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Andrew Plotkin

@eblong.com

970 followers 220 following 640 posts

An interactive fiction guy. https://zarfhome.com, https://blog.zarfhome.com, https://eblong.com/zarf/home.html

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Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · Oct 23

Intro post!

I'm a game designer and developer. I've written a bunch of old-style inteactive fiction. Then I helped start an IF nonprofit (IFComp, NarraScope, other stuff).

Currently job-hunting but also releasing small interactive narrative games.

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 20h

I snapshotted the opening of each transcript in my old Infocom transcript printout collection.

blog.zarfhome.com/2025/10/old-...

Doesn't reveal much new, but it was fun.

(I was hoping to determine the release number of the version of Suspended that I played, but the transcript doesn't show it.)

My old Infocom transcripts

Back when I was a kid, after I solved an Infocom game, I'd print out a transcript of a

blog.zarfhome.com

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 23h

Oh, yes, I have a few ongoing chains of Ascension matches that must be a decade old at this point.

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 1d

Weird Al, clearly.

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 1d

Still using mine _and_ I have a spare for when this one kicks the bucket

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 3d

I have mastered the MPMediaItemPropertyArtwork property.

Screenshot of an iPad running Pocket Storm, with the Now Playing media widget showing. The widget shows the Pocket Storm weather phase, stylized clouds and a bit of rain, labelled “Approaching storm”.

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 3d

Ooh, thanks, will dig through

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 5d

I have also made dan dan noodles and watched two episodes of Dan Da Dan, which was not a coincidence, but the show is not about noodles. It turns out.

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 5d

This would all feel like very satisfying progress, except that it is 100% work foisted on me by other people's bugs. Or, in the case of the Mac/iOS icons, other people's Neat Ideas.

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 5d

I have rebuilt and released the Meanwhile, Leviathan, and Beyond apps on Steam+Itch (Unity apps)
...and created new icons for the iOS versions of same, and gotten those into the App Store review queue
…and released an update to Lectrote with an Electron fix for MacOS 26 and also a new Mac icon

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 5d

That is wonderful definition because it is, by its own lights, fantasy.

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 5d

Update: ignore this, many people are correcting me

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 6d

Both of the latter. Lord Dunsany. Narnia (but Lewis's other stuff would have been considered sci-fi). Tolkien (who would have been known to fans in 1959, although not yet a US bestseller).

I don't think "high/low fantasy" existed as a concept until later. (I see a 1982 cite.)

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 6d

I think "speculative fiction" as a broad label came in in the 90s, on Usenet.

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 6d

When "fantasy" came back as a genre label in the late 70s (because Tolkien), it was specifically parallel to and distinct from "science fiction". (And “weird" had long since turned to "horror".)

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 6d

That's fascinating. That use of "fantasy" as a broad term fell completely out of use in the 1960s, as far as I know. (My early paperbacks of Zelazny's Amber series describe themselves as "science fiction" in the cover copy.)

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 6d

"...Other divisions of fantasy in addition to the three above have been proposed but are not generally recognized, so that the whole field remains somewhat arbitrarily divided among these three."

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 6d

Apropos of random discussion, I was flipping through Fancyclopedia 2 (published 1959) and came across:

"FANTASY As a general term, describes the whole field of science-fiction, pure fantasy, and weird fiction; it's also used as synonymous with "pure" fantasy.”

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 6d

Also, specular glass effects on a comic-book-themed app are just silly. Turned 'em all off. This icon looks like *paper*.

(To be fair, the effects will look great on the Pocket Storm icon.)

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 6d

But wow, this document-with-parameter-variations UI is not easy to grasp. If I hadn't already figured out Xcode Interface Builder, *and* done all these icon variations by hand last year, I would not know what the hell I was looking at.

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 6d

Status: Dinking around with Icon Composer (for iOS apps).

Throwing away 40+ PNG files for different icon size/light/dark/tinted/aaagghh is a huge win. I was able to replace them with one IC layered document that does the same thing.

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 6d

Also, EA's board has zero belief that the company could do better on its own. That's the bit which stands out for me. They looked at their spreadsheets and said "Could we grow 15% in the next few years? No. No chance."

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 7d

Repeating this week's Myst news: a remaster of the “Making of Myst" video that was released (as a super-squished Quicktime file) on the 1993 Mac Myst CD-ROM.

blog.zarfhome.com/2025/10/maki...

www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBtL...

The Making of Myst, remastered

Bit of news on the historic preservation front. Cyan has posted the

blog.zarfhome.com

Reposted by Andrew Plotkin

Cyan Worlds @cyan.com · 7d

Check out this amazing remastered (at 4k!) version of "The Making of Myst" mini-doc! Originally included on the Myst CD-ROM in 1993, this version has been carefully recreated by Ted Sase using footage preserved by the VGHF!
https://youtu.be/xBtLZDPnYlM

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 10d

The rest of the current batch of game reviews.

- Strange Antiquities
- Daymare Town
- The House of Tesla

blog.zarfhome.com/2025/09/post...

Post-equinoctial adventure games

Continued from previous post. I finished all of these! Sometimes with hints. Strange Antiquities Daymare Town The House of Tesla Strange Antiquities by Bad Viking -- game site A worthy sequel to Stran...

blog.zarfhome.com

Andrew Plotkin @eblong.com · 11d

That's a lovely write-up; thank you.

(I love the player garb idea, as presented in the photos.)