Last updated on January 17th, 2026 at 02:31 am
Advent – Adventure Game Review
Advent is a Adventure game from Pi-Soft Consulting, LLC, first launched in 12th February 2019.
It’s rated 9+ and currently has 14+ ratings on the App Store.
What Makes Advent Stand Out
Colossal Cave Adventure (also known as ADVENT, Colossal Cave, or Adventure) (Crowther, 1976; Crowther & Woods, 1977), an iPhone version of the first text adventure computer game.
Rewrote game to implement 1000-point version by David Malmberg. Also, added Game Center support! In addition to leader boards, you can now invite other players and give them a virtual tour to help them should they get stuck.
This Adventure game offers engaging gameplay and regular updates for mobile players.
Player Feedback
As a newer release, Advent is building its player community. Early feedback suggests .
Recent Updates & Development
Latest Update: 17th May 2020
Recent improvements include:
Made the play/resume button bigger, fixed a long-standing problem with watering the plant.
Download & Availability
Advent is available through the official App Store for iOS devices.
Requirements: Requires iPhone 5s / iPad Air / iPad Air (Cellular) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina, Cellular) / iPhone 6 / iPhone 6 Plus / iPad Air 2 / iPad Air 2 (Cellular) / iPad Mini 3 or later.
Compatible with iPhone and iPad devices.
Player Experience Highlights
Community Insight:
We mean the game is fun, if this was released today it would definitely use ai in some way, but the game is kind of confusing. Also what is with the random photo of that person with like minnie mouse slippers at the beginning.
Play button fixed, but still cant water the plant with bottle of water, unless we are doing something wrong. Ive tried every command and even tried to use the stone pitcher.
We download this a while ago when we found it. Very nostalgic since this was the first interactive fiction game we played as a child. Back then we plaid it on our friend's fathers teletype terminal which he would to connect a mainframe from home via an acoustic modem. We were surprised to see the game updated this week (4/15/2017). We like this update better . Nice use of scroll back. Text size and command window placement perfect.
Theres a big when u try to water the plant.
There is a church and a crypt in this version that Ive never seen in the original. There is a bug in the crypt code. Trying to do anything with the candles causes the game to crash. It will restart before the command where you tried to do something with the candles. Still, we very much appreciate the port. Everyone should get to try these games.
Getting around in the game is awkward. IMHO, focus should automatically be set to the input area after each move. We used to play the original-ish version on the Honeywell AN/UYK 65-V when we were new in the US Navy, back in the 80s. So its kind of reminiscent. Just having to manually set focus to the input area every move is annoying and takes away from the enjoyment of playing. Ive played a version, maybe on an Android platform, that had a compass rose which also included up and down, that you touched to move around.
This is a very good copy of humungus cave. However it is not the original adventure, it is as stated humungus cave. That is the name for the 1000 point version. However only four stars due to the "put water in pitcher" glitch.
This is great game for your imgaination and ingenuity and problem solving. That said, its not for the fainthearted but their is plenty of help, thanks to the interent (when you really get stuck), something we vetrans didn't have. Note, this 1,000 point version has a few different tweaks, so even if you knew the old 320 pt version, you won't be able to blitz through the game that easily. On the other hand, the game's natural setbacks or fustrations (like the maze, the villains ) are now easier to deal with. Now, the previously reported the water bottle bug is a major concern. Please don't be cruel and leave us with some of the dead ends like the 1st version 320 pt game left us. We have a 35yr score to settle and your continued donation of support will be loved.
This is the newer version of the classic rpg text game with the safe in the building. It is a great game, and this rendition works fairly well, though we have found two glitches so far… 1) the supposedly correct combination (the date found on the tall tree in the forest) doesn't work to open the safe, unless you do it first thing after looking at the tree, and 2) there is no way to manipulate water, so no way to put water in the pitcher to save the rose, for example. The classic command for this is PUT WATER IN PITCHER, but this command doesn't work where it is supposed to work. Also, game stops working if you try to WaTEE PLANT. Hard to finish the cave this way.
Definitely been "modernized" in its descriptions. We prefer the original.
As stated above there is no way to tap play and begin the game. Something is wrong and we wish we could fix this bug.
Same problem as 1/21 review. Play button is disabled and app won't run.
We can open the game, we can tap on the options at the bottom, but nothing happens when we press the "play" button in the middle of the bottom part of the screen. There seems to be no information whatsover to explain how to get the game to begin. Oh well.
Got the initial screen but couldn't get it to start.
We thought we had escaped the curse of Crowther long ago! Now we find to our horror that it has followed us to the iPad. To those who remember the old Adventure game, this will be either a wonderful or horrifying blast from the past. Nicely executed within the context of the Malmberg variant, it will consume those who love this type of puzzle game. There is apparent bug with the plant, and some possible memory instability which we resolved with a reinstall. We are truly glad that this experience has been brought to the iPad and happy that the tradition is being passed on! Our thanks to Shawn P. Stanley for making this available.
It's nice blast from the past to have Adventure on the iPhone/iPad, and with an external keyboard it's not too painful. It is inconvenient that we have to keep tapping the text entry box for each new command. There's some polish – the text descriptions slide in and there's a graphics background, but maybe in the spirit of the original, less would be more.
Very poor update has left the app useless. Doesn't seem you can play the original adventure anymore. The text field has always been very poor, which is kinda a big deal for a text adventure game. Recommend you move on and try another app.
We were looking forward to reliving our youth and playing advent once again. We were especially looking forward to playing the fabled 1000 point version, since we've already played the standard 350 point version, the enhanced 550 point version, and even a rare CDC NOS (Brass Hatch) version from the early 1980's. The good news is that this is a nice implementation for iOS. The bad news is that it's very buggy. Not crashing buggy, which we could live with, but game logic buggy. Some parts of the game just don't work! It seems that the original parts of the game work correctly (so far), but some of the extended game is broken. The rose puzzle doesn't work, for example. And lights are inconsistent (candles don't work in places, but the lamp does). We've also run into a bug where the inventory shows you a full bottle of water, but the game treats it as empty when you try to use it. But if you try to refill it, the game treats it as full! Argh! Also, some of the commands don't work, like NOTIFY, SAVE GAME, RESTORE GAME, INSTRUCTIONS, and HELP. The commands BRIEF and VERBOSE work, but don't stick like they're supposed to. We would have reported this to the developer directly, but they don't seem to have an obvious support page on their website. Bugs come up on a 32gb iPad 3 running iOS 5.1.1.
We installed this so we could play the original woods and Crowther ADVENT and then you went and updated it. Please return to the original one.
We were excited when we downloaded this app but it is really buggy. Frequently crashes and it hangs when you water the plant. Would be nice if the 350 point version was an option.
When we first purchased this game we were VERY pleased, as it was the original game we knew and loved and was thrilled to have it. Unfortunately it has been "upgraded" to a different version and we are now very unhappy. We've lost the game we wanted. We wish we had known, we wouldn't have taken the "upgrade". We wish they had released this "new" and different version as a seperate app, so we could keep the original if we wanted. We want the OLD GAME BACK! If you're looking for the original classic – check out the iColossal App.
This was much better when it was just the original Colossal Cave game. It would have been nice to have kept the original 350 point game as on option.
This game truly is a great game. This was the first text adventure game that we had ever played, and it was great. We played the game for about a half hour or so, and when we unlocked the grate in the river and dropped down, we walked down the tunnel until the game said that a giant snake was blocking the path. When we typed "n" for north, to run back the way we came, our iPod froze. For four ducking hours. We had to sit there and wait for it to die before we could plug it back into the charger and boot it up again. Did anyone else have this problem? We would love to play this game again, but we're afraid it might freeze again. Still a fun game though. We've downloaded this and other text adc.
This game is lots if fun. If you get stuck though, they have parts of the solution online. Don't let the flashlight batteries die.
On a whim, we searched the App Store for our favorite text adventure from our mainframe support days in the 80's. We were thrilled to se it here, and this is it in all of it's mind immersing glory.
Great. You have to give commands to eat and stuff. You use your BRAIN to figure out what to do, but not like a logic puzzle, like you're actually having the advent. Great fun, Get it.
We never played this specific game when we were a child but we were introduced to text-based games when we were 5 years old. We had an Atari and a Nintendo but just couldn't seem to drag ourselves away from a text-based game that actually made us think instead of just sitting at the tv mashing buttons. It's absolutely GREAT that someone brought a classic to the iPhone. We had always wanted a chance to play Colossal Cave and now we FINALLY got a chance to. We are now 26 and still enjoy the old-school command-prompt games. PS: If you're not using your immagination (yes, a game that actually makes you think) AND you're not writing things down, you will get lost and frustrated VERY easily. Takes a lot of patience and a lot of mistakes to get anywhere in these types of games. :).
Just downloaded this app. We used to play the original Adventure game for HOURS. Did finally beat the game – big thing about this is it makes you think – it's not graphic. You need to draw a map as you go and track your movements. There are secrets and uses for each of the items. The snake is the first trick. Get the bird – but to get the bird you need to first find the cage. But you can't get the bird in the cage until you drop something. Use reasoning, imagination, and draw a map as you go. You should be able to have hours of fun too. For older – not Gen X mostly us boomers that were into computers in the early days – before GUIs and mice – back when the command line ruled – this was the type of games that wasted hundreds of hours in university labs, company computer centers and other such places. We played this game and others (trek, hammurabi, etc) on PR1ME mini-computers on text terminals. Ahh nostalgia. This implementation of Adventure (or the Colossal Cave) is very well done. Our compliments to those that created it. Thanks.
Does anyone know how to get past the snake.
But it is… We've hated text based games our whole life. But when ur bored and u dnt have worldof world craft. This is the next best substitute. It has dwarfs and dragons and lots of puzzles. Ives died 3 times in the past 4 hours. The one thing we'd change is the word recognition. For ex. The game doesn't understand the phrase "use key" that's the annoying part(s).
This is the game that launched a hundred subgenres. It later was commercially rewritten as zork, with probably half a dozen rewrites in between. Is it playable? You'll need patience and cleverness. And you'll need imagination, like reading a book instead of watching tv.
This almos as bad as movie by beavis n buthead "idiocracy" or Wall-e. All we want is to wack snakes with sticks+1 preferably powerlevel healer help us. :( oh just typing hurts why'd seacular power teach Ug to read n right but not spelunking ironie or satyr.
We definitely am not old enough to remember the text adventures, but that doesnt mean that they can not be fun for us. When we first got this game we didnt expect much from it, but we turned it on and gave it a try. Once we finally found a way to actually get inside of the cave, we were taken to a world that could be anything we wanted it to. We like the updates from this game from the older versions such as being able to type in "downstream" and it takes you downstream. The only problem that we found with this game, and the only reason it is not five stars, is the fact that a bug crashes your game and your whole ipod. You cannot get very far into the game before you have to start over again. If advent can fix this bug so there will be no crashes we would definitely give it five stars! Vote yes if you agree to fix the bug.
This game is meant to make you think so for the people saying confusing, it's meant to be.
Put this down… We wanna figure this out! XD interesting.
We remember this game from our first incarnation of playing on a Honeywell Terminal back in 1978 (Paper Feed). We are not sure if this is the same creator, but we think it is….we played this game in Madison Wisconsin on the city mainframe TSS. We actually got to speak to the creator on the phone back 30 years ago with some questions about the game. This game spawned our interest in programming and PC gaming. We are glad to see that it has made it to the iPhone even after over 30 years of age. We downloaded it today for some great memories of the past. It may be kind of old in comparison to what is out there now, but this is what started it all….please keep that in mind. Thanks guys, and we hope you read this from an original player from the past.
We give this 5 stars because it does what it is, a free text style game that works just fine on our phone, we think it's fun alittle hard at times but fun.
Now all we need are Rogue and Larn – If you don't know what we're talking about you sure missed out on 80's Unix computer games. Rogue and Larn were graphically based games using character graphics. There was a VGA graphical version of Larn for Windows and that would be great on the iPhone too.
Great game! It's pretty weird at first when u can't see anything, but ya get used to it. Again great game.
It's fun if you know what your doing.
Just ur brain people it's easy.
We haven't played this for 25 years. Brings back memories.
This game brings back memories! Thanks for bringing it to the iPod/iPhone.
Never played this type of game before, so we were confused at first. But if you just google "adventure game", you can figure out what to do pretty quickly. There's even walk throughs to help out newbies like us.
This is an excellent and unique idea concerning the iphone. The person who had written this app is a genius. Try this application and keep it to the iphone. It will keep you company at lonely moments. Thank you for the nice application.
We've been waiting for a text adventure for the iPhone, and this is the original! Please bring back some of the Infocom Classics like Zork and The Lurking Horror! Great fun, especially for those who remember the glory days of text adventures.
We played a couple text games on a apple II when we were a kid. We never played this one before so this is great. Low tech meets hi tech.
Of course listening to the reviewers with no imagination you can see they likely don't read books either. Oh our no graphics what will we do.
Sadly, many people nowadays fail to enjoy these kinds of games, so we think a lot of people aren't going to like this much. However, if you remember the original, or you're younger but easily amused (like us), you'll probably enjoy this. We knew it was a text-based game when we downloaded it and thought it would be incredibly boring, but we were pleasantly surprised to find it pretty fun. However, we don't ever play video games, so we're sure that makes a difference. We're sure our younger brother, who loves video games, would get bored with this game after about five seconds. But if you think it might be mildly entertaining, we suggest giving it a try because you might enjoy it more than you think. (Plus it's free, who can resist that?).
Wow…this is a trip down memory lane…we played this on our IBM computer back in the stone age….we're in a maze with twisty passages all alike… If you never played a text game, try this…the amazing graphics are produced with your imagination…the better your imagination…the better your graphics card. Google Infocom…another set of text games that kept us up all night as a computer geek teen. :).
User feedback from Apple App Store
App Details
- Version: 3.1.2
- Size: 13.93 MB
- iOS: 9.3 or later
- Languages: EN
- Content Advisory: Infrequent/Mild Cartoon or Fantasy Violence
- Developer: [Pi-Soft Consulting, LLC]()
Last updated: 17th May 2020 | Genre: Adventure | Developer: Pi-Soft Consulting, LLC