Borrowed Time (video game)
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| Borrowed Time | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Developer(s) | Interplay |
| Publisher(s) | Activision Mastertronic |
| Producer(s) | Richard Lehrberg |
| Designer(s) | Brian Fargo Michael Cranford |
| Programmer(s) | Ayman Adham Jay Patel Troy P. Worrell Rebecca Heineman |
| Artist(s) | David Lowery Curt Toumanian Greg Miller |
| Platform(s) | Amiga, Apple II, Atari ST, Commodore 64, IBM PC, Mac |
| Release | 1985: Apple II, C64, IBM PC, Mac 1986: Amiga, Atari ST |
| Genre(s) | Interactive fiction |
| Mode(s) | Single-player |
Borrowed Time is an interactive fiction game about a detective, who tries to rescue his kidnapped wife. The game was developed by Interplay and published by Activision in 1985. Mastertronic republished it as a budget title as Time to Die.[1]
Written by Arnie Katz and Bill Kunkel,[2] the plot in the style of a detective story of the noir crime genre is set in the USA of the 1930s. The player takes a role of a private detective, Sam Harlow. His ex-wife Rita Sweeney has been kidnapped, and he tries to free her. In the process, he is pursued by gangsters who are after his life.
Gameplay
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Borrowed Time is a text adventure with a complementary graphical user interface. Control is via the keyboard, alternatively, many commands and objects can be selected from a graphical menu with a joystick or a mouse. Moving around is done in the same way - a selection window with cardinal directions is available. The player must interrogate suspects and collect evidence at the various locations in order to achieve the game goal. Some game actions have a time limit for problem-solving.
Development
Borrowed Time was produced by Interplay for Activision and was part of a $100,000 contract that included a total of three adventure games.[3] Interplay founder Fargo already had experience in the adventure genre: his first game was the adventure The Demon's Forge, released for Apple II in 1981. The parser used by Interplay was developed by Fargo and a collaborator, and at one stage of development had a dictionary of 250 nouns, 200 verbs, and could evaluate input with prepositions and indirect objects.[4] The same engine had been used in the previous games Mindshadow and The Tracer Sanction. The writing and much of the game design were done by Subway Software, a company founded by game journalist Bill Kunkel specifically for Borrowed Time. Fargo outsourced the writing because he felt that no one at Interplay could produce quality prose.[5]