@catnap: that sounds cool! was the website iplayif? i remember trying things on there in my youth.

@magic mirror: there’s a taxonomic debate we could have here to rival the ongoing “roguelike / roguelite” skirmish, but that’s unproductive and boring. the umbrella term i’d use is “interactive fiction”, encompassing what i’d call “text adventures” (i.e., things with parsers like zork & hitchhiker’s guide & counterfeit monkey) and ”hypertext fiction” (i.e., things where you’re given a set of choices like the choice of games & choose your own adventure books & twine games). as thread creator i decree all interactive fiction discussion to be on-topic. [bangs gavel]

anyway, that aside. i remember playing choice of dragon & choice of zombies & that one about being in a noble court when i was younger. it’s a cool format! and the way they use stats is a good way to make choices meaningful without combinatorial explosion. i never played zork & never got very far in hitchhikers, though i’m familiar enough with both to be conversant about them. as a kid i played a good deal of colossal cave (though never finished it..) which zork is riffing on.

i’ve also been reading a lot of posts from jason dyer’s ”all the adventures“ project, which is really fun. i’m learning a lot about the early 1980s state of the art. so many treasure hunts..