Decline Best Text Adventures?

[CryptRat]

Gnome Ranger has GFXs. There's more than one game in the series but I've only played the first one.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

The Magnetic Scrolls games technically had graphics (and superb ones, too, at least on the Atari), but not of the clickable kind, so that's probably not what you're thinking of.

No, no, that's EXACTLY what I'm thinking of! Traditional parser-based IF except with illustrated scenes! Thanks, these look amazing!

Be sure to play the Amiga versions of Magnetic Scrolls games:

The Pawn had great title music, too.

 

[Tramboi]

But British IF is far from Infocom or Legend level, though.
If you have no nostalgia for The Pawn, it has literally zero interest.
Wonderland is awesome though. Jinxter and Fish are brit-cool. And The Legacy was a nice puzzle-heavy blobber !

(I dislike the procedural stuff in L9 games)

 

[newtmonkey]

Was gonna mention Spellcasting X01 series, but like always Strange Fellow is one step ahead of me. Curse you!

 

[The Jester]

Lone Wolf utilising Seventh Sense.

You won't find a better text game.

Just started playing it, the combat system is random and automatic I'm literally doing nothing.
What exactly is so special about Lone Wolf?

 

[Jack Of Owls]

I only ever played 1 text adventure (Planetfall) to completion and it was enjoyable enough. I tried Suspended and Stationfall but got stumped (this was the days before instant gratification from internet sources) and never played another though I wrote a short 2 minute text adventure in Basic on my C64 around that time where the player died no matter what direction they stepped. My niece play-tested it and had a little panic attack when she realized she was doomed.

 

[Cael]

Lone Wolf utilising Seventh Sense.

You won't find a better text game.

Just started playing it, the combat system is random and automatic I'm literally doing nothing.
What exactly is so special about Lone Wolf?

It rolls a d10 for combat.

Lone Wolf was one of the original book RPGs. It was known for its writing, setting and replayability (because of the choice of Disciplines). And your choices can kill you if you are really trying to be stupid.

 

[The Jester]

Lone Wolf utilising Seventh Sense.

You won't find a better text game.

Just started playing it, the combat system is random and automatic I'm literally doing nothing.
What exactly is so special about Lone Wolf?

It rolls a d10 for combat.

Lone Wolf was one of the original book RPGs. It was known for its writing, setting and replayability (because of the choice of Disciplines). And your choices can kill you if you are really trying to be stupid.

Tnx man I continued playing and love the atmosphere so far.

 

[The Jester]

Lone Wolf utilising Seventh Sense.

You won't find a better text game.

Just started playing it, the combat system is random and automatic I'm literally doing nothing.
What exactly is so special about Lone Wolf?

It rolls a d10 for combat.

Lone Wolf was one of the original book RPGs. It was known for its writing, setting and replayability (because of the choice of Disciplines). And your choices can kill you if you are really trying to be stupid.

Tnx man I continued playing and love the atmosphere so far.

It's even better with Witcher music.

 

[MRY]

What exactly is so special about Lone Wolf?

It was a big inspiration for Fallen Gods, so I can speak to what made it special to me -- it's the impact of the skills and items. I always contrast Lone Wolf to cRPGs -- the latter tend to have a bazillion attributes, skills, items, spells, etc., but most of that doesn't feel like it matters outside of certain minmaxing or combat approaches. In Lone Wolf, every skill feels special and exciting -- every time I'd see an opportunity to use a skill that I didn't have, it would be heart-breaking, and every time I could use a skill, I'd feel like a bad ass. Getting new items was often thrilling, and even single-point attribute bonuses felt like a big deal. The first several books have a great sense of progression.

The combat is somewhat misleading when played a computer, since we're much more used to robust combat systems in cRPGs. In the game book, the combat was additive rather than subtractive (since gamebooks were a rarity and really were most comparable to Choose Your Own Adventures, which had no statistics-based gameplay). Also, the way you "rolled" was my closing your eye and picking numbers off a grid, which somehow felt meaningful (especially since I'm sure may kids would cheat or try to memorize the board). Just sitting there while the game generates random numbers is obviously less interactive.

Barbarian Prince is way more sophisticated, but it's not really playable in the way Lone Wolf was/is. Lone Wolf was really easy to lose yourself in.

 

[rohand]

The Magnetic Scrolls games technically had graphics (and superb ones, too, at least on the Atari), but not of the clickable kind, so that's probably not what you're thinking of.

No, no, that's EXACTLY what I'm thinking of! Traditional parser-based IF except with illustrated scenes! Thanks, these look amazing!

https://www.mobygames.com/game/journey-the-quest-begins

 

[Jack Of Owls]

I remember Lancelot on my Commodore 64 that drew on actual Arthurian mythology. It was a mix of stationary graphics and text adventure much like many of the examples in this topic. Alas, it was too complex for me at that time after the relative simplicity of Planetfall and I had to abandon it early in my non-playthrough. I vividly remember the puzzle with The Black Knight (invisible?) where you had no chance to defeat him because he was so skilled with a sword... unless you doused the candlelight in the room so you both fought in total darkness with all things being equal now. I was gratified to see this exact idea used on HBO's Game of Thrones when Arya was about to get her cunt kicked fatally by The Waif (who was far more deadly and skilled than her) until she used this trick.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

Maybe the most interesting ones are those free games made in relatively recent years, in the so called "renaissance of interactive fiction". The problem is that there is a huge quantity of these games now. You can check at the interactive fiction database: https://ifdb.tads.org/ (you can filter for genre, rating, year, etc.)

 

[Nifft Batuff]

Concerning the classics, I found this modern enhanced version of "the hobbit":



I think the hobbit can be listed as one of the first example of immersive sims.

 

[Blaine]

I don't believe I mentioned Frederik Pohl's Gateway I and II by Legend Entertainment:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gateway_(video_game)

Yes, there are visuals and a UI, but in the main it is text-based and could be played without them, entirely via text.

 

[Yaar Podshipnik]

I second Blaine's recommendation of Gateway. Excellent games! From the Legend catalogue I also enjoyed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freddy_Pharkas:_Frontier_Pharmacist.

For pure text, definitely A Mind Forever Voyaging. Just keep in mind it doesn't have many puzzles, would be a walking simulator if remade in this day and age I fear. Trinity (https://ifdb.tads.org/viewgame?id=j18kjz80hxjtyayw) is another great title. Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy is fun https://ifdb.tads.org/viewgame?id=zjyxds3s57pgis3x, but frustrating at times. Another Douglas Adam's title, Bureaucracy https://ifdb.tads.org/viewgame?id=zjyxds3s57pgis3x is less known, but really good.

Anything that won IF Competitoni has a good chance of being good, check https://ifcomp.org/comp. Stuff I personally played and recommend:
* Slouching Towards Bedlam https://ifdb.tads.org/viewgame?id=032krqe6bjn5au78
* The Elysium Enigma http://ifdb.tads.org/viewgame?id=qpecxgjpxnvw50xq
* Everybody Dies http://ifdb.tads.org/viewgame?id=lyblvftb8xtlo0a1

There's many more that I simply don't remember the titles . I also realised I haven't played ANY IF competition winners after 2010, decline is me.

 

[Zarniwoop]

>>Names the 2 best ones in the OP
>>Hasn't played them
>>Asks for recommendations

Play Zork god dammit.

And don't get eaten by a grue. They always get eaten by a grue.

Then play HG2G. The god-emperor Douglas Adams demands it. Don't bother with the point and click Starship Titanic though, it sucks donkey balls.

 

[Tramboi]

I second Blaine's recommendation of Gateway. Excellent games! From the Legend catalogue I also enjoyed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freddy_Pharkas:_Frontier_Pharmacist.

Ir's a Sierra game, but it has nice things going for it

 

[rohand]

Lone Wolf utilising Seventh Sense.

You won't find a better text game.

Just started playing it, the combat system is random and automatic I'm literally doing nothing.
What exactly is so special about Lone Wolf?

It rolls a d10 for combat.

Lone Wolf was one of the original book RPGs. It was known for its writing, setting and replayability (because of the choice of Disciplines). And your choices can kill you if you are really trying to be stupid.

Tnx man I continued playing and love the atmosphere so far.

It's even better with Witcher music.

I remembered I used the music from the DS version (https://www.projectaon.org/staff/frederic/index.php), which is very nice, extracted it from the rom directly as mp3.

 

[Jack Of Owls]

Never played it but how was Amnesia? It was developed at a time when literary authors thought personal computers and interactive fiction might be the next big thing. I always liked Thomas M. Disch as an SF author (though he could be like the worst of Proust at times living in his own head too much in his fiction) but I heard he mapped an entire area of NYC for this text adventure. Seems like it would be a bit mad to navigate.