Zork Returning As a Browser MMO 108
Gamasutra reports that Jolt Online Gaming is teaming up with Activision to revive the Zork franchise in the form of a casual, browser-based MMO. The Legends of Zork website provides some basic background information: "The Great Underground Empire has recently fallen and the land is in disarray. The Royal Treasury has been sacked. The stock market has collapsed, leading even mighty FrobozzCo International to fire employees from throughout its subsidiaries. A craze of treasure-hunting has swept through the remnants of the Great Underground Empire. The New Zork Times reports that trolls, kobolds and other dangerous creatures are venturing far from their lairs. Adventurers and monsters are increasingly coming into conflict over areas rich with loot. It's a dangerous time to be a newly-unemployed traveling salesman, but it's also a great time to try a bit of adventuring." Gamasutra also has a brief interview with Jolt's CEO, Dylan Collins. There's no word yet whether or not players are likely to be eaten by a grue.
Grue! (Score:3, Funny)
You know both the men and the women will be eaten by the grue.
Re:Grue! (Score:5, Funny)
throw bottle at grue
There, that should take care of him.
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> hello sailor
Nothing happens here.
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FROTZ GRUE
(Different trilogy, same mythology.)
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May I be the first to say: For the GRUE!!!!!
Of course, they'll have to tweak things so that they wimp-ify the Grue race and everyone will complain.
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No, just women.
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But today's people don't read text. It has words and stuff in it. The warning message must permeate culture. MC Frontalot has already made a song [youtube.com] about it. But it isn't enough. A full feature film with Matt Damon forgetting to bring a torch and being eaten by a Grue is also necessary to get the message through, and a spinoff TV-series with a gang of teenagers examining a string of eaten people in dark areas.
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Ah, but I have a brass lantern. And a nasty knife. And an elvish sword of great antiquity. I fear nothing...
... hey, is it me or is my light getting dim?
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I'm pretty sure it was nasty, not rusty, when I picked it up although it may be both by now since I think I dropped it somewhere near the dam.
A Nasty Little Dwarf throws a stone knife at you (Score:2)
... and misses. At least in the Adventure version; I haven't actually played Zork much.
However, as a newly unemployed travelling sales engineer, I may be in great danger of getting sucked in :-)
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rub rug;g;g;g;g;g;g;g;n;kill monster [with rusty knife]
ZAP!
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It is pitch dark... (Score:2)
...and you are likely to be spammed by a Grue!
(Joke stolen from Silly friend - couldn't resist... ;)
Planetarion (Score:4, Interesting)
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Planetarion is being ended by them though - the next round is the last.
(announcement at http://www.planetarion.com/news/news/read/235-round-30-signups [planetarion.com] )
Multi-player text adventures? (Score:5, Insightful)
Gee, someone should have thought of this YEARS AGO [wikipedia.org]!
Oh wait they did.
I'm on dialup, so got tired of waiting for TFA to load. Maybe it's graphical and awesome and whatever.
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The main difference is that it'll be browser based instead of telnet based, and with ads(unless you pay).
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So what do you call MUDs that use a java telnet client in your browser.
Re:Multi-player text adventures? (Score:5, Funny)
So what do you call MUDs that use a java telnet client in your browser.
Stupid.
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Just a warning... I'm going to stab the first joker that mentions Lynx.
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Lynx on the Commodore=64 works brilliantly!
(ouch)
"If you stab at me do I not... leak?" - Data
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So what do you call MUDs that use a java telnet client in your browser.
A reason to get wintin or tintin?
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Still telnet based......you just happen to use your browser as the telnet client (or really as the launcher for the java telnet client). You can run java apps from the command line if you have the jar file local. No browser required.
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Darn, here I was thinking about pondering "telnet planetfall.infocom.activision.com" & playing a peaceful game of Planetfall.
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404 Error: Now what?? [thcnet.net]
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Ummm... Am I to believe they used a Fortran to PHP converter?
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Re:Multi-player text adventures? (Score:4, Interesting)
You could always give Game! [wittyrpg.com] a shot instead. It should be snappy, even on dialup.
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Neat! I'll try it out soon.
You Are Likely To Be Eaten By A Grue (Score:4, Funny)
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Zork? (Score:5, Insightful)
The Great Underground Empire has recently fallen and the land is in disarray. The Royal Treasury has been sacked. The stock market has collapsed, leading even mighty FrobozzCo International to fire employees from throughout its subsidiaries. A craze of treasure-hunting has swept through the remnants of the Great Underground Empire...
Sounds a bit too much like reality to me.
It's a rare game... (Score:5, Insightful)
...that can survive being turned into a MMORPG. Most developers tend to think that making a game into a MMOG adds value, but I tend to think it's the reverse.
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Indeed...
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Re:It's a rare game... (Score:5, Funny)
Coming soon to a gaming rig near your: Guitar Hero, the MMOG version.
You can look forward to many hours of fun whacking goblins with your axe in search of the Golden Mic Stand from Kalimdor. When you have assembled a whole stage, you can hold concerts, and when you meet other players you can do battle.
(Monthly subscription rates may apply, see inside of box for details)
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Coming soon to a gaming rig near your: Guitar Hero, the MMOG version.
You can look forward to many hours of fun whacking goblins with your axe in search of the Golden Mic Stand from Kalimdor. When you have assembled a whole stage, you can hold concerts, and when you meet other players you can do battle.
(Monthly subscription rates may apply, see inside of box for details)
Shhhh...don't give them ideas. "Guitar Hero Battle of the Bands" is bound to happen sooner or later. We should pateint the idea now so that it never see's the light of day.
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You mean this?
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/wrath/features/bard/bardclass.xml [worldofwarcraft.com]
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Other than the MMO part, I think you just described Lute Hero for NWN2.
http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=NWN2ModulesEnglish.Detail&id=275 [ign.com]
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From what I've seen of MMO, more likely is that the game consists of playing one note over and over again for six hours, until you level up, then get a new note to play for another six hours. And you get to pay a monthly subscription for the privilege.
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In Lord of the Rings Online [lotro.com] the player instruments can be played using ABC Notation [wikipedia.org]
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Re:It's a rare game... (Score:5, Insightful)
We need a Leisure Suit Larry MMO.
Re:It's a rare game... (Score:5, Funny)
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That exchange should qualify for listing on bash.org, irc or not.
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> We need a Leisure Suit Larry MMO.
match.com [match.com]
It does add value. (Score:2)
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My main concern is that Zork is interactive fiction.
It's like reading a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book, albeit more complex. Therefore an MMORPG is no longer Zork, but something else entirely..... just the same as the movie version of Lord of the Rings has an entirely different "feel" from reading the original novels.
I want to see Zork revived, but I want it to preserve the original emphasis on reading and user imagination.
Two questions: (Score:2)
1. Are any of the people involved with the original in on this? I know TFA says that they were in contact with Activision regarding backstory, but that's not necessarily the same thing.
2. Will there be a Blackberry-friendly site? They mention the iPhone (booo! hiss!), so I assume there's a mobile version of the site, but they specified iPhone, not mobile, and I'm a paranoiac at heart.
When I read this headline in my feed this morning I almost wept. Zork was the first computer game I ever played (in 1985, at
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1. Are any of the people involved with the original in on this? I know TFA says that they were in contact with Activision regarding backstory, but that's not necessarily the same thing.
I think that's rather unlikely. Mr. Collins explicitly says in the interview that he's "continually searching for people who were involved in the games over the years" and quotes only Activision as a source for the "entire mythology". None of the original Zork Implementors works (or has worked in the past) for Activision.
Also, the artwork on http://www.legendsofzork.com/ [legendsofzork.com] makes you wonder if Mr. Collins has really caught up with the "entire mythology". This adventurer is from anywhere but from Zork -- not
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Perhaps he's properly removed it from Zork 3's Viewing Room...
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Maybe his lantern ran out of oil, although one wonders why he didn't just frotz it.
Reliving the glory days...but not. (Score:1)
Free Zork! (Score:3, Informative)
In related news, Infocom (?) is giving away Zork I, II and III on their website. infocom-if.org [infocom-if.org]
Now I'm definitely more likely to be eaten by a grue.
~AA
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Actual Z-Code:
location = Beginning;
move watch to player;
"You step onto the landing ramp leading down toward the surface of the legendary lost planet of Magrathea. ~Announcement, announcement. This is Eddie (the shipboard computer). Someone is leaving the ship on a strange planet without wrapping up all nice and warm. It'll all end in tears, I just know it...~ The voice fades behind you.^^Ramp^The wind moans. Dust drifts across the surface of the alien world. Zaphod, Ford, and Trillian appear and urge you
KoL (Score:1)
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I played KoL some time ago and I didn't see anything that made it "communal." It felt like a Browser based Myst with stick figures.
Did they actually add interaction with other people and dungeons or did I stop playing in the "tutorial" section because I couldn't stand it anymore. (The humor is somewhat interesting though.)
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Bad craziness.... (Score:1)
Zork, eh? (Score:1)
So it's reality based then? (Score:5, Funny)
"The Great Underground Empire has recently fallen and the land is in disarray. The Royal Treasury has been sacked. The stock market has collapsed, leading even mighty FrobozzCo International to fire employees from throughout its subsidiaries
So it's reality based then?
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No. Reality is Zork based. Though it's not clear who is playing the role of Megabozz (who destroyed the original GUE). Henry Paulson, possibly. Or of course George Bush, though he seems more likely to be the last Flathead (styled "Dimwi
It's SUPPOSED to hurt (Score:2)
already hacked as a twitter account (Score:1)
There is a twitter version (grugru) kinda working.
We Just Need a Bailout (Score:1)
Even though the FrobozzCo has fallen on some hard times, I assure you that everything will be fine once we get our government bailout money.
-JBFrobozz
Eat Me (Score:2, Funny)
Auto-Cannibalism will do nothing to improve your situation.
-Float!
People who played Zork... (Score:2)
Are probably pushing 50, probably 40 at least, right?
Is there really a good demographic to target with an MMO? I know there are people in that demo that play MMOs (I'm one) but overall I think you're getting a pretty small slice of the pie by going after that crowd with a nostalgia angle.
It can (regrettably) work for movies recycling old TV shows, but the time and money commitment for someone to partake of that is much, much less.
I just don't see it. I always figured those TV show remakes are easy to pitc
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30 years later...quite a history (Score:2)
Cool. I first played Zork on a VAX at Bell Labs, right before Infocom was formally formed in 1979.
There's a great student paper (research project?) from MIT that quite nicely recounts the history of Infocom, the making of Zork, and their fall etc.:
http://web.mit.edu/6.933/www/Fall2000/infocom/infocom-paper.pdf [mit.edu]
(yeah, PDF sorry)
Abstract from the paper:
The success and failure of Infocom, a company founded by members of MIT's Laboratory
for Computer Science, resulted from a combination of factors. Infocom succ
And to think we were talking about this at work (Score:2)
Talk about coincidence. A number of the staff in my department at work got into a conversation about old games and brought up such classics as Zork and Planetfall. And then, on the bus home, another group started talking about the 'bad' old days.
Could it be that the gaming industry is suffering from remake-itis like Hollywood? Or does improved technology justify remakes?
The first question (Score:3, Funny)
Want some rye? (Score:1)
Course ya do!
Hyphen abuse (Score:1)
Apparently people haven't been satisfied with mere apostrophe abuse [apostropheabuse.com] and have taken to hyphen abuse [wordpress.com]. Take for example:
newly-unemployed
One never, ever hyphenates with an adverb ending in -ly. It's already clear by the -ly ending that it is an adverb and that it will be modifying the word that follows. To join it with that word with a hyphen is redundant.
Meanwhile:
Eight Legged Freaks
Game Changing Performance
These terms should have hyphens. Without them, the former is about eight freaks with legs and the latter about a performance being changed by the game.
Get ye flask_ (Score:2)
Plugh is from Adventure. (Score:1)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adventure_(computer_game)/ [wikipedia.org]
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Ummm.... (Score:2)
...what is a grue?
rj
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From Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]:
> what is a grue?
The grue is a sinister, lurking presence in the dark places of the earth. Its favorite diet is adventurers, but its insatiable appetite is tempered by its fear of light. No grue has ever been seen by the light of day, and few have survived its fearsome jaws to tell the tale.
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If you'd ever asked that question from the Zork command line, you wouldn't have had to go to Wikipedia...;-)
rj
A Hollow Voice says, (Score:2)
TV documentary (Score:1)
Back in the late eighties, I saw a short documentary about Infocom on TV. It was on the BBC (or maybe Channel 4) in the UK. Does anybody know if it still exists today online? I've looked for it a few times, but not had much success.
I'm familiar with the "Get Lamp" documentary which has been in production for a while, but not sure if the director has located this video.
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Well, emailed the director Jason Scott, and it seems he knows about it but hasn't located it either.
Take a look at "Get Lamp", looks great... I really enjoyed his bbs documentary, so expecting good things.
http://getlamp.com/ [getlamp.com]