Frotz

By Deborah Armstrong, 6 July, 2011

Forum
iOS and iPadOS Gaming
If you like text adventures, let me recommend Frotz, an open-source Z-machine interpreter for iDevices. You can download hundreds of text adventure games, and it is just like playing infocom games of the past. Except for downloading new games, you can use Frotz in Airplane mode. I particularly find text adventures useful for helping me build up typing speed and skill on the integrated keyboard. I often play a game in the para transit van during my long commute and I haven't gotten around to needing an external keyboard for my iPod yet, simply because I got so much typing practice that way. Frotz gives you access to the interactive fiction archive, so you don't need to transfer games to it via iTunes. You simply browse through the archive and download any game that sounds interesting. Once the game is on your device you can play it any time without further need to access a network connection.

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Comments

By LadyMunch on Friday, July 1, 2011 - 03:57

The hitch hiker's Guide to the Galaxy Text Game is supposed to be really fun. Unfortunately, I couldn't get my brain to speak Syntax, so I left it in the dust. That attempt was made on a clunky windows laptop years ago, and I haven't tried it on an iPhone.

By Pat Pound on Friday, July 1, 2011 - 03:57

I too like Frotz as I used to play some of those text adventure games, and it cetainly does improve your typing -- but I knuckled and bought my bt keyboard! I want to download more games than what comes with frotz but I have had trouble doing that, and also had trouble as the games don't seem to have any "hints". Any advice? Pat Pound

By techluver on Monday, August 1, 2011 - 03:57

I want to play frots, but it's too crazy to try to type on the keyboard. I wonder if frots and dragon dictation would work well together.

Hi Pat When playing a game, try typing about. Among other info there's usually also something mentioned about how to get hints help whatever. hth, Guenni

I hear the latest update to Dragon Dictation has rendered the app very difficult to use, in terms of accessibility. I presume that since you're wondering if it'll work with Dragon Dictation that you don't own a 4S? I know you said typing on the keyboard was "crazy." That made me think about all the shortcuts for text adventures, like typing N for north or U for up. You can also usually leave out words like the and and. Hope this helps, Shersey

I have a bunch of old Z5 files, but how do I import them into Frotz? I put them in the saves file in my dropbox folder, but that didn't seem to do anything.