Current events

Game Releases

January 2007 Game Releases

• Countdown 3 - the Mind (Ben Croshaw as "Yahtzee"; 18-Jan-2007; Z-code). Inform 7.
• Countdown 2 - the Soul (Ben Croshaw as "Yahtzee"; 11-Jan-2007; Z-code). Inform 7.
• Countdown 1 - the Body (Ben Croshaw as "Yahtzee"; 04-Jan-2007; Z-code). Inform 7. See his website.

December 2006 Game Releases

• Resaca (Alberto Viñuela; 2006; Z-code; Spanish). Inform port of Resaca (Alberto Viñuela; 1990; PAW). (Spotted in IF Archive's unprocessed directory.)
• The Russian IF-Competition 2006 released the following six games (all of them in Russian):
  • Гэд (Davarg and Nunhan; RTADS).
  • Джинн из машины (Genie ex machine) (Корвин; URQ).
  • Дримор. Часть первая (GrAnd; RTADS).
  • Клара - расхитительница варенья (Belial). Authoring system: "6 days"(?).
  • Ожидание утра (Стас "Unreal" Старков; RTADS).
  • Stone of shady sands: First way (Зыков Иван a.k.a. ZEVS; DHTML).
• The Ebb and Flow of the Tide (Peter Nepstad; 16-Dec-2006; TADS 2).
• Monza's Phantom (Sebastiano Gobbo and Federico Gobbo; Dec-2006; Z-code).
• Last Resort (Jim Aikin; Dec-2006; Glulx).

November 2006 Game Releases

• Moments Out of Time (Adventure Type) (L. Ross Raszewski; Nov-2006; Glulx).
• The Journey of the King (Peter Nepstad; 26-Nov-2006; TADS 2). Homepage.
• Ekphrasis (JB; Nov-2006; Glulx; French). Homepage.
• Collision ... In Space! (Captain Midnight; 06-Nov-2006; Z-code). AIF. Written in I7.
• In the House of Professor Evil: The HAM HOUSE (S. John Ross; publisher: Cumberland Games; 04-Nov-2006; Z-code). Available from Cumberland's Free Stuff page.

October 2006 Game Releases

• Ron Weasley and the Quest for Hermione (captainc22; 30-Oct-2006; ADRIFT 3.9). AIF.
• University of Michigan Dearborn CIS 487/587 games. 25 small Z-code games released in October; 5 were written in Inform 7.
  • The Adventures of Bobo the Monkey (Pat Handy).
  • The Alchemist's Home (Mike Manard).
  • Breakout (Peter Wilkins).
  • CASL Rush (Walker).
  • Contrived Text Adventure Game (Alan Batsford).
  • Death at Sea (Roger Davis).
  • Disaster at the Acme Tower (Ryan Beehler). Inform 7.
  • Escape from the CIS Building (Nick Martineau). Inform 7.
  • Grounded (Justin Lado).
  • Halloween Beer Party (Michael Alff).
  • The Knight Trials (Pete Kinnunen).
  • Lost Space Colony: Infestation (John Gaffrey).
  • The M Adventure (Don Lonser).
  • Master Thief (Brian Rodriguez).
  • Merlin's Treasure (Nicholas A. Crabtree). Inform 7.
  • Neighbor from Hell (Rich Hojnacki).
  • Ogre Woes (Michael Berryman).
  • Old Man Simmons (Mark Leich).
  • Project Seed (Chris Pieprzak). Inform 7.
  • The Quest for the Sword of 1000 Truths (Carl Saenz).
  • Sneaky Game (Jim Nardecchia).
  • Stranded (Jorden Lowe).
  • The Testing (Joseph Brogowski).
  • The Three Rooms Game (Jason Sabada). Inform 7.
  • You're Fired (Aaron Stokes).

• Bob's Garage (A. Bomire; 25-Oct-2006; Z-code). AIF.
• Gifts of Phallius 2: The Key to Eternity (GoblinBoy; 25-Oct-2006; TADS 2). AIF.
• La Cité des Eaux (Adrien Saurat; 24-Oct-2006; Z-code; French). French Minicomp 2006 entry.
• Speed-IF Copyright released 2 games on October 23rd:
  • Pirates of the Caribou (jerith; Z-code).
  • Sharing All The Way To The Bank (Giacomo di Valenti; Z-code).
• The Good Neighbor (Reluctant Sire; 21-Oct-2006; TADS 3). AIF.
• Sarvegne (Eric Forgeot as "Xxyzy"; 21-Oct-2006; Z-code, Glulx; French). French Minicomp 2006 entry.
• Malaise (A. Ninny; 17-Oct-2006; TADS 2). AIF.
• S Tar Dus T (Arnzie; 12-Oct-2006; ADRIFT 3.9).

(See also Games Released in 2006.)

Reviews and News

Reviews and News in January 2007

• Playing Fair with the Player ia a new article by Jim Aikin.
• Trotting Krips Review of Narcolepsy (Adam Cadre; 2003; Glulx). (You remember Trotting Krips, right?)
• Best of Interactive Art or Fiction Results. Jay Is Games picked the works of Andrew Plotkin (Zarf) as best in this category for the year 2006, although Zarf placed last in the popular vote.

Reviews and News in December 2006

• User Friendly (Dec. 20 webcomic). Zork refs in this one and the following day.
• Best of Interactive Art or Fiction. Jay Is Games invites its visitors to vote for their favorite casual games that were reviewed on its site in the last year for its Best of Casual Gameplay of 2006. Nominees in the Interactive Art or Fiction category include Floatpoint, Façade, and the works of Andrew Plotkin (Zarf). Results to be posted January 1st.
• Inform 7 Code Poem Challenge - posting on N. B. Horvath's Blog.
• "Informless" - Shamus Young reviews Inform 7 for Twenty Sided: "Inform tried to allow programming without the use of a programming language, and what they built is programming with a confusing language that has nebulous rules."
• "Guess the Author" - Greg Boettcher reviews An Escape To Remember (2nd IF Whispers group; 2006; Z-code) for IF-Review.
• Interview: Nick Montfort - Jason Rohrer interviews Nick Montfort for Arthouse Games.
• Game Couch: Interview with Mike Gentry - December 14, 2006.
• Westfield Chandler Publishing, a new IF publisher founded by David A. Cornelson, reveals its existence. See the rgif announcement.
• IF Comp T-shirts can now be ordered. Mike Snyder has once again graciously agreed to handle t-shirts for the competition. You can order a 2006 IF Competition t-shirt from http://www.intfiction.org/tshirt06/. You have until December 17th to get your order in.

Reviews and News in November 2006

• InsideADRIFT 32 contains an interview with Jason Guest; reviews of The Amazing TV Caper, Locked Out, The Mystery Of Brackly Hall, The Sisters, Unauthorized Termination, Winter Wonderland, and The Wumpus Run; and articles by Stefan Donati, Ren, C. Henshaw, and editor David Whyld.
• Book and Volume Joins Slamdance Finalists - article at Grand Text Auto.
• SPAC 47 - The latest issue of SPAC, the Spanish IF newsletter, has been published.
• Choose Your Own Career in Linguistics by Trey Jones. This little CYOA in HTML is from November 2005, but, y'know, we're just finding out about it now.
• Imagination poster. (Okay, so it's not a reviews or news item. But it is IF-related.)

Reviews and News in October 2006

• Electronic Literature Collection Volume One was published by the Electronic Literature Organization in October 2006. This collection is both a web and a CD-ROM publication, and contains many electronic literary works, including a few works of IF: All Roads, Bad Machine, Galatea, Savoir-Faire, and Whom the Telling Changed. Visit the collection's homepage for complete information.
• Making your day with a visit to McDreamland. Emily Short wrote mini-reviews for IF-Review of The Retreat, No Famous, and Dreadwine, all of which were entries to the IF Dreams mini-competition.
• SPAG #46 issued on October 17th. Reviewed in this issue: Attack of the Yeti Robot Zombies, Dreadwine, Eragon, Escape from the Crazy Place, Gilded, The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters, Off the Trolley, Provenance, Snatches, Son of a..., A Spot Of Bother, and Time to Shine.
• The Non-Comp Review Project has a new chief, Peter Mattsson, and he is looking for reviews for any and all games released in 2006 outside of a competition. (See the rgif announcement.)
• The Bobby Blackwolf Show, a podcast, interviewed Stephen Granade about the IF Competition. October 8, 2006.
• The annual Adventure Convention in Coventry, England is scheduled for sometime in late October. (Embarrassingly, the IFWiki doesn't have any real information on this long-running annual event; perhaps people on the CASA forum would know more?) Organizer: Doreen Bardon.
• IF Comp Coverage Begins at Etoychest.org. During the comp period, Karl Parakenings, aka Orikae, will be interviewing IF Comp 2006 authors and reviewing games from earlier competitions in the meantime.

(See also: News in 2006, Reviews, Category:Publications, and Category:Websites.)

Competitions & Contest News

What's Hot

• InsideADRIFT Awards 2006 Voting deadline: 11.59pm on the 28th January 2007. Organizer: Ren.
• Erins 2006 nominees for the best AIF games of 2006 to be announced on January 3rd, and the voting to begin. Voting deadline: January 21st. Organizer: BBBen.
• Watch this space for news about XYZZY Awards 2006, which should be starting sometime early in the new year.

Results of Recent Competitions

• InsideADRIFT Game of the Year Comp 2006 for both new ADRIFT games and ADRIFT games previously released during the 2006 calendar year. The voting deadline was Sunday, December 31, 2006, 15:00 GMT. The result was joint winners of Unauthorized Termination by Richard Otter and The Warlord, The Princess & The Bulldog by David Whyld. Organizer: Ken Franklin.
• Russian IF-Competition 2006 a.k.a. KRIL-06 occured in December. See the KRIL-06 Homepage. There were six entries, and the winner was Дримор. Часть первая (GrAnd; RTADS).
• French Minicomp 2006 is a comp for games in French. 4 games. Voting concluded in late December. The winning game is La Cité des Eaux (Adrien Saurat; Z-code). Organizer: Eric Forgeot.
• GESCH MiniComp is for new cheese-themed games written in either Inform 7 or TADS 3. Other restrictions include: English only, between 25 to 100 rooms, no violence or profanity, must include walkthrough and complete source code, must be released in the public domain; see the GESCH Comp homepage for more details. Organizer: Radical Al. This comp is *CANCELLED*. There were no intents to enter or judge.
• 12th Annual Interactive Fiction Competition a.k.a. IF Comp 2006. The big comp of the year released 43 new games to an eager public in the late evening of September 30th, 2006. The top three games were Floatpoint, The Primrose Path, and The Elysium Enigma. Congratulations to all. Organizer: Stephen Granade.

Upcoming Competitions

Authors should be working on their entries for:

• NaAdWriMo 2007 or National ADRIFT Writing Month is for an ADRIFT game written during the month of January 2007. Deadline for entry is 4th February, 2007. Organizer: David Whyld.
• Spring Thing 2007 for longer and better-tested games. Intents-to-enter must be submitted to the organizer between noon EDT on September 30, 2006 and noon EST on March 1, 2007. Organizer: Greg Boettcher.
• InsideADRIFT Summer Comp 2007 is open for any unreleased, but complete, ADRIFT games. Submission deadline: June 30, 2007. Organizer: Ken Franklin.
• IF Dreams is a recurring monthly minicomp. Organizer: David Cornelson.

(See also: Category:Competitions, Category:Minicomp, and the Competition Calendar.)