Staying with the recent Zork theme here - I happened across this short video of this nifty little device created by Jonathan M. Guberman - the Automatypewriter. Guberman added various technical bits to the back of a real typewriter along with a USB interface to communicate with a computer that in effect allows you to play Zork (and presumably other IF titles as well) directly on the typewriter! You type in your commands, the typewriter recognizes them as if it were a keyboard, and then it self-types the computer output response. See him play a couple of minutes of Zork on it below. And if you want to check out his explanation of the tech details of the device you can check that out HERE.
A new way to interact with fiction from Jonathan M. Guberman on Vimeo.
I just heard something about this the other day. That's a unique way to play Infocom games!
ReplyDeleteWhat a lovely contraption. Obviously a Frobboz magical creation.
ReplyDelete