Infocom

A venerable old trophy case stands in a corner. You curiously open the lid and peek inside.

Infocom's history

Infocom was the company that came out with some of the first and dearest adventures. Remember the Zork and Enchanter trilogies, Trinity, A Mind Forever Voyaging? Unfortunately, after the company was bought by Activision in 1986, the games soon went out of stock. If you are lucky enough to find them, that's a great option, as they come with really beautiful boxes and goodies, which greatly enhance the games' atmosphere. Be prepared, however, to pay collector's prices, and don't rely on the floppies still being playable after 20 years' time. They have become mostly collectors' items, and non-playability is not the sellers' fault.

Copyright issues

A collection of Infocom games, "The Lost Treasures of Infocom", was republished by Activision in 2012 as an app for IPhone and IPad. Sadly, it appears to have been discontinued. If you were lucky enough to grab it, hold onto it by all means, as the games come with so many goodies, from feelies to Invisiclues for all games.

For the rest of us, it's back to the old issues. As far as I know, Activision have still not declared the games abandonware. But I do not believe that it is in the spirit of copyright law that works of art drift into oblivion by unavailability. The day the games are republished in their old glory, I will gladly remove the files from this site. Until then, I hope they will be allowed to remain here so you can have fun downloading and playing. Chances are that after playing, you will want to buy the original games, with all the beautiful fluff that comes with them.

Please note: I took down Zork Beyond, Zork Zero and Planetfall since they are available as a package on GOG.com. Grab them, by all means, and let's hope for more.

How to play (technical issues)

You can play the games either in DOS or - much more comfortably - with the Frotz Z-machine (find a version for your platform on the left hand side). It was originally designed for playing Infocom files and can interpret the .DAT or .ZIP game file (which in some cases is in the 'Data' directory).
If your Frotz interpreter refuses to open a .DAT or .ZIP file included in some of the games below, try starting Frotz first and opening the file from there. (Don't forget to tell Frotz it can open any file, not only z*-files.) That should work.

The games

So, here are the game files. Copy protection material is added where necessary. Mind that this is only what you absolutely need for playing. You should by all means pay a visit to The Infocom Gallery for fine replicas of the original Infocom game packages and gimmicks.

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Background material

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