Zork and Imagination

Back when we occasionally had to use our brains to create the images within games, a.k.a. in the 1980s and earlier, a text-based adventure game called Zork was incredibly popular. Since most games back then were either played on a board or in the backyard, our imaginations regularly got a workout. Besides, Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings and other books (stories written on piles of flat sheets called “paper” and bound together) were popular back then too, so the imagery came easily.

If you were born after 1980, brace yourself; the image you see below may shock you.

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David Perry has created an excellent history of video games in various genres. Seen here.
We’ve come a long way.

Related PostsVideo Games or TV?Once again surveys show that gamers are watching less and less television.

The point could be mad…Playstation 3 InterfaceIt looks like, besides an eyepopping pricetag, the Playstation 3 will sport an updated version

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FreeGamesNews has an interesting interview with Tonypa, a superb Flash game designer.
In it, he talks about the challenges he has faced with people stealing his games for use on other sites and his basic approach to protecting his content.
If you’re not aware, Tonypa is a newspaper and magazine designer who picked up Flash programming back

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New Snake

Mark Fennell has a gorgeous Snake game called Python which is like the traditional variants, but with actual snake and mouse graphics (not to mention blood and carcass graphics), more angles, and an energy meter, but more or less the same gameplay we all love.
Old Snake
There are many incarnations of the traditional Snake game,

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Apparently created for an old 5K webpage contest, Lee Semel’s tiny Javascript Wolfenstein 5K is nearly unplayable but nevertheless an interesting examination of what can be done with Javascript. Very tightly packed Javascript, mind you, but still interesting to see so much done with so little. Follow the links for a commented and un-obfuscated version.
Seen

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The numbers on a dart board appear to be arranged in random fashion, but that’s not quite right. Patrick Chaplin has written an interesting brief history of Dart Boards and Brian Gamlin.
Wikipedia has additional information on Darts.
You can get dart boards and darts at several stores, including Amazon, which also carries How To Master The

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The unveiling of the new controller for Nintendo’s Revolution caused many shouts of joy and anger. Some see how this could be great in games and others see how this could be Nintendo’s downfall. And everyone has an opinion. Here is our tilt (pun heavily intended) on things.

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The Nintendo DS has given developers a chance to put forth new and innovative games. And with the addition of the touchscreen it has enabled developers to create game ideas that were previously impossible (or at best awkward) on any kind of console. Following is a list of ideas for ports and generic game ideas that would make good use of the DS hardware.

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Batari BASIC Compiler — Fred Quimby’s BASIC compiler for the Atari 2600 let’s you create your own games that will actually run on an Atari 2600, or in an emulator.
Glamestris — Integrating AI game playing algorithms into Tetris, plus a few other Tetris links, including a 1998 article on Vladimir Pokhilko, the creator of

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Yahoo News relays the unlikely Hollywood Reporter headline Video game biz converting to Christianity. This is at least a shred of hope in the wake of the Grand Theft Auto mess, if only to create some balance to the sleaze being peddled on the store shelves.
A quick perusal of N’Lightning Software Development’s website leads one

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