• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

In 1980, Rogue was released. Rogue took Temple of Apshai to new extremes. Featuring ASCII graphics where monsters and items were represented by ASCII characters, it established the concept of a random dungeon generator. This idea had already been in the tabletop version of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Dungeon Master’s Guide, with randomized tables capable of being populated with monsters and treasure. This made the game ideal for dumb terminals with no graphic interfaces. In Rogue, the character moved through the keypad. Each dungeon had a grid of three rooms by three rooms as well as dead ends. Unlike other games, there was no general store to exchange equipment—the player character was forced to use only what he could find. Later levels included mazes and character tiles.

I played the graphical version of Rogue years later on the Atari 520 ST. I got far, but never far enough to retrieve the fabled Amulet of Yendor. Even if you did get the amulet, you had to get back OUT again, which was no simple task. The most horrible of Rogue’s beasts were ur-viles, I had no idea at the time that these creatures originally debuted in Stephen R. Donaldson’s novel The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever.

In 1980 The Tarturian was released for the Apple II. It featured large parties of up to ten characters and a wide variety of classes: cleric, elf, gladiator, magician, strongman, thief, or wizard. It was one of the first to heavily rely on party dynamics, such that each party member relied on the other for success (Barton 2008:53).

Dungeon Campaign, Wilderness Campaign for the Apple II in 1980 featured some 80 adventurers roaming in a massive mob—more an army, really. This was one of the first games to feature encumbrance limits and food requirements (Barton 2008:54).

Also in 1980 came the fledgling version of Ultima, called Akalabeth, which heralded the Silver Age of CRPGs according to Barton (2008:63). The name comes from Tolkien’s Akallabeth, part of The Silmarillion. Richard Garriott coded it in BASIC for the Apple II, distributing it himself in Ziploc bags until the California Pacific Computer Company bought the rights to distribute it. The player receives quests from Lord British to kill a series of monsters, each more difficult than the last. Akalabeth’s original name was D&D28b, as it was the twenty-eighth version of a Dungeons & Dragons–inspired CRPG that Garriott had coded. Barton theorizes that the first 27 were in fact gaming aids for the tabletop version of Dungeons & Dragons (Barton 2008:48).

Akalabeth was also noteworthy because it featured a simple wire-frame first-person perspective, in addition to an aboveground map and text. Akalabeth included many tropes found in tabletop role-playing games, including choice of character class, attributes, experience points, and a leveling system. The game sold tens of thousands of copies (2008:1).

Akalabeth is often considered the first of the Ultima series, and has been referenced as Ultima 0. In many ways, computer games retained these same fantasy elements. Perhaps the most representative of the CRPG genre is the Ultima franchise. Released in black and white in 1980 and followed by seven sequels, Ultima was always improving.

Ultima was famous for its undocumented features. You could bribe guards, even though it wasn’t immediately obvious this was an option. There were unlisted items in shops that would give you a considerable advantage. And there were hidden areas and secret doors which could be found using the search command. By Ultima IV, spell components were included to cast spells and certain mantras were necessary at shrines. The reagents had to be mixed in certain proportions lest something catastrophic happen. Some components even had to be found rather than bought, which required the character to search for them in certain locations at certain times.

Ultima featured a point-buy system across six attributes: strength, agility (dexterity), stamina