TS]

00:39:15 ◼   ► how the people who knew what they were [TS]

00:39:17 ◼   ► doing actually did it but I i wrote four [TS]

00:39:21 ◼   ► or five games that my friends played and [TS]

00:39:23 ◼   ► solved and complained about the landless [TS]

00:39:26 ◼   ► Lee I did write a book on solving [TS]

00:39:28 ◼   ► infocomm games [TS]

00:39:30 ◼   ► damn i'm not going to win this nerd [TS]

00:39:32 ◼   ► battle and my my friend and I were at [TS]

00:39:36 ◼   ► the computer store shopping for the next [TS]

00:39:38 ◼   ► infocomm game which I think was infidel [TS]

00:39:41 ◼   ► at the time and the smarmy guy who don't [TS]

00:39:44 ◼   ► know how don't put the ring on got a [TS]

00:39:47 ◼   ► needle in it well what's the difference [TS]

00:39:49 ◼   ► you're gonna die at the end of the game [TS]

00:39:50 ◼   ► anyway very unsatisfied speaking of [TS]

00:39:52 ◼   ► which [TS]

00:39:53 ◼   ► yeah what's your what's your view on [TS]

00:39:54 ◼   ► that that was allows the ending [TS]

00:39:57 ◼   ► really [TS]

00:39:58 ◼   ► yeah it didn't make it clear the game [TS]

00:40:01 ◼   ► was over i thought i had screwed up [TS]

00:40:03 ◼   ► yeah okay i'll give you that I I don't [TS]

00:40:06 ◼   ► think if they explained you have one but [TS]

00:40:09 ◼   ► your dad I would have understood what [TS]

00:40:10 ◼   ► was going on right [TS]

00:40:11 ◼   ► yes now I think I realized it was over [TS]

00:40:14 ◼   ► are also i probably would have had a [TS]

00:40:16 ◼   ► similar complaint but I i thought it was [TS]

00:40:17 ◼   ► great ending but I completely understand [TS]

00:40:20 ◼   ► where people work were ticked off about [TS]

00:40:21 ◼   ► it anyway this army guy that was helping [TS]

00:40:23 ◼   ► us hurt us bragging about how we had one [TS]

00:40:25 ◼   ► planet followed three days and he said [TS]

00:40:28 ◼   ► that he was looking for people who were [TS]

00:40:30 ◼   ► good at infocomm games because he had [TS]

00:40:32 ◼   ► just written a book called a shortcut [TS]

00:40:34 ◼   ► through Adventure land which was how to [TS]

00:40:36 ◼   ► solve a bunch of the Sierra online games [TS]

00:40:39 ◼   ► so what ended up happening was my friend [TS]

00:40:42 ◼   ► and i wrote the entire book got sixty [TS]

00:40:45 ◼   ► percent of the royalties it was just how [TS]

00:40:47 ◼   ► to solve the first ten infocomm games [TS]

00:40:49 ◼   ► and the publisher went bankrupt the day [TS]

00:40:51 ◼   ► the book itself so I never did anything [TS]

00:40:53 ◼   ► but I was like 14 or 15 that was still [TS]

00:40:57 ◼   ► pretty neat [TS]

00:40:58 ◼   ► I backpack i wrote walkthroughs you know [TS]

00:41:00 ◼   ► step-by-step walkthrough for my friends [TS]

00:41:02 ◼   ► this is before you could actually do [TS]

00:41:03 ◼   ► anything like put them online but there [TS]

00:41:06 ◼   ► were you know there was a brief shining [TS]

00:41:09 ◼   ► moment of my childhood where it was cool [TS]

00:41:11 ◼   ► to be able to solve info comes until [TS]

00:41:13 ◼   ► other people how to do it and then they [TS]

00:41:16 ◼   ► put me in a trashcan and rolling down a [TS]

00:41:18 ◼   ► hill [TS]

00:41:20 ◼   ► I ok ok I i will see you your book [TS]

00:41:25 ◼   ► authorship and I I beta-tested info [TS]

00:41:27 ◼   ► comes I beta-tested leather goddesses of [TS]

00:41:29 ◼   ► Phobos and lurking horror and money's [TS]

00:41:32 ◼   ► gonna bust at his bureaucracy story and [TS]

00:41:34 ◼   ► Hollywood hijinks and food litsky now [TS]

00:41:39 ◼   ► what was flicks key cuz i've never been [TS]

00:41:41 ◼   ► sure the Blitz key was a board game that [TS]

00:41:44 ◼   ► half of it took place inside the [TS]

00:41:46 ◼   ► computer the computer had the role of [TS]

00:41:49 ◼   ► you know like they have modern versions [TS]

00:41:51 ◼   ► of monopoly where the bank is controlled [TS]

00:41:53 ◼   ► by a little the government astok device [TS]

00:41:56 ◼   ► that comes with it and every player has [TS]

00:41:58 ◼   ► a credit card rather than cash publicity [TS]

00:42:00 ◼   ► was similar where it would roll the dice [TS]

00:42:02 ◼   ► and it would set your goals public ski [TS]

00:42:04 ◼   ► can generously be chalked up as an [TS]

00:42:07 ◼   ► interesting experiment [TS]

00:42:08 ◼   ► ok it was not infocomm me remember [TS]

00:42:11 ◼   ► seeing lots of at [TS]

00:42:12 ◼   ► for it but i never understood any of [TS]

00:42:13 ◼   ► them there were dogs involved i have to [TS]

00:42:16 ◼   ► say that Greg your beta testing of [TS]

00:42:18 ◼   ► infocomm games is pretty cool [TS]

00:42:20 ◼   ► it's gonna be hard to top that i'm super [TS]

00:42:23 ◼   ► jealous it I I felt pretty damn special [TS]

00:42:26 ◼   ► and I mean it was it was just like this [TS]

00:42:29 ◼   ► is as good as it gets which [TS]

00:42:31 ◼   ► unfortunately turned out to be true [TS]

00:42:33 ◼   ► oh it turned from a happy ending to a [TS]

00:42:36 ◼   ► setting so quickly [TS]

00:42:37 ◼   ► 50 well here's my bureaucracy story [TS]

00:42:42 ◼   ► yes in 1987 1988 infocomm was doing the [TS]

00:42:48 ◼   ► marathon of the minds as a way to get [TS]

00:42:50 ◼   ► publicity for their new games what they [TS]

00:42:52 ◼   ► do is they take their game that was just [TS]

00:42:54 ◼   ► about to come out and go to a city in [TS]

00:42:56 ◼   ► the United States and then all the high [TS]

00:42:58 ◼   ► schools in that city would send three [TS]

00:43:00 ◼   ► student teams to a location and then [TS]

00:43:04 ◼   ► they play the game until one of the [TS]

00:43:06 ◼   ► teams won the teams were composed of [TS]

00:43:09 ◼   ► people pulled out of trash cans at the [TS]

00:43:11 ◼   ► bottom of the hill largely yes for [TS]

00:43:15 ◼   ► bureaucracy which was the second douglas [TS]

00:43:18 ◼   ► adams game although had previously [TS]

00:43:20 ◼   ► mentioned douglas adams may not have had [TS]

00:43:21 ◼   ► that much to do with actually doing [TS]

00:43:25 ◼   ► anything [TS]

00:43:25 ◼   ► his name is on the box that's an extra [TS]

00:43:28 ◼   ► for bureaucracy the city of San Diego [TS]

00:43:30 ◼   ► and I got to be one of the kids on the [TS]

00:43:33 ◼   ► team which was actually highly contested [TS]

00:43:36 ◼   ► because i was going to a math science [TS]

00:43:37 ◼   ► computer magnet school at the time so [TS]

00:43:42 ◼   ► there was just a hill with thousands of [TS]

00:43:44 ◼   ► trash can lie on the bed and there's one [TS]

00:43:46 ◼   ► exhausted bully who has to keep putting [TS]

00:43:48 ◼   ► the kids in the trash can [TS]

00:43:50 ◼   ► well it's a weird school because it was [TS]

00:43:51 ◼   ► in a bad bad part of town and there were [TS]

00:43:54 ◼   ► Crips and bloods who are the local [TS]

00:43:56 ◼   ► students and then a bunch of us pasty [TS]

00:43:58 ◼   ► white math science computer kids being [TS]

00:44:00 ◼   ► bused in well it's probably good that [TS]

00:44:02 ◼   ► your pasty so you can be mistaken as a [TS]

00:44:04 ◼   ► Crip or a blood any rate we were all [TS]

00:44:09 ◼   ► shipped out to these Reuben h fleet [TS]

00:44:12 ◼   ► space theatre and science center in [TS]

00:44:14 ◼   ► balboa park and each school has its own [TS]

00:44:18 ◼   ► little computer station in the science [TS]

00:44:20 ◼   ► center and we played for 37 hours [TS]

00:44:24 ◼   ► while being supplied with endless [TS]

00:44:27 ◼   ► amounts of coke and pizza getting [TS]

00:44:30 ◼   ► bleary-eyed and insane by the end of it [TS]

00:44:34 ◼   ► when you say played for 37 hours was [TS]

00:44:36 ◼   ► there any break [TS]

00:44:40 ◼   ► no I mean you could take a break if you [TS]

00:44:41 ◼   ► wanted but that meant the other teams [TS]

00:44:43 ◼   ► would get ahead of you did you go to the [TS]

00:44:47 ◼   ► bathroom [TS]

00:44:47 ◼   ► we have to just stand up to do it [TS]

00:44:52 ◼   ► yeah like there are three people on the [TS]

00:44:54 ◼   ► team you don't need all three people at [TS]

00:44:56 ◼   ► the computer the whole time [TS]

00:44:57 ◼   ► no guys I got this great plan catheters [TS]

00:45:00 ◼   ► but as it happens my team won so I can [TS]

00:45:05 ◼   ► first of all state that I was the first [TS]

00:45:07 ◼   ► person outside infocomm one of the three [TS]

00:45:10 ◼   ► first three people outside infocomm to [TS]

00:45:11 ◼   ► win bureaucracy and also actually got my [TS]

00:45:14 ◼   ► name printed in The New York Times later [TS]

00:45:17 ◼   ► the status line which was their official [TS]

00:45:19 ◼   ► newsletter they got sued by the new york [TS]

00:45:21 ◼   ► times you have to change that and I got [TS]

00:45:24 ◼   ► a cool t-shirt which I still have some [TS]

00:45:27 ◼   ► of course you do it and we won something [TS]

00:45:31 ◼   ► like copies of all the games for the [TS]

00:45:34 ◼   ► school my favorite moment though was [TS]

00:45:37 ◼   ► they had copies of other games that were [TS]

00:45:39 ◼   ► about to come out one of which was [TS]

00:45:40 ◼   ► Hollywood hijinks and one of my [TS]

00:45:42 ◼   ► teammates snuck over and started looking [TS]

00:45:44 ◼   ► through the materials because he had a [TS]

00:45:46 ◼   ► pirated copy of Hollywood hijinks and he [TS]

00:45:49 ◼   ► needed to read the documentation to get [TS]

00:45:51 ◼   ► past the infocomm copy protection which [TS]

00:45:55 ◼   ► took the form of the secret hints inside [TS]

00:45:57 ◼   ► the documentation itself the feelies yes [TS]

00:46:00 ◼   ► physical items which I thought was [TS]

00:46:02 ◼   ► pretty clever because they never [TS]

00:46:03 ◼   ► bothered putting any actual copy [TS]

00:46:04 ◼   ► protection on their games which made [TS]

00:46:06 ◼   ► them almost unique at the time but it [TS]

00:46:08 ◼   ► was it was copy protection that wasn't [TS]

00:46:10 ◼   ► really really intrusive it was [TS]

00:46:12 ◼   ► integrated into the game and that was [TS]

00:46:14 ◼   ► terrific you know it was it was [TS]

00:46:17 ◼   ► something that wasn't easily reproduced [TS]

00:46:19 ◼   ► like wasn't digitally reproducible and [TS]

00:46:22 ◼   ► you actually had to pay attention to [TS]

00:46:24 ◼   ► everything that came in the packet [TS]

00:46:26 ◼   ► yeah and then so when you had sorcerer [TS]

00:46:30 ◼   ► for example you actually had this thing [TS]

00:46:33 ◼   ► they called an info tater which had a [TS]

00:46:36 ◼   ► two rotating dials that you had to line [TS]

00:46:38 ◼   ► up to tell you what color a group was [TS]

00:46:42 ◼   ► the problem i find though is that later [TS]

00:46:45 ◼   ► on when they came out with the lost [TS]

00:46:46 ◼   ► treasures of infocomm cd-rom packages [TS]

00:46:49 ◼   ► they didn't include all of the [TS]

00:46:51 ◼   ► documentation for some of the games [TS]

00:46:53 ◼   ► became accidentally impossible [TS]

00:46:55 ◼   ► well they built like they built the in [TS]

00:46:57 ◼   ► visit clues were you know the [TS]

00:46:58 ◼   ► aftermarket in books that they would [TS]

00:47:02 ◼   ► came with invisible ink and a pen that [TS]

00:47:04 ◼   ► you could drag across it to reveal the [TS]

00:47:05 ◼   ► answer guaranteed answers in increasing [TS]

00:47:09 ◼   ► specificity and then they integrated [TS]

00:47:11 ◼   ► those into the games later on when you [TS]

00:47:13 ◼   ► type hint and it would give you the end [TS]

00:47:14 ◼   ► it just it it never seemed is cool [TS]

00:47:18 ◼   ► what's that supposed to seem cool you're [TS]

00:47:19 ◼   ► looking at hints you should hang your [TS]

00:47:24 ◼   ► head in shame and that's how it's [TS]

00:47:26 ◼   ► supposed it's not supposed to feel good [TS]

00:47:28 ◼   ► one good thing about the lost treasures [TS]

00:47:31 ◼   ► of info concept was they actually [TS]

00:47:33 ◼   ► included all of the maps and all of the [TS]

00:47:35 ◼   ► visit clues in book form which was great [TS]

00:47:38 ◼   ► because the Invisibles were usually [TS]

00:47:40 ◼   ► written with at least as much attention [TS]

00:47:41 ◼   ► to humor as as the games themselves word [TS]

00:47:45 ◼   ► so they were often as funny to read [TS]

00:47:46 ◼   ► through it as playing the games were [TS]

00:47:49 ◼   ► they always have questions that applied [TS]

00:47:52 ◼   ► that didn't have anything to do with the [TS]

00:47:53 ◼   ► game just so they could have a few [TS]

00:47:55 ◼   ► nonsense answers and then answer saying [TS]

00:47:57 ◼   ► this [TS]

00:47:59 ◼   ► there isn't this room in this game stop [TS]

00:48:01 ◼   ► just looking at answers and go back to [TS]

00:48:03 ◼   ► playing if they did they didn't want to [TS]

00:48:04 ◼   ► didn't want the questions which were [TS]

00:48:06 ◼   ► printed in regular ink just to give away [TS]

00:48:07 ◼   ► anything about the game so that include [TS]

00:48:10 ◼   ► the fake questions you know I worked at [TS]

00:48:12 ◼   ► a software store years and years and [TS]

00:48:15 ◼   ► years ago and people would try and [TS]

00:48:17 ◼   ► return the Invisibles after having used [TS]

00:48:19 ◼   ► them [TS]

00:48:19 ◼   ► she's no use to me now how a no no ma'am [TS]

00:48:24 ◼   ► I'm sorry that that you you can't no [TS]

00:48:26 ◼   ► sorry [TS]

00:48:28 ◼   ► yes you can see the manager [TS]

00:48:31 ◼   ► I'll be right back so you guys play text [TS]

00:48:34 ◼   ► adventures anymore have you had any [TS]

00:48:36 ◼   ► other than the original you can go back [TS]

00:48:38 ◼   ► and play the old ones but they're still [TS]

00:48:39 ◼   ► being produced and there's a a small but [TS]

00:48:42 ◼   ► very vibrant community that that is [TS]

00:48:44 ◼   ► still making games if you have you [TS]

00:48:46 ◼   ► played any of these anytime recently I [TS]

00:48:49 ◼   ► have [TS]

00:48:49 ◼   ► and I'm surprised if you watch the [TS]

00:48:53 ◼   ► documentary get lamp which is a [TS]

00:48:55 ◼   ► documentary about text adventures the [TS]

00:48:57 ◼   ► DVD comes with about fifty i think text [TS]

00:49:00 ◼   ► adventures on the disk [TS]

00:49:02 ◼   ► there's an ipad app fronts [TS]

00:49:06 ◼   ► yeah frost comes with a couple hundred [TS]

00:49:08 ◼   ► yeah i'm looking at it now I played two [TS]

00:49:11 ◼   ► or three modern games i played vespers [TS]

00:49:15 ◼   ► which is this game where you're a month [TS]

00:49:18 ◼   ► trapped in a monastery at the top of the [TS]

00:49:20 ◼   ► mountain while everybody dies of [TS]

00:49:22 ◼   ► playground you so any kind of a downer [TS]

00:49:25 ◼   ► okay well you're on top of a mountain [TS]

00:49:29 ◼   ► that's really kind of the only way you [TS]

00:49:31 ◼   ► can go and there's a game called [TS]

00:49:35 ◼   ► fotopedia phot OPI a which is [TS]

00:49:40 ◼   ► technically a text adventure in that [TS]

00:49:43 ◼   ► you're entering commands and it's got a [TS]

00:49:46 ◼   ► text adventure interface but really it's [TS]

00:49:49 ◼   ► about a short story about somebody dying [TS]

00:49:50 ◼   ► in a car crash and are you the that [TS]

00:49:54 ◼   ► person you're everybody it's super [TS]

00:49:56 ◼   ► postmodern and I get the feeling that [TS]

00:49:58 ◼   ► people have gotten tired of texting [TS]

00:50:00 ◼   ► ventures as games and are really trying [TS]

00:50:02 ◼   ► to branch out do text adventures as [TS]

00:50:04 ◼   ► literature or text adventures as our or [TS]

00:50:07 ◼   ► drag actually the game I was going to [TS]

00:50:09 ◼   ► mention his lost pig which one the IAF [TS]

00:50:11 ◼   ► competition [TS]

00:50:12 ◼   ► oh yeah two or three years ago it's just [TS]

00:50:15 ◼   ► a bug [TS]

00:50:15 ◼   ► I hadn't played games in eons mean in [TS]

00:50:20 ◼   ► you know since the Paleozoic and it was [TS]

00:50:24 ◼   ► great fun because it's so highly [TS]

00:50:26 ◼   ► polished that it was a reintroduction to [TS]

00:50:30 ◼   ► the genre but I haven't sat like I said [TS]

00:50:33 ◼   ► my kids down a couple years ago and try [TS]

00:50:35 ◼   ► to get them interested in his work and [TS]

00:50:37 ◼   ► they got it but they just didn't follow [TS]

00:50:40 ◼   ► up there right now they're currently [TS]

00:50:41 ◼   ► obsessed with minecraft um but they [TS]

00:50:45 ◼   ► wandered around House little bit they [TS]

00:50:47 ◼   ► got inside and then they just drift away [TS]

00:50:49 ◼   ► from it which was disappointing and I [TS]

00:50:51 ◼   ► want to try again with lost pig just [TS]

00:50:53 ◼   ► because it's so funny and it's so well [TS]

00:50:56 ◼   ► done [TS]

00:50:57 ◼   ► here's one of the room descriptions from [TS]

00:50:58 ◼   ► lost pig fountain room all wall in this [TS]

00:51:02 ◼   ► room glow [TS]

00:51:03 ◼   ► it bright just like daytime except that [TS]

00:51:05 ◼   ► instead of sun it wall that glow and set [TS]

00:51:08 ◼   ► of grass and tree and square room with [TS]

00:51:10 ◼   ► four wall and instead of outside it all [TS]

00:51:12 ◼   ► underground but beside those things it [TS]

00:51:14 ◼   ► just like it will keep going out to east [TS]

00:51:17 ◼   ► west but normal doorway go north and [TS]

00:51:19 ◼   ► southeast and southwest in middle of [TS]

00:51:21 ◼   ► room there fountain but found to not [TS]

00:51:23 ◼   ► have any water south wall have big [TS]

00:51:25 ◼   ► curtain hanging on it big here to pick [TS]

00:51:28 ◼   ► look over then pick look away [TS]

00:51:30 ◼   ► you're basically paying a caveman trying [TS]

00:51:32 ◼   ► to get his pig back [TS]

00:51:33 ◼   ► the pig is great in that game too it's [TS]

00:51:35 ◼   ► so well-written becomes even though it [TS]

00:51:39 ◼   ► has obviously no no dialogue to speak of [TS]

00:51:42 ◼   ► it's it's a descriptive text about the [TS]

00:51:45 ◼   ► pigs is so well done that it's probably [TS]

00:51:48 ◼   ► one of the most memorable characters and [TS]

00:51:49 ◼   ► interactive fiction that i can remember [TS]

00:51:51 ◼   ► but that's what struck me was that the [TS]

00:51:53 ◼   ► pros of the game is written from your [TS]

00:51:56 ◼   ► perspective which you know usually [TS]

00:51:58 ◼   ► there's descriptions of things going on [TS]

00:52:00 ◼   ► but I've never seen the descriptions [TS]

00:52:02 ◼   ► written as a the character would [TS]

00:52:05 ◼   ► perceive them [TS]

00:52:06 ◼   ► yeah a lot of info cod games are written [TS]

00:52:09 ◼   ► from a sarcastic third person pointed [TS]

00:52:12 ◼   ► right you right you you are here witness [TS]

00:52:15 ◼   ► had some Raymond Chandler qualities to [TS]

00:52:20 ◼   ► the writing but not a lot and lurking [TS]

00:52:23 ◼   ► horror was supposed to be HP Lovecraft [TS]

00:52:24 ◼   ► but yeah they were written as they they [TS]

00:52:28 ◼   ► were written by an author rather than [TS]

00:52:29 ◼   ► writing as the perspective of the [TS]

00:52:32 ◼   ► character and when the character has [TS]

00:52:35 ◼   ► limited mental capacity in the [TS]

00:52:37 ◼   ► vocabulary you end up with something [TS]

00:52:40 ◼   ► like lost pig and I thought that was [TS]

00:52:41 ◼   ► really fun and really different and [TS]

00:52:43 ◼   ► something even 30 years into the sauna [TS]

00:52:45 ◼   ► that I had never seen before [TS]

00:52:47 ◼   ► yeah so I've i actually did play lost [TS]

00:52:49 ◼   ► pig because when i downloaded frost it [TS]

00:52:51 ◼   ► was recommended as has a fairly easy and [TS]

00:52:54 ◼   ► good first place to start for [TS]

00:52:56 ◼   ► interacting interactive fiction but I [TS]

00:52:59 ◼   ► haven't really explored much on the [TS]

00:53:02 ◼   ► modern stuff because you know you and I [TS]

00:53:06 ◼   ► well both of you and I the plural you [TS]

00:53:09 ◼   ► use know that that [TS]

00:53:15 ◼   ► that nerds generally are not great [TS]

00:53:17 ◼   ► writers and they tend to write pretty [TS]

00:53:21 ◼   ► schlocky pretty a derivative stuff and [TS]

00:53:25 ◼   ► so I I'm a little afraid to take a [TS]

00:53:27 ◼   ► chance on some random guy that you know [TS]

00:53:30 ◼   ► they posted to the IAF archive and i [TS]

00:53:33 ◼   ► still have enough up the old infocomm [TS]

00:53:35 ◼   ► games that i haven't played that I can [TS]

00:53:37 ◼   ► still go back if I feel need and and and [TS]

00:53:41 ◼   ► give one of those old games a shot now i [TS]

00:53:43 ◼   ► have actually considered maybe playing a [TS]

00:53:45 ◼   ► i guess a couple of there were a couple [TS]

00:53:48 ◼   ► of games that were written a few years [TS]

00:53:49 ◼   ► back by Yahtzee and crawshaw does the 0 [TS]

00:53:53 ◼   ► punctuation reviews on their hilarious [TS]

00:53:56 ◼   ► so i imagine those are those are [TS]

00:53:58 ◼   ► probably pretty good although it's hard [TS]

00:54:01 ◼   ► to say that I assume he doesn't use the [TS]

00:54:03 ◼   ► same kind of a rapid fire style and his [TS]

00:54:06 ◼   ► adventure are no spaces in this [TS]

00:54:07 ◼   ► description i can't read any of this [TS]

00:54:09 ◼   ► that would get fairly tedious I i find i [TS]

00:54:12 ◼   ► don't have the attention span anymore [TS]

00:54:14 ◼   ► plus have you seen Skyrim man that [TS]

00:54:17 ◼   ► thing's beautiful i love text adventures [TS]

00:54:19 ◼   ► but it's really really hard to not just [TS]

00:54:22 ◼   ► stare it a beautifully rendered portal 2 [TS]

00:54:26 ◼   ► or something [TS]

00:54:27 ◼   ► yeah yeah that's I i find that what [TS]

00:54:30 ◼   ► mommy said about skyrim kind of applies [TS]

00:54:32 ◼   ► to me too is that I i have such limited [TS]

00:54:33 ◼   ► time these days [TS]

00:54:35 ◼   ► 22 game that i can go back and play an [TS]

00:54:39 ◼   ► old text adventure and spend the [TS]

00:54:42 ◼   ► inordinate amount of time it takes to [TS]

00:54:43 ◼   ► really figure all the puzzles out and [TS]

00:54:45 ◼   ► all that stuff [TS]

00:54:46 ◼   ► or i could spend 20 minutes walking [TS]

00:54:48 ◼   ► around oblivion you know slaying goblins [TS]

00:54:50 ◼   ► and having sadly a more rich experience [TS]

00:54:55 ◼   ► really playing that and then I i could [TS]

00:54:57 ◼   ► going back the old text games much as I [TS]

00:54:59 ◼   ► love them [TS]

00:55:00 ◼   ► most games these days don't require a [TS]

00:55:02 ◼   ► pad of graph paper by your side at all [TS]

00:55:04 ◼   ► times and how much how much of our [TS]

00:55:07 ◼   ► affection for these games is just [TS]

00:55:09 ◼   ► nostalgia for me i'd say about [TS]

00:55:11 ◼   ► 60-percent the really good ones [TS]

00:55:15 ◼   ► 61-62 point hey I mean yes they hit me [TS]

00:55:20 ◼   ► at exactly the right age but the good [TS]

00:55:22 ◼   ► ones are still really good [TS]

00:55:24 ◼   ► mhm like if you see if somebody is [TS]

00:55:26 ◼   ► willing to spend the time to play [TS]

00:55:28 ◼   ► through planet [TS]

00:55:28 ◼   ► fall Floyd's death is still a really [TS]

00:55:32 ◼   ► good moment [TS]

00:55:34 ◼   ► damn it and I'll fight the man who says [TS]

00:55:37 ◼   ► otherwise i love these games i mean they [TS]

00:55:39 ◼   ► affected my childhood they they are [TS]

00:55:43 ◼   ► signposts for sadly what I've become [TS]

00:55:48 ◼   ► but I don't know that I would play them [TS]

00:55:52 ◼   ► these days I don't know that my kids [TS]

00:55:53 ◼   ► have an interest in playing them and I [TS]

00:55:55 ◼   ► just wonder if they were such a product [TS]

00:55:57 ◼   ► of their time and of the technology that [TS]

00:55:59 ◼   ► something like that is not going to [TS]

00:56:02 ◼   ► happen again [TS]

00:56:03 ◼   ► what if you've displayed them in a [TS]

00:56:06 ◼   ► different context at one point somebody [TS]

00:56:08 ◼   ► had set up an aimbot that would place [TS]

00:56:11 ◼   ► York with you that was a friend of mine [TS]

00:56:14 ◼   ► actually and ebay oh well I thought it [TS]

00:56:16 ◼   ► was a brilliant idea [TS]

00:56:18 ◼   ► did either of you guys ever play any of [TS]

00:56:19 ◼   ► the legend games after infocomm went [TS]

00:56:23 ◼   ► kaput a couple of the guys from infocomm [TS]

00:56:26 ◼   ► Steve maretskiy and Bob Bates who did [TS]

00:56:30 ◼   ► that [TS]

00:56:32 ◼   ► sadly is only really known for having [TS]

00:56:34 ◼   ► done Sherlock and Arthur but they got [TS]

00:56:37 ◼   ► together and formed their own company [TS]

00:56:39 ◼   ► they're crowning achievement they put [TS]

00:56:41 ◼   ► together again called time quest which [TS]

00:56:43 ◼   ► is effectively you're you're following [TS]

00:56:47 ◼   ► along behind a guy who's it was not some [TS]

00:56:51 ◼   ► evil duties run across the time machine [TS]

00:56:53 ◼   ► and he's gone to various periods in [TS]

00:56:55 ◼   ► history and screwed things up and [TS]

00:56:56 ◼   ► basically you're part of some kind of a [TS]

00:56:59 ◼   ► you know time police department that has [TS]

00:57:02 ◼   ► to go back in time and fix these [TS]

00:57:04 ◼   ► problems this guy is caused and it's [TS]

00:57:06 ◼   ► really really well done it's probably [TS]

00:57:08 ◼   ► one of the best adventure games that [TS]

00:57:10 ◼   ► I've ever played [TS]

00:57:11 ◼   ► it's well worth digging up and and [TS]

00:57:13 ◼   ► giving a try [TS]

00:57:14 ◼   ► never even heard of it they went to more [TS]

00:57:16 ◼   ► of a point and click format at one point [TS]

00:57:18 ◼   ► and they did that came based on what [TS]

00:57:21 ◼   ► they did a couple of sample games [TS]

00:57:22 ◼   ► laurent yeah [TS]

00:57:25 ◼   ► and something based on Shannara sorry [TS]

00:57:33 ◼   ► going [TS]

00:57:34 ◼   ► yes and but maretskiy continue to make [TS]

00:57:36 ◼   ► games and he put together something I [TS]

00:57:38 ◼   ► think his last game for them was a super [TS]

00:57:40 ◼   ► hero League of hoboken which was really [TS]

00:57:43 ◼   ► funny and really well done to so it's [TS]

00:57:46 ◼   ► worth trying to pick those up if you can [TS]

00:57:47 ◼   ► find them is it Murray or merced ski [TS]

00:57:50 ◼   ► maretskiy yeah I've been pronouncing it [TS]

00:57:54 ◼   ► wrong for two-and-a-half decades nice [TS]

00:57:57 ◼   ► days boxes keeping it on that note I'm [TS]

00:58:03 ◼   ► going to end the podcast this podcast is [TS]

00:58:05 ◼   ► over i would like to thank our [TS]

00:58:07 ◼   ► participants today Steve let's thank you [TS]

00:58:10 ◼   ► Greg [TS]

00:58:11 ◼   ► it's been a spin experience and Monty [TS]

00:58:13 ◼   ► Ashley thank you good hosting reg and [TS]

00:58:17 ◼   ► score [TS]

00:58:20 ◼   ► [Music] [TS]

00:58:38 ◼   ► Roger Ebert is wrong w always look like [TS]

00:58:47 ◼   ► he's smiling these days [TS]

00:58:48 ◼   ► yeah he looks like he's really enthused [TS]

00:58:51 ◼   ► about what happened to those pictures he [TS]

00:58:55 ◼   ► looks like you saying hi like somebody [TS]

00:58:58 ◼   ► just told him to say chin up Roger [TS]

00:59:00 ◼   ► attended oh if only he could chin up [TS]

00:59:06 ◼   ► we seem to be wondering where yes yes [TS]

00:59:10 ◼   ► look what's wrong with nostalgia i [TS]

00:59:12 ◼   ► enjoyed something is a youth and now I [TS]

00:59:14 ◼   ► get to keep doing it [TS]

00:59:15 ◼   ► half of the twilight zone episodes are [TS]

00:59:17 ◼   ► about how that's good for you [TS]

00:59:20 ◼   ► don't you mean 60-percent we're done [TS]

00:59:25 ◼   ► here yeah [TS]