Jon Ingold - Interactive Fiction Works

Interactive Fiction Works

Jon Ingold's interactive fiction is notable for its interrogation of the relationship between the player-character and the player, and most of his games explore this notion in one way or another. The best examples are Fail-Safe (in which the player is talking to the player-character over a radio, hampered by constant interference), Insight (in which the player-character knows a lot more about his world than the player) and All Roads (in which it's not at all clear who - or what - the player-character is).

His game Dead Cities (2007) won Best in Show in the Lovecraft Commonplace Book Exhibition, and will be displayed along four other games at the Museum of Science-Fiction and Utopia, Switzerland.

Other works are more fun: the Mulldoon sequence (two games) is puzzle-based. The first game, The Mulldoon Legacy (1999), is reputedly the longest text-game ever written; the follow-up, The Mulldoon Murders (2002) is much shorter and darker in tone. Till Death Makes a Monk-Fish out of Me (2002, 2nd place in the Interactive Fiction Competition, and nominated for four XYZZY Awards) is a black comic science fiction story.

  • Break-In (1999; Z-code). Finalist at XYZZY Awards 1999 for Best Individual Puzzle.
  • The Mulldoon Legacy (1999; Z-code). Winner at XYZZY Awards 1999 for Best Puzzles; also, a finalist for Best Individual Puzzle, Best NPCs, Best Setting, Best Story, and Best Game.
  • Fail-Safe (2000; Z-code). Finalist at XYZZY Awards 2000 for Best Individual NPC.
  • My Angel (2000; Z-code). IF Comp 2000: 6th place. Winner at XYZZY Awards 2000 for Best Story; also a finalist for Best Writing and Best Individual NPC.
  • Large Machine (2001; Z-code).
  • All Roads (2001; Z-code). IF Comp 2001: 1st place. Winner at XYZZY Awards 2001 for Best Setting, Best Story, and Best Game; also a finalist for Best Individual Puzzle and Best Writing.
  • The Mulldoon Murders (2002; Z-code).
  • Till Death Makes a Monk-Fish Out of Me! (with Mike Sousa; 2002; TADS 2). IF Comp 2002: 2nd place. Finalist at XYZZY Awards 2002 for Best Individual Puzzle, Best Story, Best Writing, and Best Game.
  • Insight (2003; Z-code).
  • Dead Cities (19-Jun-2007; Glulx). HP Lovecraft: The Commonplace Book Project 2007: Awarded Best in Show. XYZZY Awards 2007: Finalist for Best Story.
  • Make It Good (13-Apr-2009; Z-code 8), nominated for 5 XYZZY Awards including Best Game.
  • Klockwerk: The Shadow in the Cathedral (with Ian Finley; Glulx), published by Textfyre.inc. Nominated for 5 XYZZY Awards including Best Game.

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Famous quotes containing the words fiction and/or works:

    “The good ended happily, and the bad unhappily. That is what Fiction means.”
    —Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)

    “Again we mistook a little rocky islet seen through the “drisk,” with some taller bare trunks or stumps on it, for the steamer with its smoke-pipes, but as it had not changed its position after half an hour, we were undeceived. So much do the works of man resemble the works of nature. A moose might mistake a steamer for a floating isle, and not be scared till he heard its puffing or its whistle.”
    —Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)