''Enchanter'' is a 1983

interactive fiction '' Interactive fiction, often abbreviated IF, is software simulating environments in which players use text commands to control characters and influence the environment. Works in this form can be understood as literary narratives, either in the ...

computer game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device to gener ...

written by

Marc Blank Marc Blank is an American game developer and software engineer. He is best known as part of the team that created one of the first commercially successful text adventure computer games, ''Zork''. Career Blank first encountered Don Woods and Will ...

and

Dave Lebling Peter David Lebling (born October 30, 1949) is an interactive fiction game designer ( implementor) and programmer who has worked at various companies, including Infocom and Avid. Life and career He was born in Washington, D.C., grew up in Mar ...

and published by

Infocom Infocom was an American software company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that produced numerous works of interactive fiction. They also produced a business application, a relational database called ''Cornerstone (software), Cornerstone''. ...

. The first fantasy game published by Infocom after the ''

Zork ''Zork'' is a text-based adventure game first released in 1977 by developers Tim Anderson, Marc Blank, Bruce Daniels, and Dave Lebling for the PDP-10 mainframe computer. The original developers and others, as the company Infocom, expanded a ...

'' trilogy, it was originally intended to be ''Zork IV''. The game has a

parser Parsing, syntax analysis, or syntactic analysis is the process of analyzing a string of symbols, either in natural language, computer languages or data structures, conforming to the rules of a formal grammar. The term ''parsing'' comes from Lati ...

that understands over 700 words, making it the most advanced interactive fiction game of its time. It was Infocom's ninth game.

Plot

Krill, a powerful evil warlock, is spreading chaos and destruction. None of the more experienced members of the Circle of Enchanters dare to attempt to stop him. In desperation, the player, a novice Enchanter with only a few weak spells in his spell book, is sent in hopes that Krill will either fail to detect him or dismiss him as harmless. More powerful spells can be found on scrolls hidden in various locations, but as the player becomes more of a threat, Krill will respond accordingly.

Gameplay

This game has a new spell system based partially on

Ursula K. Le Guin Ursula Kroeber Le Guin (; October 21, 1929 – January 22, 2018) was an American author best known for her works of speculative fiction, including science fiction works set in her Hainish universe, and the '' Earthsea'' fantasy series. She was ...

's ''

Earthsea ''The Earthsea Cycle'', also known as ''Earthsea'', is a series of high fantasy books written by the American writer Ursula K. Le Guin. Beginning with ''A Wizard of Earthsea'' (1968), ''The Tombs of Atuan'', (1970) and ''The Farthest Shore'' ( ...

'' series and partially ''

Dungeons & Dragons ''Dungeons & Dragons'' (commonly abbreviated as ''D&D'' or ''DnD'') is a fantasy tabletop role-playing game (RPG) originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. The game was first published in 1974 by TSR (company)#Tactical Studies Rules ...

Vancian spell system, where spells must be prepared through "memorization" before being cast. As in the Earthsea series, each spell is represented by some nonsense "magic word" which is treated as a verb by the game's text

, so that one can use the FROTZ spell (which causes objects to glow and give off light) by typing FROTZ BOOK, in exactly the same way as one might type PICK UP BOOK or READ BOOK.

Notes

In the game ''

Zork III ''Zork'' is a text-based adventure game first released in 1977 by developers Tim Anderson, Marc Blank, Bruce Daniels, and Dave Lebling for the PDP-10 mainframe computer. The original developers and others, as the company Infocom, expanded an ...

'', a device slowly cycles through "scenes" from each of the Zork games as a number is displayed above it. A depiction of the sacrificial altar from the then-unreleased ''Enchanter'' appeared under the number "IV". Creators

and

decided during the game's design that the magic system made it a standalone product. It became the first game of its own trilogy, usually referred to as "The Enchanter Trilogy". The others in the series are 1984's '' Sorcerer'' and 1985's ''

Spellbreaker ''Spellbreaker'' is an interactive fiction computer game written by Dave Lebling and published by Infocom in 1985, the third and final game in the "Enchanter Trilogy." It was released for the Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Apple II, Atari 8-bit family, Atar ...

''. Infocom rated ''Enchanter'' as "Standard" in difficulty. ''Enchanter'' is the only game in the Zork universe where lurking grues, although they still exist, are not mentioned by name; the game doesn't even know the word "grue". The game has 17 ways to die.

Legacy

Robin Wayne Bailey Robin Wayne Bailey (born 1952) is an American writer of speculative fiction, both fantasy and science fiction. He is a founder of the Science Fiction Hall of Fame (1996) and a past president of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America ...

's 1989

novel A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itsel ...

''Enchanter'' is a companion rather than a novelisation. In 1993, about ten years after the original ''Enchanter'', a remake of the game with graphics was developed and published by Japanese software development company SystemSoft for the

NEC PC-9801 The , commonly shortened to PC-98 or , is a lineup of Japanese 16-bit and 32-bit personal computers manufactured by NEC from 1982 to 2000. The platform established NEC's dominance in the Japanese personal computer market, and, by 1999, more th ...

, entitled . Frotz, a modern open-source interpreter for Infocom games (as well as independently written interactive fiction) draws its name from a spell ("cause object to glow with illumination") in ''Enchanter'' and its sequels. Another spell,

Blorb Blorb is a package format for interactive fiction games. Many such games incorporate resources such as sound effects, music, or pictures. Blorb's purpose is to bind these together into one file. The format was devised by Andrew Plotkin and is use ...

("hide an object in a strongbox"), provides the name for a standard wrapper for interactive fiction multimedia resources. Several other IF tools have also been named after spells from the series.

Reception

Released in September, 1983, Infocom sold about 50,000 copies of ''Enchanter'' by the end of 1984, and 75,000 over its lifetime or as part of the ''Enchanter Trilogy''. ''

Computer Gaming World ''Computer Gaming World'' (CGW) was an American computer game magazine published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 1993. It expanded greatly through ...

''s Scorpia praised the game as "typically excellent" and up to the standards expected of Infocom games. ''

Ahoy! ''Ahoy!'' was a computer magazine published between January 1984 and January 1989 in the US, focusing on all Commodore color computers, but especially the Commodore 64 and Amiga. History The first issue of ''Ahoy!'' was published in January 198 ...

'' wrote that "''Enchanter'' is filled with the usual Infocom doses of wit, red herrings ... twists, turns, and surprises". It stated that while beginners would enjoy it, experienced text adventure gamers "may be disappointed. There didn't seem to be a whole lot to do. I solved the game in record time, for me; it left me wanting more ... The very moniker "Infocom" may be raising my expectations too high".

John J. Anderson John J. Anderson or J.J. Anderson (November 8, 1956 – October 17, 1989) was a writer and editor covering computers and technology. The New Jersey native was Executive Editor of '' Computer Shopper'' and ''Atari Explorer''. At the time of his ...

wrote in ''

Creative Computing ''Creative Computing'' was one of the earliest magazines covering the microcomputer revolution. Published from October 1974 until December 1985, the magazine covered the spectrum of hobbyist/home/personal computing in a more accessible format th ...

'', "With Enchanter, they have scored again ... Enchanter is full of the delightful little touches we have come to expect from Infocom." ''

Compute! ''Compute!'' (), often stylized as ''COMPUTE!'', was an American home computer magazine that was published from 1979 to 1994. Its origins can be traced to 1978 in Len Lindsay's ''PET Gazette'', one of the first magazines for the Commodore PET c ...

'' stated that ''Enchanter'' had "nothing strikingly original about it, but you'll appreciate its high level of challenge and meticulously maintained continuity". It stated that "some of the humor lacks, well, subtlety", citing the name

Dimwit Flathead ''Zork Zero: The Revenge of Megaboz'' is an interactive fiction computer game, written by Steve Meretzky over nearly 18 months and published by Infocom in 1988. Although it is the ninth and last ''Zork'' game released by Infocom before the company ...

as example, and that "the narrative won't win any literary awards, either". The magazine concluded that it "is an excellent game for adventure freaks". Ron Boerger reviewed ''Enchanter'' in ''

Space Gamer Space is the boundless three-dimensional extent in which objects and events have relative position and direction. In classical physics, physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually consider ...

'' No. 73. Boerger commented that "''Enchanter'' is ..a lot of fun, and if you're into the all-text, no-picture sort of roleplaying, I heartily recommend it."

References

External links

Packaging
at the Gallery of Zork

* {{Infocom games 1980s interactive fiction 1983 video games Amiga games Amstrad CPC games Amstrad PCW games Apple II games Atari 8-bit family games Atari ST games Classic Mac OS games Commodore 64 games CP/M games DOS games Fantasy video games NEC PC-9801 games Single-player video games SystemSoft Alpha games TI-99/4A games TRS-80 games Video games developed in the United States Zork