The Asian Challenge

The Asian Challenge is an educational game which aims to improve the understanding of the Asian culture and geography. It was developed to be used during geography class. The player takes the role of a special investigator of the Senate Foreign Aid Committee who is tasked to travel around Asia and collect information.

Each time the player enters a new area, the text is divided into three parts: a short description of the country (including some historical and social information), optionally a list of items which the player can interact with and a list of available exits. Every country is only represented with a few screens. Besides not getting lost (the author recommends to use an atlas), the puzzles involve collecting items and using them in other places. The parser understands simple verb-noun constructions and a few single-letter abbreviations. At the end of the game, the player has to take a multiple-choice test which asks for information given during play.