• Tag Archives Zork

  • Zork (TRS-80)

    Posted on by Azrael Comment

    Zork, TRS-80.

    http://darth-azrael.tumblr.com/post/163484334369/vgjunk-zork-trs-80

    Zork has a lineage the goes back pretty much as far as computer games go and it is one of the most prolific games in existence in terms of the number of platforms it was available for. The TRS-80 version was the very first commercial version available in 1980. But I’m getting ahead of things…

    Zork is a text adventure game or Interactive Fiction as some like to call it. Essentially, it is an adventure game that is played entirely in text. Descriptions of events, the environment and objects in the environment are given as text and commands are issued as text. This was a briefly popular genre of games from when computers were more limited. The Zork series is perhaps the most popular though there were a number of other such games by Infocom and others throughout the early to mid 1980s and beyond.

    Zork was inspired by the simpler Colossal Cave Adventure which was written in 1975 in FORTRAN to run on a DEC PDP-10. Like Colossal Cave, Zork (or Dungeon as it was originally called) was written to run on a PDP-10 but it was written using MDL (a LISP derivative). An ~512K version was runnable by 1977 and it was ported to TENEX/TOPS-20 which was an operating system than ran on various DEC mainframes. At this point, the game started making its way around the Arpanet (Internet predecessor) though enhancements and bug fixes would continue to be made until 1979. At this point the game was about 1 MB which was massive for the time. Zork was also ported to FORTRAN with an initial release in January 1978 which led to it becoming available on more platforms, such as the PDP-11 and DEC VAXes.

    Finally, the original developers decided to form Infocom and make Zork one of their first products. Since home computers didn’t generally have FORTRAN compilers at this time, they decided to reimplement the game using a language they invented (Zork Implementation Language) and build interpreters for each machine (interpreted languages like Python work in an analogous manner). The first interpreter (ZIP for Z-machine Interpreter) was completed in 1979. After this, much of the game had to be cut out because a megabyte was way too big for home computers at the time. The first Zork release for home computers contained about half of the original locations. The remaining locations would be used for Zork II and III. Initially, Infocom made a deal with Personal Software, the same company responsible for VisiCalc, to distribute Zork and the TRS-80 version was the first version completed in 1980. An Apple II version followed in 1981 and when Zork II was released, Infocom took over distribution. When Zork III was released in the Fall of 1982, interpreters were also released for the Commodore 64, Commodore Plus/4, Atari 8-bit, CP/M, and IBM PC. Further platforms would follow and the rest is history.

    The original TRS-80 version was distributed in a clear plastic bag containing just the disk and a 36 page book (pictured above). This version is quite rare today. After Zork II came out and the original was re-released as Zork I, it came in the typical folio packaging Infocom was known for. This version required the TRS-80 Model III with 32K but otherwise I’m not sure what the difference between the games was.





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  • Return to Zork (DOS)

    Posted on by Azrael Comment

    Return to Zork (DOS, 1993)

    The Zork games descend from the very oldest computer games. The original Zork was released in 1977 on the PDP-10, a mainframe computer and was influenced by an even older game, Colossal Cave. The first several Zork games were ultimately released on a very wide range of computer systems. These games didn’t have simplistic graphics, they had no graphics at all. The Zork games were considered “interactive fiction” and they were played by typing in various commands (e.g. “hit the troll with the Elvish sword”). The text parser was very sophisticated for the time.

    Many Zork games, spin-offs and other games using the same engine were released by Infocom throughout the years before Return to Zork was released after a five year hiatus for the series. While the original Zork games were text based, Return to Zork was a graphic adventure, somewhat similar to Myst which was released slightly later. While there have been a few Zork games released since, Return to Zork was the last to be published under the Infocom label. In addition to being released on DOS-based and Macintosh computers, Return to Zork was also released for the PlayStation and Sega Saturn.

    The Zork games all exist in the same universe and there is a cohesive timeline that the games are all a part of. Return to Zork is set later than any other Zork game. It is set so far into the future that the events of past (and future) Zork games are practically mythology. The plot of Return to Zork is not terribly original though. Some dark force has gripped the land. Evil creatures infest the area, things have unnaturally decayed and even entire buildings have disappeared. Your job, of course, is to find out what is causing this and to stop it. However, it is the details that make it interesting.

    Return to Zork received mostly positive reviews. There are purists who will hate the idea of the transition from all text to a graphical adventure but taken on its own it wasn’t a bad game. Bugs did hamper the game by making it a little harder than it needed to be. Bugs that prevented hints from being displayed could be fixed by a patch but the same patch would cause inventory items to disappear. Still, it wasn’t a huge issue. Those that like the original Zork games or graphic adventures in general should definitely give this one a try. You don’t necessarily have to track down an original copy as Return to Zork has been updated and released via Steam and GoG (where it can be had for a mere $1.97 currently) – https://www.gog.com/game/return_to_zork.


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  • Infocom (1983)

    Posted on by Azrael Comment

    Infocom advertisement from the October 1983 issue of Family Computing

    family_computing_issue-02_1983_oct-111

    Source: Family Computing – Issue Number 2 – October 1983



    Infocom was one of the first major publishers of games for home computers. They are most famous for their text adventures or interactive fiction. That reputation began with their very first game, Zork. However, Zork did not get it’s start on home computers. It was first written for a mainframe.

    In 1977, after having seen Colossal Cave Adventure (‘Adventure’ for short), the very first interactive fiction game, a group of MIT students decided to create their own game. Zork was written in MDL (a Lisp derivative) and given away for free, though you had to have access to a mainframe like the PDP-10 is was written on or the DEC TOPS-20 it was ported to.

    Not too long after, the home computer industry started to take off with computers like the TRS-80 and Apple II being introduced. Naturally, they had the bright idea to turn Zork into a commercial product and Infocom was born in 1979. The major challenge was reducing the 1 MB + program designed for a mainframe to something that could run on a less powerful computer with significantly less memory (32 KB or less). There was also the issue of Zork being written in a language not really suited to home computers at the time. But there was a solution…

    Instead of porting Zork to many computers using machine language, the developers of Zork created a kind of virtual machine or interpreter that could process a reduced version of MDL that became known as ZIL or Zork Implementation Lanuguage. This virtual machine would become known as the Z-machine. An interpreter still had to be written for each machine but this was simpler and had the advantage of making future games based on ZIL instantly portable to every machine with a ZIL interpreter.

    Zork was still too large for home computers of the time so it was ultimately reduced to something smaller. However, the sequels Zork II and Zork III would provide the content that was initially cut. Many other ZIL based games would follow over the next decade. There were ultimately 8 versions of the Z-Machine with later versions supporting graphics as well as text. Modern Z-Machine implementations exist today so with the appropriate data files, all of these games can still be played.

    Interactive fiction isn’t as in vogue as it once was but everyone should give it a try at least once. You might as well start with Zork, the game that started it all.

    The above ad is from the October 1983 issue of Family Computing and features many of Infocom’s releases up to that point.


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