Text adventures: Mind-strengthening books disguised as playable adventures

[UberScout]

Everyone who's had an old computer in their youth has more than likely stumbled across a game that's all words and no pictures controlled by typing simple commands into a parser. Infocom is quite notorious for these kinds of games, known as text adventures, and as the natural order of things would have it, my autistic mind has latched onto the creativity they provide. A whole world to explore in your mind, that YOU are part of; that's the dream, isn't it? Lots of these games teach valuable lessons, too; some are educational, while others lean more toward an Aesop-like factor, favoring meaningful messages that are received by subconscious thought later on (at least thats how i process it) rather than directly challenging the player on what they've paid attention to.

So, why do we play these text adventures, what's the point? Are we not aware that our minds are being sharpened both by the challenge of thinking outside the box and sometimes paying $36.80 for a hint book, or are our brains simply focusing on the thought of "wait, this is just a game that's nothing but words, I can read this already"? Sure, you might be able to read it already, but don't we all remember our teachers telling us that the more we read the more we learn? Add to that the fact that a player can influence the protagonists actions and you can effectively see that interactive fiction is not simply its own genre, but rather a partition of one that once slept under the shadow of point and click adventures, and now to this day has blossomed into a deathless canvas of creativity, an immortal blinding sunbeam of the strength of creativity.

So yes, it seems that you CAN get Ye Flask, that is, if you don't mind a bit of reading. It's good for the brain, am I wrong?

 

[Shamar]

Everyone who's had an old computer in their youth has more than likely stumbled across a game that's all words and no pictures controlled by typing simple commands into a parser. Infocom is quite notorious for these kinds of games, known as text adventures, and as the natural order of things would have it, my autistic mind has latched onto the creativity they provide. A whole world to explore in your mind, that YOU are part of; that's the dream, isn't it? Lots of these games teach valuable lessons, too; some are educational, while others lean more toward an Aesop-like factor, favoring meaningful messages that are received by subconscious thought later on (at least thats how i process it) rather than directly challenging the player on what they've paid attention to.

So, why do we play these text adventures, what's the point? Are we not aware that our minds are being sharpened both by the challenge of thinking outside the box and sometimes paying $36.80 for a hint book, or are our brains simply focusing on the thought of "wait, this is just a game that's nothing but words, I can read this already"? Sure, you might be able to read it already, but don't we all remember our teachers telling us that the more we read the more we learn? Add to that the fact that a player can influence the protagonists actions and you can effectively see that interactive fiction is not simply its own genre, but rather a partition of one that once slept under the shadow of point and click adventures, and now to this day has blossomed into a deathless canvas of creativity, an immortal blinding sunbeam of the strength of creativity.

So yes, it seems that you CAN get Ye Flask, that is, if you don't mind a bit of reading. It's good for the brain, am I wrong?

The text adventures generally required the development of puzzle solving skills and imagination to visualize the description. The purely graphic games seem to emphasize developing a fast trigger finger. A notable exception being Minecraft. For a while there were intermediate games with a screen you had to click around on to find an item to manipulate. Sometimes you had to click blindly all over the screen to find the right spot. I don't particularly like the pure graphic games or the intermediates. I do like solving puzzle, and wish there were more pure text games out there.

 

[An0maly_1976]

They still make text adventures? I never really played any. First PC game I ever really played was an animated adventure game, King's Quest III, part of one of several "Quest" series games (Space Quest, King's Quest, Police Quest, Hero's Quest) by Sierra On-Line, a now-defunct company that sold some time ago, I believe to Electronic Arts. They were cutting-edge for their time.

 

[Fino]

I used text adventure software to make a therapy thing.

Therapy by Alex Wright

 

[An0maly_1976]

I used text adventure software make a therapy thing.

Therapy by Alex Wright

Interesting. I guess I could see where it might help cut down on sensory processing disorder for those who find images overwhelming. I just wasn't aware anyone still made them.

As an aside, I write fiction and had considered turning one of my short stories into a comic book series, something along the lines of Quantum Leap or Back To The Future.

 

[Qoyote]

So yes, it seems that you CAN get Ye Flask, that is, if you don't mind a bit of reading. It's good for the brain, am I wrong?

Finally got that show out of my head so I could study... I can't escape it! My focus is all... crocused.

Unhealthy obsessions aside (wouldn't you know, all the support groups shut down in 2005), any specifics you'd recommend? I'm not good at the high-speed ones and my computer doesn't like good graphics. I don't know anything.

 

[UberScout]

Enchanter is a good one. You have to use magic spells in that game to progress, but it's got some fairly good puzzles.

Everyone probably knows what Zork is (the Enchanter trilogy actually takes place in the zork universe)

If you don't mind frustrating puzzles and a blood pressure system that penalizes you for incorrect commands (seriously), Bureaucracy is a fine play.

Then there's Planetfall, although i had trouble with that one. Thomas M. Disch's Amnesia was the very first text adventure I ever played, that one's HARD. You have to constantly manage what seems like your blood sugar (the game never really explains what causes you to faint sometimes), and you occasionally have to panhandle for money until you get enough to buy things you need.

There are a bunch of others, there is an app you can get on the Play Store called Text Fiction, it plays a small database of old text adventures that have kinda been made public domain (I think). You should check it out, it's really cool.

 

[An0maly_1976]

Unhealthy obsessions aside (wouldn't you know, all the support groups shut down in 2005), any specifics you'd recommend? I'm not good at the high-speed ones and my computer doesn't like good graphics. I don't know anything.

An FYI for those with older machines that are limited in upgrade capabilities...

One of the games I play bloated to the point of dragging my entry-level graphics card, memory and storage to a near-crawl. Granted, I caught some good deals that were on sale, but with an already reasonably quick Ryzen 7 1700 processor, I upgraded my memory from 8GB to 32GB, upgraded primary storage to a 1TB M.2 Solid State Drive (much faster), and upgraded my video to a GTX1650 Super for around $500 total. Did most of the work myself, but needed help getting the video card to wake up once installed. Basically for $500 I got a 72% improvement in boot time, and overall everything is much faster, even in high quality detail modes.

The GTX1650 and 1650 Super gets a bum rap from the gaming snobs, but it's actually quite a decent bang for the buck for those who can't afford top-of-the-line or the upgrades necessary to use them. Most video cards beyond this series require serious power supply and monitor upgrades. Only thing I've noticed is that one of the games I play has an annoying high-pitched whine or buzz, but I'm not the only one who's experienced this, and I don't get it with anything else, so I'm pretty sure it's the game in question. Point is, you don't need to be Mr. or Ms. Moneybags to get better bang for the buck.