(UPDATE) Starship Titanic is NOW on Steam!

Oh hey it was actually the game I was thinking of. I read the book some years ago.

That's awesome news indeed, I'm always glad to see more adventure classics on Steam.

Wow... I have the box of that one around somewhere.
I could not get through the lexical puzzles that this game required. I remember reading a walkthrough once I got very frustrated with it and was like "wtf?!" at how the puzzle was supposed to be solved. Then again, I also got to mention the sucking and blowing machine to a female friend of mind, since it was part of a puzzle while I was talking to her on the phone.

(If you come at the game as a half text adventure with an emphasis on attempts at conversational AI, the puzzle-solving bits will probably make slightly more sense.)

Fond memories of that game. Love Douglas Adams.