The Retro Adventurers

There's news out there in classic text adventures and neo-retro interactive fiction, and it's past time The Retro Adventurers got serious about delivering it! So, welcome to the first installment of a new monthly feature, OPEN MAILBOX -- where you GET NEWS AND LISTEN TO IT. This episode compiled and presented by Retro Adventurers Nick and Jason covers multiple new Infocom/Z-Machine interpreters, Andrew Plotkin's Visible Zorker developments, an amazingly layered Cornerstone prank-that's-also-real, and other novel developments. Zym II and Inform 6 Optimization: https://intfiction.org/t/zym-ii-an-8-bit-z-machine-interpreter-for-symbos/79520 https://intfiction.org/t/accelerating-inform-6-games-on-8-bit-interpreters/79531 https://github.com/fredrikr/krebf Visible Zorker - Deadline hijinx: https://blog.zarfhome.com/2026/03/visible-zorker-march https://www.patreon.com/VisibleZorker New Features for Old Hardware: https://intfiction.org/t/statusline-options/79162 https://github.com/johanberntsson/ozmoo/releases Retro Adventurers on Discord: https://discord.gg/8jrbVptACc Springtime in the PunyInform Century: https://discord.com/channels/830344544679493644/830344937252978718/1491913229721665840 https://www.springthing.net/2026/ Zabbrev: https://intfiction.org/t/zabbrev-has-been-ported-from-c-to-c/75176/24 https://jxself.org/git?p=zabbrev.git;a=summary The Linchpin to Infocom’s Database Strategy?: https://intfiction.org/t/cornerstones-vm-was-cornerstone-for-atari/79644 https://blog.zarfhome.com/2026/04/cornerstone-and-the-mu-machine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xgz5GIbKx3Y https://zilf.io/ Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation (IFTF) Grants: https://blog.iftechfoundation.org/2026-04-08-announcing-the-2026-iftf-grant-recipients.html Keep Circulating the Tapes: https://ifdb.org

Hyperspace adventure awaits as Tim Gilberts joins Jason to play two underrated science fiction games from the 1970s. For starters it's Dog Star Adventure, the first type-in text adventure in Softside Magazine. True to its 1979 roots it's steeped in Star Wars lore and vocabulary, and was ported to plenty of classic platforms in its heyday. The feature game is Aldebaran III, one of the games created by Peter Langston in his Wander system. It, too, leans heavily on genre fiction, in this case the Retief novels by Keith Laumer, covering interstellar espionage, diplomacy, and bureaucracy in equal measure. Aldebaran III (IFDB) Wander source code (Github) Wander game analysis (Renga In Blue) Aldebaran III (CRPG Adventures) Dog Star Adventure (IFDB) Dog Star Adventure in Softside May 1979 Dog Star Adventure (Old School Gamer Magazine)

It's the Infocom classic Zork, but in two unusual formats! First Nick and Jason explore the unusual covertape edition of Mini-Zork I, a stripped-down, memory-resident version of the original Great Underground Empire created in 1987 and later provided free to readers of the November 1990 issue of ZZap 64 magazine for the Commodore 64. It's a bold undertaking, but is it art? Indeed, does it even work at all? Then the Retro Adventurers take on Zork-285, a reconstruction "of the very first MDL version of Zork from June 14, 1977" as provided by Henrik Åsman. Only available to play by a small cadre of MIT insiders, this version has the bones of what would later become the full-fledged Dungeon game before being carved up for Infocom's commercial products Zork I, II, and III. It's full of pitfalls but notably empty of grues. Cover image from David Ardito's 1981 Zork poster, sourced from zarfhome.com Mini-Zork I on IFDB Zork 285 on IFDB The Newton (excerpt from The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs, performed by Jason)

Nick and Jason deliver holiday cheer straight from Santa's Grotto in the form of two 1980s Christmas classics. First up is the bite-sized Quill adventure A Spell Of Christmas Ice by Mike Turner, originally published on the tape-based 16/48 Magazine for ZX Spectrum users. For the main course, enjoy Brian Howarth's very British adaptation of the very American monster mayhem classic Gremlins. Curl up by the fire with your favorite picturebook adaptation of a Hollywood blockbuster, listen, and enjoy the season! 16/48 Magazine Issue 12 A Spell Of Christmas Ice, stand-alone tape image Mike E. Turner (IFDB) Gremlins: The Adventure (IFDB) Gremlins: The Adventure (MOCAGH) Level 9 Archive (Github) Andrew Plotkin's analysis of Zork I-III becoming open source Original cover photo by Gy21dds

Get ready to type out every letter in "dodecahedron"! Nick, Jason, and Ben play two games steeped in math, science, and trippy physics in this episode. Beyond the Tesseract by David Lo is the appetizer course, a game originally designed in TRS-80 Level II BASIC, then ported to C and published on a variety of platforms before later being reimplemented in Inform 6 by Andrew Plotkin. A self-professed "abstract adventure", you'll have a better time with it if you paid attention in school. The main course was published in 1984 for the BBC Micro by the Association of Teachers of Mathematics (UK) and goes by L: A Mathemagical Adventure. It's a core memory for many who were young and remember their school experiences with BBC Micros, but does the plot to rescue the fair maid Runia from the Drogos hold up today? Beyond the Tesseract (IFDB, includes playable link) L: A Mathemagical Adventure (IFDB) L: A Mathemagical Adventure (playable online, BBC) Beatle Quest for BBC Micro Shawn McClure's How To Design Adventure Games (IntFiction.org)

Ben, Jason, and Nick set sail for adventures new and old on this episode, starting with 10 CAVE ADVENTURE, so named for the number of BASIC lines making up its entire codebase. They then head to the Commodore VIC-20 for a crack at Young Arthur's Quest before journeying to the not-so-long-ago 2021 release Captain Cutter's Treasure, a neo-retro style adventure created in the PunyInform system. Captain Cutter's Treasure (IFDB) Young Arthur's Quest (Renga in Blue) Young Arthur's Quest (MobyGames) 10 Cave Adventure (Spectrum Computing) 8-Bit Show and Tell's breakdown of 10 CAVE

Creator of games including Hadean Lands, Spider and Web, and Shade, as well as a long-time maintainer of Inform and participant in Interactive Fiction Technology Foundation (IFTF) leadership, Andrew "Zarf" Plotkin was also a teenager once. And back then he wrote Inhumane, as covered in Episode 27. Jason and Nick welcome him to the program discuss the creation of Inhumane, the evolution of his work as a participant in the modern interactive fiction community, and the prospects for another "Infobom" title in that parody vein. Zarfhome (personal homepage and contact info) IFDB credits IFTF A Change in the Weather Praser 5 Grimtooth's Traps Episode image from The Book of Adventure Games II

Ben and Jason take on the text adventure distillations of two uniquely British phenomena. First up is the "prolific musical innovator" genre with Number 9 Software's Beatle Quest, a psychedelic trip into lots and lots of Beatle song concepts and name-checking. For the main course, the duo explore the "slobs in space" phenomenon through the storytelling of shareware highlight Jacaranda Jim by modern-day InfoSec celebrity Graham Cluley. It's one of Ben's all-time games, but can he convert his American collaborator? Beatle Quest by Garry Marsh (IFDB) Beatle Quest (playable online, ZX Spectrum) Jacaranda Jim by Graham Cluley (IFDB) Jacaranda Jim (play online or download) Christopher Drum's Infocom Zork on Cosmopolitan Graham Cluley's computer security news (YouTube) Cover photo CC-BY 2.0 khakidoggy

Peter Golden, author of Sherlock Holmes: Another Bow and a key figure in Bantam Software's Living Literature series joins us for a conversation about his work in text adventures and subsequent work as a novelist. PeterGolden.com Bantam Software's Living Literature

POW! KABOOM! KWAH! Dave and Jason explore two 1980s text adventures pulled from the world of comic books! (At the time, comics were just one of many forms of narrative expression and not the dominant storytelling platform as they are this century.) First up it's Redhawk from Melbourne House, which experiments with text/graphics adventure presentation by building a three-panel comic on-screen based on player input. Can you, as mild-mannered news photographer Kevin Oliver and as flying, fighting superhero Redhawk save the city? Then it's Questprobe: Spider-Man from Adventure International, from the short-lived Marvel Comics series which just predated the company's end. Amazing feats of wall-walking and strength await! Finally, we play the work-in-progress of the unfinished Questprobe: X-Men, provided by Scott Adams himself from his archives. Questprobe: Spider-Man (playable online, Apple II verson) Questprobe: Spider-Man on IFDB Redhawk (playable online, Amstrad CPC version) Redhawk on IFDB

Dave and Jason confront a double dose of terrifying terrors! First up is the RamJam Corporation's Valkyrie 17, a Cold War thriller set in a pseudonymous Eastern Bloc nation, boasting excellent off-screen production values but some quirky on-screen choices. The title was originally published for ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64, with a Windows update released more recently. Then we travel to South America for the so-close-to-the-original, you-can-feel-the-stubble Indiana Jones-adjacent The Mask of the Sun originally published by Ultrasoft. You are rugged professor of archaeology Mac Steele, struggling under the debilitating effects of an ancient curse! Only by enduring many (many, many) Jeep and cave-navigating sequences can he be free of the exotic pills which keep him just barely clinging to life! The Mask of the Sun was published for Apple II, Atari 8-bit, and Commodore 64, with a German translation to boot! (And one of these days Jason will stop saying something has an "X-word" parser when he means an "X-letter" parser... but not today!) Valkyrie 17 box, documentation, and audio Valkyrie 17, C64 playable online Valkyrie 17, Windows update Valkyrie 17 on Mobygames The Mask of the Sun documentation (Broderbund) The Mask of the Sun on Mobygames

Iain Lee, "an old bloke who was popular in the Nineties" as well as counsellor, broadcaster, and I'm a Celebrity survivor joins Dave and Jason this episode. They discuss Tolkien sendup Bored of the Rings by Fergus McNeill and the Mark Data classic Calixto Island. Iain shares his love for the Dragon 32, memories of sneaking text adventure time on school BBC Micros, and Experienced Media Professional Image Advice with Jason. Bored of the Rings (playable online) Calixto Island (playable online, MS-DOS with graphics) Calixto Island (playable online, "Play Now" button next to "Calixto Island (Text)", CoCo plain text) Iain Lee's Random Access Memories podcast Quill Adventure Guides (Bored of the Rings and other Quill games, deconstructed) MST3K: Detective

Jason and Dave welcome classic text adventure author Jonathan Partington to the program. While studying at Cambridge University, he created and contributed to several memorable games including Avon (featured in Episode 12), Crobe, Sangraal, Fyleet, Monsters of Murdac, and Spy Snatcher. We discuss how Jonathan got hooked into text adventures, how the pipeline between Cambridge mainframe creations and the broader commercial market worked, and the best time of day to play games on official campus computers without getting scolded. And for the first time, we ask a living author which of his games we should play next! Special thanks to Mark Hardisty for helping connect us with Jonathan. CORRECTION: The interview mistakenly credits L to Peter Killworth. The game in question was actually GiantKiller. Jonathan Partington on IFDB Topologika (The Digital Antiquarian) Phoenix (mainframe operating system) on IFWiki Mystic Wood (board game) Sorcerer's Cave (board game) Peter Killworth on IFWiki How To Write Adventure Games by Peter Killworth on MOCAGH L: A Mathemagical Adventure