Weekly Links #191

Oh my. As of this week, the IFComp 2017 is on, and it's the biggest edition ever for the second year in a row, at no less than 79 entries! Judges seem undaunted, but if you want to help them it will be appreciated. On that note, can't help but wonder what will happen if this trend continues. The community has grown large, and while that's awesome, certain traditions like the IFComp might need more than updated rules, going forward.

In other news, we have an article about the challenges of adapting games from other media, and a more technical write-up on why porting games to PC is hard. The latter won't be a surprise to anyone who understand the difference between a console with its fixed hardware configuration and PCs with their myriad options, but clearly some gamers need this explained point by point.

From the same source we get a comparative review of three roguelikes, much like those I used to do (how time flies). And elsewhere entirely, via Vintage is the New Old, there's the story of rediscovering a 35-year-old type-in game and meeting its author — who turns out to be a really interesting person.

Last but not least, Jimmy Maher's history of narrative computer games has reached Lemmings, and it's a fascinating chapter indeed, especially given the context he built over the previous month.

Have fun, and see you next week.