our games. It was more difficult and less cost effective to need to copy a bunch of pack-
age elements as well as the floppy disk. Also, because the packages were so neat and so
integral to the experience of playing the game, many people wouldn’t have felt they
owned the game unless they owned the complete original packaging.
The next games wereZork IIIandStarcross.Zork IIIjust went in a blister pack to
match its brethren, butStarcrosswas placed in a large plastic flying saucer, along with
an asteroid map of your ship’s vicinity. This package, while problematic for some stores
because of its size and shape, was phenomenally eye-catching and popular. Recently, a
still-shrink-wrapped copy ofStarcrossin this original packaging sold forthree thousand
dollarson eBay.
My favorite package of all the ones that I worked on wasLGOP, with its scratch ’n’
sniff card and 3D comic. The comic was a collaboration between me, a comic book art-
ist, and a guy who specialized in translating conventional 2D comic drawings into 3D
layers. For the scratch ’n’ sniff card, I got several dozen samples from the company that
made the scents. Each was on its own card with the name of the scent. So one by one I
had other Infocom employees come in, and I’d blindfold them and let them scratch each
scent and try to identify it. That way, I was able to choose the seven most recognizable
scents for the package. It was a lot of fun seeing what thoughts the various scents trig-
gered in people, such as the person who was sniffing the mothballs card and got a silly
grin on his face and said, “My grandmother’s attic!”
We, the implementors, had pretty wide latitude on the choice of package elements,
as long as we stayed within budgetary parameters. But marketing often had good ideas
too, suggesting that my idea for a book inZork Zerobecome a calendar, and suggesting
things like the creepy rubber bug in theLurking Horrorpackage. But most of the best
ideas came from the writers.
The best package pieces were those that were designed in from the beginning of
the game, rather than tacked on as an afterthought once the packaging process started
in mid-alpha. Most other game companies had anti-piracy copy protection in their pack-
ages, but it was often completely obvious and mood-destroying, such as “Type the
seventh word on page 91 of the manual.” With the better Infocom package elements,
you never even realized that you were involved in an anti-piracy activity, because the
package elements were so seamlessly intertwined with the gameplay. And, of course,
in the all-text environments of our games, the package elements were a great way to
add visual pizzazz to the game-playing experience.
There seems to have been a clear difference between Infocom games and the
games the rest of the industry offered, especially in terms of a consistent level
of quality. Why do you think this was? How was this quality maintained?
Partly, it was the very early philosophy of Infocom, and even before Infocom, in the cre-
ation ofZork, which was to take a fun game,Adventure, but do it better. So there was
always a strong desire to be the best. Also, partly it was because the people who made
up Infocom were just a really smart and talented group of people. And partly it was luck.
We had early success, so when we created each new game we could invest a lot of time
and money into it, knowing that its sales would justify the investment, while many
other companies couldn’t assume that level of sales and therefore couldn’t afford the
same level of investment.
Chapter 10: Interview: Steve Meretzky 187