Non-English entries at IF Comp

This page attempts to give an overview of the non-English games entered in the Annual IF Comp.

• Shattered Memory (Andrés Viedma Peláez; 2001; Z-code).
  This game was an English translation of the Spanish game Olvido Mortal by the same author. Unfortunately, because the game had been previously released in 2000, albeit in Spanish, it was disqualified from IF Comp 2001. Olvido Mortal was later re-translated into English, this time by Nick Montfort, who called his translation Dead Reckoning; most English players prefer this translation. In a SPAG 40 interview with Urbatain, the game's original title is translated as Fatal Forgetfulness, though Deadly Oblivion is probably more accurate.

• Begegnung am Fluss (Florian Edlbauer; 2001; T.A.G.). German.
  Babelfish translates the title as Meeting at the River. It took 36th place out of 51 games. See the author's Begegnung am Fluss page.

• The Gostak (Carl Muckenhoupt; 2001; Z-code).
  Strictly speaking, this game is in nonsense English. That is, the nouns, adjectives, and verbs are made-up words, but small English words like "the", "and", "in", and "at" are kept, as is English syntax, punctuation, and sentence structure. Much of the game involves trying to figure out what the words mean (or merely how they relate to each other). The Gostak placed 21st out of 51 games, and won the Golden Banana of Discord in 2001. At the XYZZY Awards 2001, it won the Best Individual Puzzle and Best Use of Medium awards, and was a finalist for Best Individual NPC and Best Puzzles.

• The Big Scoop (Johan Berntsson; 2004; Z-code).
  Only the English version was released to the IF Comp 2004, where it placed 13th out of 36 entries. However, its readme file informed players that it was developed in parallel with a Swedish translation titled Pangnyheten, which was released only after the comp results were announced.

• Mingsheng (Deane Saunders; 2004; Z-code).
  This game is in English, but included some "Chinese character flavour text" in room names, some object descriptions, and on a .pdf map. Fortunately for the English player, neither knowledge of Chinese nor a Z-code interpreter capable of displaying Chinese characters was necessary to play the game. Mingsheng placed 7th out of 36 entries, and was a finalist for Best Setting at XYZZY Awards 2004.

• Die Vollkommene Masse (Alice Merridew; 2004; TADS 2).
  Despite the title, this game is in English. Also, Alice "Omega" Merridew withdrew her game from the comp because she mistakenly sent the wrong version to the comp organizer. (This entry included in an attempt at completeness.)

• Hello Sword - The journey a.k.a. Hello Sword - Il viaggio (Andrea Rezzonico; 2005; Z-code).
  This game was released with two z5 files, one in English and the other in Italian.

• Visocica (Thorben Bürgel; 30-Sep-2006; T.A.G.; German). This game tied for 39th place in IF Comp 2006.

• Trap Cave (Emilian Kowalewski; 01-Oct-2009; Node-X; MS-Windows and Linux; English and German).

• Raik (Harry Giles; 1-Oct-2014; Twine; Web browser; Scots and English). IF Comp 2014: 15th place.
  This entry tells a dual narrative - one in English, one in Scots - with the player initially able to choose in which language to read the story. The two narratives are markedly different, yet the actions in each map to the other (unseen) narrative. Giles expounded on the use of dual language in Raik in a postmortem on intfiction.org.