268: A Paean To Floyd
- Thread starter Chuck Wendig
- Start date
Ahh, Floyd... ahh, text adventures...
What is it about games with no graphics, no sound, nothing at all that can possibly be described as a "video" game, that makes them so compelling? I'll tell you what I think it was: writing. Back in the day, if you wanted to write a game with story and characters, your only choice was text adventures, because "video" games were just not advanced enough to allow for that. Even today, modern videogames don't offer half the possibilities text adventures did, because it's impossible to animate every possible action. So text adventures had great stories.
And, OK, so some of the best or most well-known had no story at all (Zork, ADVENT, LGoP...). But there were an awful lot of great ones, and there's still some being written. If someone out there is looking for a text adventure out of nostalgia, or even just searching for something with a great story, I personally recommend looking up some games from recent text adventure competitions, like IFComp, or XYZZY Award winners.
What is it about games with no graphics, no sound, nothing at all that can possibly be described as a "video" game, that makes them so compelling? I'll tell you what I think it was: writing. Back in the day, if you wanted to write a game with story and characters, your only choice was text adventures, because "video" games were just not advanced enough to allow for that. Even today, modern videogames don't offer half the possibilities text adventures did, because it's impossible to animate every possible action. So text adventures had great stories.
And, OK, so some of the best or most well-known had no story at all (Zork, ADVENT, LGoP...). But there were an awful lot of great ones, and there's still some being written. If someone out there is looking for a text adventure out of nostalgia, or even just searching for something with a great story, I personally recommend looking up some games from recent text adventure competitions, like IFComp, or XYZZY Award winners.
