i'm not a complete expert on this, but the dates entailed here trigger clear memories.

the date on the Zork archive you linked to is 1977. in 1977 there was not really yet a notable software market for personal computers based on microcomputer chips, and software development at MIT in that timeframe would have been on Multics or DEC-10 or 20's and (probably not quite) the dawn of Vax-750s

just a couple years later the names on the archive you linked to went on to found infocom to sell this software ported to personal computers, Apple II 6502's or CPM S-100 bus 8080 and Z80s.

the Colossol Cave Adventure game for the PDP-10 had been released (to other institutions that had PDP-10's) just a couple years before and had caught fire in popularity at universities. These people at MIT took the same idea and reimplemented it with embellishments.