Getting Into IF - Part One
Here's-a what I'm gonna do in my next two articles. I'm going to give ya a bunch o' step-by-step instructions for how to get hold of the finest works of interactive fiction currently available to the general public. In my travels across the web, I've noticed that virtually all of the sites I've come across that have anything to do with IF have been addressed to the relatively sophisticated PC user - someone adept at shifting amongst the various protocols used on the internet and at using the basic set of tools needed for efficient downloading and program management. But I also know that there are many, many lovers of literature and gaming out there who only have about enough skill and experience at using the web to get them - well, about as far as this very site. These latter folk will be my intended audience for the next few weeks. In this short piece, I'll take you through the basic procedures involved in making your computer IF-ready; in Part Two I'll provide you with some basic information about how to get specific works of IF, as well as some tips to help you decide which works of IF might be suited to your particular tastes and preferences.
So here we go! Now, the first salient and highly pleasing fact you need to know about IF is that most of the stuff being produced nowadays is ABSOLUTELY FREE! That's right, neighbor - provided you've got a PC equipped with a modem, a few megs of free space on your hard drive and the ability to propel your mouse along one o' them squishy little pads, you won't need to lay down another nickel to get the most up-to-date and polished IF in the world. Understand that for the writers who produce IF, most of whom are hobbyists with no direct financial interest whatsoever in the computer industry, nothing is more exciting than having somebody download one of their works and giving it a spin. They are hardly likely to impede your access to their work by asking for anything as vulgar as hard cash. Because of its low-tech feel, IF hasn't really been a commercially viable genre since the early 1980s, when a visionary company called INFOCOM made millions off early text-based computer games with names like ZORK, TRINITY, A MIND FOREVER VOYAGING, DEADLINE, and their celebrated adaptation of A HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY. Back in the days, these works ran for about $50 a pop, and came on those big 51/2'' floppies like the ones you've got gathering dust in your basement. These days, everyone's too busy ogling Lara Croft or killin' stuff in moronic 3D games like DOOM to be willing to lay down their dough for a form of electronic entertainment that relies exclusively on the printed word. Most of the old Infocom games are now available on a CD put our by Activision called INFOCOM MASTERPIECES - at twenty-four bucks, it's a steal really, unless your dirt-poor like me, in which case, read on.
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