This hampered me when playing the HHGTTG text adventure as a youth. My memory is fuzzy on the specifics, but one of the early things needed is to relieve a headache or similar, and a search of Arthur's home would reveal an "analgesic" eventually. Unfortunately you wouldn't be able to do something else until you consumed the analgesic, and eventually you'd lose the game because the home was demolished while you're in it.

I did not know at the time what an analgesic was, despite having a fairly broad vocabulary. If anything, I assumed it was some dirty adult toy; certainly not a thing to be consumed as a remedy for pain.

It was frustrating because I searched high and low for aspirin, Tylenol, pain-killer, etc. but never got past that section until I had a chance to search the Internet for a solution - many years after I really cared to play a text adventure again.