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Beyond Zork (full title: Beyond Zork: The Coconut of Quendor, written by Brian Moriarty) was one of the last games in Infocom's Zork series, not counting games like Zork: Grand Inquisitor and Zork: Nemesis, which were created after Infocom had dissolved and existed only as a trademark. It signified a notable departure from their earlier format which, with the exception of Zork Zero, relied purely on text and puzzle-solving. Beyond Zork takes the form of a MUD, or Multi-User Dungeon, except that Beyond Zork is obviously single-player. Its resemblances to MUDs include variable character statistics, character levels, semi-random combat, and semi-random maps, always including the same rooms but in different configurations. Perhaps its most obvious cosmetic enhancement is the addition of an onscreen map, which shows the room the player is in in relation to the surrounding rooms. The map also created the, at the time, new concept of navigation through the game by mouse clicks.
The game itself produces one of the most engaging environments of all of Infocom's fantasy games. The player navigates the fascinating and varied country of New Quendor. Possibly Infocom's largest game in terms of map size, the world of Beyond Zork encompasses all of the locations the protagonists of earlier Zork games previously explored, though the earlier games are in fact set chronologically later.
The monsters are also many and varied. They are all covered in a small booklet, "The Lore and Legends of Quendor," included with the original game, so unless the player possesses a pirated copy of the game they can get information on any and all of the creatures and other curious items in the game, which can be helpful in solving puzzles.
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