A Mind Forever Voyaging (Infocom, 1985)

Few computer games have ever achieved as much on as many different levels as A Mind Forever Voyaging. One of the most distinct and powerful computer novels written by Infocom or any other company, AMFV is a masterful piece of science-fiction writing by one of the industry's best-ever authors, Steve Meretzky. As a sentient computer in the socially troubled year of 2031, it is your responsibility to enter a simulation of the future to test a plan for renewed national prosperity. Yet, despite your stated goals of determining the appropriateness of this plan, the game deals every bit as much with personal exploration and the questions of what determines your life and your reality. Packed full of some of the most detailed writing and developed characters ever found in a computer game, puzzles are few and far between. Though this works to the game's benefit, the main series of puzzles (near the end of the game) do not flow as smoothly from the exploration parts of the game as they could have. Yet, the game never ceases to work, amaze, and enthrall throughout, which makes the game's ending--possibly the best ever presented in a computer game--seem all the more magical and special. A landmark title, yet one that never received the recognition from the public it so richly deserved, no one should miss A Mind Forever Voyaging.

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