Playing English

日本語 | English

Playing

ZORKERB I and ZORKERB II are text adventures played, as the originals, by typing English commands. This page covers the command forms, common commands, and saving and restoring.

Command forms

Commands are short English sentences. Case does not matter.

Form	Examples
Verb only	look, inventory, wait
Verb and object	take lamp, open door, read leaflet
Verb, object and preposition	put coins in case, attack troll with sword, unlock grate with key
Several objects	take all, take lamp and sword, take all but sword
Several commands	open mailbox. take leaflet, north then east
Orders to a character	name the character, as in tell robot to ...

In the included games, input is parsed with the original story's dictionary and syntax rules. Unknown words get I don't know the word "...". As in the originals, words are matched by their first six letters.

Common commands

Command	Meaning
look (l)	Describe the surroundings
examine object	Look at an object (x is not in the originals' dictionaries)
inventory (i)	List what you carry
north, south, east, west, up, down, ne, nw, se, sw (also n, s and so on)	Move
take object, drop object	Pick up, put down
open object, close object	Open, close
turn on lamp	Light the lamp
again (g)	Repeat the last command
oops word	Replace the unknown word in the last input
score	Show the score and moves
verbose, brief, superbrief	How much of a room description to show
diagnose	Check your health
version	Show the original's release information

When the game asks "What do you want to ...?", you can answer with just the object's name.

Saving and restoring

To	Type
save	save (slot 0), save 3 (slot 3)
restore during play	restore, restore 3
restore from the title screen	1, then the slot number

• A successful save or restore prints Ok., a failed one Failed.. Where the originals ask for a file name, the ports use slot numbers 0 to 9.
• save without a number overwrites slot 0.
• With PyEmuera, saves are written to .pyemuera/saves/ inside the game folder (for example ZORKERB-I/.pyemuera/saves/). Each game keeps its own saves.
• A damaged save or one of another game is not loaded; during play this prints Failed. and nothing changes.
• Saves of the originals (Quetzal) are not compatible.

Differences between the games:

	ZORKERB I	ZORKERB II
Saves of earlier revisions	Save format 29. Saves from r29 load; saves from r28 and earlier are rejected	First public release; there are no earlier revisions

Starting over and quitting

Type	Effect
restart	Start over after a confirmation
quit	Quit after a confirmation

After dying or winning you choose RESTART, RESTORE or QUIT, as in the originals.

Random numbers

Combat, characters and other events use random numbers, drawn at the same places and in the same order as in the originals.

The originals' debugging command #random number switches to the Z-machine's predictable random mode; the same input then gives the same random sequence as the original.

	ZORKERB I	ZORKERB II
Numbers	1 to 999 (sequential mode)	1 to 999 sequential mode; 1000 and above use the same generator as the Frotz used for comparison

The originals' own instructions

In ZORKERB I, the leaflet in the mailbox (read leaflet) explains how to play.