zlacker

> I finished most of the Infocom games available without using clues - it can be done.

IIRC, both Witness and Bureaucracy had physical stuff in the box that didn't look like copy protection, but without which it wasn't possible to finish the game - e.g. There was no way to figure out some things in Bureaucracy unless you read the included copy of "Popular Paranoia".

>>beagle+(OP)
Yup. Starcross was similar; I meant clues rather than copy-protection under another name. I played store-bought versions of these game (on my old Commodore 64) and never bought "invisiclues" so the line between these categories was quite clear. I don't recall what the medium of my final "tap out" in Zork 3 was - but recall being stuck for months and finally looking up the "hello sailor" bit.

This might not have been such a problem if I had played the Zorks in order, but I bought Zork 3 before Zork 1 because that was what they had in the shop. Otherwise I might have seen the verse in Zork 1:

"Oh ye who go about saying unto each, "Hello sailor", Dost thou know the magnitude of thy sin before the gods?"