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I think the issue is that the games tended towards Guide Dang It, as tvtropes.org puts it. You basically needed to scoop up everything you saw and try it in ran

I think the issue is that the games tended towards Guide Dang It, as tvtropes.org puts it. You basically needed to scoop up everything you saw and try it in random, often nonsensical combinations (e.g. getting the Babel fish) -- all to extend the time spent playing. As a teenager it was easy to spend a pile of time on, but as an adult this bears entirely too much similarity to various unpleasant things, most of which actually advance you in your life (unlike playing a game that, I presume, you bested as a 14-year-old).

logfromblammo 9y ago
My experience is that I remembered how to solve all the puzzles, so all the challenge was gone. It was basically an exercise in nostalgia. As for the Babel fish, while the actions required seemed nonsensical, they were each clued by the previous press of the vending machine button. It was an interactive Rube Goldberg machine. But yes, if you didn't think in exactly the same way the puzzle designer thought you would, you had to resort to combining every object in your inventory with every object in the room in order to progress. More modern IF games are actually a lot better about not being Guide Dang It, so it's really a shame there's no market for them any more. Nelson and Plotkin are pretty good about trying to make things sensible and solvable, most of the time. For instance, there are many different ways to open the pill bottle in Curses--ways based on common sense--not just the one where you find the pill-bottle-opening-machine in the goblin lair, insert the "E" battery that you removed from a malfunctioning weather radio, and press the "open pill bottle" button, instead of one of the 999 "kill player horribly" buttons, because you read the goblin language primer at the public library that only had two books in it. (That is not in Curses, it's just an example of how Infocom might have scripted it.)
- syntheticnature 9y ago
  I suppose part of that is that the replay value might not be high; without something to change the flow, such as areas you could get away with ignoring, puzzles with more than one solution, or even much optimization available necessarily when you're simply trying to succeed. Maybe there might be some pieces in the text you'll appreciate more since it's been some time, but it isn't the sole focus of the activity. I was a bit younger than you at the time I tried the HHGTG text adventure, and only managed the Babel fish via meeting someone older who had beaten it... though my mistake was not realizing I actually needed EVERYTHING (as a kid, why grab the junk mail?), and also needed to disrobe. At least, having read the book, I knew I needed to lie down in front of the bulldozer.
  - logfromblammo 9y ago
    A more modern take would have had Ford give you the junk mail at the pub if you didn't pick it up yourself. "Here. I grabbed your post for you, in case you didn't have any other souvenirs. Drink up."
- NoGravitas 9y ago
  The only problem with the Babel fish puzzle (as I remember it) was that if you went through, being clued by the previous press of the vending machine button, the machine would run out of babel fish before you got one. So...go back to a save. But then realize you didn't have the junk mail, so start the game over from the beginning. Modern IF games usually make it harder to get your game into an unwinnable state.
ballenf 9y ago
So it was an unrefined (and unmonetized) version of the mindless grinding(1) required in Farmville and the like? (1) As opposed to RPG-style grinding.
- lobster_johnson 9y ago
  As an avid adventure gamer back then, not really. Way too slow to qualify as "grinding". Adventure games back then had a low number of useless items that had no impact on the plot; it was more about figuring out, when you found a new item, how it might solve some earlier problem. The best games were clever about how items could be combined, and only in rather few cases were the combinations unintuitive (and it was typically for comedic effect, especially in LucasArts games).
- tedunangst 9y ago
  Grinding implies a certain amount of automation. Just invest time, get results. Puzzle games are frequently much more like step functions. Ex: You have a mirror to look around the corner, but it's too big to glue to a stick. So obviously you need to break it. There's 100 ways one could do that, but in the game it requires identifying the one pixel that represent a brick you can pick up and smash the mirror with. You can fool around and click on everything, but you also need to be really freaking meticulous or you'll miss a pixel.

logfromblammo 9y ago

My experience is that I remembered how to solve all the puzzles, so all the challenge was gone. It was basically an exercise in nostalgia. As for the Babel fish, while the actions required seemed nonsensical, they were each clued by the previous press of the vending machine button. It was an interactive Rube Goldberg machine. But yes, if you didn't think in exactly the same way the puzzle designer thought you would, you had to resort to combining every object in your inventory with every object in the room in order to progress. More modern IF games are actually a lot better about not being Guide Dang It, so it's really a shame there's no market for them any more. Nelson and Plotkin are pretty good about trying to make things sensible and solvable, most of the time. For instance, there are many different ways to open the pill bottle in Curses--ways based on common sense--not just the one where you find the pill-bottle-opening-machine in the goblin lair, insert the "E" battery that you removed from a malfunctioning weather radio, and press the "open pill bottle" button, instead of one of the 999 "kill player horribly" buttons, because you read the goblin language primer at the public library that only had two books in it. (That is not in Curses, it's just an example of how Infocom might have scripted it.)

syntheticnature 9y ago
I suppose part of that is that the replay value might not be high; without something to change the flow, such as areas you could get away with ignoring, puzzles with more than one solution, or even much optimization available necessarily when you're simply trying to succeed. Maybe there might be some pieces in the text you'll appreciate more since it's been some time, but it isn't the sole focus of the activity. I was a bit younger than you at the time I tried the HHGTG text adventure, and only managed the Babel fish via meeting someone older who had beaten it... though my mistake was not realizing I actually needed EVERYTHING (as a kid, why grab the junk mail?), and also needed to disrobe. At least, having read the book, I knew I needed to lie down in front of the bulldozer.
- logfromblammo 9y ago
  A more modern take would have had Ford give you the junk mail at the pub if you didn't pick it up yourself. "Here. I grabbed your post for you, in case you didn't have any other souvenirs. Drink up."
NoGravitas 9y ago
The only problem with the Babel fish puzzle (as I remember it) was that if you went through, being clued by the previous press of the vending machine button, the machine would run out of babel fish before you got one. So...go back to a save. But then realize you didn't have the junk mail, so start the game over from the beginning. Modern IF games usually make it harder to get your game into an unwinnable state.

ballenf 9y ago

So it was an unrefined (and unmonetized) version of the mindless grinding(1) required in Farmville and the like? (1) As opposed to RPG-style grinding.

lobster_johnson 9y ago
As an avid adventure gamer back then, not really. Way too slow to qualify as "grinding". Adventure games back then had a low number of useless items that had no impact on the plot; it was more about figuring out, when you found a new item, how it might solve some earlier problem. The best games were clever about how items could be combined, and only in rather few cases were the combinations unintuitive (and it was typically for comedic effect, especially in LucasArts games).
tedunangst 9y ago
Grinding implies a certain amount of automation. Just invest time, get results. Puzzle games are frequently much more like step functions. Ex: You have a mirror to look around the corner, but it's too big to glue to a stick. So obviously you need to break it. There's 100 ways one could do that, but in the game it requires identifying the one pixel that represent a brick you can pick up and smash the mirror with. You can fool around and click on everything, but you also need to be really freaking meticulous or you'll miss a pixel.