Interviews
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Adventure Interview with Howard Sherman – Malinche Entertainment
Interactive Fiction (IF)
writer and designer, Howard Sherman, CEO of Malinche Entertainment,
is the author of various text adventures, Pentari: First Light
(PFL), being his most well-known piece of IF. In this interview
he answers our questions regarding PFL as well as other issues
related to the actual state of the Interactive Fiction subgenre.
JA – First of all, Could
you give us some background concerning yourself and your company?
Where is it located? Is it a one-man business or other people work
with you?
Malinche Entertainment
is a brand owned by my company Admiral Ventures, Corp. Admiral Ventures
is small but it’s more than a one man show. There’s just too much
work for one person to do.
JA – How did you start
writing adventures and why did you choose to focus your work in interactive
fiction (IF)?
Like many people, I
wished Infocom was still around to create new masterpieces of Interactive
Fiction. My vision for re-launching IF as a viable platform dated
back to 1996 when I first discovered Graham Nelson’s Inform programming
language. Inform makes it possible to write IF in traditional as well
as non-traditional ways. I dabbled in 1996 and 1997 and then took
a long hiatus as my career shot into orbit. With some spare time during
my slow season I decided to finish First Light more than five
years after I started it.
JA – IF is well alive now
but mainly its vitality arises from amateur efforts. Why do you think
that the market has a niche for commercial IF?
So many people loved
adventure games but were, sadly, deprived of any new ones until I
came along. I’ve received emails from people all over the world thanking
me profusely for creating BOFH and First Light. Some
of those emails were very moving. We all remember those magical times
such as the first time we explored the Bank of Zork or tried
to get past the Ogre in Spellbreaker. Who can forget Floyd?
There’s a certain magic in Interactive Fiction and I am continuing
that magical tradition with Malinche. Zork fans maintain active
fan sites with lots of activity more than twenty years after Zork
was released. Looking at the landscape created by the IF fan I quickly
deduced that the IF fan would receive my work very favourably. My
take on the market turned out to be accurate; I get warm, fantastic
fan mail every week and copies of First Light are sold every
day. It’s a real rush.
JA – Do you play text adventures?
If yes, Which ones?
I play text adventure
games as often as time will allow. While I remain a staunch fan of
all of Infocom’s work I am currently exploring the works of Magnetic
Scrolls. Guild of Thieves is the game I’m playing now and
I’m really enjoying it. It’s fresh, new and challenging to me and
it really stirs up all those great feelings adventure games are legendary
for invoking.
