Marc S. Blank was one of the pioneers of interactive fiction (aka text adventures). Among his most noteworthy achievements was co-founding Infocom and co-authoring Zork, the classic text adventure.
Blank was born in 1955. He graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Albert Einstein College of Medicine prior to co-founding Infocom in the summer of 1979. His co-founders were Tim Anderson, Joel Berez, David Lebling, Mike Broos, Scott Cutler, Stu Galley, J. C. R. Licklider, Chris Reeve, and Al Vezza. Infocom's best-known game, Zork, had actually been written on a mainframe two years prior to this, by Lebling and Blank.
Blank worked for Infocom from 1979 until 1986, when he resigned. He was reportedly unhappy with the direction the company was taking. He maintained close ties with the company for the next few years, however, and was credited with authoring two titles after he officially left the company. Much of his time with Infocom was spent in management, as he replaced Broos (who had resigned) on the board of directors in late 1979. Because of this he only had limited time to author games.
The following titles were authored or co-authored by Blank:
In total, Blank authored the following titles outside of Infocom:
- Mystery Capers (1994, Eidetic, with Mike Berlyn)
- Motile (1994, Eidetic, with Mike Berlyn)
- Live Action Football (1994, Accolade, with Mike Berlyn)
- All Star Baseball (1995, Accolade, with Mike Berlyn)
- Bubsy 3D: Furbitten Planet (1996, Accolade, with Mike Berlyn)
- Zork: The Undiscovered Underground (1997, Activision, with Mike Berlyn)
- Syphon Filter 1 (1998, Eidetic)
- Syphon Filter 2 (2000, Eidetic)
- Syphon Filter 3 (2001, Sony Bend)
Source: http://www.infocom-if.org/authors/blank.html