Z-Machines

Infocom used a scripting language for its games that many subsequent creators of Interactive Fiction have also used.

On the pages on this site where we provide z-machine games, we use a Java z-machine interpreter to display those games to you. On the one hand, that's great, because it means you can play the game in-browser. On the other hand, it sucks, because you can't save your progress. (For security reasons, in-browser Java doesn't let any data get transmitted to your hard drive.)

And it also potentially sucks because Microsoft and Sun had a pissing match a while back, and Java isn't automatically installed on all computers any more. If you need Java, you can get it here.

If you want to save your progress, you can--but you need to install a z-machine interpreter to your computer, and use it to open the game's file. Here are the interpreters we recommend:

• For Windows: WindowsFrotzInstaller
  
• For Mac: Zoom 1.0.5
  
• For -nix: Frotz2.42.tar.gz

For every game that can use a z-machine interpreter, we provide a Download link in the left column (under Demos). Click that, download the file, then open it with your installed interpreter. You won't be subject to our ads while playing (darn!), so we don't get any money (double darn!), but you'll be able to save your progress and continue even if you shut your computer down (aah!).