Reviews by Drew Cook

I'm trying to work my way through the Infocom catalog, posting my thoughts on a gaming forum all the while.

I started with Zork I, and I suppose it's easy to give it a hard time. The plot is more than thin--a monofilament of a story. The protagonist, an indeterminate blank slate, reaches a small white house in the midst of a forest. Reading the manual(s) accompanying Zork I, the player is told that the Adventurer wants treasure for themselves. The game will award points for collecting it and placing it in a trophy case.

Why does the Adventurer leave the treasure behind, if they want it so much? What is the significance of the case, unremarkably sitting in an unremarkably abandoned house?

In the course of their treasure hunt, the player-protagonist wanders a rather inorganic funhouse of a map, looking for things to do, solving puzzles until all rooms and treasures are discovered.

One of the means of fast travel, while convenient, has no apparent clues as to its use.

Zork has an expiring light source, though sooner or later an alternative may or may not be found.

There are a whopping three mazes, none of them fun or interesting. The largest and most tedious, called only "Maze," features 12 possible exits from each of its rooms as well as an NPC that picks up and moves dropped items--the Hansel and Gretel approach will not work here. Wise players will swallow their pride and retrieve a map from somewhere. Mapping this monstrosity is in no way worth the trouble.

It's easy to forget that the design of Zork was initially undertaken in order to improve upon ADVENT, which was then the only widely-known game of its kind. I suppose this may be a controversial statement: Zork does, in fact, improve upon ADVENT in almost every meaningful way. It is more technologically sophisticated, running on an engine that eventually evolved into one that is widely used today in contemporary IF. It has a sense of humor. It is, compared with its only competitor at the time, more interactive and more descriptive. The puzzles--the fair ones, at least--are more interesting than those in ADVENT. I have seen essays indicating that ADVENT makes fewer mistakes, but then again there is far less of it to begin with.

The parser at the time was a revelation. In ADVENT, the player DROPs treasures on the floor. In Zork, the player PUTs them in a CONTAINER.

We are lucky that Zork made so many mistakes, thus sparing future efforts the indignity of making them. It was not yet clear what made adventure games fun, but Zork was the first step in figuring that out.

This is not to say that parts of it are not fun. I particularly enjoyed the "bell, book, and candle" and coal mine puzzles.

Zork is worth playing for the sense of context it provides. If its outdated nature annoys, then the invisiclues z-code is legally available at The Infocom Documentation Project, free of charge. I found it satisfying to solve, but I think just looking around is worthwhile for the curious.

I give no rating for Zork. I'm not sure that measuring it against contemporary standards is relevant.

In my effort to get through all of Infocom's games, I have determined that Zork I-III and Deadline are too big to judge. I'll give a rating for Starcross if/when I get there.

I'm trying to work my way through the Infocom catalog, posting my thoughts on a gaming forum all the while.

I find it hard to evaluate Zork II, but perhaps this is my problem alone. After all, it is the second best-rated Zork game on IFDB, surpassed only by the rather corpulent Zork Zero.

It contains what many consider the two worst puzzles in the Infocom canon. One, I am happy to forgive, considering the intent behind it. In creating the infamous "baseball maze," Dave Lebling wished make to something interesting out of Zork I's least interesting obstacle: the maze. It is, in other words, a failed attempt to innovate. The other notorious Zork II puzzle is the Bank of Zork, which is only inches away from being a worthwhile and challenging puzzle. Unfortunately, it was simply ported directly from the mainframe version of Zork. I wonder if Lebling was unwilling to alter Marc Blank's work (the puzzle was his creation). Judging from his talk at a GDC Post Mortem years ago, Lebling knew that the puzzle had issues. He knew that others at Infocom had problems with the puzzle. The Bank of Zork went in untouched, all the same.

So I will forgive one and begrudge the other.

In other good news: Zork II's map feels far more organic than Zork I's, despite the fact that they were largely cut from the same puzzle-laden cloth. My only complaint is that its central hub, the carousel, is a massive waste of your lantern's batteries, and there is no torch to save you this time. On your first playthrough, you may immediately stumble upon the source of the carousel's spinning, or you may not reach it until your lamp is flickering. Just as many game developers today do, Infocom was perhaps struggling to find the line between a challenge and a hassle.

The game's final act before victory appears to be unmotivated, and a related event can render the game unwinnable.

However, the game's new additions, the Wizard and the demon, take Zork II in an interesting and new direction. This time, the treasures are actually FOR something. There is a reasonable, in-game reason for collecting treasure that propels Zork, a game and a half later, beyond the reach of ADVENT's shadow. Slight as it is, we have something new here: a bona fide story.

The titular Wizard is a mixed bag. At the time, of course, he was a bit of a marvel, performing feats of magic that had differing effects based on multiple factors. He was additionally a font of Zorkian humor, alternately causing you to levitate out of a hot air baloon or... conjuring the smell of fudge.

By the time your second playthrough rolls around (the one where you are better able to conserve lantern batteries), you will likely have tired of him and his battery-burning abra kadabery. Though far less remarked-upon, the really compelling new character is the demon--Lebling obviously enjoyed writing him.

Zork II is an interesting pivot point for Infocom. The Adventurer is no longer *just* a looter of fallen civilizations. They are playing a bigger game now, defeating wizards and ordering demons about. While few saw it coming, the glum ambiance of Zork III makes sense. The time has come, as they say, to put away childish things.

I like Zork II more than Zork, and I think I am in the minority despite IFDB's numbers: these things are hardly scientific. I feel that, in Zork II, the confines of ADVENT's "cave game" have begun to buckle. Lebling's addition of Wizard, Demon, and modest plot are quite innovative for their time, and they were brought to life by what was then the world's most sophisticated parser.

Like Zork I, Zork II is historically significant. It is worth a visit if nothing else, and can be quite enjoyable if one is accepting of such an old game's eccentricities.

I give no rating for Zork II. I'm not sure that measuring it against contemporary standards is relevant.

In my effort to get through all of Infocom's games, I have determined that Zork I-III and Deadline are too big to judge. I'll give a rating for Starcross if/when I get there.