I wonder how long before someone hooks up AI image generation for the scenes with this. It could either be very tastefully done or complete slop. Probably the second option.
Microsoft makes Zork open-source
51–60 of 256 posts
Re: Microsoft makes Zork open-source
#52Re: Microsoft makes Zork open-source
#53It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
I wonder if grue was taken from Nelson Goodman's Fact, Fiction, and Forecast . https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_riddle_of_induction
Yes. Because it is pitch black and therefore you can not determine it's color (plus, the fact that you haven't been eaten by one yet does not justify the conclusion that you won't be). It's also a play on Gardener's "unexpected hanging paradox".
Re: Microsoft makes Zork open-source
#54Why does Microsoft own the rights to Zork?
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Re: Microsoft makes Zork open-source
#55I wonder how long before someone hooks up AI image generation for the scenes with this. It could either be very tastefully done or complete slop. Probably the second option.
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Re: Microsoft makes Zork open-source
#56So derivative works are possible, who will be the first to attach Zork to the OpenAI API?
I love the idea that these can live forever in apt/rpm repositories.
Re: Microsoft makes Zork open-source
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
The others don't seem to have the MIT license pullreq added, so they are not open source; the source code is merely available. The repos have a note: "This collection is meant for education, discussion, and historical work, allowing researchers and students to study how code was made for these interactive fiction games and how the system dealt with input and processing. It is not considered to be under an open licens…
Yeah the code was leaked without Activision's permission a few years ago. It's strange to me that Microsoft has taken this opportunity to clear up the rights to Zork 1-3 but not to the rest of the Infocom back catalog. The other games haven't been available for sale since the mid 90s when Activision put out a shovelware CD collection containing every Infocom game except Hitchhiker's and Shogun, so it's not like they…
> It's strange to me that Microsoft has taken this opportunity to clear up the rights to Zork 1-3 but not to the rest of the Infocom back catalog.
Likely explanation: their lawyers are worried there may be third party rights or agreements limiting their ability to open source a game – even if that isn't true, lawyers want to see paperwork to convince themselves it isn't true. For Zork, that was comparatively easy because the game's history is well-known, and Activision had a history of releasing sequels. For other games, that may be more difficult – so start with the lowest hanging and highest profile fruit.
Re: Microsoft makes Zork open-source
#58I wonder how long before someone hooks up AI image generation for the scenes with this. It could either be very tastefully done or complete slop. Probably the second option.
In the early days of LLMs I tried it, but it was kinda terrible, and I also realised that the fun of these games, like reading a book, was the imagining of the action. Take that away and they are very simple puzzle games
Re: Microsoft makes Zork open-source
#59So derivative works are possible, who will be the first to attach Zork to the OpenAI API?
It seems likely that the entirety of Zork (world state and the possible actions to transform it) is already learned by the model. Which means that there is a grue in there, too. Not good. I’m starting to re-think the doomer argument...
Re: Microsoft makes Zork open-source
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
Zork was originally written at MIT for PDP-10s in an obscure Lisp dialect (MDL). The authors then later formed a company to sell the game on micro-computers. To do it, they built a virtual machine optimized for this purpose, a new Lisp dialect (ZIL) that could compile to the virtual machine, and the ported the game over to that new dialect. Even so, they had to split the game into three parts to fit. The source you'r…
MDL was a dialect of lisp invented by/in part/under Sussman, the originator of Scheme and SICP; what you're calling an obscure dialect was was part of the continuum of a research trajectory, one of a number of experimental languages designed to test out ideas. Sussman got his PhD in 1973 so we're talking about his later work as a student/early work as a postdoc/assistant professor, and Abelson was in the same timefra…
Was go to say - MIT, dec-10: probably not obscure.