Infocom was an American software company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that produced numerous works of interactive fiction. They also produced a business application, a relational database called Cornerstone.
Interactive fiction, often abbreviated IF, is software simulating environments in which players use text commands to control characters and influence the environment. Works in this form can be understood as literary narratives, either in the form of interactive narratives or interactive narrations. These works can also be understood as a form of video game, either in the form of an adventure game or role-playing game. In common usage, the term refers to text adventures, a type of adventure game where the entire interface can be "text-only", however, graphic text adventures still fall under the text adventure category if the main way to interact with the game is by typing text. Some users of the term distinguish between interactive fiction, known as "Puzzle-free", that focuses on narrative, and "text adventures" that focus on puzzles.
Zork is a text-based adventure game first released in 1977 by developers Tim Anderson, Marc Blank, Bruce Daniels, and Dave Lebling for the PDP-10 mainframe computer. The original developers and others, as the company Infocom, expanded and split the game into three titles—Zork I: The Great Underground Empire, Zork II: The Wizard of Frobozz, and Zork III: The Dungeon Master—which were released commercially for a range of personal computers beginning in 1980. In Zork, the player explores the abandoned Great Underground Empire in search of treasure. The player moves between the game's hundreds of locations and interacts with objects by typing commands in natural language that the game interprets. The program acts as a narrator, describing the player's location and the results of the player's commands. It has been described as the most famous piece of interactive fiction.
Suspended: A Cryogenic Nightmare is an interactive fiction video game written by Michael Berlyn and published by Infocom in 1983. Infocom's sixth game, it was released for Amstrad CPC, Apple II, Atari 8-bit family, Commodore 64, Commodore Plus/4, IBM PC, TRS-80, and TI-99/4A. It was later available for Macintosh, Amiga, and Atari ST.
Copy protection, also known as content protection, copy prevention and copy restriction, describes measures to enforce copyright by preventing the reproduction of software, films, music, and other media.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is an interactive fiction video game based on the comedic science fiction series of the same name. It was designed by series creator Douglas Adams and Infocom's Steve Meretzky, and it was first released in 1984 for the Apple II, Macintosh, Commodore 64, CP/M, MS-DOS, Amiga, Atari 8-bit family, and Atari ST. It is Infocom's fourteenth game.
Bureaucracy is an interactive fiction video game released by Infocom in 1987, scripted by comic science fiction author Douglas Adams. Infocom's twenty-fourth game, it is part of the Infocom Plus range which requires a machine with a minimum of 128K of memory.
Leather Goddesses of Phobos is an interactive fiction video game written by Steve Meretzky and published by Infocom in 1986. It was released for the Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Amstrad PCW, Apple II, Macintosh, Atari 8-bit family, Atari ST, Commodore 64, TI-99/4A and MS-DOS. The game was Infocom's first "sex farce", including selectable gender and "naughtiness"—the latter ranging from "tame" to "lewd". It was one of five top-selling Infocom titles to be re-released in Solid Gold versions. It was Infocom's twenty-first game.
Brian Moriarty is an American video game developer who authored three of the original Infocom interactive fiction titles, Wishbringer (1985), Trinity (1986), and Beyond Zork (1987), as well as Loom (1990) for LucasArts.
Planetfall is a science fiction themed interactive fiction computer game written by Steve Meretzky, and the eighth title published by Infocom in 1983. The original release included versions for Apple II, Atari 8-bit family, TRS-80, and IBM PC compatibles. The Atari ST and Commodore 64 versions were released in 1985. A version for CP/M was also released. Although Planetfall was Meretzky's first title, it proved one of his most popular works and a best-seller for Infocom; it was one of five top-selling titles to be re-released in Solid Gold versions including in-game hints. Planetfall uses the Z-machine originally developed for the Zork franchise and was added as a bonus to the "Zork Anthology".
The Lost Treasures of Infocom is a 1991 compilation of 20 previously-released interactive fiction games developed by Infocom. It was published by Activision for MS-DOS, Macintosh, Amiga, and Apple IIGS versions. It was later re-released on CD-ROM, and in 2012 on iOS.
Little Computer People, also called House-on-a-Disk, is a social simulation game released in 1985 by Activision for the Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, Atari ST and Apple II. An Amiga version was released in 1987. Two Japanese versions were also released in 1987, a Family Computer Disk System version, published in Japan by DOG, and a PC-8801 version.
Deadline is an interactive fiction detective video game published by Infocom in 1982. Written by Marc Blank, it was Infocom's third game. It was released for the Amstrad CPC, Apple II, Atari 8-bit family, Commodore 64, IBM PC, Osborne 1, TRS-80, and later for the Amiga and Atari ST.
Infidel is an interactive fiction video game published by Infocom in 1983. It was written and designed by Michael Berlyn and Patricia Fogleman, and was the first in the "Tales of Adventure" line. It was released for the Amstrad CPC, Apple II, Atari 8-bit family, Commodore 64, IBM PC, TRS-80, and TI-99/4A. Ports were later published for Macintosh, Atari ST, and Amiga. Infidel is Infocom's tenth game.
The Witness is an interactive fiction video game published by Infocom in 1983. Like Infocom's earlier title Deadline, it is a murder mystery. The Witness was written in the ZIL language for the Z-machine, which allowed it to be released simultaneously on many systems. It is Infocom's seventh game.
Fooblitzky is a board game-style video game published by Infocom in 1985 and designed by a team which included interactive fiction authors Marc Blank and Michael Berlyn. It is unique among Infocom titles for not being interactive fiction and for being the first to incorporate graphics beyond ASCII characters. Unlike most Infocom games, it was only released for the Apple II, Atari 8-bit family, and IBM PC compatibles.
Rescue at Rigel is a 1980 science fiction role-playing video game written and published by Automated Simulations. It is based on a modified version of their Temple of Apshai game engine, which was used for most of their releases in this era. The game was released for the Apple II, IBM PC, TRS-80, Commodore PET, VIC-20, and Atari 8-bit family.
Universe is a science fiction space trading and combat game by Omnitrend Software. It was created by William G M Leslie and Thomas R Carbone. The first version was programmed in valFORTH on an Atari 800, based on a board game created by Leslie. It was Omnitrend's first game.
A bit nibbler, or nibbler, is a computer software program designed to copy data from a floppy disk one bit at a time. It functions at a very low level directly interacting with the disk drive hardware to override a copy protection scheme that the floppy disk's data may be stored in. In most cases the nibbler software still analyses the data on a byte level, only looking to the bit level when dealing with synchronization marks (syncs), zero-gaps and other sector & track headers. When possible, nibblers will work with the low-level data encoding format used by the disk system, being Group Coded Recording, Frequency Modulation, or Modified Frequency Modulation.
Repton is a Defender-inspired game written by Dan Thompson and Andy Kaluzniacki for the Apple II and published by Sirius Software in 1983. It was ported to the Atari 8-bit family, and Commodore 64.
