Editing Interactive fiction (section)

==History==
===1960s and 70s===

====Natural language processing====
Though neither program was developed as a narrative work, the software programs [[ELIZA]] (1964–1966) and [[SHRDLU]] (1968–1970) can formally be considered early examples of interactive fiction, as both programs used [[natural language processing]] to take input from their user and respond in a virtual and conversational manner. ELIZA simulated a psychotherapist that appeared to provide human-like responses to the user's input, while SHRDLU employed an artificial intelligence that could move virtual objects around an environment and respond to questions asked about the environment's shape. The development of effective natural language processing would become an essential part of interactive fiction development.<ref>{{cite book | last = Montfort | first = Nick | year = 2003 | title = Twisty Little Passages: An Approach To Interactive Fiction | publisher = Cambridge: The MIT Press | isbn = 0-262-13436-5| pages = 84–85}}</ref>

====''Adventure''====
Around 1975, [[Will Crowther]], a programmer and an amateur caver, wrote the first text adventure game, ''[[Colossal Cave Adventure|Adventure]]'' (originally called ''ADVENT'' because a filename could only be six characters long in the [[operating system]] he was using, and later named ''Colossal Cave Adventure'').<ref name="jerz">{{cite web | author = Jerz, Dennis G. | date = 17 February 2004 | url = http://jerz.setonhill.edu/if/canon/Adventure.htm | title = Colossal Cave Adventure (c. 1975) | publisher = Dennis G. Jerz, [[Seton Hill University]] | access-date = 20 October 2006 |url-status=live | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070906223152/http://jerz.setonhill.edu/if/canon/Adventure.htm | archive-date = 6 September 2007 | df = dmy-all }}</ref> Having just gone through a divorce, he was looking for a way to connect with his two young children. Over the course of a few weekends, he wrote a text based cave exploration game that featured a sort of guide/narrator who spoke in full sentences and who understood simple two word commands that came close to natural English. Adventure was programmed in [[Fortran]] for the [[PDP-10]]. Crowther's original version was an accurate [[simulation]] of part of the real life [[Mammoth Cave National Park|Mammoth Cave]], but also included fantasy elements (such as axe-wielding dwarves and a magic bridge).

Stanford University graduate student [[Don Woods (programmer)|Don Woods]] discovered ''Adventure'' while working at the [[Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory]], and in 1977 obtained and expanded Crowther's source code (with Crowther's permission). Woods's changes were reminiscent of the writings of [[J. R. R. Tolkien]], and included a troll, elves, and a volcano, which some claim is based on [[Mount Doom]], but Woods says was not.<ref>"Even the description of the volcano, which some writers have claimed was modelled after Mount Doom, was written with no particular vision in mind." {{cite web| url = http://www.avventuretestuali.com/interviste/woods-eng| title = Interactive Fiction? I prefer Adventure| access-date = 22 May 2007| date = June 2001| work = L'avventura è l'avventura|url-status=live| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20120204191752/http://www.avventuretestuali.com/interviste/woods-eng| archive-date = 4 February 2012| df = dmy-all}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://jerz.setonhill.edu/if/adams/intro.html |title=Jerz's Introduction (Storytelling and Computer Games; UWEC Panel, May 2001) |publisher=Jerz.setonhill.edu |access-date=1 February 2011 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101230202618/http://jerz.setonhill.edu/if/adams/intro.html |archive-date=30 December 2010  }}</ref>

In early 1977, Adventure spread across [[ARPAnet]], and has survived on the [[Internet]] to this day. The game has since been ported to many other [[operating system]]s, and was included with the floppy-disk distribution of Microsoft's [[MS-DOS]] 1.0 OS. ''Adventure'' is a cornerstone of the online IF community;{{Citation needed|date=February 2024}} there currently exist dozens of different independently programmed versions, with additional elements, such as new rooms or puzzles, and various scoring systems.

The popularity of ''Adventure'' led to the wide success of interactive fiction during the late 1970s, when home computers had little, if any, graphics capability. Many elements of the original game have survived into the present, such as the command '[[xyzzy (magic word)|xyzzy]]', which is now included as an [[Easter egg (media)|Easter Egg]] in modern games, such as ''[[Microsoft Minesweeper]]''.

''Adventure'' was also directly responsible for the founding of Sierra Online (later [[Sierra Entertainment]]); [[Ken Williams (game developer)|Ken]] and [[Roberta Williams]] played the game and decided to design one of their own,<ref name="jerz"/> but with graphics.

====Commercial era====
[[Adventure International]] was founded by [[Scott Adams (game designer)|Scott Adams]] (not to be confused with the creator of [[Dilbert]]). In 1978, Adams wrote ''[[Adventureland (video game)|Adventureland]]'', which was loosely patterned after the (original) ''Colossal Cave Adventure''. He took out a small ad in a computer magazine in order to promote and sell ''Adventureland'', thus creating the first commercial adventure game. In 1979 he founded Adventure International, the first commercial publisher of interactive fiction. That same year, ''[[Dog Star Adventure]]'' was published in [[source code]] form in ''[[SoftSide]]'', spawning legions of similar games in [[BASIC]].

The largest company producing works of interactive fiction was [[Infocom]],<ref name="dm4-46">{{cite web | author = Graham Nelson | date = July 2001 | url = http://www.inform-fiction.org/manual/html/s46.html | title = A short history of interactive fiction | work = The Inform Designer's Manual | access-date = 1 November 2006 |url-status=live | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070827050426/http://www.inform-fiction.org/manual/html/s46.html | archive-date = 27 August 2007 | df = dmy-all }}</ref> which created the ''[[Zork]]'' series and many other titles, among them ''[[Trinity (video game)|Trinity]]'', ''[[The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (video game)|The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]]'' and ''[[A Mind Forever Voyaging]]''.

In June 1977, [[Marc Blank]], Bruce K. Daniels, [[Tim Anderson (Zork)|Tim Anderson]], and [[Dave Lebling]] began writing the mainframe version of ''Zork'' (also known as ''Dungeon''), at the [[MIT Laboratory for Computer Science]]. The game was programmed in a computer language called [[MDL programming language|MDL]], a variant of [[LISP programming language|LISP]].

The term Implementer was the self-given name of the creators of the text adventure series Zork. It is for this reason that game designers and programmers can be referred to as an [[Implementer (video games)|implementer]], often shortened to "Imp", rather than a writer.

In early 1979, the game was completed. Ten members of the ''MIT Dynamics Modelling Group'' went on to join [[Infocom]] when it was incorporated later that year.

In order to make its games as portable as possible, Infocom developed the [[Z-machine (interpreter)|Z-machine]], a custom [[virtual machine]] that could be implemented on a large number of platforms, and took standardized "story files" as input.

In a non-technical sense, Infocom was responsible for developing the interactive style that would be emulated by many later interpreters. The Infocom [[parser]] was widely regarded as the best of its era. It accepted complex, complete sentence commands like "put the blue book on the writing desk" at a time when most of its competitors parsers were restricted to simple two word verb-noun combinations such as "put book". The parser was actively upgraded with new features like undo and error correction, and later games would 'understand' multiple sentence input: 'pick up the gem and put it in my bag. take the newspaper clipping out of my bag then burn it with the book of matches'.

Several companies offered optional commercial [[feelie]]s (physical props associated with a game). The tradition of 'feelies' (and the term itself) is believed to have originated with ''[[Deadline (1982 video game)|Deadline]]'' (1982), the third Infocom title after ''Zork I'' and ''II''.<ref>{{cite web | author = Allen Varney | date = 9 December 2006 | url = http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/issues/issue_62/365-Feelies | work = The Escapist, Issue #64 | title = Feelies | access-date = 10 July 2009 |url-status=live | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20071012153126/http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/issues/issue_62/365-Feelies | archive-date = 12 October 2007 | df = dmy-all }}</ref><ref>{{cite newsgroup | title = FAQ 2/3: (2.3) How did Infocom make those neat packages? | author = Stephen van Egmond | date = 17 April 2004 | newsgroup = rec.games.int-fiction | url = http://www.faqs.org/faqs/games/interactive-fiction/part2/ | access-date = 7 October 2009 |url-status=live | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20090918154157/http://www.faqs.org/faqs/games/interactive-fiction/part2/ | archive-date = 18 September 2009 | df = dmy-all }}</ref> When writing this game, it was not possible to include all of the information in the limited (80KB) disk space, so Infocom created the first feelies for this game; extra items that gave more information than could be included within the digital game itself. These included police interviews, the coroner's findings, letters, crime scene evidence and photos of the murder scene.

These materials were very difficult for others to copy or otherwise reproduce, and many included information that was essential to completing the game. Seeing the potential benefits of both aiding game-play immersion and providing a measure of creative copy-protection, in addition to acting as a deterrent to software piracy, Infocom and later other companies began creating feelies for numerous titles. In 1987, Infocom released a special version of the first three ''Zork'' titles together with plot-specific coins and other trinkets.<ref>{{cite web|author=Peter Scheyen |year=1987 |url=http://www.csd.uwo.ca/Infocom/Articles/NZT/Tslspr87.html#ztrilogy |title=Genuine Zorkmid coin minted for the Zork Trilogy |access-date=10 July 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060616010715/http://www.csd.uwo.ca/Infocom/Articles/NZT/Tslspr87.html |archive-date=16 June 2006 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web | author = Robin Lionheart | year = 2009 | url = http://quendor.robinlionheart.com/zorkmid/ | title = The Zorkmid Project | access-date = 10 July 2009 |url-status=live | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20090411143847/http://quendor.robinlionheart.com/zorkmid/ | archive-date = 11 April 2009 | df = dmy-all }}</ref> This concept would be expanded as time went on, such that later game feelies would contain passwords, coded instructions, page numbers, or other information that would be required to successfully complete the game.

===1980s===

====United States====
Interactive fiction became a standard product for many software companies. By 1982 ''[[Softline (magazine)|Softline]]'' wrote that "the demands of the market are weighted heavily toward hi-res graphics" in games like Sierra's ''[[The Wizard and the Princess]]'' and its imitators. Such [[graphic adventure]]s became the dominant form of the genre on computers with graphics, like the Apple II.<ref name="maher20120828">{{cite web | url=http://www.filfre.net/2012/08/saga/ | title=SAGA | work=The Digital Antiquarian | date=28 August 2012 | access-date=10 July 2014 | author=Maher, Jimmy |url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140711194415/http://www.filfre.net/2012/08/saga/ | archive-date=11 July 2014 | df=dmy-all }}</ref> By 1982 [[Adventure International]] began releasing versions of its games with graphics.<ref name="maher20120828" /> The company went bankrupt in 1985. [[Synapse Software]] and [[Acornsoft]] were also closed in 1985, leaving Infocom as the leading company producing text-only adventure games on the Apple II with sophisticated parsers and writing, and still advertising its lack of graphics as a virtue.<ref name="maher20120828" /> The company was bought by [[Activision]] in 1986 after the failure of ''[[Cornerstone (software)|Cornerstone]]'', Infocom's database software program, and stopped producing text adventures a few years later. Soon after, Telaium/Trillium also closed.

====Outside the United States====
Probably the first commercial work of interactive fiction produced outside the U.S. was the [[dungeon crawl]] game of ''[[Acheton]]'', produced in Cambridge, England, and first commercially released by [[Acornsoft]] (later expanded and reissued by [[Topologika]]). Other leading companies in the [[United Kingdom|UK]] were [[Magnetic Scrolls]] and [[Level 9 Computing]]. Also worthy of mention are [[Delta 4]], [[Krome Studios Melbourne|Melbourne House]], and the [[Homebrew (video games)|homebrew]] company [[Zenobi]].

In the early 1980s [[Edu-Ware]] also produced interactive fiction for the [[Apple II]] as designated by the "if" graphic that was displayed on startup. Their titles included the [[The Prisoner (video game)|''Prisoner'']] and ''Empire'' series (''Empire I: World Builders'', ''Empire II: Interstellar Sharks'', ''Empire III: Armageddon'').

In 1981, [[CE Software]] published ''[[SwordThrust]]'' as a commercial successor to the [[Eamon (video game)|''Eamon'']] gaming system for the Apple II. SwordThrust and Eamon were simple two-word parser games with many [[Role-playing game|role-playing]] elements not available in other interactive fiction.<ref name="Montfort">{{cite book|last=Montfort|first=Nick|title=Twisty Little Passages: An Approach to Interactive Fiction|orig-date=2004|year=2005|publisher=The MIT Press|location=Cambridge, Massachusetts|isbn=978-0-262-13436-1|page=196|chapter=The Independents|quote=Some special-purpose interactive fiction development systems were used by the ordinary home computer owner of the 1980s. An important early one was Donald Brown's 1980 freeware system Eamon, a system for creating text-based role-playing games... Eamon was used to create more than 240 games.|ref=Montfort}}</ref> While SwordThrust published seven different titles, it was vastly overshadowed by the non-commercial Eamon system which allowed private authors to publish their own titles in the series. By March 1984, there were 48 titles published for the Eamon system (and over [[List of Eamon Adventures|270 titles]] in total as of March 2013).

In Italy, interactive fiction games were mainly published and distributed through various magazines in included tapes. The largest number of games were published in the two magazines Viking and Explorer,<ref name="fm-18">{{cite web | author =  | url = http://ready64.it/articoli/leggi/idart/55/le-collane-avventurose-in-italia-parte-i-arscom-e-le-altre-realt%c3%a0 | title = Le collane avventurose in Italia (Adventure game series in Italy) | language = Italian | work = Ready64 | publisher = Roberto Nicoletti | access-date = 6 March 2008 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20100314040535/http://ready64.it/articoli/leggi/idart/55/le-collane-avventurose-in-italia-parte-i-arscom-e-le-altre-realt%C3%A0 | archive-date = 14 March 2010 | df = dmy-all }}</ref> with versions for the main 8-bit home computers ([[ZX Spectrum]], [[Commodore 64]], and [[MSX]]). The software house producing those games was Brainstorm Enterprise, and the most prolific IF author was [[Bonaventura Di Bello]],<ref name="fm-19">{{cite web | author =  | url = http://www.ifwiki.org/index.php/Bonaventura_di_Bello | title = Bonaventura Di Bello | work = IFWiki | publisher = David Cornelson | access-date = 6 March 2008 |url-status=live | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20080312001923/http://www.ifwiki.org/index.php/Bonaventura_di_Bello | archive-date = 12 March 2008 | df = dmy-all }}</ref> who produced 70 games in the Italian language. The wave of interactive fiction in Italy lasted for a couple of years thanks to the various magazines promoting the genre, then faded and remains still today a topic of interest for a small group of fans and less known developers, celebrated on Web sites and in related newsgroups.

In Spain, interactive fiction was considered a minority genre, and was not very successful. The first Spanish interactive fiction commercially released was ''Yenght'' in 1983, by [[Dinamic Software]], for the ZX Spectrum. Later on, in 1987, the same company produced an interactive fiction about ''Don Quijote''. After several other attempts, the company [[Aventuras AD]], emerged from Dinamic, became the main interactive fiction publisher in Spain, including titles like a Spanish adaptation of ''Colossal Cave Adventure'', an adaptation of the Spanish comic ''El Jabato'', and mainly the ''Ci-U-Than'' trilogy, composed by ''La diosa de Cozumel'' (1990), ''Los templos sagrados'' (1991) and ''Chichen Itzá'' (1992). During this period, the Club de Aventuras AD (CAAD), the main Spanish speaking community around interactive fiction in the world, was founded, and after the end of Aventuras AD in 1992, the CAAD continued on its own, first with their own magazine, and then with the advent of Internet, with the launch of an active internet community that still produces interactive non commercial fiction nowadays.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.caad.es/ |title=Club de Aventuras AD |publisher=Caad.es |date=13 November 2010 |access-date=1 February 2011 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110508122859/http://www.caad.es/ |archive-date=8 May 2011  }}</ref>

===During the 1990s===
[[Legend Entertainment]] was founded by [[Bob Bates]] and [[Mike Verdu]] in 1989. It started out from the ashes of Infocom. The text adventures produced by Legend Entertainment used (high-resolution) graphics as well as sound. Some of their titles include ''[[Eric the Unready]]'', the ''[[Spellcasting (series)|Spellcasting]]'' series and ''[[Gateway (video game)|Gateway]]'' (based on [[Frederik Pohl]]'s novels).

The last text adventure created by Legend Entertainment was ''[[Gateway (video game)|Gateway II]]'' (1992), while the last game ever created by Legend was ''[[Unreal II: The Awakening]]'' (2003) – the well-known [[first-person shooter]] action game using the [[Unreal Engine]] for both impressive graphics and realistic physics. In 2004, Legend Entertainment was acquired by [[Atari]], who published ''Unreal II'' and released for both Microsoft Windows and Microsoft's Xbox.

Many other companies such as Level 9 Computing, Magnetic Scrolls, Delta 4 and Zenobi had closed by 1992.

In 1991 and 1992, [[Activision]] released ''[[The Lost Treasures of Infocom]]'' in two volumes, a collection containing most of Infocom's games, followed in 1996 by ''[[Classic Text Adventure Masterpieces of Infocom]]''.

===Modern era===
After the decline of the commercial interactive fiction market in the 1990s, an online community eventually formed around the medium. In 1987, the [[Usenet]] newsgroup {{mono|rec.arts.int-fiction}} was created, and was soon followed by {{mono|rec.games.int-fiction}}. By custom, the topic of {{mono|rec.arts.int-fiction}} is interactive fiction authorship and programming, while {{mono|rec.games.int-fiction}} encompasses topics related to playing interactive fiction games, such as hint requests and game reviews. As of late 2011, discussions between writers have mostly moved from {{mono|rec.arts.int-fiction}} to the Interactive Fiction Community Forum.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.intfiction.org/forum/|title=intfiction.org • Index page|website=www.intfiction.org|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111225172346/http://www.intfiction.org/forum/|archive-date=25 December 2011}}</ref>

One of the most important early developments was the reverse-engineering of Infocom's [[Z-machine|Z-Code]] format and [[Z-Machine]] [[virtual machine]] in 1987 by a group of enthusiasts called the [[InfoTaskForce]] and the subsequent development of an [[interpreter (computing)|interpreter]] for Z-Code story files. As a result, it became possible to play Infocom's work on modern computers.

For years, amateurs with the IF community produced interactive fiction works of relatively limited scope using the [[Adventure Game Toolkit]] and similar tools.

The breakthrough that allowed the interactive fiction community to truly prosper, however, was the creation and distribution of two sophisticated development systems. In 1987, Michael J. Roberts released [[TADS]], a programming language designed to produce works of interactive fiction. In 1993, [[Graham Nelson]] released [[Inform]], a [[programming language]] and set of libraries which [[compiler|compiled]] to a Z-Code story file. Each of these systems allowed anyone with sufficient time and dedication to create a game, and caused a growth boom in the online interactive fiction community.

Despite the lack of commercial support, the availability of high quality tools allowed enthusiasts of the genre to develop new high quality games. Competitions such as the annual [[Interactive Fiction Competition]] for short works, the [[Spring Thing]] for longer works, and the [[XYZZY Awards]], further helped to improve the quality and complexity of the games. Modern games go much further than the original "Adventure" style, improving upon Infocom games, which relied extensively on puzzle solving, and to a lesser extent on communication with non player characters, to include experimentation with writing and story-telling techniques.

While the majority of modern interactive fiction that is developed is distributed for free, there are some commercial endeavors. In 1998, [[Michael Berlyn]], a former Implementor at Infocom, started a new game company, Cascade Mountain Publishing, whose goals were to publish interactive fiction. Despite the Interactive Fiction community providing social and financial backing, Cascade Mountain Publishing went out of business in 2000. Buster Hudson, developer of ''The Wizard Sniffer'' (201''7),'' emphasized that parser-based puzzle can be used to control the pacing or develop a character.<ref name="ao-20171201">{{Cite web |last=Laskow |first=Sarah |date=2017-12-01 |title=Welcome to Interactive Fiction: You're a Wizard-Sniffing Pig |url=https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/welcome-interactive-fiction-wizard-sniffing-pig-controversy-video-games |access-date=2025-02-13 |website=Atlas Obscura |language=en}}</ref>

Other commercial endeavors include: Peter Nepstad's ''[[1893: A World's Fair Mystery]]'', several games by Howard Sherman published as [[Malinche Entertainment]], The General Coffee Company's ''Future Boy!,'' ''[[Cypher (video game)|Cypher]]'', a graphically enhanced cyberpunk game and various titles by ''Textfyre''.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.textfyre.com/ |title=Home of the Best Interactive Fiction |publisher=Textfyre.com |access-date=1 February 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110202110329/http://textfyre.com/ |archive-date=2 February 2011  }}</ref> [[Emily Short]] was commissioned to develop the game ''City of Secrets'' but the project fell through and she ended up releasing it herself.<ref name="COS-upcoming">{{cite web | author = Emily Short | date = 5 October 2003 | url = http://www.mindspring.com/~emshort/CSUpcoming2.htm | title = City of Secrets | access-date = 1 November 2006 |url-status=live | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070109050336/http://www.mindspring.com/~emshort/CSUpcoming2.htm | archive-date = 9 January 2007 | df = dmy-all }}</ref>