January/February 1996
Issue #7
Hollow Voice
Do you play text adventures by yourself, or as part of a group? I'm used to considering it a solitary activity, so it was a real treat to get together in early January -- on the first day of the Great Blizzard of '96, no less! -- with several other IF fans in the New York City area. (For those who couldn't make it because of the weather, yes, you definitely had a valid excuse!) Since surfing the Web, playing sneak previews of upcoming games, drinking coffee, and eating chocolate chip cookies are four of my favorite things (not necessarily in that order), I naturally had a great time. I hope to organize another such get-together in the near-term.
I also wanted to give a quick mention to a book that came across my desk recently called "Interactive Writer's Handbook," by Darryl Wimberley and John Samsel (Los Angeles: The Carronade Group, 1995). Targeting writers, producers, and designers interested in learning about writing interactive screenplays, the book mainly addresses the creation of CD-ROM games and other multimedia entertainment but I think that text adventure game developers would draw inspiration from it too. Among other notable interviews, the book includes a question-and-answer session with Michele Em, screenwriter for Return to Zork that includes some telling details about how that project was pieced together. For example, she notes she had five or six weeks to write the dialogue -- including deciding where and how to place puzzle clues -- for 28 characters (the game had already been designed by this point). Raising the level of ridiculousness up a notch, Return to Zork's producer also wanted her to write the screenplay using Excel!
On the brighter side, Em notes that "I think that I got the job because I was a screenwriter who actually played games. Infocom games were my favorites. I had played the text version of Zork dozens of times." That should be some consolation for those who've wondered aloud on the rec.arts.int-fiction newsgroup if their love of text adventures could ever pay off for them financially. :)
Until next issue, happy gaming!
Eileen Mullin
eileen@interport.net
Contents
- Legalese / Contact Information
- Newsbriefs/Top 10 IF Web Sites
- Letters
- Tales From the Code Front: The Hard Part is Making It Look Easy
- IF in 1995: The Year in Review
- Article: Adventure Game Interfaces
- Sneak Previews
- More Tales From the Code Front: Rexx-Adventure
- Game Review: Lethe Flow Phoenix
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