A Mind Forever Voyaging
Infocom
Amiga, Apple II, Atari ST, Commodore 128, MS-DOS, Macintosh, Browser
There has been a certain resurgence of text-based adventure video games in the last five years, and while most people were surprised to find that these games were not only a source of entertainment for many, sometimes over 30 years ago, but also were a source of entertainment, emotions and good stories. Some of us just smirked and smiled as we remembered the originals, and while it’s now almost a cliché to say that all from the past was better, I’m pretty sure that the Infocom text-based adventures are among the best things that ever came out of the 1980’s in terms of video game entertainment.
While I certainly didn’t grow up in the 1980’s (I was born in 1990), I was in a cultural context where video games were important, they were topics of conversations in school, high school, university and now academic papers, thoughtful analysis, that come from people from my generation or the one before, those that saw the evolution of video games from an entertainment to an art form. It was an era were ROMs were most of the time the only way to experience the history of video games, and that’s the way I approached the text-based adventures of the 80’s, with a fright that they would bore me, but at the same time with the assurance that they would work as interactive fiction, a topic that I was obsessed with at that time in high school.
Nevertheless, my first experience wasn’t exactly the most ‘adventure-y’ of the lot that could’ve been played. With all the Zorks and Darkness‘ that could’ve been played, I chose the sci-fi setting of A Mind Forever Voyaging, which attracted me with its poetry influenced title, and the promise of being a highly political game. My surprise was that when I tried to move, the game told me “You can’t move, you’re a computer!”. So much for “forever voyaging”.
I was stuck in one of the strangest titles in the catalogue of the Infocom text-based adventures. Written and designed by Steve Meretzky, and done in response to his disgust for the policies of Ronald Reagan, the video game works like this: you’re a computer with an AI that has personality, which is introduced to a simulation of real life, but 5 years into the future. The simulation is done to prove the feasibility of a series of laws and amendments that would make a better society: cutting taxes, deregulating gun and car registration, reinstating military draft, you know, the good stuff. Simulation ends and the results satisfy Dr. Perelman, your father, so to speak, who awoke you from your previous unaware state of artificial intelligence.
You could say that there’s not much to this game, as the simulation puts you inside a small town that seems happy and more orderly than ever with the installation of the new plan, and you can be more than happy with the pat on the head that you just received from your creator. However, the player is an inquisitive mind and finds a way to run the simulation again, but this time 10 years into the future, then 20, then 30, and that’s when you start to realize how screwed up everything is. After a couple of years of stability the overreaching state starts to induce more criminal behavior as well as an overall state of fear, in which police raid apartment blocks for no reason, as well as shoot individuals with no consequences whatsoever, robbers run amok… sound familiar? Eh, sorry.
This is a highly opinionated video game, which doesn’t shy away from describing the brutality of everything that happens in this dystopian society, one that seems to be gradually form itself into the most Orwellian of nightmares. The constant simulations have a toll on the computer, as one can see in the way that it reacts to the events seen. The game’s main mechanic is the ‘Record’ function, in which you must type the command so that the professor, back in the real world, can see what’s happening and thus make a decision about what they can do about it. What can they do? I leave you find out for yourselves if there’s anything that can be done against a government that strongly wants to force upon society a series of rulings that will ultimately end with the destruction of society itself.
The good news is that you no longer need to dust off your Atari or Amiga or Commodore to play this game, as it’s available in browser format if you have Java installed (This link works as a digital rental for free, as said in the webpage) and spend a few minutes or hours exploring the places, the people and the horrific events that happen in the near future, as imagined in 1985.
Or you can play Zork.
– Jaime Grijalba