Winners of the 1998 IFComp

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1st place

Photopia

Cover art for Photopia

Adam Cadre

This work also won 1st place in the 1998 Miss Congeniality Awards.

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2nd place

Muse: An Autumn Romance

Cover art for Muse: An Autumn Romance

Christopher Huang

Early September, 1886. Autumn. The Victorian Era. The Rev. Dawson, 59, is off to the Continent and an unexpected Romance...

This work also won 3rd place in the 1998 Miss Congeniality Awards.

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3rd place

The Plant

Cover art for The Plant

Michael J. Roberts

You're on a business trip with your boss, driving down a deserted highway in the middle of nowhere, when the car breaks down. You set off on foot seeking help, but you soon find yourself in the middle of a shocking conspiracy in a dangerous industrial complex. Can you penetrate the decades-old cover-up and reveal the secrets that might forever change the world?

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4th place

Arrival, or Attack of the B-Movie Clichés


5th place

Enlightenment

Cover art for Enlightenment

Taro Ogawa

The intepid Adventurer has escaped the caverns. Nought remains to block a successful escape but this troll here. Hmmm. A one-room adventure. The author recommends this for people who grew up on Zork II and Advent, and begs people choosing their first piece of IF to play to look at other IF (preferably good IF!).

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6th place

Mother Loose

Cover art for Mother Loose

Irene Callaci

It's been one of those days. It started out bad and just got worse: You're seven years old and in trouble a lot. You try to be good and to do as you ought, but nothing, it seems, goes exactly as planned. For instance, today things got quite out of hand: you poured your own milk, but it spilled on the floor; the cat wanted out just as you slammed the door; you didn't remember to turn off the faucet; your brother, poor thing, is still locked in the closet. But that wasn't all. No, indeed. Did I mention that things got much worse? They did. Pay attention: you're lost and alone and nothing's familiar. You wander around for a while until you're ready to panic. Then, out of the blue, an egg on a fence asks for help--and from you!

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7th place

Little Blue Men

Cover art for Little Blue Men

Michael S. Gentry

This game is a joke. This game is a warning. This game is a satire. This game is inspired in equal parts by Vaclav Havel's "The Memorandum" and Hunter S. Thompson's "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas". This game is a big, stupid shaggy dog story.

This work also won 2nd place in the 1998 Miss Congeniality Awards.

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8th place

Trapped in a One-Room Dilly

Laura Knauth

A one-room game. It's nicely appointed, but...

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9th place

Persistence of Memory


10th place

Downtown Tokyo, Present Day

John Kean

In this game you actually play two people - one is the real you, sitting in the dark in a movie theatre, and the other is the hero of the film that you are watching. Originally conceived for Adam Cadre's infamous Chicken-Comp of June 1998 (spot the chicken-crossing-the-road).

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11th place

Informatory

William J. Shlaer

You feel like weeping; you might as well have stayed by the slit in the stream bed and waited for plate tectonics to widen it. You are in front of that all too familiar white house again! Replay the beginnings of Adventure/Zork, with a few twists...

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12th place

Ritual of Purification

Jarek Sobolewski

Tha' art a magician, embarked on an astral projection. Danger. Romance, perhaps. Learning, maybe...

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13th place

The City

Sam Barlow

"An interactive short experience." This game is intended not as an exploration or a challenge, more as a situation. Stylistically interesting for its lack of banners, opening-titles, location-headers, status-line and meta-verbs such as "save".

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14th place

Where Evil Dwells

Steve Owens and Paul T. Johnson

A few short hours ago you were in your private investigator's office sleeping- er, concentrating hard on your work when a frightened young girl named Elizabeth came to you with a sinister tale.

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15th place

Purple

Stefan Blixt

Another Earth, another time. War. Disaster. Death. Air travel.

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16th place

Four in One


17th place

Research Dig

Chris Armitage

An apparently straight-forward archeological research dig at an old English churchyard leads to something not quite the norm...

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18th place

CC


19th place

Spacestation

David Ledgard

Based on the example transcript that came with Infocom's "Stationfall", with extensions and improvements, of course.

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20th place

Cattus Atrox

David Cornelson @david_cornelson

A promising date devolves into violence, sex, more violence.

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21st place

In the Spotlight

John Byrd

A one-room game with one major puzzle. Tie two strings together. Simple?

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22nd place

Lightiania


23rd place

Acid Whiplash

Ryan Stevens and Cody Sandifer

Tooth beavers, hermits, phallic-shaped dust tomatos. Billed a living memorial to the wit, style, and unintentional genius of Rybread Celsius by Cody Sandifer.

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24th place

I Didn't Know You Could Yodel

Andrew J. Indovina and Michael Eisenman

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25th place

Fifteen

Ricardo Dague

You stand in the kitchen. Sigh! Yet another darn treasure hunt game! Modeled after Scott Adams's "Adventureland." Dedicated to Sam Loyd (1841-1911), inventor of the 15-puzzle.

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26th place

The Commute


27th place

Human Resources Stories

Harry M. Hardjono

A state-of-the-art job interview for a position as computer programmer.

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The organizer of the 1998 Annual Interactive Fiction Competition was David Dyte.