Zork I

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The canonical IF dungeon crawl, February 12, 2022

It was the original mainframe Zork from the 1980's which showed me that text adventures could do more than just the two word commands of the Scott Adams adventures. The breadth of the dungeon was astounding and I loved the variety of puzzles. My eighth grade self loved the experience.

Zork I reduced the original Zork into bitesized puzzles. I helped my nephews through this dungeon crawl over the past few months, only giving advice when the puzzle just wasn't well clued and I wanted to save them from trying everything. There is a nice feeling of exploring caves but there is so much that just doesn't make sense. The puzzles surrounding the (Spoiler - click to show)egg were particularly well-made.

Although this is a classic game that deserves all of the praise for inspiring so many to write IF, it just isn't that much fun as a game in 2022. Enchanter & Planetfall do a much better job of giving motivation beyond just gathering treasures.

Too big to judge?, August 14, 2021

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.

sucked, March 10, 2021

I would rather read read the Catcher in the Rye a thousand times than be forced to play this again. Sucked

One more star for the hystorical importance, March 1, 2021

This text adventure is essential and it is a must-to-play for every IF fanatics due to its hystorical importance.

But from an technical/artistic point of view, it's very difficult, unfair, sometimes illogical and frustrating (maze, inventory).

In spite of its fame it's not the pinnacle of the genre, but it keeps its legendary charm despite its 50 years of age.

A classic!, October 5, 2020

I really enjoyed playing through this game again this year (after having played, but not beaten it back in the 1980s). Yes, I understand how the phrase "Zork hates its player" came about, but at least because the tasks are compartmentalized and getting back to where you last were doesn't take more than a few minutes that it doesn't feel like a major setback to blow yourself up when you weren't expecting it. I had fun puzzling through everything (or at least most things, I had to cheat to figure out (Spoiler - click to show)the secrets of the egg) and even making the maps on my own, though I can see how those can become tedious as well.

Overall I thoroughly enjoyed myself and look forward to picking up Zork 2 and 3 for the first time ever, soon.

One of the first Adventures I've played., August 20, 2019

This Adventure is something that you have to play. I remember being a young child on my parent's 386. Spending my summer days trying to solve the puzzles. It makes me yearn to be young again. But now I'm a father and my two kids are just discovering Infocom.

Look. I have yet to find a game as satisfying as 'Zork 1.', May 6, 2019

If you've never played 'Zork 1' before, give it a spin. As for myself, 'Zork 1' is the first interactive fiction game I've ever played. Maybe it isn't the friendliest game for beginners of IF, but I'm personally glad that I began with this clasic masterpiece.

What 'Zork 1' did well, in my opinion, is that it hooked me right away. The opening scene - and this is not a spoiler, it's the start of the game - where the player is placed in front of a mysterious white house is purely brilliant. My brother and I, who I first played this with, would brag to each other via text who made it furthest into the game. It was thrilling to text to him that 'Hey! I made it past the house!' or 'I did it - I killed (Spoiler - click to show)that horrible thief!'

So maybe it was the rivalry I had ongoing with my brother in playing this game that made it so exciting and gratifying to me on my first play, but 'Zork 1' really is clever when it comes to its presentation of exploration and surprise.

Don't miss this one.

I'm grateful for Zork and never want to play it again, May 3, 2019

Yes, Zork was the most important computer game of the early 1980’s. Perhaps even more important than King’s Quest. "You are standing in an open field, west of a white house," is quite possibly the most well-known line in adventure game history. It laid the foundation for many wonderful things to come. And it was an incredibly impressive, engaging adventure when it was released. But other than nostalgia, it has little going for it after all these years.

A simple treasure hunting expedition can actually be a welcome relief from more story-based games, but Zork breaks so many conventional rules of modern game play that most fans of current interactive fiction would rip it to shreds were it released today. First, there’s the pointless maze (of twisty little passages, all alike). Then there’s the random enemy encounters and random battle elements. There are several ways to lock one’s self from victory without even realizing it, and a few puzzles are so poorly clued (or not clued at all) that it doesn’t matter anyway. And all that onto a time limit (due to a finite light source, at least early on), and you have one maddening game.

To be fair, the atmosphere still holds up well after all these years. The parser is impressively strong. And a few of the puzzles are rather ingenious. But I don’t have patience any longer for the aforementioned annoyances. Zork used to be a giant, but so many others have piled on top of its shoulders that it has weakened considerably. Still, I would recommend this to those who do have an interest in seeing how computer gaming first exploded in the market.

Play it, but don't play it first., December 31, 2017

It almost goes without saying that the original Zork trilogy is a must-play for most interactive fictions enthusiasts. As someone who is relatively new to the medium/genre, it was gratifying to play through the first part of the trilogy (and then the sequels) after I had experienced some more recent works first. This set me up to have a whole bunch of "Oh, this is where that came from" moments as I played through Zork's underground that would have been lost on me otherwise. The narrative style of the game works really well for me when paired with a sense of vague familiarity.

The modular structure and dubious geometry of the underground may not earn the game points for realism, but I enjoyed mapping the maze-y areas with Trizbort while playing. There was also never a sense of "What do I do next?" at any point, I think due to the clear association of specific rooms with specific puzzles and functions. The puzzles themselves were hard as hell, but gratifying to complete.

While the game is obviously littered with ideas that become genre tropes and conventions later on, there are also some things that I am glad didn't stick. For instance, I never would have completed the meta-parser puzzles (e.g. (Spoiler - click to show)the cyclops and echo puzzles) without using a walkthrough. The (Spoiler - click to show)sceptre puzzle was also maddening, seemingly requiring knowledge of previous games and/or a willingness to brute-force every possible command into the parser.

Heaven in text form, April 24, 2017

One of the finest IF games I've ever played. I remember sitting at my old computer for hours just mapping out this game. If you like massive adventures, then this one's for you.

A nice commercial clean-up of the MIT version, February 3, 2016

Until last week, I had no idea that Infocom games were still available on current platforms. After downloading an iPad app, I had the pleasure of trying my first commercial game after 5 years of free interactive fiction.

The manual and feelies were great, and the parser was very smooth, with great runtime. I missed several of Inform's features, especially when killing enemies. Overall, the game felt thoroughly tested, and a large number of the annoying features of MIT Zork were removed. Examples include a better coal maze, some of the smug writing, and better correlation between exits and etrances of nearby rooms.

I thought at first it was silly to split up the game into three, but having started Zork II, I am really enjoying the expanded versions. Very few of the free games I have played rival this kind of polished game, with Curses! and Anchorhead as my main examples of great gameplay.

Great Game, October 5, 2013

This is one of the best ones out there

Zork, October 22, 2011

In this game you explore a very intricate world full of confusing paths and underground tunnels looking for treasure to add to your collection.The list of treasures you are searching for is 20 items long and can only be found through exploring.
Enemies are easy and far in between so after a good 20 minutes of game play It becomes more of a exploring game; But your one light source is not eternal so saving often and then going back to get items using less moves is a must. You'll also find that many of the puzzles in the game are quite challenging.
the downsides are that the movement in certain areas are off, no real story line and most the game is spent trying to find out how to get around quickly.

AMAZING!!!, September 28, 2011

I am thrilled with this game. It is amazing. This is one of my many favorite text-adventures. FIVE STARS!

:), May 31, 2011

This is one of the greatest games in history!

addicting and fun, even for the young generation of IF players., June 26, 2010

I enjoyed Zork very much, I thought it was brilliant. It is important to me to emphasize that Zork isn't only good for the sense of nostalgia.

When Zork was at its glory commercial days I was still in diapers, so I cannot be blamed for having special feelings for the game. I have played it on a modern laptop using gargoyle, and have never seen it on flickering green commodore screen. Still, I enjoyed it very much.

after I got the point, the game-play was addicting. Zork has no story, but none is needed. The game has a huge world full of puzzles, that are very interesting and lots of fun. Thats all there is to it. The game can be played for a long time. I still haven't gotten all the points available. ((Spoiler - click to show) weird egg that keeps on breaking.)

Of course, it took me awhile to get used to some strange things that I had not encountered in more "modern IF" such as a limit in inventory, a limited light source, mazes and a thief. The vocabulary was not as good as I had usually seen in polished games, and the descriptions were minimal. But, after I got used to the thief and the limits these seemed strong points to me, that added to the depth of the game-play.Also, I didn't feel like anything was missing from the descriptions.

I must also say some parts of the game can be frustrating since it is easy to make the game un-winnable, and you'll probably have to play it a few times through ( (Spoiler - click to show) once for example, the thief stole my matches and i couldn't find them in any room, so I couldn't banish the demons or complete the puzzle with the gas room ).

Even though it has flaws, and needs getting used to (to players of more modern IF). After a short while it's flaws are barely noticeable, and the game flows. It has addicting gameplay and fun puzzles. A definite must-play In my humble opinion... even if you are from the younger generation of If players, like me.

Without Which, this page would not be here, March 17, 2010

I played Zork I back in the 80's when it was the new thing. I missed out on the original dungeon and cave adventure until much later when the internet made every game available, but I still go back to Zork time and again for a refreshing review.

The game has no real story to speak of. You are an AFGNCAAP wandering around the cave complex in the basement of someone's house collecting valuable items and putting them in his treasure box.

The game had some well thought out puzzles, and plenty of amusing things to do when you were bored. It also had cute little extras, like mirrors you could teleport with or walls you could teleport through, or various solutions to puzzles (proving you used the hints- because why would you think about that otherwise?).

The game created the inventory management and light puzzle (Damn you!), though you do find a permanent light source eventually. It included ramdomized battles as well, which I don't see much in IF anymore (and it was well implemented). It also includes the dreaded maze puzzle, difficult to map because some guy is stealing and moving your stuff. And then there's that infamous egg puzzle, which had me endlessly confused!

It's a great testament to the game that even some 20 years later I'm still marvelling at the ideas and puzzles they used. The Dam puzzle, the coal basket puzzle, performing the ritual to enter hades, they still amaze me at how well thought out they were. It's easy to think of them and see them in games now, but these guys came up with it from scratch, no one had done this before, and that's why this game may be the most influential game in IF ever.

Please, play it through. Give it a chance. Ignore it's annoyances (they're due to it's age) and learn where it all started.

A canonical puzzle-fest, January 10, 2008

Some modern reviewers have said Zork I is dated, and to some extent it is, although not in the usual way that computer games become dated, which is to say technologically. The technology of IF has improved over the years, certainly, but only incrementally; Zork I is, after all, written on basically the same Z-Machine that a lot of authors are still using today. Sure, parsers have gained a few niceties over the years, but the fact is that even the most sophisticated current parser is still an unnatural computer interface that you have to learn to use; Zork's parser is maybe 10% harder to learn than the current standards. Try digging out a video game from last year, let alone one from Zork's era, and see if they hold up as well.

The thing that makes Zork I look dated isn't the technology; it's the genre. Zork is a story-less treasure hunt in a big cave full of wacky incongruities and anachronisms; it's an unapologetic puzzle-fest; it's a slightly unfair, one-sided contest between a smirking author and a frustrated player. This sort of game went of out style years ago (among IF enthusiasts, I mean - the whole of IF went out of style even earlier among the broader gaming population). Some IFers look at it and say, good riddance: this sort of thing went out of style because it was inferior to what IF has evolved into. I tend to disagree; I think this sort of game actually went out of style because it was done to death, in large part by imitators of this very game. Zork I isn't inferior to modern IF; it's just different from modern IF.

The appeal of Zork I is that of a crossword, or of one of those evil little entangled-wire-loop puzzles. And the thing is, Zork has a ton of that kind of appeal. Once you get into the game, it's really good at doling out just enough positive feedback to keep you going, while keeping the challenges numerous and difficult. Maybe you have to have the right personality type, but if you do, it can become an obsession to beat the thing, to get that last lousy point. The game is unfair, but just a little; its designers had a good feel for just how far they could push their luck before players would feel cheated. It's the kind of game you really want to solve on your own, without looking at hints or walkthroughs, because it always feels like the answers are just within reach.

If you're still convinced that modern IF is just objectively superior to the likes of Zork I, here's something to consider. Modern IF dogma ranks immersiveness as one of the great virtues a work can have. Some look at Zork I's sparse room descriptions and irrational map and scoff. But Zork suggests that there's more to immersion than pretty descriptions. For many IFers, Zork I and its ilk have created some of the most intense subjective feelings of immersion they've had from any sort of game, just because they spent so much time walking back and forth and back and forth across the map. The obsessive play, I think, makes up for the thin text, and then some.

Sic Transit..., January 5, 2008

Some people here give Zork four or even five stars. These must be people who have played Zork many, many years ago, when players' expectations were lower than they are today--because, to be honest, playing Zork today is not a four or five star experience.

The depth of implementation of this game is just horrific: it doesn't know half of the nouns it uses in the room description, and 80% of the objects it does know have no description. Sometimes, it doesn't even seem to know the objects it has allowed me to discover by taking special actions. In the beginning of the game, you can find a grating beneath a pile of leaves; but when you try to examine it, the game tells you that it knows of no 'gratin'. (Maybe that was I was asking you about a fence-like metal structure, not a French culinary invention, in the first place?) Also, you can find a trap door beneath a rug, but when you try to open it, the game tells you that you see no trap door here. Look, you just described it to me! (You can open the trap door by first removing the rug; but the appropriate error message would be something like "the rug is still on it".)

The prose is nothing to write home about either. You are walking around through rooms with names like "north-south passage", and descriptions which are hardly more interesting. There are MANY rooms, but I would rather have had a couple of interesting ones than dozens that are strung together in some non-obvious way.

If there is a story in this game, I have no found it. You start outside a white house, but are given no clue as to who you are or what you are doing here. You appear to get points for collecting treasure, but even so it would have been good to know why I am collecting treasure and what lured me to the white house in the first place.

But if there is no story, there IS an irritating carry limit; there is random death whenever you walk into a dark place; and there is a maze of the most tiresome kind. (At least you get to know where the "twisty little passages" come from.)

Is that were the pain ends? Not at all--so much is irritating about this game that you could go on for quite some time. What about the fact that you cannot abbreviate "examine" to "x"? Or the fact that the descriptions in this game seem to have been written with the express intention no to help the player? If you try to open the door to the white house, you get the message "This door cannot be opened." Well-why on earth not? Has it been boarded? Glued to the frame? Tell me more! If you try to hit the door, you will find that the game asks you to specify something to hit the door with. Supplying the commonsensical answer that you wish to hit it with yourself results in the game telling you that suicide is not the answer. Apparently, then, the player character is made of glass.

But this is my favourite proof that Infocom didn't do any serious beta testing:

> enter river
You hit your head against the river as you attempt this feat.

I started up Zork about 5 or 6 times, but I've never managed to play it for longer than 15 minutes; it is just too irritating. This game must have aged very badly, given that people thought it was good when it came out. I cannot recommend it to anyone who is not filled with nostalgia at the very mention of the word "Infocom".

Zork gets 2 stars for basic technical competence.

Perfectly Balanced, November 6, 2007

Zork I holds a special place in my heart. Although I had played Adventure and enjoyed it, I fell in love with Zork I. Adventure was ultimately frustratingly random and obscure, but Zork I was descriptive, challenging, and intriguing. It kept you hungering to find out just what was around the bend, and what the next puzzle would reveal. If you factor in the state of the technology at its release, when moves would occasionally cause the floppy disk drive to whir, you can get a feel for the fun that playing IF was then. You never knew just what would happen when that disk whirred.

In Zork I, you are an adventurer and the world is your oyster. While the plot may be tired by now, when Zork I was released, this was novel. Blame the following deluge of rip-offs and hacks for the decline of the cave crawl genre, not one of the founding games. Though to be fair, a goodly part of Zork I occurs outside, so the "cave crawl" genre is a rough fit.

The prose is evocative without being excessively detailed and by turns slyly humorous; the puzzles are easy-to-medium in difficulty; the parser is head-and-shoulders above Adventure's, which is to say just a step or two behind modern Inform. Also worth noting is that Zork I encourages you to explore by not introducing movement-blocking puzzles right away. This is a key factor in the sense of immersion.

While Adventure opened the world of IF to many, it was Zork I that made people want to stay. If you have never played this game, play it by all means.

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