Synopsis
Written by no less than future U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky, Mindwheel is one of several attempts throughout computer game history to imbue Infocom-style adventure games with literary importance. On a quest to save the world by finding the core of human consciousness, you journey inside the minds of a dictator, a Bowie-esque rock star named Bobby Clemon and others, solving abstract puzzles and filling in the blanks of Pinsky's lovely sonnets.
Today, the online interactive fiction scene -- hobbyists who write freeware adventures -- aim for this level of ambition (or pretention), in games like Photopia and Jigsaw. But at the time, Mindwheel was the exception to the rule, with other adventures playing it closer to pulp and fantasy roots. That doesn't make Mindwheel better than its peers. The writing is eerie and often humorous, taking you into strange, whirling vortexes of familiar objects, meeting a demon reading the New York Review of Books and visiting a Love Room full of insects getting it on. But there's not much interactivity, and the puzzles too often operate at the level of "remember the word." For word games in interactive fiction, you're better off with Nord and Bert Couldn't Make Head or Tail of It. The game includes a novella by Pinsky.
