gistfile1.txt

"Many puzzle-based adventures suffer from the imbalance of providing more material affordances than
 formal affordances. This results in the feeling of having many things to do (places to go, objects to 
fiddle with) without having any sense of why any one action would be preferable to another. For
 example, Zork Grand Inquisitor offers a rich world to navigate and many objects to collect and 
manipulate. Yet, since there is no unity of action, there is no way to relate current actions to the 
eventual goal of defeating the Grand Inquisitor. This leaves the player in the position of randomly 
wandering about trying strange juxtapositions of objects. This destracts from the sense of agency ..."


Michael Mateas: A preliminary poetics for Interactive Drama and games

http://www.electronicbookreview.com/thread/firstperson/mateas