Text Adventures

[Sculpher]

Re: Text Adventures

Really wish that someone would get these old games working on mobiles. Give me Infocom's back catalogue, the Lucasarts point and clicks and Escape from the Planet of the Robot Monsters on my BlackBerry and I'll be a happy lad indeed.

It really depends on what mobile you have...

[Derekflint]

Re: Text Adventures

LOL Break the key in half, put the two halfs together which gives you a whole, climb through it, the end rofl

Oh wow. That's too much - be honest, did you ever work for Infocom or Level 9?

Remember reading a review of Leather Goddesses of Phobos - they mentioned finding a length of rubber hose, so they tried tying it. The response was along the lines of:
Congratulations. By tying the hose you have earned four thousand points and have beaten the game.
But seriously, folks, you cannot tie the rubber hose.

Really wish that someone would get these old games working on mobiles. Give me Infocom's back catalogue, the Lucasarts point and clicks and Escape from the Planet of the Robot Monsters on my BlackBerry and I'll be a happy lad indeed.

[Heather74]

Re: Text Adventures

YOU ARE IN A ROOM. THERE IS A LOCKED DOOR AND A KEY ON THE FLOOR.
WHAT NOW?

LOL Break the key in half, put the two halfs together which gives you a whole, climb through it, the end rofl

[Secret lemonade drinker]

Re: Text Adventures

YOU ARE IN A ROOM. THERE IS A LOCKED DOOR AND A KEY ON THE FLOOR.
WHAT NOW?

>GET KEY

SORRY, I DON'T UNDERSTAND. WHAT NOW?

>PICK UP KEY

SORRY, I DON'T UNDERSTAND. WHAT NOW?

>GET ALL

SORRY, I DON'T UNDERSTAND. WHAT NOW?

>GET F**KING KEY F**KING DOG MACHINE

SORRY, I DON'T UNDERSTAND. WHAT NOW?

>QUIT

Happy memories, indeed.

I remember one adventure game on the Spectrum where, right at the start, you had a puzzle involving getting through an airlock where there was no oxygen. I tried and tried to solve it and, after weeks, gave up. About a year after, I saw the answer in Crash; you had to type 'hyperventilate'. Ridiculous! I was 11, how the hell was I supposed to know that?

[Sculpher]

Re: Text Adventures

For your creamy text-adventure-nostalgia goodness - hop along to this website here for a slew of emulators and links to downloadable games - including some commercial games that have been set free into the wild. For anyone looking to play the games on their Windows Mobile / Pocket PC device - this is my favourite. A quick Google for 'Frotz' or 'Z-machine emulator' or 'z-machine interpreter' and the name of your system should return joyous results. Happy day.

[Derekflint]

Re: Text Adventures

On the consoles, the game loads up, but once you select a game to continue, if the bug has struck, the loading screen comes up and it freezes.

And Ubisoft won't fix it, as it isn't a big enough problem, apparently.

[Elbmek]

Re: Text Adventures

You should be okay then, it only seems to be an issue with the console versions.

I do have an occasional problem, when the flash screen comes up, sometimes it just reverts to desktop. Another prob was solved by updating graphic drivers.

[Derekflint]

Re: Text Adventures

Quad core pc 3gb ram GeForce 8400 GTS or something!

You should be okay then, it only seems to be an issue with the console versions.

[Elbmek]

Re: Text Adventures

I have to be serious here; what are you playing that on? If it's a 360 you could be in for a nasty surprise. I traded my copy after I experienced the bug that corrupts the game save. The official line is to make multiple saves so if it comes up, you try another. Since this would have meant a restart for me after thirty hours, I just got rid of it.

Quad core pc 3gb ram GeForce 8400 GTS or something!

[rossobantam]

Re: Text Adventures

thanks for the tip Derek...jusy bought my son Far Cry2 for the 360....will tell him your tip!

(if he can get me off it...I love Fallout 3 )

[Derekflint]

Re: Text Adventures

Boooooooooo Derek, you have spoilt it now, I shall have to go back to Far Cry 2 now!!

I have to be serious here; what are you playing that on? If it's a 360 you could be in for a nasty surprise. I traded my copy after I experienced the bug that corrupts the game save. The official line is to make multiple saves so if it comes up, you try another. Since this would have meant a restart for me after thirty hours, I just got rid of it.

[Richard1978]

Re: Text Adventures

I remember playing Classic Adventure with my brother & my Dad on our Acorn Electron. Some parts were really tricky, especially the maze of tunnels which was very easy to get totally lost in.

My Dad drew out a map to plot out all the locations, which helped to a degree. I don't think we ever got to the end though.

At school I played Rick Hanson, & never managed to finish it, mainly because it was really easy to be killed off.

There was also an Adventure game set in Australia which had some game like sections. It was nearly impossible to play without a handbook, but I managed to complete it once, the final task of guiding a rescue helicopter was really tricky.

[Elbmek]

Re: Text Adventures

Boooooooooo Derek, you have spoilt it now, I shall have to go back to Far Cry 2 now!!

[Derekflint]

Re: Text Adventures

Infocom's Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy is available online - I think they have it somewhere on the BBC site.

I tried it out, having yearned for the game back in the 80s when it came out on 3 inch disk for the Amstrad - unfortunately it only ran if you had 128 kb, and I had a 464, with 64kb and a tape deck. Boooo!

However, I couldn't get on with it. As with any text adventure, it was incredibly pedantic about what you could do. Should have known. Return to Eden from Level 9 was the same. After so many turns, the spaceship that you had escaped from (in a previous game), turned its engines on you so you burned. The trick was to find the soft mound of earth, dig, then make your way to a part of the cave you found and just keep sleeping until the ship went away. Oh yes, very intuitive. 'Want to order a cheat sheet?' Grrr.

[Chaeo]

Re: Text Adventures

First game I ever played on a computer (Commodore 16) was Pirate Adventure. I was so pleased when I completed it!

Much much much later on I wrote a few not-too-great adventures using Graphic Adventure Creator - I still have them. A two part adventure of mine was snapped up by Zzap! magazine and went on their front cover tape. For about 5 minutes I was the coolest person in my town. Ah, great days!

Edit: Nearly forgot to annoy you all with the fact that we still own 2 Commodore 64's - one original version and one newer version - both still boxed and working! I also have an Amiga 1200 on this internet connection running a BBS (AmiExpress). It's like a time machine to anyone that dialled up those BBS's in the 90's.