The Text Adventurer

I’m no stranger to the Internet.
I’m a member of Generation Y. I have Facebook. I use the word ‘Google’ as a verb. I’m capable of navigating through a series of emails without giving my bank details to estranged African princes so they can safely remove fabulous quantities of cash from their country and, of course, give me a percentage, or deciding to send on mysterious chain mails about ghosts who somehow inhabit the entire world’s plumbing system and will definitely kill you or something if this message isn’t forwarded to 666 people in the next three seconds, or accidentally purchasing an Asian mail-order bride after clicking on a concealed link. I check Cyanide & Happiness every day, without fail, and do the same for Pottermore; I have three email accounts on the Google server alone. I use Wikipedia for basically everything, from actual research to a kind of general hope of improving my general knowledge. Did you know that the Vanuatan national anthem is in Bislama, a form of Creole? Or that the hokey pokey was supposedly invented by nuns? Or that you can get to the page for Philosophy from any Wiki page, purely by clicking on the first link mentioned in every article until you arrive? Because you can.
I live by YouTube. It’s entirely thanks to that particular site that I’ve watched the entirety of Monty Python’s Flying Circus, and as many episodes of CNNNN as are available. I even take time out to write about my experiences with the Internet, on the Internet.
Sure, I’m not totally clear on how it works, and am still partially convinced that it’s a form of magic developed by researchers in Sweden to spread the joy of badly spelt poetry about dead pets and dodgy porn sites to the world, concealed by technical jargon. But the point I’m trying to make is that I spend a large portion of my life in this computerised form of reality, as does about every other person I know.

Hence why it came as such a surprise to me recently to discover a portion of the Internet that I’ve simply never come across before. Not such a surprise, I suppose, as the development of increased technological ability was anathema to this particular fountain of undiscovered pleasure. This (based largely on the renowned source of ‘stuff I Googled earlier today when I figured it might be useful for a post’) is the history, so far as I understand it:

Once upon a time, a long way back in the 1980s, there was no such thing as computer games. At least, not as we know them now. Not the kind with fancy switching viewpoints and multiple controls and changeable heroes and, above all, graphics chips.

Fortunately for the ‘80s people, this was not the end. Because they had something far, far greater than any of those glitchy action-filled experiences that amateurishly shows what’s happening to the character. Something that actually tested players’ powers of logic, memory, and lateral thinking, rather than their ability to hit a button as repetitively and aggressively as they can while staring at some pixellated troll. Something that relied on the imagination as much as on specialised coding and design.

Yes. Not only were the 1980s known for bizarre, now retro clothing, and the release of some of E.L.O.’s greatest music, they were also the home of the text adventure game.

Most of the people reading this will have absolutely no idea what a text adventure game is. Let me explain. The game will begin with a simple description of the scene, such as:

You are standing in an open field west of a white house, with a boarded front door. To the north is a path into a forest. Next to you is a closed letterbox.

In response to this, you simply type commands, such as:

>Open mailbox

Or

>Go north

If you open the mailbox, you will receive a leaflet saying something like ‘Welcome to Zork, the exciting fun-filled empire we look forward to having you explore,’ (the above description of game is taken from a game called ‘Zork 1: The Underground Empire’ and is definitely not an exact quote. The original wording was more inspiring). From this point onwards you are free to explore the Underground Empire, slaying enemies, collecting treasures, and being eaten by grues, which has happened to me a far greater number of times than I’m really happy with.

While, in the 1980s, these games were played by inserting a floppy disk into your obscenely large and box-like computer monitor (remember floppy disks?), they are nowadays freely available on the Internet. This is how I play them, mostly because the manufacturers of the computer in my house, strangely enough, completely neglected to include a floppy disk slot into the design. Also, where do you buy floppy disks from now? The same places they sell vinyl records?

Another thing about text adventure games: they’re not all that complicated. Code-wise, I mean. Playing-wise, it’s hard to think, offhand, of something with more twists and turns. Anyway, I feel it’s time to mention now that Peanut, my oft-mentioned friend, is an IT double major, and hence is one of the only people I know who actually understands the concept/appeal of these text-based pastimes. I know I’ve written previously about her desire to become a game designer. Well, this semester in her Programming class they’re actually creating their own text-based games. I’ve called the right to be the first official player. Several times. It’s going to be awesome. In my English double major class we’re looking at the the novel ‘Regeneration’. It’s alright, yes, but hardly up to the standard set by other major classes.

Anyway, in my admittedly limited experience, I think Zork is by far the best text adventure game, possibly to be excepted with whatever Peanut ends up designing. There are three games within Zork, although I’m stuck on the first one. I swear, I’d been playing for about two hours when my lantern suddenly ran out in the middle of a coal mine and I was eaten by a grue. Grues are these supposedly terrifying creatures that lurk within dark places and viciously attack you if you venture towards them without a light. And somehow, when you don’t have a light, they’re always there. This is normally how it goes:

>Go through trapdoor

You go through the trapdoor. It is dark. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.

>Turn on lantern

You have no lantern

>Turn on light

I do not know the word ‘light’

>Go north

A grue attacks you with its slavering fangs.

***You die***

You have lost all your items, including the lantern you didn’t have anyway because you failed to take it after you foolishly assumed it would not be necessary.
Do you feel clever now?
You achieved 3 out of 391 possible achievements.
You suck.

The best known games are Zork, and Zork’s predecessor, called Colossal Caves or Colossal Adventure or something like that. Evidently they’re not best known by me. I haven’t tried playing that one yet because I’m determined not to move on until I have completely defeated the smug Zork narrator, which could take a while, largely because that’s not actually possible within the game.

Anyway, novice as I am, I think these games are awesome. Maybe it’s because I don’t own a Wii or a PSP3 or whatever the hell they’re called and so don’t actually play normal, picture-based games. Possibly.

In all fairness, that makes a lot of sense: recently, during a brief lull in the conversation with Phoenix at her house, I suggested she give the text adventure game a go. Phoenix plays a multitude of Sims and Wii games. She wasn’t all that thrilled with the text-based world over the games she normally spends her time at. This is how it went:

You are standing in an open field west of a white house, with a boarded front door. To the north is a path into a forest. Next to you is a closed letterbox.

>open letter box

Opening the letter box reveals a leaflet.

>kill leaflet

What do you want to kill the leaflet with?

>sword

There was no verb in that sentence.

>kill leaflet with sword

You have no sword.

Phoenix turned to me. ‘Leslie, this game is stupid.’
‘Maybe you just don’t get the game,’ I said defensively. ‘What about, you know, READING the leaflet?’

>read leaflet

Welcome to Zork!

After that, we managed alright up until the moment when Phoenix found the way to get inside the house. If you’re interested, there’s a window ajar on the east side. Open it and go through. If you’re not interested, why are you reading this?

You are inside the kitchen of the white house. A table seems to have been used recently for the preparation of food. A passage leads to the west and a dark staircase can be seen leading upward. On the table is an elongated brown sack and a glass bottle. The bottle contains:

A quantity of water

>open bag

There is no bag here.

>open sack

Opening the brown sack reveals a lunch, and a clove of garlic.

>eat lunch

Much appreciated.

>make cookies

I do not know the word ‘cookies’

>use recipe to make cookies

I do not know the word ‘recipe’

>you’re stupid

I do not know the word ‘stupid’

>drink water

There is no water here.

>yes there is water here

I do not know the word ‘yes’

>screw you

Such hostility.

After her initial enthusiasm at this response – ‘Look, it knows I’m insulting it! Stupid game,’ – Phoenix began to be galled once more.

>throw bottle

Throw bottle where?

>throw bottle at wall

Which wall do you mean, the granite wall or the surrounding wall?

>i don't care

I don't know the word 'don't'

>what?

I don't know the word 'what?'

>that's stupid

I don't know the word 'stupid'

>go west

You are in the living room. There is a doorway to the east, a wooden door with strange gothic lettering to the west, which appears to be nailed shut, a trophy case, and a large oriental rug in the centre of the room. Above the trophy case hangs an elvish sword of great antiquity. A battery-powered lantern is on the trophy case.

>take sword

Taken.

>stab self

If you insist ... Poof, you're dead!

***You have died***
You lose.

‘Look at that,’ Phoenix said, smiling cheerfully. ‘That’s made the game more interesting.’
‘You just killed yourself,’ I said. ‘On a text adventure game. I didn’t even know that was possible. Do you want to have another go?’
‘No. No I don’t.’

Honestly, it’s hard to associate the idea of these games with the modern era. There’s probably a reason most people prefer games with pictures, something I’m just missing. The only reason people still make them is because they’re given them as IT assignments.

I’m no stranger to the Internet. I’m essentially like any other websurfing, Facebooking teenager. I email. I blog. Evidently.
Except for that one part of me antiquated enough to absolutely adore the concept of text adventure games. I don’t know why more people don’t play them. I don’t know why more people don’t like them. I only stopped trying to get through Zork to blog about how I’m trying to get through Zork.

It’s only people who were actually alive at the time, and played the games properly, and people like me, who haven’t been exposed to actual games and hence enjoy the opportunities provided by the freedom of the text-based world, who cling on to this game. We’re a lot of losers wasting time on something that’s the technological equivalent of an evolutionary dead end.
And as someone who is, apart from that, a bland, boring, appalling normal Internet user – with Facebook, Google, and countless email addresses, everything the same as everyone else in the same situation worldwide – I have to ask:
What’s wrong with that?