Context
Although Zork officially released in 1980, it was playable throughout the early development stages from 1977 until its official release (Tim Anderson et al, 1985). The ARPAnet, the predecessor to the internet, was a connected network of machines that allowed researchers at major universities such as MIT, Harvard, and Stanford to communicate with one and another.
Unlike the internet, security on the ARPAnet was nonexistent allowing anyone to connect to machines within the network if they knew the desired host information (Tim Anderson et al, 1985). This allowed users to share files with virtually anyone on the ARPAnet; first connecting to the desired host machine, and distributing it to another node within the network. The ARPAnet played a significant portion in the early development and community building of not only Zork, but many other historical games (Adventure, the game that created the “easter egg”, was also playable on the ARPAnet).
The challenges that many video games face is digital obsolescence, when the format of the digital resource is no longer readable. This primarily occurs due to two reasons; computing expansions reducing the demand and user-base for other technologies, and a lack of metadata on the resource making it unplayable.