Hey Matt - I'll jump in on the Zork & Zelda topic.
Zork -
I cannot comment specifically on the Zork experience. I didn't play it back in the day, however I did acquire Zork I, III, and III for Commodore 64 just a couple of months ago. I played a bit of Zork I for a few minutes, and I plan on playing the game through once I find the time.
I can comment from a slightly different angle regarding text-based adventure games. These games are truly in a genre of their own. If you take away graphics and are left with text, you are reminded of a book. Though the text-based adventure games may not contain the complex storytelling characteristic of a good fiction book, they allow readers to take that first step into the fiction - or - into the "adventure." I elected to use the term readers because I believe that people that read books are the ones most likely to get enjoyment out of this type of game. If you take a typical gamer of the current young generation of gamers and a person that enjoys reading fiction, I think that perhaps you may have a better chance of the reader adopting the game or at least giving it more of a chance than the young gamer. While books have illustrations on the front covers and possibly at the chapter stops, they are essentially nothing but text. As is has been the case for many, MANY years, it is up to the reader to create the scenes in their head. The reader has to picture the characters, the scenery around them, and the actions as they take place. The better the reader's imagination, the more likely a well-written fiction novel will succeed. In much the same way - the greater the imagination of the text-based adventure gamer, the more FUN said gamer will have playing a game such as Zork. He won't sit there feeling upset about the missing graphics - the entire game will come alive inside his head. The unpredictability (hopefully) of the adventure game is the key to suspense and anxiety for the adventure going on in the gamer's head.
Personally, I have more experience creating text-based adventure games than playing them as that was one of the first things I did when messing with Quick Basic many years ago. You're essentially writing an interactive novel, and it is a lot of fun to watch your friends try to play it. Are your puzzles too easy? Too hard? Do your friends go about solving the puzzle the same way you already knew how to solve it when it was first created? A unique experience to be sure.
Zelda -
I had owned and played an Atari 2600 for several years at the time I first saw a NES. A friend of mine owned one, and he showed me two games back to back: Super Mario Bros...which was amazing and then BAM! Zelda. Wow.
The sort summary of my experience was that I loved it. As more games have been released in the series, I have played them. They seem to have gone a bit stale on me as the years go by. New games are released, but I do not find that draw that the earlier games of the series did. Ocarina was better than I thought it would be, and Twilight Princess was entertaining as well. Neither one of these games could create the same level of excitement I had for the original game or Link to the Past. Is it because I am older? I cannot say.
I'll have to read your dungeons and desktops book at some point, Matt. I am curious as to what you had to say about Zelda in a D&D book. There is a minor argument (or major depending on your corner of the internet) as to if Zelda is considered an RPG or not. I consider King's Quest an adventure game. I consider Zelda to be an action-adventure game. I don't really consider it an RPG. If I did, I would have to refer to it as an "action-adventure RPG game." Even then...I would be more likely to slap the "puzzle" genre in there (especially for the more recent games) before I would add RPG. Unfortunately, this opinion offends fans of Zelda. I do not know why. I still like the series - why does it matter what genre it is? The discrepancy comes from how people define the term RPG.
For me, Zelda defines the action adventure genre by taking what I consider a traditional adventure game to be - exploration, item acquisition, and puzzle-solving - and combining it with a fast-paced, arcade style combat system.
Regardless of the classification of Zelda games, I would say they still define action-adventure games.
So if Zork defines text-based adventure games, and Zelda defines action-adventure games, are they still from the same basic genre - "adventure games?" I wouldn't use the cliche apples to oranges to compare the two, but they aren't really the same...are they? How about an idiom along the lines of "an apple tree and an orange tree growing in the same garden?" Each game initially shares several basic traits before development begins, but each is completely different after it starts to take shape.
Hey Matt - I'll jump in on the Zork & Zelda topic.
Zork -
I cannot comment specifically on the Zork experience. I didn't play it back in the day, however I did acquire Zork I, III, and III for Commodore 64 just a couple of months ago. I played a bit of Zork I for a few minutes, and I plan on playing the game through once I find the time.
I can comment from a slightly different angle regarding text-based adventure games. These games are truly in a genre of their own. If you take away graphics and are left with text, you are reminded of a book. Though the text-based adventure games may not contain the complex storytelling characteristic of a good fiction book, they allow readers to take that first step into the fiction - or - into the "adventure." I elected to use the term readers because I believe that people that read books are the ones most likely to get enjoyment out of this type of game. If you take a typical gamer of the current young generation of gamers and a person that enjoys reading fiction, I think that perhaps you may have a better chance of the reader adopting the game or at least giving it more of a chance than the young gamer. While books have illustrations on the front covers and possibly at the chapter stops, they are essentially nothing but text. As is has been the case for many, MANY years, it is up to the reader to create the scenes in their head. The reader has to picture the characters, the scenery around them, and the actions as they take place. The better the reader's imagination, the more likely a well-written fiction novel will succeed. In much the same way - the greater the imagination of the text-based adventure gamer, the more FUN said gamer will have playing a game such as Zork. He won't sit there feeling upset about the missing graphics - the entire game will come alive inside his head. The unpredictability (hopefully) of the adventure game is the key to suspense and anxiety for the adventure going on in the gamer's head.
Personally, I have more experience creating text-based adventure games than playing them as that was one of the first things I did when messing with Quick Basic many years ago. You're essentially writing an interactive novel, and it is a lot of fun to watch your friends try to play it. Are your puzzles too easy? Too hard? Do your friends go about solving the puzzle the same way you already knew how to solve it when it was first created? A unique experience to be sure.
Zelda -
I had owned and played an Atari 2600 for several years at the time I first saw a NES. A friend of mine owned one, and he showed me two games back to back: Super Mario Bros...which was amazing and then BAM! Zelda. Wow.
The sort summary of my experience was that I loved it. As more games have been released in the series, I have played them. They seem to have gone a bit stale on me as the years go by. New games are released, but I do not find that draw that the earlier games of the series did. Ocarina was better than I thought it would be, and Twilight Princess was entertaining as well. Neither one of these games could create the same level of excitement I had for the original game or Link to the Past. Is it because I am older? I cannot say.
I'll have to read your dungeons and desktops book at some point, Matt. I am curious as to what you had to say about Zelda in a D&D book. There is a minor argument (or major depending on your corner of the internet) as to if Zelda is considered an RPG or not. I consider King's Quest an adventure game. I consider Zelda to be an action-adventure game. I don't really consider it an RPG. If I did, I would have to refer to it as an "action-adventure RPG game." Even then...I would be more likely to slap the "puzzle" genre in there (especially for the more recent games) before I would add RPG. Unfortunately, this opinion offends fans of Zelda. I do not know why. I still like the series - why does it matter what genre it is? The discrepancy comes from how people define the term RPG.
For me, Zelda defines the action adventure genre by taking what I consider a traditional adventure game to be - exploration, item acquisition, and puzzle-solving - and combining it with a fast-paced, arcade style combat system.
Regardless of the classification of Zelda games, I would say they still define action-adventure games.
So if Zork defines text-based adventure games, and Zelda defines action-adventure games, are they still from the same basic genre - "adventure games?" I wouldn't use the cliche apples to oranges to compare the two, but they aren't really the same...are they? How about an idiom along the lines of "an apple tree and an orange tree growing in the same garden?" Each game initially shares several basic traits before development begins, but each is completely different after it starts to take shape.
Chris Kennedy, Editor
Location: Houston, Texas, USA
Email: chris@armchairarcade.com