#andrew plotkin

On the whole, it was worth the trip. The plains really were broad and grain-gold, if scarred with fences and agricultural crawlers. The mountains were overwhelming. And however much of the capital city is crusted with squat brick and faceless concrete hulks, there are still flashes of its historic charm. You've seen spires above the streets -- tiny green parks below tenements -- hidden jewels of fountains beyond walls. Any bland alley can conceal balconies wrought into iron gardens, fiery mosaics, a tree or bed of flowers nurtured by who knows who. This alley, however, is a total washout. It ends in flat bare dirty brick, and you've found nothing but a door which lacks even the courtesy of a handle. Maybe you should call it a day.

The clear reading of this code (as the screenshot says) is that the inventory limit in Zork 1 is random, not a fixed number of items. Each item you pick up makes it more likely that you'll hit a "holding too many things" error. But since it's a random chance, you can just try again -- it might work next time.

This was passed around in a commentary cloud of "This game was unfair," "games in the 80s were terrible," and so on. (See this NeoGAF thread, for example.)

This is fascinating! I played Zork, as I played all the Infocom games, and I didn't remember this inventory detail. It felt dimly familiar when I was reminded of it, though.

Research time!

This chamber is not hexagonal, but it reminds you of a hexagon in all directions, if that makes sense. Perhaps it doesn't.