The Retro Adventurers

"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)

Your monthly classic text adventuring news update delivered this month by Jason, Nick, and Tim. The top stories are  game contests still open for players votes at time of publication! Don't delay, listen and click today!

Text Adventure Literacy Jam 2026

https://itch.io/jam/talp2026

https://gameobserver.com/6th-annual-game-jam-inspires-next-generation-of-developers-to-keep-text-adventures-alive/

Iron CHiF Season One Episode Two: ZIL

https://intfiction.org/t/iron-chif-season-one-episode-2-lancelot-vs-someone2-using-zil/79983

Inform 6 benchmarking

https://discord.com/channels/830344544679493644/830344548315037739/1501871149288525844

PunyInform v6.6

https://github.com/johanberntsson/PunyInform/releases/tag/v6_6

Visible Zorker update: Deadline for backers, Zork III goes public

https://blog.zarfhome.com/2026/05/visible-zork-3

https://archive.org/details/Suspended_Map_Recreation

https://archive.org/details/Infocom_Starcross_Chart_Recreation

Dialog 1b/01

https://intfiction.org/t/dialog-1b-01-library-1-2-0-a-machine-1-0-0-is-released/80151

https://github.com/Dialog-IF/dialog/releases/tag/release-1b01-1.2.0

War of the Worlds for Commodore 64

https://michel-molenaar.itch.io/war-of-the-worlds-c64

Modern PAW environment

https://www.reddit.com/r/interactivefiction/comments/1tgyyj2/show_if_a_modern_jsonbased_paws_engine/ 

https://carlosparamio.itch.io/paws-ai

Text Adventure Studio (formerly Apple II Adventure Studio)

https://www.reddit.com/r/textadventures/comments/1t3yypi/apple_ii_adventure_studio_is_now_officially_text/

https://textadventurestudio.com/ 

The Forgotten Nightmare release

https://intfiction.org/t/the-forgotten-nightmare-series-platform-expansion-release/80323/5

Voyage of the Beano for Spectrum Next

https://qladventures.itch.io/the-voyage-of-the-beano

Spring Thing 2026 recognizes C64 Latinorum, other neo-retro titles

https://www.springthing.net/2026/play.html

2026 IntroComp kickoff

https://mastodon.social/@Feneric/116636591715718306

It's an Infocom antiheroic classic and a throwback Infocom parody this time out as modern IF legend Andrew Plotkin (Zarf) joins Jason and Nick for two perilous adventures.

Lurking Horror sendup The Smirking Horror by Jason Davis leads off, a reasonably faithful re-interpretation of The Lurking Horror from Infocom. It's the first Amstrad CPC exclusive on the show and makes surprisingly minimal use of the graphics available in Graphic Adventure Creator.

For the main course we take on Infocom's Infidel, memorably parodied by Zarf himself (Episode 27's Inhumane) and created by Michael Berlyn and Patricia Fogleman. Legendary for its surly protagonist and shock ending, does it hold up to modern scrutiny?

Infidel (IFDB)

Infidel packaging (gray box)

Infidel packaging (folio)

The Smirking Horror (CPCWiki)

The Smirking Horror (playable online)