This is the tiniest of nitpicks, but it doesn’t support Glulx, it supports the Z-machine. (The compiler optimizes much more heavily than Inform, so I don’t believe any Dialog work has ever hit the Z-machine’s limits.)
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The horns have sounded; the Free IF Playoffs’ Division Finals are over! Here are the highlights:
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For Division 1, 3rd-seeded Superluminal Vagrant Twin surprised most fans submitting predictions by even being present – in fact, despite its superior seed ranking, about three-quarters predicted that it would lose its Round 3 match against Lost Pig. Nonetheless, it stepped onto the field ready to rumble with 5th-seeded The Wizard Sniffer, another verb-restricted parser work which was just as determined to root out a victory. An early lead earned by the pig-themed contestant began to shrink around the end of Day 1, and by the time the first quarter was finished, the two had drawn even at 10-10. There they remained, locked in an exhausting struggle until the last day of the match, when Superluminal jumped past the challenger’s defenses to score two final goals and win the match at 12-10. The Wizard Sniffer, winner of the IF Comp and five XYZZY Awards in 2017 (including both Best Game and Best Story), was the second and final competing entry by author Buster Hudson. New fans of Hudson’s may wish to check out Oppositely Opal, another highly-rated work by the same author. We salute the tournament’s most successful pig-oriented entry and its author as they retire from the field.
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For Division 2, top seed Counterfeit Monkey finally faced an opponent in the same weight class: #4 seed Worldsmith. Any speculation that the Top 100’s reigning champion might face trouble in this match was quickly shown to be baseless as it proceeded to run up a large lead over the course of the first day, scoring ten points to the challenger’s three – a better margin than it had seen since its opening performance in Round 1. This was extended to a 12-3 lead by the end of the first quarter, after which the champion seemed content to have finished warming up for its post-division matches. A surprising vote switch away from the leader caused barely a stumble, and Counterfeit Monkey scored again on the last day to secure the victory at 12-4. Worldsmith, a formerly-commercial work and the only one competing from author Ade McTavish, has finished its run in the tournament but remains firmly among the top 1/16th of 1% of works across the history of the form. We salute the author’s multimedia innovations and the game’s performance as they depart the field.
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For Division 3, the 1990s classic Spider and Web went toe-to-toe with relative newcomer Repeat the Ending. Despite being placed adjacently in the seed rankings, fan predictions universally favored the spy thriller to win, and only half of submitting fans expected the self-designated “slice of life” work to make it this far. As it has done throughout the tournament, Spider and Web started strong and took an early lead, but in an echo of its Round 3 match, challenger Repeat the Ending was soon hot on its heels and caught up by the end of Day 1 at 9-9. Before another day had elapsed, the defender had pulled a pair of goals from its bag of tricks, ending the quarter ahead at 11-9. A second quarter goal by the challenger showed that the match still had life left in it, but a third quarter vote switch upset the matchup’s delicate equilibrium and left Spider and Web a few steps ahead. Although the challenger picked up two more points on the final day of the match, the defender also scored again, and when the whistle blew the score stood at 13-11 in Spider and Web’s favor. Repeat the Ending is the first and only IF released by author Drew Cook, and its run in the tournament was extraordinary for a debut work. We salute it and its author as they exit the arena.
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In the far court, #2 seed Anchorhead vied with #12 seed Savoir-Faire for the Division 4’s title. The two games were originally written in I6, and both of these works from the turn of the century echo through the ages to today. It’s almost certain that long-standing opinions drove the majority of votes for one or the other, and the first surge propelled the horror classic to a lead of 9-3 in the early hours of the match. The challenger quickly proved that it knew what it was doing, however, and closed the gap to just two points at 10-8 by the end of the first day. Though the logical magic puzzler continued to press for victory, Anchorhead was able to maintain a lead throughout the match’s remaining days, and it ended ahead at 13-9. Savoir-Faire is the third entry to be eliminated by author Emily Short, who had an unequaled four works competing at the start of the tournament. Her remaining entry, Counterfeit Monkey, which just took the Division 1 title, is already contending against Superluminal Vagrant Twin in the Round 5 tournament semi-finals.
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What an end to the segment! Votes aplenty poured out of hiding in the last twelve hours, making for an exciting finish to Round 5. A quick overview of the highlights:
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In the near court, #3 seed Superluminal Vagrant Twin took its best shot at Counterfeit Monkey and did surprisingly well against the seemingly invincible Atlantean puzzler. It took an early lead out of the gate, and after Monkey caught up at 4-4 it rocketed ahead again. In past segments, the tournament’s top seed has never had to work so hard – but work hard it did, soon pulling even at 8-8. Amazingly, Superluminal regained the lead a third time, surprising just about every onlooker as the match moved into second half of Day 1. By the end of the first day, however, calamity struck: An anonymous vote switch stole the challenger’s momentum and, in combination with another vote for the defender, left it down two at 10-8. The two opponents circled warily, scoring no goals, for the next two days, but a brief exchange in the last half day went in Counterfeit Monkey’s favor, and it secured the win with a final score of 12-9. Superluminal Vagrant Twin, which won the XYZZY Awards for Best Game and Best Implementation in 2016 and has appeared high in the last two editions of the Interactive Fiction Top 50 of All Time, was the second and final competing entry by C. E. J. Pacian, a pioneer in the limited parser format. We salute this king of its class and the author who produced it, and they retire from the playing field amid cheers and applause from the crowd.
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In the far court, #27 seed Spider and Web locked horns with #2 seed Anchorhead. Both games were originally released before the turn of the century and written in Inform 6, though an I7 version of Anchorhead was later published. Despite the disparity in seed rankings, players of the prediction game strongly favored the classic spy thriller, with three-quarters of them betting that it would win against the Lovecraftian interactive novella. After the starting pistol was fired, both games played strong on offense, and a rapid give-and-take of goals in the first few hours ran the score up to 5-5 without a clear leader. Spider and Web began to flag at that point, and in the next five hours Anchorhead pulled in a run of unopposed votes that put it ahead at 9-5. The challenger didn’t give up, and it kept scoring goals over the next two days, but most of these were matched by the defender, and with less than one full day left on the clock it was still behind 11-8. A last minute pair of goals brought it close to the leader at 11-10, but the defender matched those as well and finished the game at 13-11. Spider and Web was (perhaps suprisingly) the only competing entry written by Andrew Plotkin, who is one of the three most important people in modern IF. He has repeatedly extended the boundaries of the form in ways large and small, in terms of both gameplay and underlying technology. In addition, he has been extremely generous in sharing the fruits of his innovative efforts with the rest of the community – most especially the Glulx virtual machine, on which nearly every modern parser game runs. Spider and Web won a total of five XYZZY Awards in 1998: for Best Game, Best Puzzles, Best Individual Puzzle, Best Individual NPC and Best Use of Medium, and it is widely considered to contain the single greatest puzzle ever devised. It has appeared in every edition of the Interactive Fiction Top 50 of All Time, with positions ranging from 1st place to 4th. We salute this incomparable work and its incomparable author as they retire honorably from the arena to thunderous applause from the stands.
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The Free IF Playoffs are over! Counterfeit Monkey has won the title, but not without effort. It started the match ahead of opponent Anchorhead but temporarily lost its lead – a first in the history of its performance in the tournament – when, after a grueling and sustained effort, the challenger tied the game at 11-11 near the start of the second half. More fans soon responded, returning the defender to the frontrunner position at 13-11. A last-minute goal by Anchorhead left it achingly close to a tie at 13-12, but in the end the tournament’s top seed has prevailed against all comers and added another laurel to its already tremendously decorated career.
Anchorhead was the #2 seed for the tournament, and like its opponent it shares the same position as its seed number on the IFDB Top 100 list – all other entrants place lower on the Top 100 list than their seed ranking due to the presence of commercial games. Its debut on the scene was strangely muted given its eventual positioning in the pantheon of great IF: While nominated for six XYZZY Awards in 1998, it won only Best Setting. However, its critical and popular responses have ensured it a place in every edition of Interactive Fiction Top 50 of All Time (with rankings ranging from 2nd to 4th), plus it was rated #1 in a Top 5 IF Games list published by Adventure Gamers in 2002. Although later re-released commercially in an illustrated Inform 7 version, the Inform 6 original showed here that it still has staying power. Author Michael Gentry had no other competing works in the tournament, and he has written relatively few works of IF. Fans are encouraged to check out his introductory piece for children, The Lost Islands of Alabaz. We salute this game and its author as they retire honorably from the field, swarmed by supporting fans.
About top seed Counterfeit Monkey and its author, there is far too much to say than can fit within a quick paragraph. The game took five XYZZY Awards in 2012, including Best Game, Best Puzzles, Best Setting, Best Individual PC, and Best Implementation. It has appeared in every edition of the Interactive Fiction Top 50 of All Time since its release, rocketing to the #3 spot in the 2015 edition and staying firmly in the #1 spot for years 2019 and 2023. Author Emily Short has written numerous well-received works in her career, both short format and long, many of which represent significant advances in artistic style and/or depth of implementation. Among many others, these include Metamorphoses, Galatea, Pytho’s Mask, Best of Three, A Day for Fresh Sushi, Glass, Floatpoint, Bee, First Draft of the Revolution, and The Mary Jane of Tomorrow, as well as the three (three!) other entries of hers that competed within this tournament: Savoir-Faire, City of Secrets and Bronze. In addition to her activity as an author, Short has contributed heavily to the development of Inform 7, having written the large majority of examples in the Recipe Book and undoubtedly exerting more than an average amount of influence on the shape of the language as it is developed by her spouse, Graham Nelson. We salute this leading light in the field and her exemplary work as they take the winner’s stand to receive the tournament trophy.
As a final note, the organizer would like to thank @mathbrush for volunteering his excellent compare-and-contrast reviews of the lineups in each segment, @AmandaB for her exemplary behavior as a participating author and fan, the authors of games winning upset victories who provided very interesting answers to my hastily-prepared interview questions (including AmandaB, @jnelson, @peccable, @dibianca, mathbrush and @J_J_Guest), the members of FIFP Fans for showing their support for this impromptu forum game and participating in various mid-game polls, and every other fan for their positive commentary on games and sustained interest in voting – it quite literally wouldn’t have been possible without all of you.
Thanks for playing!
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This was fun to watch. I’ve written it up on IFWiki, for posterity. Apologies in advance for any transcription errors.
(@otistdog, hope you don’t mind my pinching your graphics for the wiki.)
Did you really flip a GET LAMP coin for the draws, as the graphics suggest?
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Not at all.
Yes. The official observer’s comment upon seeing the coin was “This is very nerdy.”
And it does turn up heads/lantern about as often as would be expected, despite the fact that every flip in the tournament came up tails/compass.
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When I first came across the playoffs I thought the idea was neat but the results might be not so surprising. The audience of IFDB and this forum is very similar; shouldn’t the results of every poll be very predictable based on those scores?
More dynamic than expected! I think for two reasons:
- Asking someone which of two games is better is a bit different than asking someone to give each of them a star rating and then comparing the ratings. Mathbrush has given us great rundown of this.
- The “only vote if you’ve played both games” restriction gives things an interesting spin. Of course some folks have played everything, and some folks played a bunch of games just to vote, but those weirdos[1] aside, the voting public is the sort of people who have chosen to play both games. Like, if I see a good rating for A Beauty Cold and Austere on IFDB, that means a person who thinks a math-themed puzzler sounded interesting enough to play liked this particular one… but if I see a vote for it in this comp, it means that someone who thought they might enjoy a biblical murder mystery liked the math even better.
Anyways just a thought I had. Thanks to the organizer!
(affectionate) ↩︎
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Worse ways to go out than losing to Eat me!
Turandot was 2nd in the 2019 IF Comp, though, not the Top 50 of all time (which was in fact held before the game was released).
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How very embarrassing! My apologies for the error; I must have flubbed a copy-and-paste operation when transferring notes to summary.
Fixed above.
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