Planetfall
Platform: Commodore 64
Gametype: Undefined
_________________________

It all started with your great-great-grandfather who was a High Admiral and one of the founding officers of the Patrol. All generations since then have served in the Patrol. Now it's your turn and two years into you are still a lowly Ensign Seventh Class. Your direct report, Blather, is really making your life miserable. Are you really Stellar Patrol material?

Difficulty Level: Standard

Alternate Titles
"Sole Survivor" -- Working title
"Planetfall - a science fiction story" -- Tag-lined title

---

Trivia

A novelisation (perhaps better termed a cross-promotional tie-in loosely related to the original property) of the game was produced by Byron Preiss (with a grey-striped cover design emulating Infocom game packaging), published by Avon Books. It was written by Arthur Byron Cover and first published in August of 1988. Its ISBN is 0-380-75384-7 and the rear cover blurb reads as follows:
"Arthur Byron Cover combines the antic sense of Robert Sheckley, the far travelling of A. E. Van Vogt, the deadly serious wry whimsy of Kurt Vonnegut... with a fresh, invigorating talent all his own." - Harlan Ellison

THE PATROL'S LOOKING FOR A FEW GOOD ORGANISMS

The recruiting poster said, "Join the Stellar Patrol and visit exotic worlds!"

Homer took the poster's advice and signed up for service. His heroism on the planet Resida quickly earned him a promotion, and Homer was assigned to the most important Diplomatic Conference in the history of the Third Galactic Empire.

Then Homer got lost. Really lost.

Fortunately, Homer was accompanied by his loyal robot Oliver and the ghost of his beloved robot Floyd.

The fate of the empire depended on the Stellar Patrol's finding Homer--the only man in the fleet who can play the soprano saxophone!

The sci-fi based janitor turned hero theme of Planet Fall was also used in later adventure games such as the Space Quest series and Future Wars.

A third sequel for Planetfall was planed and almost released in 1995. "Planetfall - The Search for Floyd" was supposed to take place 100 years after Stationfall, and dealt mainly with the resurrection of the beloved Floyd thanks to an alien device. A full design doc and storyline was completed circa 1993 by Steve Meretzky and the game was supposed to start development for the Return to Zork engine by late 1994. The deal went sour however, and all that survive of the game are some conceptual screenshots.

If you add a six to the beginning of the ID number on the enclosed card and space out the digits appropriately, you'll get the phone number to The Tech, MIT's official newspaper.

---

(From The New Zork Times Vol.3 No.2 Spring 1984)

Some statistics about Planetfall:

Number of rooms: 105 
Number of different ways to die: 41 
Number of words in vocabulary: 666 
Number of takeable objects: 49 

Contributed by Belboz  (6599) on 10.05.2000. -- edit trivia

---

(From The New Zork Times, Vol.3 No.1, Winter 1984)

Planetfall was titled Sole Survivor by its author, Steve Meretzky, and later shortened to just Survivor. When Infocom discovered another game called Survivor, they decided they'd rather switch than fight. Infocom's ad agency, Giardini/Russell, submitted a list about 30 long, their favorite of which was Lost Planet. Reaction was less than enthusiastic, not the least because it reminded two of Infocom's employess of the TV series, Lost in Space. Marc Blank suggested Planetfall during a long, frustrating meeting - he thought he had seen it once in an SF book as a word meaning arrival on a new planet (much like landfall). Nobody really believed him, but it was never improved upon. 

Accardi-3 is named after Gabrielle Accardi, Infocom's Marketing person.

The working title for Planetfall was Sole Survivor

The old "Folio" packaging of Planetfall consisted of a folder containing "Today's Stellar Patrol" - recruitment brochure, a Special Assignment Task Force I.D. card, three postcards (Ramos II, Nebulon, and Accardi-3), and a personal diary (4 pages, 1 empty). 

The re-release of Planetfall used the standard box format which consisted of a grey box with coloured horizontal stripes. It contained "Today's Stellar Patrol" - recruitment brochure, a Special Assignment Task Force I.D. card, three postcards (Ramos II, Nebulon, and Accardi-3), and a personal diary (4 pages, 1 empty). 

The Science Fiction Classics collection consisted of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Planetfall, and A Mind Forever Voyaging in a specially designed trilogy slipcase.

---

Description from the packaging:

Interactive fiction.
Science fiction.
Standard level.
"Join the Patrol, and see the Galaxy!" You took the poster's advice, bait and all, and marched right over to the recruitment station near your home on the backwater planet Gallium. Images of exotic worlds, strange and colorful aliens, and Deep Space heroism had danced in your head as you signed the dotted line. And since that day the closest you've come to Deep Space heroism was scrubbing down the radioactive leper colony on Ishmael-3.

But suppose that jumbo fortune cookie you got at Qwang's Take-Out Asteroid last shore leave was right. Maybe you will indeed narrowly escape disaster. It's even possible that you'll actually travel to an unknown corner of the Universe, where you'll save a doomed planet- or die in the attempt. In fact, we'll guarantee it- every crumb of it- because that's just the way the cosmic cookie crumbles.

Get inside a story.
Get one from Infocom!
It's like waking up inside a story! Load Infocom's interactive fiction into your computer and discover yourself at the center of a world jam-packed with surprising twists, unique characters and original, logical, often hilarious puzzles.

For the first time, you're more than a passive reader. You can talk to the story, typing in full English sentences. And the story talks right back, communicating entirely in vividly descriptive prose. What's more, you can actually shape the story's course of events through your choice of actions. And you have hundreds of alternatives at every step. In fact, there's so much you can see and do, your adventure can last for weeks and even months.

To find the Infocom interactive story that's right for you, just choose any one marked with the level of difficulty listed below that best matches your current level of interactive skill.
Junior: Best introduction to interactive fiction. Written for everyone from age 9 up.
Standard: Good introductory level for adults. This is Infocom's most popular level of interactive fiction.

Advanced: A greater level of challenge. Recommended for those who've already experienced Infocom's interactive fiction.
Expert: For real diehards seeking the ultimate challenge in interactive fiction.
Then find out what it's like to get inside a story. Get one form Infocom. Because with Infocom's interactive fiction, there's room for you on every disk.


http://www.mobygames.com/game/c64/planetfall
