Announcing the 1997 XYZZY Awards

Now that the voting for the 1997 IF Competition is at last at an end, it's time to get down to ... more voting! That's right: the 1997 XYZZY Awards are upon us. And unlike the Competition, all games released in 1997 are eligible for these "IF Oscars," and everyone is eligible to vote.

The rules are as follows:

Eligibility: All IF games released for the first time during the year 1997 are eligible for the 1997 XYZZYs. Whether it showed up on a web page or in some obscure subdirectory of GMD, it's on the list. (See below.)

Voting: Anyone is eligible to vote. You may not vote twice. Voting by dead people, fictional characters, and inanimate objects is strictly prohibited. Authors may not vote for their own games, nor may they threaten, cajole or otherwise intimidate their friends into voting for their games. While it is suggested that you play as many of the eligible games as possible before casting your ballot, we're not going to get ridiculous here.

Categories: There are ten XYZZY categories this year: Best Game, Best Writing, Best Story, Best Setting, Best Puzzles, Best NPCs, Best Individual Puzzle, Best Individual NPC, and the two newest categories: Best Individual PC and Best Use of Medium. In the "individual" categories, vote for a particular NPC, PC, or puzzle; in the rest, vote for the game as a whole. Vote once in each category, then stop.

Deadline:: All ballots must be returned to eileen@interport.net by February 1, 1998. Ballots arriving after that date will be used as cat litter.

And now, on with the voting:

Name:

E-mail:

Best game:

Best writing:

Best story:

Best setting:

Best puzzles:

Best NPCs:

NPC stands for "non-player character"

Best individual puzzle:

Best individual NPC:

Best individual PC:

PC stands for "player character"

Best use of medium:

This award is meant to honor proficiency in use of the parser, default messages, and so on. In the words of Kathleen Fischer, who came up with the name for it: "I would give the award (whatever we call it) to the game that reduces the number of "You can't see any such thing." and "You can't do that." to a bare minimum. The game should offer some clever reason why I can't burn down the forest with my match and handle me taking water from the stream 100 times with grace. The parser should understand me within the context of the game and the grammer must be complete enough that I don't have to play "guess the verb". If the game describes a pile of garbage in the room I expect it to be prepared for me to to try to get it, eat it, or push it out the window. The window, by the way, should be either openable, locked, or "It's not that kind of window" and not "That's just scenery". I know you are saying "But I can't code all my objects". I'm just saying this is an award... and if somebody goes to that much effort they should get some credit for it!"

List of Eligible Games

A Bear's Night Out
A Good Breakfast
A New Day
Apartment F209
Aunt Nancy's House
Babel
Baltimore:24
Bedlam
Breath Pirates
Candy
Cask
Caso Cerrado
Coming Home
Comp '97
Congratulations!
Down
E-Mailbox
Everybody Loves a Parade
Friday Afternoon or: Escape from MicroSun
Glowgrass
Heist: The Crime of the Century
House II
Interstate Zero
Kook U
Leaves
Lost Anaheim Hills
Madame L'Estrange and the Troubled Spirit
Magic Realms: The Sword of Kasza
Mercy
Mystery Science Theater 3000, Adventure 102, Reel 1: A Fable
Myth
Oskar und der Tod v1.1
Papa wird vermisst
Phred Phontious and the Quest for Pizza
Pick up the Phone Booth and Die
Pick up the Phone Booth and Die, Part 2
Pintown
Poor Zefron's Almanac
Sea of Night
She's Got a Thing for a Spring
Shivani, Ciudad del Mal
Sins Against Mimesis
Sunset Over Savannah
Sylenius Mysterium
Symmetry
Temple of the Orc Mage (level one)
The Acorn Court
The Chronicles of Aarbron
The Edifice
The Family Legacy
The Frenetic Five vs. Sturm und Drang
The Garden
The Hollywood Murders
The Incredible Erotic Adventures of Stiffy Makane!
The Lost Spellmaker
The Mad Bomber
The Obscene Quest of Dr. Aardvarkbarf
The Space Under the Window
The Tempest
The Town Dragon
The Unholy Grail
The Zuni Doll
Travels in the Land of Erden
Tryst of Fate
VirtuaTech
Zero Sum Game
Zombie!
Zork: The Undiscovered Underground

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