Author: professor6153

The Magic Tower was created by Gary Bedrosian, Richard Christie, and Lee Elmendorf in BASIC language for North Star computers in 1978.  Loyal or avid readers of my CPRG journey know how enamored I’ve been with Gary Bedrosian’s past efforts.  Game #19: Lords of Karma was reviewed as well as his most excellent Game #30: Empire of the Overmind as well.  As a matter of fact, both of Bedrosian’s games in 1978 and 1979 took top award honors from me for the Interactive Fiction Game of the Year.  I have been wanting to play this for a long time now, but I was having trouble even getting a title screen.  The problem was I was using a NSDOS emulator working within a DOS emulator, and it was not an easy task.  However, I was able to use AI to aid me now, and after much trial and error I was finally able to get the game working.

The Magic Tower is an all-text game that has you create a cast of characters to hunt artifacts that have been amassed by the forces of evil and stored in a tower.

When you begin play, the game has you first create the Universe that the game takes place in.  You accomplish this by the LOAD UNIVERSE and then RUN UNIVERSE commands.  Creating the universe takes a few minutes and what the program does is randomize the different magic items, allies, and enemies that are going to populate the universe.  The game chooses a very specific magic item to be the object of your quest.  In my case, I was tasked with finding and recovering Amril’s Boots.

Once the Universe has been created and you’ve been assigned a specific magic item to recover, it is time to create your party.  Your party can range in size from 2 to 16 characters.  This is an interesting variable because the difficulty level of combat is determined by the level of the tower that you are on.  It is not based on the size of the party.   The larger your party is, the easier it should be to complete your task.  A large party size would definitely slow the game down as management of each character during combat would become tedious.  I started with a party of four and had a very difficult time surviving in the higher tower levels.  I had a few hours of game play under my belt and only had about five different magic items to show for my troubles, so I decided to switch to a party of five.

Your party members have five different attributes which seem affected by race:

• Combat
• Morale
• Sorcery
• Endurance
• Fatigue

Combat deals with your fighting prowess.  Your Morale seems very tied to combat.  The better your Morale score the better you handle adversity.  Sorcery deals with your spell casting power and how much damage your spells can inflict upon casting.  Endurance is an attribute that can increase with experience.  The more times that you survive the tower and are able to make your way back to home base and rest, the more your Endurance score will increase.  The rankings for each attribute can be as low as Incapable to as high as Extremely High.

• Incapable
• Very Low
• Low
• Moderately Low
• Moderate
• High
• Very High
• Extremely High

 

There are 10 different commands in the game as depicted above.

1.  List Character Status – you can examine each of your characters and their attributes
2.   List Magic Item Status – I am not sure how many magic items there are in the game.  The highest number associated with a magic item I found was #82 so there are at LEAST 82 different magic items in the game.  Choosing this option will let you know which magic items are stored in your home base and which magic item each character might be equipped with.  Each character can carry or equip only ONE magic item.  The rest of the magic you recover is stored at your home base.
3. Change Marching Order – this is an important option as sometimes you are attacked from behind and after the first initial round you’ll want to change your marching order.  You might also have a character who gets knocked unconscious during combat and you’ll want to change your marching order to protect him or her.  If a character is struck while unconscious they die immediately.
4. Pick up a magic item – this is done when you’re at your home base. Picking up an item also identifies that item.  You want to be very careful here as there are GOOD magic items and EVIL magic items as well.  Most of the EVIL magic items negatively impact your attributes however a few of the EVIL magic items also cause instant death.  I always had the weakest character in my party pick up and test the magic items and that way if he or she is instantly killed I simply roll up a new character to replace my loss.  If you do pick up what is identified as an EVIL item and it didn’t cause instant death, you can always drop it in favor of something else.
5. Pack a magic item – you can elect to pack a magic item to carry with the group to the tower without it being carried by any specific person.
6. Head for a TOWER level – you can choose this option from your home base or from any tower level.  If you are at your home base and choose this option and then type in 1, you will then journey to the first tower level.  If you do not have a random encounter while on your way to the tower, or on the 1st tower level, you can then choose this option and go to a different TOWER level, perhaps 2.  I should also note that you can choose this option and then select 10 which will then start you on a journey to the 10th tower level.  I chose to just take it a tower level at a time because if you choose let’s say TOWER level 8, and you are on TOWER level 2, it will keep checking for random encounters until you reach your destination. If you are greatly weakened, and want to head for home to rest and heal, the game will instead keep checking for encounters until you’ve reached the end of your destination.  So do not bite off more than you can chew.
7. Head for home – choosing this option, no matter where you are in the tower, begins to take you to home base.  You will have to deal with possible random encounters however all the way back.
8. Search current area – this is how you search for magic items.  You can find magic items either at the end of a combat encounter, or by searching a TOWER level.
9. Rest – you can choose this option from anywhere and it will help to move your fatigue level back in a positive direction.  If one of your party members are unconscious too, resting several times can restore consciousness.  If a party member is unconscious, you cannot head for home.
10. Change a character’s name – exactly as it sounds

Combat in The Magic Tower is pretty unique. Combat begins with a spellcasting round and you are asked to rate your spellcasting aggressiveness on a scale of 0 to 1.  I found through trial and error that this assignation is the lynch pin of your success in this game.  If you assign a score of 0 to your spellcasting aggressiveness than 100% of your spell power is held in reserve for your defense against spellcasting enemies.  If you assign a score of 1, then 100% of your spellcasting power is put into offense.  I found that most of the time I was assigning a 1 to my spellcasting aggressiveness unless I was facing other spellcasters.  Once the spellcasting round is over, physical combat then begins.

In physical combat, the number of your fighters that get to attack depends upon how many enemies you encounter.  In my experience with the game, I found that the number of enemies ranged from 2-12.  If there are only four enemies and you have five individuals in your party, your last party member does not get to attack this round.  During combat, much like your spellcasters did, your fighters have to choose their physical aggressiveness on a scale of 0 to 1.  If you choose 1, 100% of your efforts are in offense and striking your opponent. The damage that you can do is greater, but you leave yourself susceptible to be hit.  I found that if you choose 1, your characters quite often die very quickly.  If you choose 0, 100% of your effort is in defense, which works great for prevention of being hit, but you will never hit your opponent.  The happy solution here, is the medium between the two.  I learned the hard way, but if you choose 0.5 for your aggressiveness, it’s the perfect amount of offensive and defensive allocation.

If during combat one of your characters is struck unconscious, or the fatigue rating on a character is particularly high, you can choose to change the marching order after each round.  This does become very strategic as you climb the levels of the tower.  Combat on the 8th, 9th, and 10th level can be exceedingly difficult.

One of things about this game that I found to be quite fun, was wondering what the magic item was that you found.  A number rating is also assigned to each of the magic items, and like I mentioned above, one of the magic items I found was assigned #82.  So there are at least 82 different magic items in the game.  Here is a list of the different magic items that I recovered before finding the object of my quest:

• The Iron Sword (EVIL) #67
• Oranon’s Demon Helm (EVIL) – causes instant death #70
• Vikarna’s Dagger (EVIL) #26
• The Challenger Sword (GOOD) #58
• The Crimson Cleaver (EVIL) #79
• The Iron Shield (EVIL) #66
• Singling (mace) (EVIL) #82
• The Evil Bow (EVIL) #30
• The Black Helm (EVIL) – causes instant death #38
• The Idiot’s Ring (GOOD) #13
• Elfrit Bottle (EVIL) #56
• Avenger (sword) (GOOD) #57 – very powerful
• Yadava (sword) (GOOD) #22

And then FINALLY, I found Amril’s Boots which was the ultimate quest that I was assigned.

 

I think I was rather unlucky in that I seemed to find an inordinate number of EVIL items.  I guess a player could get lucky and find the object of their quest on the very first try, or it could have taken me much longer to find Amril’s Boot’s.  If you count character death’s and losing items on the way to home base, I probably found 20 magic items before finally succeeding.

I rather enjoyed this game, and you have to remember that this was programmed in 1978.  The game was somewhat difficult too and took me about 10 hours to complete.  I am thankful that I got to play this piece of CRPG history.  The emulator within an emulator was certainly a hurdle for me in getting this to properly run.  I remain a big Gary Bedrosian fan and wish that he would have gone on to make more games.  I was lucky enough to be able to chat with Gary about Empire of the Over-Mind when I reached out to him.

Thanks for taking the time to read me.  Until next time……

Dragons was created in 1980 by Bruce Nesmith.  If you’re a huge Dungeons & Dragons fan this name might sound familiar to you.  He was the author of a dozen different Adventure Modules as well as contributing to the Book of Lairs II.  He is best known for expanding the original Ravenloft adventure into the full Ravenloft: Realm of Terror campaign setting (1990 boxed set, with Andria Hayday), though that is a setting rather than a single adventure module.

Nesmith created Dragons on the HP 3000 when he was attending Beloit College.  The game turned out to be popular with TSR Hobbies who hired Nesmith as soon as he finished college.  Nesmith created the only video game that TSR published: Theseus & the Minotaur.  Following his stint at TSR, Nesmith went to work for Bethesda Game Studios and retired in 2021 after more than 20 years of service.  He has since focused on writing which includes his Loki Redeemed Trilogy.

Dragons is a turn-based dungeon crawler, and the map uses ascii characters like many of these earlier CRPGs.  When the game begins, you’re asked if you want to start with an old or new character.  You have the ability to save your character between sessions.  Once you leave the dungeon and enter the shop you can choose to quit the game which saves your character.  Permadeath is a very serious threat as it is difficult to stay alive.  The character that you are creating is a fighter, there are no spells nor magic system in the game.

If you choose to keep the randomly rolled attributes you then choose a name for you character.  When you’re generating a name, the game asks you for a secret password.  If you leave this blank and then hit ENTER then the game allows you to skip this step.  It also asks you for three characters that you want to use to represent yourself on the ascii dungeon map.  I chose to use the name of Fost Longstrider and used FOS to represent the character on the map.  It is now time for you to go shopping.

When you purchase your equipment there are six different materials to choose from which affect the cost of the item as well as the bonuses associated with each item.  It required a lot of exploring and much gold merely to upgrade to S Steel or M Steel.

The dungeon is fixed and comprised of 10 50 x 50 levels consisting of rooms and corridors.

There are four different entrances into the dungeon: the North Entrance, South Entrance, West Entrance, and East Entrance.  Each time you enter the dungeon the entrance that you start from is random.  When you begin a new session with a saved character you get to choose which entrance you’d like to start at.  You can see the ascii dungeon map depicted above.  The walls of the dungeon occupy squares for the sake of properly mapping.  In the above picture, Fost Longstrider is mauled by a Bear.  The Bear is one of the toughest opponents on the first two levels because it gets two attacks per round and is a killing machine.  I was slain by a Bear on three different occasions.

The picture above shows me at 3rd level with 32 hit points.  I was actually able to achieve 4th level and had 34 hit points.  I had about 2/3 of the 2nd level mapped out when I was jumped and quickly slain by a 4th level Ghoul in one round.

The following is a list of all of the creatures that I encountered on the first two dungeon levels: Anklyosaurus, Panther, Triffid, Torpedo, Clinger, Blog, Warg, Bear, White Worm, Great Weasel, Tritero, Triclops, Walking Stick, Giant Ant, Rust Lizard, Venus Trap, Giant Centipede, Flying Snake, Giant Bat, Indigon, Warg, and Stag Beetle.  Each of these creatures that I battled had a different experience level attached to them as well ranging from 1st through 4th.  I had encountered 1st and 2nd level Ghouls and had no problem dispatching them but was absolutely crushed by a 4th level Ghoul.

There were a lot of secret doors to uncover on the map.  Most of the rooms contained an encounter and I never had a random encounter occur in the corridors.  When you slay a monster there is usually also a treasure chest occupying the room that you can attempt to unlock.  Gold, silver, copper, and jewels are what you can expect.  The game uses encumbrance as well so once you are heavily encumbered with treasure it’s time to exit the dungeon where you can store your wealth in the shop.

The following commands are also available:

• T – (T)reasure – displays the current treasure that you are carrying and it’s value
• I – (I)nventory – displays your current equipment
• C – Heal – only works outside of the dungeon and in the shop.  It is the equivalent of a rest and heals all of your wounds
• U – Opens treasure chests that you find in the dungeon
• G – Picks up the treasure found in the chests
• L (L)ook – this is a very cool and unique feature of the game that Nesmith definitely put a lot of time into.  If you enter a room and encounter a dungeon denizen you can hit L and it will describe the creature for you. All of the descriptions are very cool  I wish that Nesmith would have put just a quarter of this effort into detailing a room or two on each dungeon level much like you see in Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord.  I am already extremely impressed with this game in 1980.  If Nesmith had added an overall plot point or a specific way to WIN the game, this might have rivaled Rogue for the best CRPG of 1980.  Below are a couple of examples of the LOOK feature:

You move about the dungeon by using the N, S, E, W keys.  If you encounter a stairway the letter A climbs up and the letter D climbs down.  The stairs remain fixed on each level grid which gives you a fixed point to map from. I mapped the entire 1st level and will provide you with the map and I was able to map 2/3 of the 2nd level but it remains unfinished due to my untimely demise.

Because there is no winning condition associated with this game nor any true end, I am content to end my exploration with the 2nd dungeon level.  Make no mistake, I spent hours with the game merely to achieve as much as I did.  Permadeath is very real with no way to save your game unless you make your way out of the dungeon.  I don’t see the sense in taking the time to map out all 10 dungeon levels with so many more games awaiting to be played and discovered.

I was very impressed with this game, despite the fact that there is no winning condition nor magic system.  It was very addictive and I was thrilled at having to map out the dungeon levels.  The difficulty level of the game is high and permadeath is a constant threat.  The LOOK feature and the verbose descriptions of the creatures was very cool and unique.  The different material choices for both weapons and armor was also a unique feature.  If there had been a winning condition you had better believe I would have made the attempt to map out all 10 levels.  If I am hungry for any kind of computer role-playing game experience in 1980, I could have seen myself spending an inordinate amount of time with this one.

New games are always discovered and then archived, so I found myself returning to the 1980 list of CRPGs with both Dungeon of Doom and now Dragons.  I can now boast, that for the time being, I have now completed every single CRPG that was produced in 1980.

Thank you for taking this journey with me.  Until next time…….

I found myself going back in time once again to my 1980 Game List in order to play a game entitled Dungeon of Doom.  A homicide detective would have labeled this “a cold case” as any copy of the game had been missing for years.  A Youtuber, “DefaultGen”, uploaded it to the Internet Archive and I’ve now been able to play it.

Dungeon of Doom was published in 1980 by Argon Games for the Apple II computer.  The game was created by Stephen G. Walburn and Robert J. McCredie.  They also created three board games for Argon between 1980 and 1981.  Dungeon of Doom appears to have been their only computer title.  Walburn handled the programming and McCredie contributed to the concept and design.  Argon Games seems to have existed primarily for these titles and was a very small, independent publisher out of Raleigh, North Carolina.  Walburn died of a heart attack in 1986.

When the title screen appears, it asks if you want to use a previously saved party or create a new one.  In this dungeon exploration game, you can actually create and control a party of up to 12 characters!

You can have any combination of fighter, mage, or cleric.  Each character has six attributes: Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma.  Any Dungeons & Dragons fans are going to recognize these attributes.  They all range between 3-18 but you can actually create a character with all 18s.  You can also make the characters any level that you want and assign any hit point totals that you want.  I made each of my characters level 20,000 with 999 hit points.  It did not break the game and allowed me to do so.  I was flabbergasted.  When you assign equipment, you can give all armor and weapons up to a +5 magical bonus as well.

The game is interesting in that it works on the honor system.  It assumes that you’re going to create a party of first level characters, do some exploring, slay a few monsters, find a few treasures, and then leave the dungeon.  The (T)reasure key will inform you how much treasure you’re walking around with and how much experience you’ve earned.  You’re supposed to record the experience and calculate for yourself whether your characters have made a level or not and then edit the number of their hit points accordingly.

I grudgingly went along with this method…..for awhile.

…and then I added an edited character to the party……and then progressed to creating five super characters at level 20,000 with 999 hit points apiece.

Why?  You’re right, this is so very uncharacteristic of me, so what gives?  It turns out there is no plot of any kind nor is there any kind of story to set you up in the game’s MANUAL

There is no winning condition nor is there any need to map as the game provides the map for you.

 

The dungeon consists of six levels and 78 rooms per level.  The hallways and map configuration is always the same however the rooms, represented by the colored tiles, are randomly distributed.  You always begin play in the lower SE corner and the doorway to the next level is in the upper NW corner.  When you attempt to move to a lower level the game will warn you with a message that looks something like this; “only 48 of the 78 rooms have been cleared, are you sure you wish to proceed?”  As you can see up above I methodically began checking off rooms as I explored them.  Some of the rooms are empty and some of them contain encounters as well as treasure.

Dungeon exploration is in a first-person perspective.  You move about using the F, B, L, and R keys on the keyboard.  Each letter stands for Forward, Back, Left, and Right.  Movement is rather odd in that when you choose to go (L)eft or (R)ight it turns you in that direction but also moves you a step forward in that direction as well.  It took some getting used to.  A positive is you’re not mapping each dungeon level by hand but that is also the game’s weakness as it takes away some of its charm as well.  When you find yourself outside of a door on the map you hit the letter E to (E)nter the room.  Pressing M will display the (M)ap of the current dungeon level.  The following keys are also available:

• P – shows the group along with their current hit points
• T – Displays the group’s treasures
  H – the cleric can heal party members.  When you press this key the name of the cleric in your party must be typed in to access the menu with different levels of healing
• C – you type in the name of your mage and you can then teleport to a different position in the maze
• Ctrl + N – this requires the password “1” and you can teleport up a level or down a level (the 1 or 2 keys respectively)
• Ctrl + P – displays your coordinates of the group’s tile within the current level. I never understood the significance of this since hitting the letter M to bring up the map always showed you your current location.
• Ctrl + R – asks whether you want to randomly reposition rooms on the current level you’re on.  The advantage in doing this is that the deeper you travel in the dungeon the harder the battles become.  If you’re choosing to play it straight this can be a boon because you can reset the first level and continue to grind to build up your characters before exploring the second level.
• Q – exits the game

Combat is both interesting and quite cumbersome.   Once combat is initiated your view changes.  If you’re in a room this is a gigantic 40 x 40 grid and if you’re in a hallway it’s a 20 x 40 grid.  You battle one monster type only and the character icons are represented by different colors which you select for them during character creation.  The manual claims that there are 141 different creature types.  I didn’t stick around long enough to find out if this is true.  Sometimes the creatures attack first, and other times the party gets to attack first.  The game will cycle through each of the characters in order during their turn.

Your options during combat are movement, a melee attack, a ranged attack, or the casting of a spell.  The 40×40 grid is just way too large.  You will find that quite often one of your characters might be surrounded by the enemy while others are very far away. It becomes a slow and tedious process to begin moving each character towards the melee.  There are nine different directions that characters can move during combat represented by the numbers 1-9.

Once combat is over, you’re awarded experience and/or treasure.

It is interesting to note that before the glorious debut of Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord, it was initially believed that 1982’s Tunnel of Doom was the first game to offer multi-character combat.  We now know that it is actually 1980’s Dungeon of Doom that now has that distinction.  While this is an interesting footnote in the history of computer role-playing games, it does not make the experience of playing this game any more enjoyable.

I am extremely thankful that the “cold case” of this missing game was finally solved and that it’s place in the history of computer role-playing games is now firmly established.  It was actually the first game to feature multiple characters in a party and also the first game to feature multiple characters in a top-down tactical combat grid.  Because of these distinctions, I really wanted to enjoy the game but playing it felt more like a chore.  The exploration and mapping choices, the slow speed of the game (the map took FOREVER to redraw and each combat took at least 15-20 minutes), and no plot or winning condition sucked all of the joy out of the game for me.  I’d like to clarify what I meant by exploration and mapping choice.  If each of the six dungeon levels were a mystery, and I had to draw them by hand, I might have (yes it would have been sheer insanity) mapped out a few of the levels.  But since I can see the dungeon level, and the corridors remain the same but the rooms and their contents are random, it just removed any charm for me that the game might have had.

Thank you for taking the time to read me and for joining me on this journey.  Until next time……

 

 

Castle Quest was created in 1980 by Rick Taubold for the Compucolor Computer (CoCo) and distributed on disk number 33 of the CHIP (Rochester Compucolor Users Group).

I was rather surprised at the pull of this game and soon found myself addicted. The game is a turn-based dungeon crawler with a fixed map of 20 rooms to be explored. The goal is to amass 20,000 experience points through exploration of the dungeon without dying.

When you first start the game it asks if you want to continue with a saved game or start a new one. You can save the game once you successfully exit the dungeon. If you start the game back up later and want to continue with the same character all you have to do to access that character is type in the character’s name. The game features permadeath so if you die within the dungeon you cannot access the saved character again.

There are four different experience levels in the game. 2nd level can be attained with 2,000 experience, 3rd level with 5,000 experience, and 4th level with 10,000 experience. When you enter the castle you choose your difficulty level between 1-4 which depends of course on your experience level. You have to pay 50 gold coins each time you enter the castle so you MUST keep your entrance fee in reserve at all times otherwise you will soft lock your game.

You gain experience points from slaying monsters however your experience point total is not updated until you leave the castle. Encumbrance is a part of the game as well and your character has maximum weight limits. I found myself dumping gold pieces at different points in the game because I was overburdened.

Armor represents Armor Class and the lower your score the better. It starts and 10 and shields and armor that your purchase or find subtract from that Armor Class.

I found that the maximum hit points were random and usually between 30 and 39.

The type of weapon you purchase definitely impacts the amount of damage you can do. In one of my playthroughs I did find a Sword +1 as well so there are magic weapons to be found.

The game features six different kinds of spell scrolls that you can purchase. Knock which opens locked doors, Dispel removes traps in the room including those in chests, Heal will mend some of your wounds, Repel which also rebuffs monsters away from you, Flame which acts like an offensive fireball spell, and Shield which prevents monsters from attacking you for six rounds. I found the Knock, Heal and Shield spells to be absolute necessities so once you have some success you’re going to want to begin to purchase these spells. When you purchase a spell, and then use it, the spell is gone. So you constantly have to spend gold to replenish your spells.

I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve seen this tombstone screen. It is extremely hard to survive in this game. You could be third level, have 50 hit points, have an arsenal of spells, and if you’re hit by a Giant Spider and poisoned you die instantly. There are numerous different examples of this of this kind of instant permadeath in the game.

The game is unique in that you type in a number to move to that room number on the map but you are not yet in the room, you are merely just outside of the room. It took me a couple of playthroughs to realize this. You can then Enter the room if the door is unlocked. If the door is locked you have to use a Knock spell to open the door. You have to be careful with your Knock spells, you’ll need to always carry at least two, otherwise just ignore locked doors. Why? Many rooms will have a trap that when you enter the room the door locks behind you and the walls begin to move in. You have three rounds to get out or you will be crushed to death.

Chests can contain gold, gems (worth 10 to 99 gold each) or jewelry (worth 100 – 499 gold each), rings, or magical weapons. Most of the time you find gold but it is thrilling to find gems and jewelry. When I find a cache, I’d usually leave the castle and purchase better equipment or spells.

Some of the monsters have special abilities such as poison, flame, regeneration, and multiple attacks. You need to be very aware of these special abilities. Note that spells can only be used in the first round of combat so it is important to hold your powerful spells in reserve for when you encounter the deadlier denizens of the dungeon.

After all of this work and anxiety to survive, you are rewarded at the end with a screen that merely says congratulations. I have to say however that I found this game wildly addictive and could not stop playing it.

I had originally planned to start Autoduel which was released by Origin Systems in 1985 but got sidetracked with this little gem. Next up on the docket will indeed be Autoduel.

Until next time………..

Monster Combat was created by Lee J. Chapel for the KIM-1 and was published in the December 1980 issue of Byte magazine (Volume 5, Number 12) in the “Programming Quickies” section.

This excellent adventure-themed cover was illustrated by renowned artist Robert Tinney.

Monster Combat was an early text-based RPG game that was written in BASIC. You wander through a randomly generated 9×9 forest map represented by text characters.

The goal is to explore, encounter monsters, fight or avoid them, and collect as much treasure as possible while staying alive. The game ends when you exit the forest or die.

The Combat Strength is assigned at the beginning of the game and appears to be random. The strength value is spent when you choose to fight a monster. In a unique twist, you decide how much Combat Strength you want to spend in the encounter and then you’ll discover if that was enough of a value to overcome your opponent. Winning yields treasure, losing kills your character.

Movement around the map uses a simple directional command of N, S, E, W.

The monsters appear randomly and you decide then if you want to fight, flee, or bribe. It is a very minimal dungeon crawl in a forest style game and typical of BASIC programs from this era – short, hackable, and meant to be typed.

When the game begins, your character starts in a random place in the forest. Each space on the map can be an OPEN space, a tree, or a wall. There are different random events which can take place as you move through the forest:

• you can fall into a pit which causes damage and then deposits you in a different spot on the map
• a giant bat picks you up and deposits you in a random spot on the map – this usually happens as you’re nearing the edge of the forest and possible escape
• you can find treasure guarded by a Nothing

The different monsters and their individual strength are given to you below:

• Basilisk 100
• Chimera 70
• Cyclops 20
• Dragon 80
• Giant 40
• Goblin 5
• Griffin 60
• Harpy 50
• Minotaur 10
• Wyvern 90
• Zombie 30

When you successfully leave the forest, you win the game and are then given your total treasure accumulated score.

Treasures that you find can include silver spoons, swords, jewelry, gold, and chests (some trapped). Enchanted swords can boost your combat strength.

There are ports of the game and emulated versions that exist for the Commodore 64, TRS-80, Atari 8 bit, DOS/GWBASIC, and the TI-99/4A.

Lee J. Chapel wrote a few other games in the early 80s, including some for the TRS-80 Color Computer (CoCo) like Journey to Mt. Doom. Chapel also wrote a newer version of this game entitled Giant Monster Attack which was published in the book Big Computer Games.

The new version features improved features such as a time limit, inns and castles now featured on the map, spells, and more random events and creatures.

I played the original Monster Combat version that was typed out for the Commodore 64.

Next up on the docket I am going back to 1985 to play Autoduel by Origin Systems.

Until next time……

Alternate Reality: The City was released for the Atari 8-bit in 1985 and then a year later was released for the Apple II, Commodore 64, and Atari ST. In 1988 it would be released for both the Amiga and DOS. Phillip Price published this game through California-based Datasoft amidst quite a bit of publicity. The City was going to serve as a home base and from the city the player could then move in and out of future planned releases: The Arena, The Palace, The Wilderness, Revelation, and Destiny, each with its own set of quests and winning conditions. The idea was that the player could transition from game to game as Price wanted to create a huge world for he or she to immerse themselves in.

The first break of this outline was when Datasoft forced an early release of The City. The Sewers would have been included in the initial release but a year later became The Dungeon and it’s own release. Although The Dungeon was completed and released, work on the 5 remaining installments never moved beyond theoretical outlines. A brief summary of these outlines follows:

The Sewers (which was supposed to be included with The City but later became The Dungeon – the dungeon here is made up of four levels.

The Arena – slavers were to be added to The City who would then capture new gladiators and force them into combat in the arena. There were other ways in which a character might enter the arena. A free man could also join the arena and be pitted against other opponents and possibly retire into a life of luxury.

The Palace – would feature courtly intrigue and the ability to purchase land in the city. A player could climb a ladder of power and responsibility and maybe even choose to rule as king over the city. A character could retire in politics and “win”. New players could attempt to overthrow the king.

The Wilderness – was to be a scenario for players to discover the truth concerning Alternate Reality. There would be traps and tricks and diversions all in an attempt to turn the character away from this quest of truth. This expansion would feature vast new areas of outdoor terrain to explore.

Revelation – with the illusion of The City broken, a player could now find his or her way to the alien ship and out of the holo-world. You could reach the ship through the fourth level of The Dungeon as well as an area in The Wilderness.

Destiny – now armed with high tech equipment and allies of alien factions, the player could now take the fight to his alien captors.

Price’s plan, vast in scope, never came to be. Price was not even able to finish The Dungeon and it was finished instead by Ken Jordan and Dan Pinal. Gary Gilbertson created the music for both games.

Character creation involved choosing a name and then six attributes would begin spinning along the top of the screen much like a slot machine. Hitting the space bar stops the spinning and you are then assigned your attribute scores. The six attributes are stamina, charisma, strength, intelligence, wisdom, and skill. Your experience points, level, and hit points are also displayed. Once you are assigned your values you are dumped into the city.

One of the things about this game that I instantly took a disliking too was movement. Your steps are not measured. This makes mapping of the city extremely difficult. When you move in a particular direction, the movement is reminiscent of a vehicle in an arcade game. Your character glides in the direction you want to move in and picks up speed as you hold down the key. I gave up trying to map the city and just started wandering around.

Survival in this game is a tedious affair. You begin the game with no money, dressed in rags, and bare-handed. Exploration of the city is in real-time too. There is a PAUSE button which you can activate by hitting P on your keyboard, and I made great use of this. If you hesitate at all, you will trigger a random encounter. I encountered the poor, disenchanted, thieves, cutthroats, couriers, rats, and orcs. When you’re fighting in rags and bare-handed the odds of winning any of these encounters is not very high. I found myself cycling through several characters in the beginning until I was able to find success.

When combat begins you have the choice to charm, ignore, sneak, trick, engage, use, ready, cast or leave. Engage is the same as attacking and once you choose to engage you can then lunge, attack, or parry. Charm is a very interesting option but is hit or miss. When you choose to Charm if you succeed it actually kills the opponent. I got lucky with my sixth character and was able to charm an opponent. I was able to acquire enough coppers to go to a smithy and purchase a stiletto. Once I had a minor weapon, I could then engage weaker opponents and slowly build up my experience and wealth. It was a challenge building up enough wealth to even stay at an inn. Later, Fost, my sixth character was also able to find a dagger. When you defeat opponents, you gain experience and depending on the skills used your attributes can increase with time as well. Food and water were also a chief concern.

There were some interesting innovations that were extremely noticeable in my exploration of the city. Weather changed while you’re exploring and you could experience rain and clouds as well as view a bright sun high in the sky. You can even witness sunrises and sunsets. Day turned into night and the music in the game would change based on which locations of the city you were in.

There are banks that you can deposit money in which earns interest for you. There are merchant shops, inns, a smithy, and hidden areas in the city as well. All of this would make for a memorable experience if it were not for one major detail, which is my largest complaint.

There is no specific goal for the character to achieve here. You CAN grind your character higher, but it ultimately feels like an unfinished product. There are no dungeons or ruins or storylines of any kind here. Because there was no established goal or storyline, I did not feel compelled to spend more than ten house with the game. I built my character up to 3rd level and had amassed over 4500 coppers and just decided to call it quits there. I felt like I had done enough to give me a good feel for the game and to be able to report on it. The game seems to have obtained something of a cult status with many players and quite honestly I’m not sure why. I am sure that I will enjoy The Dungeon scenario much more because there are established goals and a quest to complete.

There is a lot to appreciate in the game’s design and innovations but it’s two chief problems are big ones for me: the continuous movement and lack of any kind of goals or plot. I did find a complete map of the city that someone created online and I’m including it here for your perusal or use.

Next up I am going back in time once again to 1980 to a game entitled Monster Combat.

Until next time……………

I put a pin in my current 1985 list of games and went back in time to 1980 as I realized I had missed one of Crystalware’s games. John and Patty Bell were responsible for many of the early games that I’ve played in my journey. The House of Usher, Quest for Power, Forgotten Island, Fantasyland 2041 A.D. and The Crypt have all been completed and reviewed here for your perusal. Beneath the Pyramids was released in 1980 for the Apple II and in 1981 for the Atari 800. I chose to play the earlier 1980 Apple II version.

I have always romanticized the shifting desert sands hiding forgotten tombs beneath unexplored pyramids. You will find me a big fan of the old Universal mummy films as well as the Brendan Frasier franchise reboot. Thus, I found myself looking forward to playing a game set within this genre despite being previously underwhelmed with previous Crystalware titles.

The premise here is that we’ll be exploring an ancient pyramid looking for a secret chamber that contains a gold statue of the ancient cat goddess Bast. So far, it’s enough to make you want to rub your hands together in glee.

You begin the game with a shopping spree at the Bazaar. This is the game’s first initial puzzle that can only be solved through trial and error. You’re going to have to deduce which items are necessary to successfully complete your expedition into the pyramid. It also took me a couple of rather unsuccessful forays to realize that by purchasing the duffel bag first it would allow me to carry even more equipment. A rifle as well as ammunition is certainly a necessity. You’ll find that you can flee from most of the creatures that will assault you within the pyramid but there are times when you’re backed into a corner and will have to use the rifle. A rope and grappling hook are absolutely necessary to win. You’ll also want to purchase a crowbar, lantern, pick axe, wool coat, rations, and gas mask.

The biggest puzzle of this game is the labyrinth of the pyramid itself. There are many rooms and corridors, and it is easy to become lost.

Your health score can be depleted from various traps and triggered events within the pyramid. If the creatures you encounter are able to successfully attack you, they will drain your health. Your energy score will decrease as you explore the pyramid. You have to learn the maze of the pyramid and successfully navigate it, but you have a limited amount of time to do so. This forces you to have to economize and plan your foray carefully.

The triggered events that can befall you in any given room seem random. This is where the items you purchased at the bazaar come in handy. If a heavy statue falls on you, you’re going to need the crowbar to get it off of you. If a level of the pyramid is unbearably cold, only donning the wool coat will prevent you from being injured. If a vase topples and breaks, releasing a noxious gas throughout the room, you’re going to need your gas mask to avoid being poisoned. Even when you successfully use these items, you’ll find that these various traps all sap your energy to some degree.

In the Apple version, the pyramid is much like a dungeon which consists of four dungeon levels. The deeper you go, the closer you get to the prize you seek. There are a total of four stairways or pits that you’re going to need to find. Once you come upon one of these, only the rope and grappling hook will get you down to the next level. It took a lot of trial and error to realize what the TRUE items were that I needed from the bazaar all the while mapping the pyramid and searching for stairways to the next level.

All of the rooms and passages are labeled at the bottom which certainly helped with the mapping. I found the titles to be very creative and helped with the immersion. The Doorway to Ka, Temple of Bast, the Mummy Chamber, the Queen’s Chamber, the Royal Way, Hall of the Gods, Hall of Death, Hall of Akhenaton IV are but some of the examples.

Eventually I did find the golden cat statue of Bast. You’re going to need a pickaxe to obtain the statue as it is the only thing that allows you to bust through the walls of the chamber. Once you obtain the statue you’re going to have to reverse direction and leave the pyramid the same way you got in.

You’ll need to consume your rations and also have a little bit of luck in order to have enough energy to escape. Hopefully you’ll find a healing potion or magical incense in your explorations to help with energy recovery.

You are in for a bit of a surprise just as you’re ready to leave the pyramid. A guardian materializes near the entrance and asks you a riddle. You have to answer the riddle correctly otherwise you are sealed in the tomb forever.

Once you answer the riddle correctly you receive the following congratulatory message up above.

It took me about five total hours to beat the game. There appears to be quite a difference in the gameplay between the Apple version and the Atari version. I’ve watched some videos of the Atari gameplay and the maps as well as locations are completely different. Even though the game tells you that you are delving into a pyramid the Atari map looks a lot like the shape of a Sphinx. Whereas in the Apple version the rooms are fixed and the map is more like four dungeon levels. In the Atari version it appears the Temple of Bast is located high and in the Apple version the Temple of Bast is in the last and deepest dungeon level.

I’m not sure that I would call Beneath the Pyramids a must play game, but the completionist in me and attempt to be somewhat of a historian compelled me to go back and check this game off of the list.

I am heading right back to the 1985 list and next up will be Alternate Reality: The City.

Until next time……….

When I generate a list of games to play for each respective year, I use more than a few resources to determine what CRPGs were published that particular year. I had never heard of this particular game and thus was excited to see what it was all about. What I did not expect at all was that this game appears to be a total rip-off of Donald Brown’s Eamon franchise.

I was completely shocked. How did Green Valley Publishing get away with this? You can read my earlier review of Donald Brown’s Eamon: Beginner’s Cave HERE

I really enjoyed what Donald Brown was able to accomplish with his Eamon engine. There are now well over 250+ adventures that all begin and end in the adventurer’s hall. Donald Brown would later try to commercialize his Eamon series under the guise of Swordthrust. You can read my review of the first Swordthrust adventure HERE.

There is really nothing different between this current product and Brown’s previous The Beginner’s Cave other than cosmetic changes. All that Green Valley really did was change the name of attributes, many of the creatures, and location names. For example, The Hall of the Guild of Free Adventurers becomes the Guildhall of Free Adventurers. This blatant attempt to avoid copyright infringements occur throughout the entire game but did they really think it would fool anybody? Attribute names are changed, creature names are slightly altered, skills have different names, and so on.

One big cosmetic difference is once you enter Beginner’s Cave the interface changes to a split screen.

I thought I might see an improvement in gameplay with this cosmetic difference but my experience was quite the opposite. There are not as many verbs that are recognized in this version as there are in Brown’s version. There are some noticeable wrinkles as well. I feel like the combat in the original Eamon series seems to statistically work better. The biggest difference I found was that in the original game if you are close to defeating your opponent, they will often flee the location. When you move to an adjacent location your opponent will then be there creating a feeling of fluidity. In this ripoff version, I found that when your opponent flees, they are often nowhere to be found. When I was leaving the cave to go back to the hall and hit the Large Chamber location, all of my previous foes were all in this area. This is a programming flaw and not purposeful in my opinion.

The above just shows you yet another example of how Green Valley just changes some words and titles from the original Eamon game in this obvious rip-off.

The map and locations are also identical to the original game. I played through this entire version successfully and the treasures I uncovered were converted to gold so that I could purchase equipment. I was, and still am, a huge fan of the Eamon engine but this version with some lipstick on it somehow loses the magic that the original game had. The discovery of this game left such a bad taste in my mouth I could not wait to be done with it. Cave of the Mind and River Adventure were also released by Green Valley – both of them also original Eamon adventures. If there are any readers who can shed more light on this Green Valley Publishing mystery I’d love to hear from you.

Next up on the docket: I am once again going back through time to 1980 to play a game from Crystalware that I somehow missed: Beneath the Pyramids.

Until next time……….

Space I, also known simply as Space was published by Edu-Ware in 1979 for the Apple II. It is a text-based role-playing/strategy simulation game inspired by the Traveller tabletop RPG.

It involves a quite lengthy character creation process through military service branches, skill development, space exploration, trading, combat, and more. An expansion called Space II was released in 1979, but Edu-Ware later replaced both with their Empire trilogy due to legal issues. The creator of Traveller, Game Designers Workshop, successfully sued Edu-Ware and the game was pulled from the market. A licensed version of Traveller entitled MegaTraveller was released in 1990. Edu-ware would come back with an original trilogy called Empire between 1981 and 1984 which were released for the Apple II.

I spent a good amount of time trying to find an original box or cover art to show to you and I could not locate any pictures or scans of original packaging. Early Edu-Ware titles from 1978-1980 often used very basic, low-budget packaging such as Ziploc bags, photocopied manuals, and minimal, if any, artwork. Broderbund and Sierra would later publish more elaborately illustrated boxes and documentation.

The main menu gives you an option of Characters and then four adventures to choose from. You cannot play any of the adventures until after you have successfully created a character. In the character creation process you first choose which branch of the military you’d like to serve in: navy, army, marines, scouts, merchant marines, “other services”, or you can choose a random draft of the above.

The game then assigns you attributes in strength, dexterity, intelligence, education, social standing, health, and a psychological evaluation as well.

Once the character is created you then go through four years of rigorous training. You get to select where you’d like to focus your training at the beginning of each year and once the year is over you can then review the results of your training.

It took a good half hour before I had a character that I was happy with or that merely survived. The character creation process doesn’t always end well. I had one character die during training, and my second character had a weak heart and suffered a fatal heart attack during my four years of training.

My fourth character ended up having pretty good attributes and there were no physical or psychological problems. My third character was a hot mess. He did not respond to leadership well AND was also afraid of enclosed spaces. I did save that character but went back to the drawing board once again. Once you are done with the character creation process you are discharged to civilian life. You then return to the main menu and you can now choose one of the four adventures that are available.

The five adventures: First Blood, Defend, Explore, Trader, and High Finance couldn’t be more further apart from one another in terms of the skills that they focus on as well as the outcomes. I decided to choose the first scenario, First Blood, and in this scenario you choose your weapon, armor, mode of attack (close combat or ranged) and your attack speed. Once your choices are complete you are then faced with an opponent and taken through a series of battle rounds. Rolls for the outcome are hidden and appear to be based on your skills and training.

My fourth character, Ben Nova, successfully completed that mission after which I was once again returned to the Main Menu.

In the second adventure you are defending a planet and simply have to choose different commands that are presented to you as choices.

In all honesty, the hardest part of Space was the character creation process. Each scenario or adventure never took longer than about 20 minutes of my time to complete.

I was most interested in the High Finance scenario because I work full time in the stock market. It was indeed a portfolio building investment game that seemed completely random. I think I accrued almost 2 million dollars and then easily became bored with it. You could keep playing until your heart’s content.

I also thought exploring planets might be a lot of fun but once again all of the events seemed random and very quickly grew tedious.

Space does have a lengthy character creation process and in the first scenario it did sport statistic driven combat but it barely qualifies as a computer role-playing game in my opinion. The game is listed though, in more than one source, as a CRPG and thus the completist in my had to go back and cover this offering from 1979.

Next up on the docket is a return to 1985 and a game entitled: Adventure: Only the Fittest Shall Survive.

Until next time……

Matt Barton, from Dungeons & Desktops: A History of Computer Role-Playing Games, describes Wizard’s Crown as “probably the most hardcore RPG of its time” and “one of the most sophisticated tactical CRPGs ever designed.” I’d have to whole-heartedly agree with both of his statements. It took me 57 hours to beat Wizard’s Crown and when I was finished my emotions warred between euphoria and relief. The only other game that took me longer to complete was Moria which was played on the Plato system.

Compute! magazine favorably reviewed Wizard’s Crown describing it as “probably the most unusual fantasy game to hit the market in some time”. Citing its graphics and detailed combat, the magazine stated that the game “will excite and challenge even the most seasoned veteran of fantasy warfare”. Computer Gaming Worlds’s Scorpia admired the game’s advanced use of injuries and bleeding when simulating combat, but believed there was too much emphasis on fighting or hack and slash, with only a few trivial puzzles and too light on interactions. In 1993, she became more positive, describing it as a “better-than-average hack n’ slash. ANALOG Computing magazine called the Atari version “superb….a true gem, an addictive game which you will find yourself playing day in and day out.”

SSI sold almost 48k copies of the game in North America and it was the company’s second best-selling Commodore game as of 1987. It was the first game to be designed in-house by SSI, previously known as a wargame company. The game design and programming was done by Paul Murray and Keith Brors, both of whom have a background in wargaming. This explains the complexity of the Wizard Crown’s tactical combat. For example, shields block attacks only from the front or the left, not from the rear and the right. Spears can attack two squares away, flails ignore defender’s shields, axes have a chance of breaking shields. Bows provide targeting and long range strategic options. There is an option for quick combat, and high level skirmishes can take as long as 40 minutes to complete per encounter. The game would spawn a sequel entitled The Eternal Dagger and it’s combat engine would find it’s way into SSI’s best selling Gold Box Series.

There has been much time that has passed since my last update. This was a conscious decision on my part because I did not want to inundate you with updates on new equipment or magical items found. What I have discovered in my game play is that Wizard’s Crown is time intensive and it might be the “grindiest” game I have ever played thus far. Each time I felt confident in the power and strength of my party I would meet crushing defeat within the ruins outside of the city and realize that I needed to spend more time grinding my characters higher. Hours upon hours were spent earning enough experience points so that I could raise attributes, skills, and life points. Each time you accrue experience points you have to choose very specifically what you’re going to increase. EVERYTHING needs to be increased! Skill points, life points, attributes like Strength and Dexterity, all of them demand your attention and so the grinding process is excruciatingly slow. Every single time you think you’re finally there, a big beat down in a particular part of the game informs you how wrong you truly are.

You can see in the character snapshots up above that the gameplay is very rogue-like in the sense that you need to acquire powerful items which augment both your protection and strength. I discovered that as the dungeons get increasingly more difficult, you’re going to need a couple of +5 weapons in order to get to the final battle. Each character also needs at least three items of protection to help aid against magic thrown at you by enemies. The need to increase your character’s statistics and to hunt for increasingly more powerful items to aid you in your quest makes the grind very real.

The object of the game is to rescue a magical crown from Tarmon, a wizard who sealed himself and the crown in his laboratory 500 years ago. In my previous blog post, I had explored the Old Thieves’ Guild and discovered an Emerald Key. I found that the key grants access into Gozaroth’s Mansion which is in the western part of the ruins. I soon discovered that I was no match for the denizens lurking within the mansion and went back to grinding. Once I felt my party might be strong enough, I entered the mansion again.

Gozareth’s Mansion consisted of three levels. There were three things of interest that I found within the mansion: 1) three parts of a staff hidden throughout the levels – with all of the parts you can then form the Golem Staff – a powerful magic item needed to help with an early battle within the Palace 2) the password needed to get through the gate of the Palace and lastly 3) you learned more of Tarmon’s plans as shown below:

Once the pieces of the Golem Staff were assembled, I felt it was time to storm the Palace and discover what lies within. Once I made my way safely through the gate and started exploring the first dungeon level, I was brutally reminded that I needed to leave and do a lot more grinding. Hours and hours of grinding ensued until I felt I was ready to storm the Palace once again.

A tremendously difficult battle occurs on the second level of the Palace. A fireplace reveals a secret door which leads to the stairs to level three. However, once the secret door is triggered, golems appear out of the woodwork to assault the party. This is where the golem staff comes in handy. Strategic placement of your party here is also imperative for the win. Winning this battle and continuing on to the third level is a watershed moment.

When I reached level three, I was faced with a rather “shocking” surprise. The entire level was a treacherous maze. One wrong step in any direction triggered a deadly lightning strike. I spent an entire evening painstakingly mapping out the entire level by trial and error. You do find a map on the first level which is supposed to help you in this endeavor, but I found it to be completely useless.

While mapping out the maze I uncovered strange writing on a pillar that proved to be a valuable clue that I would need later.

The fourth level proved to be a puzzle of a different kind. In order to progress through the level, you need the proper combination of open and closed doors. I found the puzzle to be extremely frustrating as you had to backtrack and open and close doors and then return to see if you could then open a closed door to proceed. The clue from level three actually provided misinformation but the organization of the clue itself and what it portended told me what I needed to do to solve this puzzle. There are three important finds on this level: 1) you find a non-magical spear with a glowing tip that can aid you in your battle against Tarmon 2) you are told by a prisoner that magical weapons do not affect Tarmon and that if you try to use them, they will disintegrate upon impact 3) you find a secret word that you will need to get the crown itself.

Level 5 was a real heartbreaker. There is an EXTREMELY difficult battle here with a horde of Demons and High Demons. I found that no matter what I did, I was no match for them. I had to completely retreat and backtrack through the 5 levels of the Palace and begin to grind once more. I spent another few hours grinding and I also spent much of my gold reserves improving my magical weapons so that three of my party members wielded +5 weapons. Once I felt confident enough to try again, I once more stormed the Palace. I made my way slowly back to the fifth level and this time I was able to defeat the demon horde. I was finally able to climb the stairs to level six.

The entire sixth level was called The Garden of Life. There is a stream here and you can heal your entire party if you drink from it. I drank deeply and then moved forward to confront Tarmon. Strategically Tarmon places himself behind a demon horde and he casts spells safely from this position and he also teleports all over the place. I found it best to charge forward and take on the horde as quickly as I could instead of letting them sling spell after spell against me. This is the hardest battle of the game, and it took me over an hour to complete this particular battle. In order to win, half of your party members need to retain their most powerful weapons so that they can properly tackle the demon horde. The other half of the party you have to equip with non-magical weapons as they are the only thing that can cause damage to Tarmon. I barely survived the encounter, but I was able to defeat Tarmon and his horde.

I found the wizard’s laboratory, and this led to the discovery of the crown! If you do not speak the secret word found on Level 4, DORVAL, you will die instantly here.

Once you have the crown you then have to make your way back out of the palace. Before leaving this level, I drank from the Stream of Life again to heal my party. This proved to be a good thing, because just as you are about to exit the palace, demons erupt from the surrounding pillars, and you have one last titanic battle on your hands with 24 Hell Born. I was able to miraculously survive and escape the palace with crown in hand.

The trek back to the city was very difficult. You are assaulted by monsters almost every third step of the way. Despite this difficulty, I was able to make it back through the gates of the city. When you return you are greeted with the following message:

This was a very difficult game. It required great patience and perseverance to get to the finish line as well as a lot of time. It took me 57 hours to achieve victory, and the journey almost made me change the way that I do things. I strongly considered starting another game and going back and forth between the two because the grinding almost made me lose my mind a couple of times. I was worried however that if I split my time between two games, that it would merely take me that much longer to finish, so I am glad that I stuck with it. I am curious what the percentage of people are who actually finished the game after starting it. If you’re someone who loves to character build, and you love grinding over long periods in the pursuit of better equipment and higher attributes, then this is the game for you.

Next up on the playlist: Instead of tackling another game from 1985 I am going back in time once again to 1979 to a game that I missed: Space

Until next time…….