As I hinted at an Inform 6 port earlier, I thought I should give an update.
I’ve done an enhanced version in Inform 6. By ‘enhanced’, I mean fixing all the bugs, full sentence parser, ability to examine objects (including scenery), proper doors and containers, support for UNDO, ability to save and restore from within the game and so on.
The puzzles, scoring, wandering monsters, resurrection and the bulk of the original text are maintained, although there’s a few things that I may still change. For example, the resurrection seems pretty pointless, as you can only be resurrected twice and each time you’re resurrected, your belongings are scattered at random. Because of the resurrection mechanism, you can’t undo on death. Personally, I’d prefer the undo, as you get killed a lot in this game and resurrection costs you 10 points.
I’d also like to improve the hint system to ‘smart’ hints. The current system is quite cumbersome and costs you 5 points per hint, but the hint might tell you something that you’ve already done.
The enhancements aren’t finished yet and it hasn’t been tested. I’ve had to put it on hold for a few months because of various game jams and competitions, but I’ll try to get back to it later this year. As the port is 40 years overdue, I didn’t think a few extra months would matter.
As this is a derivative work, I’ll also have to make some enquires about permissions and so on, so as not to upset the original authors.