Zork I: The Great Underground Empire - 1980

Infocom, various PC platforms

Heavily inspired by the first true text adventure Colossal Cave Adventure, development of the original incarnation of Zork started in 1977 on a PDP-10 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). It continued to grow and eat up precious resources until it was about as big as was possible to store within the memory allocated to it — a whole megabyte! — and had users connecting from all over the US via ARPANET. Zork was clearly a key part of the cold war effort.

When the developers (Tim Anderson, Marc Blank, Bruce Daniels and Dave Lebling) began to move towards commercial aspirations within the nascent home computer industry and founded Infocom, “mainframe Zork” was divided (mostly) into Zork I and Zork II, and the whole trilogy became the backbone of their software sales for years. The games in the Zork trilogy would regularly continue to outsell new games in the Infocom catalogue. In fact, the success of Zork would only really be matched by one game: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in 1984.

Notable for having the most complex parser of its time, and for the relative modular ease of adding new rooms, objects and scripts, Zork (and later Infocom efforts) would stand above competitors – such as Adventureland – by the metrics of depth and realism. Unfortunately, I believe it is fair to say that, while Infocom developed their narratives and storytelling, they struggled to adapt to the rapid technological growth of the computer gaming industry and were ultimately left behind.

Getting Started

I am playing what represents about as final a release as Zork I received: revision 88 for the IMB PC using a web-based emulator found here. Several locations, concepts and puzzles have been spoilt for me, so I cannot judge the game’s difficulty very well, but I will be doing my best. I’m hoping to visit some of the less universally-spoilt Infocom interactive fiction games in future.

As I go along, I am mapping within Trizbort and noting my thoughts and frustrations. Once I have finished, I will also take a look at the available source code for the game to check my working and ferret out any interesting things I missed. There will be spoilers for the environment, but few for the puzzles themselves. Within the writing, I will refer to rooms using their unique identifier within the source code and will include these within my map.

Above Ground

by David Ardito and Steve Meretzky, 1982

You are standing in an open field west of a white house, with a boarded front door. 
There is a small mailbox here.

Each copy of Zork contains the game engine paired with the game content and, since storage was at such a premium, there is little space for fluff. Arguably the single most important description in the game – the one you see when you load the game – is just a single sentence for the room (WEST-OF-HOUSE) and an even shorter sentence for the object that we can see: the mailbox. I have not learned much at first glance, though some examining paints more of a picture of the world:

The house is a beautiful colonial house which is painted white. It is clear that the owners must
have been extremely wealthy.

The door cannot be opened.

As I map the house, the forest and the cliffside that comprise the easily accessible starting region, I am struck by the differences between some of these descriptions. Some are just a few words:

You are in a clearing with a forest surrounding you on all sides. A path leads south.

Others are far more detailed. The following is the description for CANYON-VIEW and stands out as an example of having the wider world described in a fashion that paints where I stand within the greater space of Zork:

You are at the top of the Great Canyon on its west wall. From here there is a marvelous view of the
canyon and parts of the Frigid River upstream. Across the canyon, the walls of the White Cliffs join
the mighty ramparts of the Flathead Mountains to the east. Following the Canyon upstream to the
north, Aragain Falls may be seen, complete with rainbow. The mighty Frigid River flows out from a
great dark cavern. To the west and south can be seen an immense forest, stretching for miles
around. A path leads northwest. It is possible to climb down into the canyon from here.

My favourite description is actually one of the shorter examples. When I try to move south from FOREST-3, I am simply told “Storm-tossed trees block your path.” Functional and descriptive!

Prose aside, I am given some foreshadowing of one of the main idiosyncrasies with Zork. Routes between rooms are not always consistent and this is made worse by not having the direction you enter a room described to you. If your first action on booting the game up is to walk west, you enter FOREST-1. However, trying to return east takes you to PATH. I have some not-so-positive views on this. If my character intrinsically knows compass directions when I leave a location, why do they not also know from which direction they enter a new room? This example is even more egregious as there is no way to get from FOREST-1 back to WEST-OF-HOUSE. Did I fall out of the sky? Topology can’t quite be playing ball here.

Inside the house, we learn a lot more. I get my objectives in the LIVING-ROOM, learn about darkness in the ATTIC, and I find supplies in the KITCHEN (who eats a hot pepper sandwich?!) I am amused by the fact this trio of rooms makes up such a large house in all the supporting artwork, but I attribute this to descriptive space limitations. There is also a reminder that a player may need to interact further with items described within a room, often having to guess the correct verb to even get a response, let alone progress. I MOVE the rug to reveal a trapdoor, and the game is properly afoot.

South of the Reservoir

by David Lebling, 1978

I find myself within the main bulk of the game, a sprawling portion of the titular underground empire. I am immediately faced with combat — a troll, the first signs of the fantasy setting — and experience one of the main elements of randomness that can ruin a playthrough. My first attempt has me win after two “KILL TROLL WITH SWORD” actions, but my following incarnation ends with me being killed instantly. I later learn that combat skill is linked to the player’s score, but it is impossible to have many points at this early point in the game. To aid with further playing, I create a restore point post-troll after following a roughly optimal run of the above-ground area.

Narratively, I ponder how it appears the house was built intersected with these underground ruins. Did the owner leave, or did they get swallowed up by the darkness beneath?

A chasm runs southwest to northeast and the path follows it. You are on the south side of the chasm,
where a crack opens into a passage.

Most of my early playtime is spent mapping the easily accessible sections of the game and locating the individual puzzles. There is clearly a whole bunch of stuff going on around the temple, a puzzle around the reservoir and dam, a river I cannot navigate, an entrance to a maze and some sort of sneaky guy who likes to take things. I am not particularly happy with how some of the puzzles rely on purposefully abstract descriptions. The control panel on the dam:

There is a control panel here, on which a large metal bolt is mounted. Directly above the bolt is a
small green plastic bubble.

Honestly, I struggled with this. I assumed that the green plastic bubble was a case I needed to open — probably via the bolt — and that it hid some sort of button that would trigger the dam to change. Instead, the bubble is an indicator, a light that turns on when the control panel is active, and the bolt is turned to open or close the sluice gates. Many of the Zork I puzzles rely on approaching the description of an object with a particularly abstract mind.

The Maze

by David Ardito, 1981

The maze — a common element across early adventure games — is my frustrations with the forest dialled up their logical conclusion. Verisimilitude is replaced with an artificial challenge for the player. The only sane way to map the maze is to drop items in each room (there are fifteen!) and carefully record which exit leads to which room. This process is hindered by the thief, who may move your items around. Only one of the fifteen maze rooms has what could be considered a landmark. The skeleton of an unlucky prior adventurer is found in MAZE-5. Some voices online consider this unfortunate soul to be an homage to the protagonist of Colossal Cave Adventure, but I think that's a sad and ignoble end for a historic character of such pedigree. Instead, I rationalise that it may be the owner of the house at the start of the game lost during an expedition.

On reflection, I accept the maze for what it is. Having a well-defined region within the game that obviously exists to disorient the player feels fairer than having illogical exits in more cleanly described regions like the forest. I don't think I would be happy playing a game that was mostly maze. There’s a free treasure here, the leather bag of coins, and a couple of shortcuts back to the starting region of the game. This is important because the only way to truly open up the map is to manage to get back inside the house to reopen the trapdoor.

The Cyclops stymies many. I feel like one of the developers was strongly remembering their classics lectures or had recently read The Odyssey as the cyclops in Zork I is the son of Polyphemus, who was outwitted by Odysseus. Incidentally, this makes him the grandson of Poseidon, whose crystal trident is another of the scoring treasures. Dealing with the cyclops can be achieved in a couple of ways and the only delicate situation is to make sure not to accidentally feed him the garlic, which is required elsewhere.

Finally, the thief makes his home here. I find two complications. Arriving too early (with too low a score) can leave the player bleeding out and dying. Successfully killing the thief before dealing with the jewel-encrusted egg makes the game unwinnable. The first time I kill the thief I do so outside of his hideout; I don't realise for a while that this makes stolen treasures irretrievable.

North of the Reservoir

After solving the reservoir puzzle, I can travel north into the last big section of the game. It’s a coal mine and I find the required actions here fairer than elsewhere. Each step is logical and approachable. A creature with “vampire” in the name has an aversion to a classic vampiric weakness, a room filled with gas mustn’t be entered into with an open flame, and you cannot squeeze into the final rooms while carrying any items at all.

Each small puzzle solved scores a few points. The jade figurine and the sapphire bracelet are free for the taking. My only complaint is that the solution to get light into the final section relies on a logical leap about the layout of the mine as a whole. I need to know that the drafty room is directly below the shaft room so that I can move items between the two, but I'm not given the room description that would give me the solution to the puzzle until I've lit the room by already solving the puzzle. A chicken and egg situation.

The giant diamond is my last treasure here. A lucky case of trying the first item I had on hand in the right place!

Final Regions and the Meta Puzzle

by David Ardito and Steve Meretzky, 1982

My favourite area is the last section I map; the river. From a technical standpoint, launching the boat (which masquerades as an innocent pile of plastic) and being dragged inexorably downstream towards the Aragain Falls is by far the most narrative experience in the game. I am not even bothered by how easy it is to break the boat, because it's possible to repair it an infinite number of times using a mysterious gunk. I feel a little betrayed by the digging descriptions required to find the jewelled scarab (I read the messages as telling me to stop digging) and I really have no idea how someone is meant to know to “wave” the sceptre. It’s not a verb used at any other point in the game.

For my final playthrough I start by dropping the jewelled egg in the cellar, pray my way out of the temple to bank the gold coffin and sceptre, hoover up several treasures in rapid succession (the trunk, the trident, the platinum bar, the painting, the crystal skull and the two items from the mines. I then dive into the maze and defeat the thief, retrieving the canary in the process. One more trip to the mine with the ivory torch lets me grab the diamond and I finish up by getting the three treasures near the waterfall. The brass bauble is very obscure, so I need help online to get it.

…You have mastered the first part of the ZORK trilogy. Those who pass over this bridge must be
prepared to undertake an even greater adventure that will severely test your skill and bravery!

Your score is 350 (total of 350 points), in 560 moves. 
This gives you the rank of Master Adventurer.

Closing Thoughts

Zork I was an interesting experience. By today’s standards, it feels small. With just a few exceptions, the puzzles feel either basic, vague or rely on managing to guess the correct verb. However, the experience of exploring an unknown space while the thief dogged my steps was more visceral than I had anticipated. I attribute this to the fact that hand typing my commands gives me a sort of personal agency; typing out "KILL THIEF WITH SWORD" is markedly more involved than simply pressing a single button to attack and this makes each action feel more weighty.

While there are deaths and instances of locking out victory, I feel like I learn from each of them. This echoes the feeling of playing something like Dark Souls and finding iterative progress through death. There was more satisfaction than I expected to be found piecing together the "perfect run" using the knowledge developed through mapping and solving each region.

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Verdict:

Worth playing to experience raw exploration from an era preceding what many would consider fair game design.

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My completed map for Zork I. Dark rooms have a wedge at the top right. Pale green rooms are sacred, which means the thief cannot misbehave there. Right click and view in a new tab to see in full size.

Memorable Content

Locations:

"This is part of a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.",
up a tree,
the coal mine shaft puzzle,
and the mirror rooms.

Creatures:

The thief,
and the cyclops.

Items:

All the treasures, but particularly:
the ivory torch and the Egyptian sceptre,
the Elvish sword, and the magic, all-purpose gunk.

Other:

"Hello, Sailor!"

Part of the Zork Series

Games:

Zork I, Zork II, Zork III

An accurate picture of me.

Zork I was originally published by Personal Software, before Infocom bought back the rights around the time of Zork II. I am impressed by the detail of this box-art. The Elvish sword and several of the treasures are visible. This stands in contrast to most contemporaries; early box-art tending towards the fantastical.

Tabletop Zork I Treasure Roller: Roll 1d20 and consult the following:

1 - Jewel-encrusted Egg Contains another smaller treasure. Fragile.*

2 - Clockwork Canary May be wound up to produce a beautiful song.

3 - Portrait Of someone famous, by someone famous.

4 - Brass Bauble Worth a trivial sum.

5 - Pot of Gold Exactly what it says on the tin!

6 - Platinum Bar Worth a decent sum.

7 - Ivory Torch An inextinguishable and everlasting light source.

8 - Gold Coffin Very heavy, but worth a lot. May contain another treasure.

9 - Egyptian Sceptre Wave this to make rainbows solid.**

10 - Trunk of Jewels Worth a lot of money.

11 - Crystal Trident Some sort of water-themed power?

12 - Jade Figurine Worth a tidy sum.

13 - Sapphire Bracelet Also worth a tidy sum.

14 - Huge Diamond Worth the most money.

15 - Bag of Coins Like the Pot of Gold, but fewer coins.

16 - Crystal Skull Pretty spooky.

17 - Jeweled Scarab Might make a nice brooch.

18 - Large Emerald Worth quite a lot.

19 - Silver Chalice Worth an adequate sum.

20 - Ancient Map Leads to a burial mound.

* The egg should require some sort of dextrous, fiddly skill to open without damaging.
** Probably just once a day. Not quite sure how this would manifest (or even be useful).

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A thank you to The Digital Antiquarian, for an entertaining, detailed insight into Zork, Infocom and interactive fiction as a whole.

An additional thank you to Zarf Updates for a neat collection of Zork maps.