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  • Iron Curtain
  • limited exchange of goods and information with the West
  • no private enterprise
  • no market of hardware or software
  • lack of language skills

understanding the genre

community function:

intertextuality

You are standing in front of the Grocery House department store. The entrance into the subway is fortunately clear. An annoying man (probably a communist) is looking out of a balcony and happily watching the good work of the members of the Public Security. You can go down, to the right and inside. You see a cop.

> USE AXE

You drove your axe so deep inside his skull, that it cannot be pulled out. You see a dead cop. (Znovuzrozeny, 1989)

becomes a character

towards the mainstream:

nationwide contests

micro computer

enthusiast community

imported 8-bit computers (mostly Sinclair ZX Spectrum)

computer clubs

often parts of youth organizations, Svazarm

(Association for Cooperation with the Army)

informal distribution networks

  • mostly distributed on cassete tapes
  • fast and efficient
  • works at “the speed of lightning”
  • no respect for copyright
  • gift economy

to be continued...

  • no shortage of foreign game titles
  • calls for localization of TA

"The most serious problem for us due to the lack of time is the transcription of dialogue games from English into Czech. This is enormously difficult in case of games with compressed text. We welcome (and are ready to remunerate) any fruitful effort that would help include these specific, strategically and logically challenging games into the Mikrobáze collection […]"

(Mikrobáze Newsletter, 1986, p. 62).

domestic production

social context

  • most of domestic games were text adventures
  • “We didn’t have time, knowledge or skills for anything more.”
  • in 1985-89 at least 65 TAs for ZX Spectrum
  • TAs become a locus of "vernacular" digital creativity

Indiana jones fights the communist police

1980s Czechoslovak text adventures as a transitional media form

community

technologies

genre

Jaroslav Švelch, Charles University in Prague

as cultural practice

design conventions

City of Robots (1989)

“You are standing on a clearing near a huge rock massif. There is small opening in the rock at the ground level. Another quite big opening is about 15 meters above you. You can see a letter. You can go east. Command: ?”

(movie ticket: 10 crowns)

  • "encrypted", advertised in the national media
  • registration: 99 crowns
  • 5,000 prizes
  • easy to hack

why him?

Stanislav Hrda (sybilasoft):

Fuksoft (1987)

František Fuka (Fuxoft):

CITY OF ROBOTS: INSTRUCTIONS

(1989)

"During the game, the player must decide for an astronaut, as if he was remotely controlling him. The aim of the game is to overcome all the obstacles, find a spaceship, ready it for launch and take off for Earth. There is an emphasis on player’s logical and creative thinking."

Welcome, Tim Coleman, [...]

Vengeful Jack Ragger and Jonathan Fox got into F. Fuka’s apartment and plant a timed bomb there. I hope you will be a gentleman and won’t strand your friend!

Stinging Indiana Jones (1987)

IJ and the Temple of Doom (1985)

IJ 2 (1987)

IJ 3 (inspired by the Last Crusade, 1990)

Madmax:

IJ and the Golden Idol of the Celts (1989)

variation

how much influence of Western TA?

crossover featuring

Fuka and Indiana Jones

  • "textovka" (text game) - a broad term
  • smaller size, less complexity
  • specific fictional worlds
  • different interfaces: menus
  • a subgenre: hacking games

Anonymous:

The Adventures of Indiana Jones in Wenceslas Square in Prague on January 16, 1989

“<< City of Robots >> A science fiction computer game. Produced by Zenitcentrum to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Pionýr Organization of the Socialist Union of Youth. (Press a key)”. The in-game screen: “I am on a metal-plated street. I see: A round building. A thin beam of light. A steel door. Robot parts. Exits: East. West. […]”

“O.K. You are standing at an unobstructed entrance into the subway. As soon as you showed up, an officer came to you and searched you. Having found nothing, he called on his “comrades” and they beat you senseless. As they were running away to deal with some woman with a baby carriage, one of them lost a machete. You crawled for it and committed hara-kiri. INDIANA JONES IS DEAD [scroll]”

...What The Heck?! (1990)

sting III - podraz III (1986)

System 15000 (1984)

"Play the role of the unemployed programmer Tim Coleman, equipped with a Timex 2097 computer and a RS-2368 modem, and try to rob other robbers with a little help from your friends"

  • "encrypted", advertised in the national radio
  • registration: 106 crowns
  • around 2,000 sold
  • prizes: trips in France
  • hacked by some
  • hypertext-based
  • web of references, fictional universe
  • confusion in sequel numbering:

two different Sting 4's, neither by Fuxoft

  • metatexts: messages, greetings

"Of course I want to say hello especially to T.R.C. and Cybexlab […] And, what’s going on?? Radek Solar still hasn’t returned the black shopping bag I left at his place on last year’s New Year’s Eve […]." (Indiana Jones 3)

“There is *terminal* on your desk, that connects you to the newest agency news reports and the paper’s archive. The surroundings of the terminal are decorated with *messages*.”

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