ZORKAHOLICS GALORE...
Continued
By Tim Lee
...<<<Back
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As a serious player I eventually learned to draw maps and save my game location
frequently, so I could return to the moment of safety just prior to being destroyed
by a host of critters far nastier than a meager troll. I played right through
that first night until - - all of a sudden - - the sun was peeking through my kitchen
window. How did that happen? Undaunted, I put on a pot of coffee, called
work, slathered a few choice, flu-like symptoms into the phone, took a day of sick
leave, and played ZORK non-stop for another eighteen hours.
"You are standing in a cold, dank cave. You are holding a lantern whose yellow
light barely illuminates the cavern. You own a sword, a magic amulet, a section
of rope, a clove of garlic, a rubber raft, and a bicycle pump. From the East
you feel a chilly breeze. To the South you hear the faint fluttering of wings.
Large stones block your way to the West and to the North."
You type: "Raise lantern."
"Vampire Bats descend. You drop the lantern In the sudden darkness you
feel teeth tearing at your face. Tiny bat-paws are clinging to your lips."
You frantically type: "THROW CLOVE OF GARLIC!"
"It is dark. You can't find the garlic. Stinky bat-tails are wriggling
up your nostrils. A bat has grabbed hold of your tongue. You are
on the verge of blacking out."
My heart is racing. I am actually SWEATING . I save the game location with
a practiced keystroke, and just for the heck of it, I type: "%!&# you!"
The floppy's busy-light flickers, the disk whirls. Computer byte-brains are
flying out of the floppy drive's bay door. Then, the mighty ZORK responds:
"I am sorry, but I do not understand the word 'YOU'."
It is too late, anyhow. I crack up laughing.
"You smell like bat guano. Your tongue looks like spaghetti. You are
drained of blood. You are dead. Would you like to restart?"
ZORK was a wonderful game whose days were numbered in the same short moments as
those sound-effect-ridden Radio Day shows. Gone forever and - - if my math
is correct - - remembered by few. Usually it's the off-the-wall Simply Tim yarns
that draw so many reader responses. I'm amazed. Tuesday's "STICK SWORD IN EAR" story
was one of them. Most folks wrote about how nice it was to have tripped back down
memory lane; how the old game of ZORK had also drawn them into its rich tapestry
of intrigue; how they, too had called in sick and had forever fallen under ZORK'S
mysterious spell; how old-fashioned IMAGINATION was lacking in today's modern computer
games; how kids can't enjoy PURE music anymore without accompanying videos; how
the act of reading a book is disappearing from our culture; how no one sends bona
fide, handwritten letters nowadays. . .
You get the idea. ...More
>>> Copyright Tim Lee 2003
