What you will find here
- Company and studio overview pages
- Connections to heritage exhibits
- Links to pioneer interviews and people pages
- Future routes into game catalogues, packaging, and timeline material
Sidon Adventure Archive
Companies of Interactive Fiction
The story of interactive fiction is also the story of the studios, publishers, labels, and small creative teams that shaped it. Some became major names of the commercial era; others were regional, short-lived, experimental, or are now only faintly remembered.
This section acts as a museum-style guide to those companies, linking studio histories with heritage exhibits, creator profiles, interviews, and future catalogue work as the archive continues to grow.
Studio histories
Heritage links
Preservation-led overview
Exhibit pathways
Archive structure
How this section connects to the wider archive
The companies area is not intended to stand alone. It forms part of a larger preservation structure linking studios to exhibits, people, and original research material across the Sidon Adventure Archive.
Connected archive paths
Visitors can move between company history, individual creators, and museum-style exhibits to build a fuller picture of the period rather than viewing each subject in isolation.
Featured heritage routes
Current entry points
These are the strongest company routes currently in place. Each one connects directly to a fuller heritage presentation or related archival material and acts as a gateway into the wider collection.
Adventure International
One of the foundational names in early commercial text adventures, closely associated with Scott Adams and the first major wave of home-computer parser gaming.
Level 9 Computing
A major British studio whose technical approach, ambitious design, and cross-platform reach made it one of the defining names in adventure gaming history.
Magnetic Scrolls
Known for richly written adventures and advanced presentation, Magnetic Scrolls helped push parser games towards a more ambitious, literary, and technically polished form.
Growing collection
Studios planned for expansion
Many more studios deserve their own place within the archive. Some were widely known in their day, while others are now obscure but still form an important part of the wider adventure-game story.
Gilsoft
Best known for The Quill and related authoring tools, Gilsoft occupies an essential place in the story of how players became creators.
Archive page plannedIncentive Software
A key name in the development of illustrated adventure forms and later graphical experimentation within British adventure gaming.
Archive page plannedDelta 4
A distinctive studio voice whose work deserves wider attention within any serious historical view of British adventure games.
Archive page plannedMuseum-style routes
Where to continue next
The companies section works best as a branching route through the archive, allowing visitors to move from studios to exhibits, then on to people, interviews, and related historical context.
Browse heritage exhibits
Explore the archive’s flagship museum-style pages, currently including Scott Adams, Level 9, and Magnetic Scrolls.
Follow the people behind the studios
Use the people section to connect company history with pioneers, authors, designers, and creative collaborators.
Read original interview material
Interview pages add first-hand voices and context, helping to turn company history into a richer human story.
Why companies matter
Studios are part of the story
Individual games matter, but so do the companies behind them. Their tools, staff, publishing models, branding, and technical constraints all shaped the forms that adventure games took.
Publishing context
Studios determined packaging, platform support, marketing, and how adventure games first reached players.
Shared technical identity
Many companies were defined not only by stories and settings, but by parsers, engines, illustration styles, and house design philosophies.
Preservation value
Company histories help preserve the links between people, games, artefacts, and the markets that shaped them.