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Welcome to the world of modern interactive fiction! A game that brought you to this page is a proof that text
adventures, or "interactive fiction" as we die-hard fans like to call them, are alive and well thanks to several
excellent text authoring languages. Inform , TADS , and Hugo
are the most popular languages in modern-day IF world. New TADS and Inform games are being produced almost
monthly by IF enthusiasts. Inform has the added bonus of its ability to run Infocom games, but new versions of
TADS allow HTML elements which make graphics and sound integration easier than ever. Hugo is a relatively new
language that is gaining popularity among IF authors.
In order to play some of these games, you would need an interpreter program (which is similar to an
operating system-- it's a "front-end," that reads the game data files and "interprets" them
into a playable game. All of these interpreters are available at the GMD IF Archive, of which I recommend the following (click on the
names to download)
- Interpreters for Inform games:
JZip for DOS and Windows Frotz 2002
for Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP (Zip is more cumbersome to use, but may be necessary to play some games that
would crash under Windows Frotz). For more information on Inform, visit the Official Inform Page
- Interpreters for Hugo games:
Download Page at Kent Tessman's official
Hugo site has everything you need to play Hugo games
- Interpreters for Alan games: Download Page at official Alan
site has everything you need to play Alan games in the "Runtime Only" section
Got those interpreters? Good. Now: Inform and TADS games are easy to distinguish by their file extension: .z5
(or .z8) are Inform games, and .gam are TADS. If you install HTML TADS, TADS games can be run automatically by
clicking on their names. You can do the same with WinFrotz.
There are numerous sites dedicated to modern-day IF. For more information and thorough reviews, check out the
following:
- IF Archive - THE central repertoire of all things IF related,
including games, walkthroughs, and even manuals and adverts from old IF companies
- Trotting Krips - My most favorite IF reviews site,
Trotting Krips boasts dozens of reviews for both famous and not-so-famous games, with a great sense of humor
to boot
- Brass Lantern - an excellent news/information site about
interactive fiction and adventure genres. Be sure to check out its comprehensive Links section!
- PARSIFAL - Arguably the most comprehensive index
page to IF-related sites, including authors' personal sites, review sites, and more
- IF Library - A great place to start if you're new to IF. Be sure to
go northeast and read the Beginner's Guide to IF. Also a great place to visit if you are an IF author looking
for collaborators or beta testers
- rec.games.int-fiction - Lively
usenet newsgroup for the discussion of IF or hint request. Many IF authors and fans hang out there... a real
community
- rec.art.int-fiction - Similar to
rec.games, but meant for IF authors looking for coding help with Inform, TADS, or other interpreters
- Baf's Guide to the Interactive Fiction Archive - A great IF review
site
- Paul O'Brian's Interactive Fiction Page - Paul's
excellent reviews of modern IF are legendary in the IF community
- XYZZY - Great IF magazine, full of game reviews, author interviews, and
much more
- The Official IF Competition Page - Annual competition within the
community, when IF authors submit entries to vie for prizes. A great birthplace of new talent and constant
source of quality short works
- Last but not least, browse our Infocom company profile page for more
great links in tribute to the best IF comppany of all time
Enjoy the games! Here's a tip: if you have any Infocom game, try to run them with WinFrotz (open the .DAT
file)-- it's a much better way of playing :)
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