Re: The 1st Annual 1-2K Text Adventure Competition

[adam@fsf.net (Adam Thornton)]

In article <cbuak0$ecm$1@mamenchi.zrz.TU-Berlin.DE>,
Thomas Richter  <thor@cleopatra.math.tu-berlin.de> wrote:
>Hi,
>
>> Yes, although the total source file cannot exceed 2,816 bytes. THe binayr 
>> file, zipped or UPXed, cannot exceed 2,999 bytes. External data files are 
>> ok.
>
>Are you sure that these are useful limits? I mean, I'd place all the
>test, all the room linkages (doors), possibly even graphics in external
>data files. The "source code" would be just a simple text parser, possibly
>even with its parsing rules encoded in external files. Maybe you'd even
>get a "scott adams" adventure in 2K this way.

Scott Adams games actually only need a few dozen bytes of RAM.  Most of
the game (16K in the classical games) is ROM. 

I've been semi-seriously thinking about an Atari 2600 port of
Adventureland, since we already have the text display engine from
_Fellowship of the Ring_ (which is the _Dark Mage_ engine with
additional enhancements by Thomas Jentzsch, although _Dark Mage_ in turn
borrows from _Stellar Track_).  Sure, you'd need a bankswitched cart,
and you'd need a better input scheme than the joystick menus of _Dark
Mage_ and descendents, but I think it might be possible even without
additional RAM.  Of course with some of the address space mapped to
additional RAM (like the Supercharger or some later, uh, M-Networks(?)
games) it wouldn't even be that big of a challenge.

Adam

Adam