puns

Nord and Bert was unique among Infocom games in that it was highly surrealistic, centering around word play and puns. It is Infocom's twenty-seventh game. Nord and Bert defies easy description, and in fact almost seems to have been created in an effort to be as strange as possible. For example, the title and front box illustration (two farmers staring at an animal that consists of two cows' rear halves fused together) have nothing to do with the game. Rather, Nord and Bert revolves around several different kinds of wordplay, with a "chapter" of the game dedicated to each style. The first seven chapters can be played in any order, since each exists as an independent "short story" unrelated to the other chapters; to begin the eighth, however, the player must provide seven "passwords" provided by completing each of the other sections. (Wikipedia)

Coupling the physicality of the printed page with the electric liquidity of the computer screen, Between Page and Screen chronicles a love affair between the characters P and S while taking the reader into a wondrous, augmented reality. The book has no words, only inscrutable black and white geometric patterns that—when seen by a computer webcam—conjure the written word. Reflected on screen, the reader sees himself with open book in hand, language springing alive and shape-shifting with each turn of the page. The story unfolds through a playful and cryptic exchange of letters between P and S as they struggle to define their turbulent relationship. Rich with innuendo, anagrams, etymological and sonic affinities between words, Between Page and Screen takes an almost ecstatic pleasure in language and the act of reading. Merging concrete poetry with conceptual art, “technotext” with epistolary romance, and the tradition of the artist’s book with the digital future, Between Page and Screen expands the possibilities of what a book can be. Writer and book artist Amaranth Borsuk and (her husband) developer Brad Bouse, have created a magical space for the reader to discover what lives in the “in-between.”

(Source: Publisher's description)

Ad Verbum is a Oulipo-inspired wordplay-based game.