The Retro Adventurers

Pack your phrasebook and get ready to defend democracy as Ben and Jason take on a pair of quirky early 1980s adventures. For an appetizer, we order Infocom legend Brian Moriarty's early effort, a type-in published in ANALOG Computing Magazine no less:  the Nicolas Cage-coded Adventure In the Fifth Dimension.

The feature game is Invincible Island by Pete Cooke... that's Cooke with an e, sadly, although Ben and Jason do find time for a little Derek & Clive discourse which steers clear of the need to flag this episode for adult content. Both games have mindbending maps, but do they have anything else in common?

Also, there's quite a bit of listener mail and news... from the summer of 2025, which is how long this episode has been waiting for publication! Thanks to Nick for breathing life into this one. If nothing else, let it serve as a reminder why we've created the monthly >OPEN MAILBOX series!

Invincible Island (IFDB)

Invincible Island (playable online, ZX Spectrum)

Adventure In the Fifth Dimension (IFDB)

Adventure in the Fifth Dimension (playable online, Atari 8-bit)

The Guild of Thieves, Hit It With a Hammer! playthrough (YouTube)

Encounter HD

Asimov's The Black Widowers

No rest for retro adventuring news this summer as Tim and Jason bring you lots of news: contest developments (don't delay, some deadlines are very very very soon!), Visible Zorker updates which aren't as stark as they seem, lost games and a lost development environment unearthed, and really quite a bit more.

Special thanks to Andrew Johnson for permission to use ZorkPBX demo audio.

ParserComp 2026 voting closes soon

https://itch.io/jam/parsercomp-2026

IFComp entries accepted (closing very soon!)

https://blog.ifcomp.org/post/821438949798084608/ifcomp-2026-now-accepting-intents-entries

Visible Starcross

https://blog.zarfhome.com/2026/07/visible-starcross

Arcturus Z-Machine compiler

https://github.com/ByteProject/Arcturus/tree/main

https://intfiction.org/t/arcturus-a-new-programming-language-compiler-for-the-z-machine/81091

pdp10 issues in Z1/Z2 Zork

https://intfiction.org/t/frotz-and-bocfel-cant-parse-pdp10-in-v1-v2-zork-a-shift-lock-z-machine-spec-3-7-1-easter-egg/81002

Game console Linux ports

https://github.com/LinuxMD/linuxmd

https://cakehonolulu.github.io/linux-for-jaguar/

Zork-PET / BitShifter interpreter work resumes

https://codeberg.org/root42/zork-pet

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wznA6SHQnMQ

https://youtube.com/live/IvGJ7XQSHcc?feature=share https://youtube.com/live/Ywp51hY5GDo?feature=share

https://github.com/Edilbert/BSA

R.A.I.L. language unearthed

https://www.gamesthatwerent.com/2026/07/r-a-i-l/

Iron ChIF Adventuron

https://intfiction.org/t/iron-chif-season-one-episode-3-flacrabbit-vs-dee-cooke-using-adventuron/81129

https://intfiction.org/t/volunteer-to-beta-test-flacrabbits-game-in-iron-chif-s1e3-aug-23-27/81255

Catacombs and Goblin Towers for Commodore PET recovered

https://www.commodoregames.net/catacombs.asp 

ZorkPBX

https://github.com/aejx00/zorkpbx

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvIENNmuUlY

Babelmap interpreter

https://intfiction.org/t/babelmap-rust-z-machine-glulx-scott-tui-w-graphics-and-sound-linux-macos-windows/81213

https://github.com/sharkusk/babelmap

Review-a-Thon

https://intfiction.org/t/review-a-thon-2026/80860

Never Gives Up Her Dead on Steam

https://store.steampowered.com/app/4815350/Never_Gives_Up_Her_Dead/

Mega Adventure Creator

https://theoasisbbs.com/mega-adventure-creator-adds-new-menu-system-and-status-bar/ 

https://github.com/lipi650/MAC

Multiple Choice Adventure Engine

https://solhsa.com/mucho/mucho.html 

https://github.com/jarikomppa/speccy/tree/master/mucho 

Adventure Coder Magazine

https://www.flickr.com/photos/christopherhester/albums/page2

https://archive.org/search?query=creator%3A%22Chris+Hester%22

The Fool and His Money recovered

https://blog.zarfhome.com/2026/07/the-fool-and-his-money-returns

David Youd Enhances Secrets of the Pyramid of Light

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OiUZ7qtRHB4

Atari games optioned by major film studio -- what about Infocom?

https://bsky.app/profile/neilpolowin.bsky.social/post/3mre5rfptgk2x

Interactive Fiction Discord Server (visit #retro-adventurers-podcast !)

https://discord.com/invite/8jrbVptACc

TREK37 on IFDB

https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=a026gnl4v2aclec2

Skull Island on IFDB

https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=jrvu7excy55dtjuu

"I don't want to suggest this is a more obviously American game than some others, but I will say you do solve one problem by shooting a tree." - Dudley of Yesterzine

Jason and special guest player Dudley from the Yesterzine YouTube channel take on two curiosities from the early 1980s. First up is a Spectrum-exclusive adventure with few champions but a lot of rooms: Steve Silver Adventure #1 by Colin Webb and Jim Bennett.

The main course is Sirius Software's Gruds In Space by Chuck Sommerville and Joseph Dudar. It's one of many Sirius titles featuring the gremlin alien Gruds, a graphic/text puzzler with many similarities to the later Tracer Sanction as covered on Episode 4 of The Retro Adventurers.

Gruds In Space (IFDB)

Softalk November 1983 review of Gruds In Space

Steve Silver Adventure #1 (IFDB)

Your Computer September 1983 review of Steve Silver #1

Atari ST on Yesterzine

Amiga Batman Pack on Yesterzine

Classic text adventure news so late-breaking that we have to interrupt our news to bring you new news about that news! Presented again this month by Retro Adventurers Nick, Tim, and Jason.

University of Winchester alumnus

https://www.hampshirechronicle.co.uk/news/26175575.university-winchester-alumnus-won-award-game/

ABP: Help preserve Amstrad Infocom interpreter source code!

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1CwYXQ6FiV/

Oo-Topos Commodore 64 copy protection

https://www.lemon64.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=89439

SchoolAdventure, adapted to Inform

https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=6duybkh9bo1oq5s4 

NAIL: Not An Inform Library

https://github.com/fredrikr/nail

Iron ChIF ZIL contest entries

https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=v2b896mwtwf5mhwt

https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=b3vcdy1s1ukd5xcw

PunyInform 6.7

https://github.com/johanberntsson/PunyInform/releases/tag/v6_7

Puny BuildTools

https://github.com/ByteProject/Puny-BuildTools#build-targets

Eclipse (Bonaventura Di Bello Project)

https://bdb-project.itch.io/eclipse

https://ifdb.org/viewgame?id=03enp9z2oszblv5h

Text Adventure Literacy Jam 2026 Results

https://itch.io/jam/talp2026/results

IntroComp

https://introcomp.org/

Strange Stories RPG

https://www.backerkit.com/call_to_action/ed994b09-71cf-4128-88bc-e45f89cf7d1b/landing

Zork Zero for Mac VoiceOver users

https://intfiction.org/t/looking-for-mac-voiceover-users-to-test-zork-zero-in-spatterlight/80791

Mysterious eyeglasses-cleaning game (?!)

https://bsky.app/profile/retroadventurers.bsky.social/post/3mnryqxe5k22e

Interactive Fiction Discord Server (visit #retro-adventurers-podcast !)

https://discord.com/invite/8jrbVptACc

Unofficially official text adventure sequels to beloved media properties both published in 1984. That's what these two have in common.

Laugh While You Can, Monkey Boy! because this John Lithgow Appreciation Podcast features Nick and Jason playing the Adventure International-published unofficial sequel Buckaroo Banzai before marching into the world of post-war New York City as imagined in the world of Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, published by Telarium/Trillium.

Fahrenheit 451 (IFDB)

Fahrenheit 451 in-game music (DeepSID)

Buckaroo Banzai (IFDB)