Infidel (video game)

Infidel (English for non-believers ) is a text adventure from Infocom from the year 1983.

Action

The player is an adventurer who is originally as an assistant to the archaeologists Craige in Egypt in the 1980s in search of pyramids. Disappointed by lack of recognition by Craige he deceives his superiors, he secretly commissioned by the daughter of an archaeologist to find a mysterious documents posted on the pyramid, adopts and hastily puts together an expedition of its own. During the expedition, the player will leave after a few ( mostly self-inflicted ) setbacks of his team and wakes up at the beginning of the game in the largely cleared excavation camp, without aids and far away from any civilization. The game objectives are, first, the player's survival, then later finding and exploring the mysterious pyramid.

Gameplay and technology

Infidel is a text adventure, that is, there is no graphic elements. Environment and events are made and the actions of the player entered as on-screen text also as text using the keyboard. The parser of Infidel understands about 600 words, almost as many as the parser of Zork ruled. Unlike other Infocom games come in Infidel before any non-player characters ( NPCs), which can be explained by the setting ( first-time exploration of a pyramid).

As side dishes ( " Feelies " ) contained the early releases of Infidel a fictional expedition diary, a letter to the Contracting Authority, the translation of a Hyroglyphenfragments by the father of the client and a map of the area around the archaeological camps. These supplements have been referenced in the game and presented thus represents a copy

Reception

Were positively emphasized in the press, the general setting of the game and the clever handling of the topic hieroglyphs. The low compared to previous Infocom games psychological depth, the somewhat weak parser and sometimes memory due Spartan room and object descriptions were criticized .. The end polarized: Many critics found them abrupt and disappointing, some realistic.