''Trinity'' is an

interactive fiction Interactive fiction (IF) is software simulating environments in which players use text Command (computing), commands to control Player character, characters and influence the environment. Works in this form can be understood as literary narrati ...

video game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...

written by Brian Moriarty and published in 1986 by

Infocom Infocom, Inc., was an American software company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that produced numerous works of interactive fiction. They also produced a business application, a relational database called ''Cornerstone (software), Cornerston ...

. It is widely regarded as one of the company's best works. The plot blends historical and fantastic elements as part of a

prose poem Prose poetry is poetry written in prose form instead of verse form while otherwise deferring to poetic devices to make meaning. Characteristics Prose poetry is written as prose, without the line breaks associated with poetry. However, it make ...

regarding the destructive power of the

atomic bomb A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission or atomic bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions (thermonuclear weapon), producing a nuclear expl ...

and the futile nature of

war War is an armed conflict between the armed forces of states, or between governmental forces and armed groups that are organized under a certain command structure and have the capacity to sustain military operations, or between such organi ...

in the atomic age. The name refers to the

Trinity test Trinity was the first detonation of a nuclear weapon, conducted by the United States Army at 5:29 a.m. MWT (11:29:21 GMT) on July 16, 1945, as part of the Manhattan Project. The test was of an implosion-design plutonium bomb, or "gadg ...

, the first nuclear explosion, which took place in July 1945. It is Infocom's twentieth game and the last game released by the company when it was solvent.

Plot

As the game begins, the player's character is spending a final day of a London

vacation A vacation (American English) or holiday (British English) is either a leave of absence from a regular job or school or an instance of leisure travel away from home. People often take a vacation during specific holiday observances or for sp ...

in the

Kensington Gardens Kensington Gardens, once the private gardens of Kensington Palace, are among the Royal Parks of London. The gardens are shared by the City of Westminster and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and sit immediately to the west of Hyde Pa ...

. The evening flight back to the United States is looking increasingly unlikely for a number of unusual reasons. Hordes of nannies are blocking all exits from the Gardens, and the grass actively resists efforts to be walked upon. Worst of all, a gleam on the horizon soon heralds the unwelcome arrival of a

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

nuclear missile Nuclear weapons delivery is the technology and systems used to place a nuclear weapon at the position of detonation, on or near its target. All nine nuclear states have developed some form of medium- to long-range delivery system for their nuc ...

. Time begins to slow as the missile approaches, and with some ingenuity the player's character finds an incongruous door hovering in mid-air. There's no telling where it may lead, but it cannot possibly be worse than the alternative of being at ground zero of a nuclear detonation... The doorway leads to a strange land, where impossible objects exist. Space and time do not seem to behave in the familiar ways here. Exploring this new environment, the player finds several other mysterious doors, each of which leads to another chapter in the history of nuclear weaponry. After visiting test sites (including ones in

Siberia Siberia ( ; , ) is an extensive geographical region comprising all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has formed a part of the sovereign territory of Russia and its predecessor states ...

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a landlocked state in the Western United States. It borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the seventh-most extensive, th ...

, and the Eniwetok Atoll) and

Nagasaki , officially , is the capital and the largest Cities of Japan, city of Nagasaki Prefecture on the island of Kyushu in Japan. Founded by the Portuguese, the port of Portuguese_Nagasaki, Nagasaki became the sole Nanban trade, port used for tr ...

just before each device is detonated, the player has one scenario left to deal with. The final door leads to the

New Mexico New Mexico is a state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States. It is one of the Mountain States of the southern Rocky Mountains, sharing the Four Corners region with Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. It also ...

desert on July 16, 1945, mere minutes before the test-firing that will change the course of history. But something is wrong at the "Trinity" site, and without the player's intervention things will go horribly awry. The player is witness to, or rather narrowly escapes being a witness to, a number of nuclear explosions in the game. The sites visited, and the markings on the sundial that represent them, are: * London, near future (fictional,

Omega Omega (, ; uppercase Ω, lowercase ω; Ancient Greek ὦ, later ὦ μέγα, Modern Greek ωμέγα) is the twenty-fourth and last letter in the Greek alphabet. In the Greek numerals, Greek numeric system/isopsephy (gematria), it has a value ...

) *

Low Earth Orbit A low Earth orbit (LEO) is an geocentric orbit, orbit around Earth with a orbital period, period of 128 minutes or less (making at least 11.25 orbits per day) and an orbital eccentricity, eccentricity less than 0.25. Most of the artificial object ...

, near future (fictional, Mercury) * Nevada (underground), 1970 (

historical History is the systematic study of the past, focusing primarily on the human past. As an academic discipline, it analyses and interprets evidence to construct narratives about what happened and explain why it happened. Some theorists categ ...

Pluto Pluto (minor-planet designation: 134340 Pluto) is a dwarf planet in the Kuiper belt, a ring of Trans-Neptunian object, bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune. It is the ninth-largest and tenth-most-massive known object to directly orbit the Su ...

) * Eniwetok Atoll, Pacific Ocean, 1952 (

Neptune Neptune is the eighth and farthest known planet from the Sun. It is the List of Solar System objects by size, fourth-largest planet in the Solar System by diameter, the third-most-massive planet, and the densest giant planet. It is 17 t ...

) * Siberia, 1949 (

Libra Libra generally refers to: * Libra (constellation), a constellation * Libra (astrology), an astrological sign based on the star constellation Libra may also refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Libra'' (novel), a 1988 novel by Don DeLillo Musi ...

) * Nagasaki, Japan, 1945 (

Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun. It is also known as the "Red Planet", because of its orange-red appearance. Mars is a desert-like rocky planet with a tenuous carbon dioxide () atmosphere. At the average surface level the atmosph ...

) * Trinity, New Mexico, 1945 (

Alpha Alpha (uppercase , lowercase ) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of one. Alpha is derived from the Phoenician letter ''aleph'' , whose name comes from the West Semitic word for ' ...

) Each of the symbols has a meaning relevant to the incident it represents. Trinity was the site of the first atomic explosion, and is therefore represented by an alpha, which is the first character of the

Greek alphabet The Greek alphabet has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early 8th century BC. It was derived from the earlier Phoenician alphabet, and is the earliest known alphabetic script to systematically write vowels as wel ...

. The bombing of Nagasaki was an act of war, and

is the Roman god of war. The test in Siberia (actually in the

Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic The Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic, also known as Soviet Kazakhstan, the Kazakh SSR, KSSR, or simply Kazakhstan, was one of the transcontinental country, transcontinental Republics of the Soviet Union, constituent republics of the Soviet Un ...

) was an example of another superpower attempting to establish balance in the

nuclear arms race The nuclear arms race was an arms race competition for supremacy in nuclear warfare between the United States, the Soviet Union, and their respective allies during the Cold War. During this same period, in addition to the American and Soviet nuc ...

, and the zodiacal sign of Libra is represented by the scales, making a reference to restoring the balance. The Eniwetok Atoll test took place in the middle of the ocean; hence it is symbolized by

, the Roman god of the sea. The Nevada test is underground, and thus represented by

, god of the underworld. The fictional incident in London was chronologically the latest to take place, and

omega Omega (, ; uppercase Ω, lowercase ω; Ancient Greek ὦ, later ὦ μέγα, Modern Greek ωμέγα) is the twenty-fourth and last letter in the Greek alphabet. In the Greek numerals, Greek numeric system/isopsephy (gematria), it has a value ...

is the last letter of the Greek alphabet. The symbols also appear at the corresponding locations in ''The Illustrated Story of the Atom Bomb'' comic, which was included with the game. The fictional Low Earth Orbit (Mercury) detonation is very likely a reference to the space interceptor subproject of the

Strategic Defense Initiative The Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) was a proposed missile defense system intended to protect the United States from attack by ballistic nuclear missiles. The program was announced in 1983, by President Ronald Reagan. Reagan called for a ...

, nicknamed "Star Wars", contemporary with the game's development. ''Trinity'' also includes numerous references to British children's literature, including the

Alice Alice may refer to: * Alice (name), most often a feminine given name, but also used as a surname Literature * Alice (''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland''), a character in books by Lewis Carroll * ''Alice'' series, children's and teen books by ...

books of

Lewis Carroll Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, was an English author, poet, mathematician, photographer and reluctant Anglicanism, Anglican deacon. His most notable works are ''Alice ...

, the

Mary Poppins Mary Poppins may refer to: * Mary Poppins (character), a nanny with magical powers * Mary Poppins (franchise), based on the fictional nanny ** Mary Poppins (book series), ''Mary Poppins'' (book series), the original 1934–1988 children's fanta ...

books of P. L. Travers, and especially

J. M. Barrie Sir James Matthew Barrie, 1st Baronet, (; 9 May 1860 19 June 1937) was a Scottish novelist and playwright, best remembered as the creator of Peter Pan. He was born and educated in Scotland and then moved to London, where he wrote several succe ...

s novel '' The Little White Bird''.

Development

Brian Moriarty created ''Trinity''s story in 1983. After joining Infocom in 1984 he proposed it to the company, but management believed that it was too large for the

z-machine The Z-machine is a virtual machine that was developed by Joel Berez and Marc Blank in 1979 and used by Infocom for its text adventure games. Infocom compiled game code to files containing Z-machine instructions (called story files or Z-code ...

at the time. After completing '' Wishbringer'' Moriarty began working on ''Trinity'' in May 1985, researching the history of nuclear weapons and visiting the Trinity site and

Los Alamos, New Mexico Los Alamos (, meaning ''The Poplars'') is a census-designated place in Los Alamos County, New Mexico, United States, that is recognized as one of the development and creation places of the Nuclear weapon, atomic bomb—the primary objective of ...

. He attempted to make the game accurately depict the geography of New Mexico and Kensington Gardens. Moriarty completed the game in June 1986, and later stated that "writing it wasn't a pleasant experience, I can tell you that. It's not easy to sit down and write that stuff ... It was hard to live with that game for a year". He added, however, that "''Trinity'' is not a funeral, and on'tbe afraid of it. It's kind of a dark game, but it's also, I like to think, kind of a fun game, too. But I do want people to think about what they see."

Release

The packaging for ''Trinity'' contained several items, called feelies, related to the plot of the game. These feelies included: * A map of the Trinity site * A cardboard sundial marked with odd symbols * ''The Illustrated Story of the Atom Bomb'', an "educational"

comic book A comic book, comic-magazine, or simply comic is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panel (comics), panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are often accompanied by descriptive prose and wri ...

laden with ironic statements regarding the feelings of

patriotism Patriotism is the feeling of love, devotion, and a sense of attachment to one's country or state. This attachment can be a combination of different feelings for things such as the language of one's homeland, and its ethnic, cultural, politic ...

idealism Idealism in philosophy, also known as philosophical realism or metaphysical idealism, is the set of metaphysics, metaphysical perspectives asserting that, most fundamentally, reality is equivalent to mind, Spirit (vital essence), spirit, or ...

, and

jingoism Jingoism is nationalism in the form of aggressive and proactive foreign policy, such as a country's advocacy for the use of threats or actual force, as opposed to peaceful relations, in efforts to safeguard what it perceives as its national inte ...

surrounding the production of atomic weaponry * Instructions on how to fold an

origami ) is the Japanese art of paper folding. In modern usage, the word "origami" is often used as an inclusive term for all folding practices, regardless of their culture of origin. The goal is to transform a flat square sheet of paper into a ...

crane ( orizuru) using the Yoshizawa–Randlett system (a reference to Sadako Sasaki), and a small square of origami paper with which to do it.

Reception

In 1996, '' Next Generation'' listed ''Trinity'' at number 100 in their "Top 100 Games of All Time", commenting that "''Trinity'' takes the same types of serious themes of ''

A Mind Forever Voyaging ''A Mind Forever Voyaging'' (''AMFV'') is an interactive fiction game designed and implemented by Steve Meretzky and published in 1985 by Infocom. The game was intended as a polemical critique of Ronald Reagan's politics. Its title comes from ...

'', and adds to them a heavy dose of mythology and fantasy. ... this is not only one of the most socially and politically powerful game experiences ever created, but also a landscape upon which puzzles of trademark Infocom quality can appear." Later the same year, ''

Computer Gaming World ''Computer Gaming World'' (CGW) was an American Video game journalism, computer game magazine that was published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 199 ...

'' listed ''Trinity'' at #120 among their top 150 best games of all time. The editors called it "a tense, ethical tightrope walk through the Cold War".

Legacy

Trinity was included as one of the titles in the 2010 book ''

1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die ''1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die'' is a video game reference book first published in October 2010. It consists of a list of video games released between 1970 and 2013, arranged chronologically by release date. Each entry in the list ...

''. Video game designer and programmer

Jonathan Blow Jonathan Blow (born 1971) is an American video game designer and programmer. He is best known for his work on the independent video games ''Braid'' (2008) and '' The Witness'' (2016). Blow became interested in game programming while at middle ...

mentioned ''Trinity'' as one of his formative influences and was a significant inspiration for his game,

Braid A braid (also referred to as a plait; ) is a complex structure or pattern formed by interlacing three or more strands of flexible material such as textile yarns, wire, or hair. The simplest and most common version is a flat, solid, three-strand ...

References

External links

*
Walkthrough, with maps
* {{Infocom games 1980s interactive fiction 1986 video games Adventure games Amiga games Anti-war video games Apple II games Atari ST games Classic Mac OS games Commodore 128 games Commodore 64 games DOS games Infocom games Japan in non-Japanese culture Single-player video games Video games about nuclear war and weapons Video games about time travel Video games about vacationing Video games adapted into comics Video games developed in the United States Video games set in Japan Video games set in London Video games set in Nevada Video games set in New Mexico Video games set in Siberia Video games set in the 20th century Video games set in the Soviet Union