<!--
	Title: A Mind Forever Voyaging
	Author: Shay Addams
	Source: QuestBusters, v2(10)
	Date: November 1985
	Transcription by Steve Derby
-->

The freewheeling humor of Steve "Planetfall" Meretzky is notably missing in the
first of Infocom's Interactive Fiction Plus line, and appropriately so. For the story portrays a
harrowing vision of the future, a window into an alternative world that seems all too possible
a reality, a first-hand look at what might happen if religious cults and right-wing
politicians team up to take over the government. As effective social commentary,
*AMFV* may be the first work of interactive fiction to also qualify as interactive literature.

However, this is not your standard "look rock" adventure, for few conventional puzzles
await the logical-minded mavens of adventuredom. Instead, Meretzky has
composed another sort of adventure, one with a new perspective on interaction that makes
this experience more like reading a book. Of course, you are still the protagonist.

<h2 class="center">RYDER'S ON THE STORM</h2>

The story opens in the year 2031, where you've just been "awoken" by Dr. Perelman
and have learned for the first time that you are actually PRISM, the world's first computer
that thinks like a human. This was made possible by software that runs a simulation of
everything that happens to a human from birth. Your ongoing simulation of the life of
Perry Simms has been prematurely disturbed so you can run another simulation, one that
will project the long-range effects of The Plan.

The brainchild of redneck Senator Ryder, The Plan aims to "eliminate moral decay" and
restore America's respect as a world power. Oh, and to save the world from imminent
destruction by terrorists armed with pocketsized nuclear bombs and other neat examples
of tomorrow's high-tech community.

When you enter simulation mode, you assume the role of Perry Simms, who lives in
the city of Rockvil tens years after adoption of the Plan. With a recorder, you can observe
the Plan's effects and report them back to Dr. Perelman. Your recorded data from the first
run indicates the Plan will have beneficial effects, so it is adopted and part two begins.
As the game progresses through four stages, you'll be running simulations depicting life
10, 20, 30, 40, 50 and 60 years in the future.

During the simulations, the game follows the usual adventure format of walking around,
examining things -- but you'll find no treasures of gold or jade to loot, and the key to
the only locked door is already in your pocket. The reward is knowledge, gained by
witnessing the changes in the daily life of Rockvil's citizens. Meretzky's vision of the
future -- the futures, really -- paints a thought-provoking picture, one that makes *AMFV*
the *1984* of interactive fiction.

<h2 class="center">ON THE MODE AGAIN</h2>

After exiting simulation mode, you become PRISM again. While you're PRISM, not
Perry, the game often feels like *Suspended*, minus the robots. You can't walk around to
investigate the situation, but must enter communications mode to observe things in
different parts of the building or to talk to people, or into library mode to read files on
current events like the emergence of the Church of God, a new federal police agency
and other topics. Interlace mode enables you to operate various peripherals attached to
PRISM: with one, you can control the building's ventilation and heating, another
maintains world-wide traffic schedules.

By part three, your simulations have led to controversy and a National Guard takeover of
the building. You're forced to do something, not just wander around and take notes for
Perelman, or you'll be shut down -- and we all know that sinking feeling when the computer
dies in the middle of a program. These situations are the only real puzzles, and they're
not as difficult as Infocom's "Advanced" rating suggests. It's far easier that *Hitchhiker*,
which was rated as a "Standard" level game.

With all the extra memory (128K is required to play this game), Meretzky has
ample space for extensive prose passages. The parser has been outfitted with a
remarkable feature called oops. If the parser tells you "I don't know the word 'interfaxe',
you can type "oops interface" and the parser automatically inserts the correction into your
previous command. This saves retyping the entire command, consequently sparing fast but
sloppy typists like Shay Addams a considerable amount of time. In other areas,
the parser is more sophisticated (though once I caught it eating peas with a knife) than that of
other Infocom games. Usually these are subtle things. If you say "transmit buffer," it
now asks "worlds news buffer, special report buffer, or record buffer?" rather than just
saying "which buffer?". With these enhancements, Infocom clearly heads the pack
in the parser department, once again setting a new standard by which others will be
measured. (If only it could be retro-fitted into programs with less than 128K -- but face it, as
48K was once the memory standard and 64K is for the moment, the day of 128K is
rounding the far turn and closing fast).

This game is sure to spark diverse reactions: veterans may say it's not hard
enough, reviewers and maybe a few English lit. professors will debate its literary merit, the
FBI will launch a full-scale investigation of Infocom's political background (only kidding
with that last one, folks). While I enjoyed the story's unique qualities, I felt it was over all
too quickly -- a fast read that would have had more play-value if the first two parts of the
game had been a bit more difficult. Even so, Interactive Fiction Plus, as Infocom calls this
new line, has a promising future, a future much closer at hand than any of the futures
envisioned by Meretzky in this game.

<hr style="border-top: 4px double;">

**Computer:** 128K Home Computers (512K for Macs)<br>
**Skill Level:** Novice/Intermediate</br>
**Price:** $44.95<br>
**Manufacturer:** Infocom
