Earth and Sky

Earth and Sky is an interactive fiction trilogy written and produced by American author Paul O'Brian about the adventures of a brother and sister who gain superpowers while searching for their lost parents. Games in the series have won awards in the annual Interactive Fiction Competition and received an XYZZY Award.

The first game begins a month after the disappearance of two scientists at the local university, Clair and Scott Colborn. After exploring their parents' lab, the playable character, Emily Colborn, and her brother Austin find that their parents had been developing suits that grant sky-themed and earth-themed superpowers. Using the suits, Emily gains the ability to fly, generate fog and shoot electric blasts. Adopting the superhero names 'Earth' and 'Sky', the siblings decide to search for their parents themselves and defend the campus from an accidentally mutated monster.

The game is entirely text based and players type commands to move through the story. The story file can be downloaded for free online and though O'Brian recommended using Frotz, Earth and Sky is compatible with several interpreter programs which are available as freeware. The game is also available for online play through O'Brian's web page.^[1]

The second installment of the series continues the story with the player in control of Austin. The earth suit grants him super strength, the ability to jump high enough to go over buildings and some invulnerability to electricity. Soon after the events of the first game, the siblings follow-up on a lead and travel to Nevada. There, they discover a portal and venture through to explore an alien world in search of their parents.

Another Earth, Another Sky is longer than the first game and featured more puzzles as well as the option of using super strength to simply break through some obstacles. It was formatted utilizing Glulx to include comic style 'crash' and 'pow' images and is available online for free download.^[5][6]

El juego final incluye un componente opcional que ofrece introducciones alternativas basadas en lo que el jugador especificó que sucedió en las partes anteriores. También permite alternar entre Emily y Austin para utilizar ambos conjuntos de poderes mediante el comando >intercambiar . Esto cambia el estilo descriptivo, permitiendo a los jugadores experimentar dos perspectivas narrativas diferentes. ^{[ 9 ]}

Funciona con Glulx y está disponible para su descarga gratuita con un cómic virtual que resume los dos juegos anteriores. ^{[ 10 ]}