#017 - Hunt the Wumpus: Who Wants to Go on an Adventure?

Release Date: May 1973

Platform: Mainframe

Genre: Adventure

Developer(s): Gregory Yob

Publisher(s): People's Computer Company

Mugwump. Hurkle. Wumpus. 1973 had a thing for similarly-named mythical creatures, eh? Another thing 1973 had going for it was adventure. Yes, the beginnings of a new genre are taking place here in 1973, and one that would define much of early popular computer gaming, alongside CRPGs. Before being eaten by a Grue, one had to be eaten by a Wumpus.

I'm going to be spending more time on the authorship and history section of this article because there's a ton of information available about Hunt the Wumpus (also simply titled Wumpus) and its creator, Gregory Yob.

Gregory Yob (who also went by the names Hara Ra and Gregory H. Coresun) was a sometimes-contributor to the People's Computer Company newsletter. He provided a substantial write-up for the PILOT programming language in PCC's April '73 publication, and Hunt the Wumpus would later be included in the November edition the same year. I'm not sure where the May '73 date MobyGames has comes from.

PCC's Wumpus article. They let you come up with your own Wumpus design.

What I do know for certain is that Hunt the Wumpus succeeds Mugwump and Hurkle, because Yob himself confirms it. Those two games are effectively the reason why he made Hunt the Wumpus. While the game isn't in Ahl's BASIC Computer Games, it (and its sequel) are featured in that book's sequel, More BASIC Computer Games. On top of that, Yob himself did the write-up for it, explaining why he made the game. He records his reaction to seeing Mugwump and Hurkle for the first time as - and I quote - "EECH!!" 

Suffice it to say, he was not impressed. He hated the grid-based games, and wanted to see a game like them with the grid removed entirely. Later that day, he had an idea. The phrase "Hunt the Wumpus" came to him during meditation, and that's where the game began. The concept revolved around having a playing area made up of interconnected points, which Yob decided would be in the shape of a flattened dodecahedron because "it's my [Yob's] favorite Platonic solid." The shape would have 20 interconnected points, which would become different rooms in a cave system.

He didn't really know what this "Wumpus" creature was to look like, exactly. It's appeared in several forms in later media - including being the mascot of Discord (hint: shameless plug) - but at the time Yob was inviting readers to come up with their own ideas of what the Wumpus looked like. It took a few years for the general design of the Wumpus to be formed, but it was settled by at least the time the TI-99 computer came out in 1979.

The Wumpus as depicted in the TI-99 version of Hunt the Wumpus. Horror game material?

As for the objective of the game, it involved the player exploring the caves in hunt of the Wumpus. When they thought they were in a room near or adjacent to the Wumpus, which you would know from its pungent body odour, they'd shoot it with bow and arrow. Just to make things more interesting, however, Yob added some hazards into this cave system. Two, to be exact: bottomless pits and what he called "Superbats." Bottomless pits are obvious, but "Superbats" would grab the player and take them to a random room elsewhere in the cave system. The starting positions of player, Wumpus and hazards were all randomised at the start of the game.

The Wumpus could also move around the caves. It would move whenever the player shot an arrow or entered its current room in the cave. Yob even thought about some lore for how the Wumpus avoided the hazards - it was to heavy to be lifted by the bats, and had "sucker feet." It also had a thing for human flesh, as if the player ended up in the same room as the Wumpus after it moved, they became lunch. Very few games did this sort of thing at the time, and it creates a tension between hunter and prey, where the hunter could become the hunted. Some have argued that this is the genesis of horror/survival horror games, and I can see their point to some extent. Your character can meet a gruesome end, either from pit or coming face to face with the Wumpus, which can make exploring the caves somewhat unnerving.

The in-game instructions probably explain it better than I do.

What I will say for certain is that Hunt the Wumpus is the first adventure game. It has the working parts of an adventure game, even if not fully fleshed out. The bulk of the game is taken up with exploring this cave system, with the occasional descriptor appearing, sometimes functioning as hints to what's in the connected rooms, other times describing the player's unfortunate demise. We'll see this format expanded on later on in the decade in games like Wander and, eventually, Zork.

The descriptors/hints/warnings/whatever you want to call them. Also sequels!

Later in 1973, Yob presented his complete game to the People's Computer Company, where it was included in the November edition of the newsletter as I mentioned earlier in the article. Yob recalls attending a conference about a month after submitting the game, where almost every terminal was filled with people playing Hunt the Wumpus. It seemed like Yob had a hit on his hands. Creative Computing got their hands on the game in 1975, and Yob capitalised on his unexpected success by creating a number of sequels in an example of an early series/IP (we could say Pong was the first real video game series.) Yob created at least three more Wumpus games. 

Creative Computing's Robo-Wumpus. Definitely horror game material.

Now, I've played a form of Hunt the Wumpus previously on the Apple I (emulated, of course, because nobody actually owns an Apple I.) I recall that version not working too well - it may have been bugged to the point that the Wumpus didn't actually appear! I remember spending a long time wandering about in those caves with no sign of a Wumpus anywhere!

This time, I'm playing a DOS port from the Internet Archive. It's another one of those "modern or classic mode" versions where I always pick classic because I'm a purist snob like that. I can confirm that the Wumpus does indeed appear in this version. I know because I shot it and the game cackled at me, declaring "THE WUMPUS'LL GETCHA NEXT TIME!!"

Instructions are standard fare in Hunt the Wumpus, telling you all the things you need to know about how the game works, hazards, win and lose conditions, etc. One loss condition is shooting yourself with your own arrow. If you somehow manage to loop the arrow around multiple rooms back into your current room, you can kill yourself accidentally. I did this back on the Apple I version when I had no idea what I was doing. What a noob.

Having practiced archery, I don't know how one can shoot a "crooked" arrow.

Hunt the Wumpus dumps you straight into the caves, and now it's up to you to explore and try not to die. Having thought about it some, I realised that this is one of the only games up to this point in time where exploration is central to gameplay. The only other game I can think of that does this is Mike Mayfield's Star Trek. While it won't be obvious immediately, this emphasis on exploration marks a significant shift in game design. We have a few more early adventure games coming up (the Caves series) but, come 1974, we'll get Wander, another milestone in adventure games, and from there the floodgates open for exploration-based games (exclusively in the computer game sphere; arcades and consoles take a long, long time to catch up.)

I found that it's critical to memorise the locations of hazards within the cave system. I also think I got lucky with my first layout, as the first move I made allowed me to easily deduce the locations of one pit and one super bat.

Avoiding rooms 11 and 18.

Back to room 20 to go the other way. I slowly work my way through the other rooms without incident, until I get to room 12, where I'm able to determine the location of the other pit, in room 3.

A dead end. Literally.

The only real choice to make here is to backtrack and move over into the single-digit rooms. I go back to room 4 and make the discovery I need - the Wumpus is near! All that I need to do is determine which room it's in, which is actually very easy to do. I just came from room 14, and I know that room 3 has a pit, so that leaves only room 5. I load up my bow, and fire into room 5...

Got him!

And it's a win for me. Again, I honestly think the random generation was quite kind to me here, so I wanted to try again with a different setup. Fortunately the game is quite kind and lets you generate a new game without having to close and reopen it. 

My second attempt was a bit trickier, as I encountered the Wumpus first. I quickly figured out that a good strategy to avoid the Wumpus was to move back a room and shoot from a safe distance. I missed the first time (I stuffed up the inputs on my first go) and the Wumpus moved further away. I chased it and tried the same thing again, and this time was successful at snagging him.

You can see my strategy at work here.

I had a few more goes, just to got a more rounded view of possible game scenarios. I had one where I got caught by a bat. When that happens, the game declares "ELSEWHEREVILLE FOR YOU!" There's certainly a peculiar quirkiness that runs through the game. My reading on Gregory Yob suggests that he was quite an odd individual, so it checks that his personality would feed into the game. Fun fact: when Yob died in 2005, he was cryogenically frozen in hopes of being revived far into the future. Presented without comment.

Gather round the campfire now, enjoy some flame-grilled Wumpus steaks (are they edible?) as I go through the scores.

Time Played: 20 minutes (approx.)

Difficulty: 2/10 (Very Easy)

I didn't die once in my entire time playing the game. It gives you a lot of assistance in identifying hazards, so they end up not really being much of a danger, even if you start with a slightly trickier configuration.

Gameplay: 12

Easily one of the better games I've played for the blog thus far. It has a lot going for it in terms of game design. The emphasis on exploration is novel for its time, but it also makes good use of the mechanic by introducing hazards to avoid. Sometimes, depending on the cave configuration, a calculated risk is necessary to proceed. On top of this, there's additional strategy required. Identifying the location of pits is essential, and it's also necessary to build a strategy for taking out the Wumpus once encountered to ensure you don't become it's dinner.

Hunt the Wumpus also succeeds in building a small degree of tension. The stakes are high, it's either the Wumpus or you, and there are several ways you can die, which really isn't something we've seen before. It helps in making the caves exciting, and somewhat nerve-wracking to traverse.

The only significant piece of criticism that I can give is that the game undoes a bit of its strategic and tension-building work with how easy it is. I think it gives a little bit too much assistance to the player, as I could always back up whenever there was a pit or bat in an upcoming room and go around, making them a non-issue most of the time. The Wumpus being a static target most of the time also doesn't help. I think that it may have made the game more tense and exciting if the Wumpus had a chance of moving with each action you made. You may eventually end up in the same room as it, creating a real moment of tension and fear.

Controls: 5

It's pretty much as standard as it gets with regards to controls. Single or double digit inputs all around.

Visual: 6

It gets an extra point not so much for its formatting (which is fine), but more its writing. Since I don't consider story for this game, I add the writing of the game into the visual category so that exceptional writing is rightly rewarded. There's a lot of personality and goofiness in the writing of Hunt the Wumpus, from the grumbling of the game when you get the Wumpus, to its evil cackling when you die, and the weirdness of being caught and moved by a Super Bat to "elsewhereville." It's fun and memorable.

Functionality: 5

No issues, unlike the Apple I version.

Accessibility: 4

I do think Hunt the Wumpus manages to be a bit more accessible than other text-based games. It doesn't require as much reading as other games, only more imagination, which I think is a benefit. 

On the practical level, the game was so popular that it's practically ubiquitous, so there shouldn't be any issues finding a version to play.

Fun Factor: 12

I'd easily want to play this ahead of anything else I've played so far, except for Star Trek. It's memorable and easy to replay thanks to every round being slightly different. Again, the only knock against it is that it's too easy, which dampens my enthusiasm to return to it.

I don't know about the Wumpus steaks, but the game is pretty good. It earns a score of 44, which makes it only the second game to land a C-tier placement thus far, and is also earns second overall on the list, behind only the mighty Star Trek.

One can definitely see why Hunt the Wumpus was such a hit back in the day. It was something very different to the norm, and having a titular fantasy creature as the main focus, alongside its emphasis on exploration, predicts much of the future of video game design. I'd definitely consider it a "milestone" game.

The next few games go back to the standard fare of the time, but there's another series of early adventure games coming up soon, courtesy of a man they call "Dave of the Caves." Stay tuned for those.

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#016x (Gaiden 01) - Animal: "Machine Learning" Taken Literally

Release Date: April 6, 1973

Platform: Mainframe

Genre: Non-game

Developer(s): Arthur Luehrmann, Nathan Teichholtz, Steve North

Publisher(s): Digital Equipment Corporation

And now for something... really different. I'm not even sure this qualifies as a game, to be completely honest. It's more like... artificial intelligence training. 

I'll explain what I mean. Animal is a guessing game, except the one doing the guessing is not the player, but rather the computer. Your role, as a "game master" of sorts, is to teach the computer new animals. You start by thinking of an animal, and then the computer will asks questions to try and guess the animal. It only knows two to start with - fish and bird - and only three questions, but you can teach it new animals, and to ask questions to distinguish between animals. 

The concept for Animal was developed at the home of BASIC, Dartmouth College, by Arthur Luehrmann. I found a substantial interview he did with Kevin Bunch at Atari Archive back in September, 2022 that gives plenty of background on Luehrmann's life and career. I rather enjoy a lot of Bunch's work, and it's a great interview. Luehrmann was a physics professor at Dartmouth from 1965 - 77, and was an early champion of BASIC, writing a few games other than Animal, including one called Potshot. Animal is briefly mentioned in the interview, but is not the main focus of the interview. Most the discussion they have on that game is on the need for a "filth filter" to parse out all the possible vulgarities college students might invent when given free reign to type whatever they like into a game. Animal just seemed to be another of the many experiments conducted with BASIC during its formative years.

I hope that's not how the computer pictures said animals...

Digital Equipment Corporation later got their hands on Animal, where it was modified by Nathan Teichholtz and included in 101 BASIC Computer Games. Steve North of Creative Computing (David Ahl's post-DEC organisation) would further modify the game when the microcomputer edition of the book released in 1978. One of the distinguishing features of the original game was its being one of - if not the very first game - to have a save feature. All of the information you taught the computer could be saved to be used next time the program was run. Theoretically, you could spend a couple of hours teaching the computer several animals, and then invite a friend to test what the computer had learned.

However, the save feature is not in the 1978 modification of the game, which also happens to be the version I have access to. The write-up claims that you could theoretically modify the game to allow for a form of saving, but that could only be done if your system allowed for it. Admittedly, I think this kind of defeats the purpose of Animal. You need to spend a decent amount of time teaching the computer various animals, and having nowhere to save that data spoils the fun.

The '78 edition page on Animal. Now with less scary monsters.

I know I've referred to Animal as a game throughout the article, but, after researching and playing it, it's not really a game at all, if I'm being blunt. My thoughts circulated into one summary point to describe Animal - and it's a weird one, so bear with me - which is that the program is essentially a flowchart creator. The computer asks you a question, like "does the animal swim?" and, based on your answer, it will ask another question (once you build up its database.) It's literally:

• Ask question
• If yes, then A
• If no, then B
• Repeat until animal is guessed

And you can expand the flowchart as much as you want. It's a novel idea, and, as the '78 edition of BASIC Computer Games suggests, it has potential use in an educational environment.

What? I like otters. They're cute.

All this is to say, that I'm making this my first Gaiden article. To recap, in case you haven't read the "My Process" page linked in the sidebar (which is probably due for a revision,) I have two main categories of articles: regular articles and "gaiden" articles (Japanese for "side story" - I shamelessly ripped this idea from Fire Emblem.) Regular articles are the main article, denoted by a number, and are simply all the games that my rules permit me to apply a score to. Gaiden articles are marked with an "x" after the number of the previous article, and are for games (or software, in this case) that I cannot in good conscience provide a score for. Usually this would be for multiplayer-only games, but also the odd non-game like Animal. They're also not counted in the game statistics in the sidebar.

So, I won't be scoring Animal. It's not a game - at least, it doesn't fit within my definition of a game. It's more of a historical curiosity; a glimpse into the infancy of artificial intelligence, and also a novel flowchart creator.

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#016 - Slalom: It's All Fake Snow Up Here

Release Date: March 8, 1973

Platform: Mainframe

Genre: Sports

Developer(s): Jonathan Panek

Publisher(s):

[Ed. trying out some new colours on the blog - let me know what you think!]

We're re-entering the strange world of text-based sports games for this next entry. It's always seemed rather peculiar to me that early game developers thought that sports were suitable for text-based games, especially for more fast-paced sports like the one we're examining today. They seem diametrically opposed on the surface, but maybe, because of that, there's the making of an interesting game here? 

Slalom is a winter sports game, based on the slalom discipline of skiing. It's not exactly the first of its kind, as Magnavox's Odyssey console does have a ski game from 1972, creatively titled Ski (plus there's also its cancelled Ski Festival game.) But it is at least the first text-based attempt at a winter sport I know of.

The 1978 edition of BASIC Computer Games informs us that the author of Slalom, J. Panek, was a student at Dartmouth College when he wrote the game. Once again, this is a one-and-done author, though there is fortunately a good amount of information about him online. A quick search provides a LinkedIn profile of a Jonathan Panek, who fits the profile of scant information provided by the book and MobyGames. MobyGames adds that the J. Panek who wrote Slalom attended a St. Paul's school in 1977, which matches Jonathan Panek's LinkedIn profile. He also continued at Dartmouth College after St. Paul's School - in electrical engineering, no less, and later worked at Hewlett-Packard. From this information, I think it's a reasonable conclusion to say that this Jonathan Panek is the most likely author of Slalom.

Game description is savage. Maybe David Ahl didn't like skiing?

Dating the game might be confusing at first (it was for me,) as the source code in BASIC Computer Games has the game's setting as the 1976 Olympic Winter Games. Panek being at St. Paul's from 1971 - 1977 would also suggest that a later date may be likely (IMDB's entry for the game has it listed as a 1975 game.) However, the original source code is online, saved on the Sol-20 website, where it confirms the 1973 date. Panek tells us in the fourth line of the source code that his last work on the game was completed March 8, 1973. He also originally intended the game to be set at the '76 Winter Games, so that mystery is also solved. I do love it when all the data comes together neat and tidy like this.

Now, only one question remains: how do you simulate slalom skiing in a text-based game? The solution Jonathan Panek came up with was to have exclusive focus on one of the main controllable elements of skiing - speed. Slalom then, is all about speed management. At each gate of the slalom course, you have the choice of how much to speed up or slow down (or to maintain your current speed.) Go too slow, and you won't get a medal. Go too fast, and you'll hit a flag and crash out. Doesn't sound too bad, does it? You're even given to option to try and cheat by attempting to skip a flag, which got a chuckle out of me when I first saw it.

Slalom runs a little differently to most other text games I've covered so far. The first thing you do in game is not to look at the instructions. Radical game design. No, you first choose how many gates the slalom course you want to run will have. It can have as many as 25 gates, and as few as a single, lonely, solitary gate. I can't imagine one gate being much fun (spoilers: it isn't,) so I went for a moderate number for my first attempt: 10 gates.

Once you're done with that, then you can read the instructions. But, once again, Slalom does things a little differently. At this point. you've got three options:

1. Read the instructions.
2. View maximum speeds.
3. Start the race.

1 and 3 are self-explanatory, but option 2 appears an odd one on the surface. Basically, this option tells you the approximate top speed for each gate. You'd theoretically want to aim to pass each gate at around this speed in order to get the best time, without going over it, which would risk you missing the gate or crashing. In practice, however, it really doesn't work like this. At all. More on this later.

If I - an Australian - am America's only hope, we're in big trouble...

So I get the maximum speed list for the gates, and off I go. Although, there is one more thing to do before you get to start the race: difficulty selection. The game asks you how good a skier you think you are, with 1 being "worst," and 3 being "best." These are, apparently, the difficulty modes. I'm assuming that 1 is easiest and it gets harder from there. I haven't attempted the harder modes as I write this part. I think this is the first game to have actual difficulty modes, though. Sure, some previous games have had customisation options that affect difficulty, but not actual difficulty modes.

Obviously, I selected 1 for my first go. I've literally never even seen snow before in my life, so you can be sure I've never skied before. With that, I was off on this perilous journey down the course. Gate 1's max speed was 14 MPH, and I started at 13 MPH, so I opted to select option 3 and speed up a "teensy" bit. I pass the gate at 14 MPH.

Gate 2's max is 18 MPH, so I figure I can speed up a bit more, and choose to speed up a "little." 17 MPH passing the gate. Things seem to be progressing smoothly so far. Before I choose what to do at Gate 3, I check my time: just over 29.34 seconds. I don't know if that's good or bad.

Gate 3 represents a big speed jump - I can take it at 26 MPH. I speed up a lot. Up to 25 MPH, to which the game comments, "Close one!" Got to risk it for the biscuit.

However, this risk fails to pay off any further. Gate 4 is at 29 MPH, so I keep speeding up. I snag a flag, and it's game over. Although, I must say I was very confused at this stage of the game. It told me I had gone over the maximum speed, but I had not. My speed at Gate 4 was only 28 MPH.

Err, no I didn't. I want to speak to an official.

The game allows you to try again, and so I did. Same thing happened again, only at Gate 3. The maximum speed was 26 MPH, but this time I was only going 21 MPH and was told I went too fast. I played a fair bit safer on my next attempt, and got to Gate 8 before the same thing occurred. Its max speed was 32 MPH and I crashed out at only 28 MPH.

I then went for another attempt and... something very strange happened. The game printed its race start line, and then I was greeted with the message, "!OUT OF DATA IN LINE 540," and then the game stopped.

This time, the game wiped out.

Did it just crash on me? Several more attempts ended in the same fashion, so it appears to be a bug in the game. There was also a typo I noticed, where "MAXIMUM" was sometimes misspelled "NAXIMUM." What's weird about this typo, however, is that it isn't in either the original source code or the BASIC Computer Games revised code. Both of them abbreviate the word "MAXIMUM" as "MAX." so I have no idea where this error comes from. In fact, the entire line saying you've gone over max speed has been entirely re-written in the version I got from Vintage BASIC. Who did this and when is a complete mystery. I won't be holding this against the game in scoring, and I in fact went into the game code and fixed the spelling, just so that I wouldn't have to think about it anymore.

Right, with that out of the way, back to the game. I had an overnight think about the strange stuff going on with the max speeds not lining up, and decided to do a test on the game. I started with a 1 gate race, and played it several times over to get an idea of what was going on in the game, repeating the process with 2 gate, 3 gate races, and so on. This is Obsessive Gaming Chronology, after all, I'm gonna do deep into these games. 

What I discovered is that I have no idea how anything in this game works, and it all seems mostly random and inconsistent. Fun!

First, I can't tell if the difficulty modes actually do anything. I was able to get bronze, silver and gold medals on all modes, so I really don't know what difference the choice makes.

Second, your end results - if you don't crash out - appear to be mostly random. And wildly random at that. The same race I got a gold medal time in, I can get a time up to 20 seconds slower, even if I use the same inputs. On top of this, you can actually become a time traveler in Slalom, because you can crash out of a race with a negative time. 

I found a rift in the space-time continuum.

The third thing, and something I alluded to earlier, is that the max speed chart lies to you. I discovered from doing 4 gate races that what that chart tells you (the values are static) is either misleading at best or blatantly incorrect at worst. Gate 4 is always set at a max speed of 29 MPH, but you'll always crash if you get anywhere near that speed at this gate. You actually need to slow down to have a chance to pass this gate cleanly, after the first three gates often allowing you to go at full pelt.

What this means is that you actually need to play more reactively than you'd think. The random nature of game results, and the variability of your starting speed and speed gains means that what you actually need to do to have a successful run is to listen to what the game tells you. This is the most likely way you'll get a medal. If it tells you that you went over speed at a gate, it's probably best to slow down a bit for the next one - same if it says "CLOSE ONE!" If you consistently wipe out at one particular gate, you probably need to slow down more at it in future attempts. It's honestly not how I expected the game to play at all coming into it. I also find it very frustrating, as I feel like my success in game is more reliant on luck than skill. Everything is just too random.

And yet, I press on. The other point of me putting the word "obsessive" in the blog title is that I'm a completionist - I'm usually not satisfied just beating a game - I need to master it. Every collectible, every difficulty mode, every achievement... I leave no stone unturned in exploring any game I play. There hasn't been much opportunity with previous games to lean into this tendency of mine, but there is with Slalom. 

But, how do I even determine completion of Slalom? The difficulty modes don't do anything discernable, and I don't even know which one is supposed to be the "hardest" one, so there's no point in using that as a metric. That just leaves the race length. 25 gates is the longest a race can be in Slalom, so that's my goal: get a gold medal on a 25 gate race. The successful attempt will be added in a video at the top of the article, if and when I do so. [Ed. video is up now.] The releases of article and video will likely become desynched the longer and more complex games become, especially because I want the videos to be of a high gameplay standard. Eventually I want to start live-streaming all my gameplay, but that simply isn't viable for me at the current time.

[Ed. Update on Slalom progress: Look, folks... I think it's impossible. I managed to snag a Silver medal on the 25 gate race, after about half an hour and several Bronzes in a row, and switching from mode 3 to 1. Which was great - I though Gold couldn't be far off. I also thought now, maybe the difficulty modes made a difference... I eventually went back to mode 3, and got another Silver. And another. And another. So, maybe they do, only in the opposite direction. Mode 3 might actually allow to get faster times, as my first mode 3 Silver time was over 20 seconds faster than the first Silver. I went from 64 seconds to 42 seconds.

So... what does it take to get Gold, then? I assume under 40 seconds. So I kept trying for over an hour. Nothing better than the 42 seconds. In fact, I didn't even come close to beating that time. I even tried the cheat option - which worked once, and never again - but no, nothing remotely close. It's so frustrating because I'm not in control of the outcome. I feel like I'm doing Gran Turismo license tests again, except I can only suggest to the car what it should do.

Therefore, I think I have to call it here for Slalom. Whether or not the Gold time is possible, I don't know. I don't think it is, and I don't care to find out anymore.]

All that's left to do now is score Slalom. Is it in the running for a podium finish? Probably not, but let's find out, anyway.

Time Played: 2 hours (most of which was spent attempting to get gold in the 25 gate race...)

Difficulty: 6/10 (Challenging)

It's difficult (irony) to rank Slalom's difficulty on account of the randomness built into the game. This makes it hard to tell how well you're doing, and sometimes you can fail without warning. Learning the game isn't particularly difficult, and is just a matter of knowing what to do at each gate. The in-game difficulty modes have no discernable bearing on the game, so I've not factored them into this score.

[Ed. I've increased the difficulty score 2 points after my failed attempt to get the 25 gate Gold medal.]

Gameplay: 6/20

There's a lot of problems with Slalom, but also some meritorious gameplay. The foundation of the game is good, and I appreciate the range of choices it gives you that allow for more precision (even letting you cheat, which I've never seen be successful to date.) Managing your speed requires learning the course, knowing when to speed up and when to slow down. The game also does a reasonable job of warning you when you're going too fast, allowing you to react accordingly.

Slalom's chief issue is its sheer inconsistency. The game can just fail you at any moment. You might've gotten through that gate at that speed with no complaints from the game last time - but not this time. The speed gains and slow downs are somewhat unpredictable, and the actual time you earn at the end of the course can fluctuate wildly without reason.

Other issues include the max speed chart the game provides being very deceptive, as closing in on the reported max speed will often result in a crash. It ends up being better to learn by ear what each gate requires, and reacting to the randomness of the game accordingly. I also can't tell if the "rate yourself as a skier" difficulty modes actually do anything.

Controls: 5/10

Aside from the commands at the start of the game, the rest is your standard single-key inputs. Makes sense and does the job it needs to do.

Visual: 6/10

I will give Slalom props for doing a very good job with its formatting and presentation. It's clear to me that some consideration was given to ensuring that the game is neatly presented, and with some writing charm, to boot. The race start text, and even the instructions are good examples of the writing and neatness, respectively. Even the little indenting of the speed text at each gate is a detail that elevates the game presentation. 

Functionality: 4/5

Obviously it loses a point for the "out of data" bug that causes the game to crash. Fortunately, it doesn't directly impact gameplay and takes a while to show up.

Pro tip: when doing a 25 gate race, don't pull up the instructions and max speed chart. The game will crash immediately upon trying to start a race. Starting the race immediately will not cause this issue.

Accessibility: 3/5

It's fairly standard for a text-based game. A decent level of reading proficiency is needed.

Fun Factor: 5/20

Look, the game has some merit to it, despite the raft of flaws. There is a degree of skill and learning of the game required to do well, which encourages replaying. However, once you learn the game, its extreme randomness results in a "grind until the game lets you win" type of situation. Then it becomes more work than fun if you actually want to "complete" the game (by my standard of completion, anyway.)

This one was an interesting, but tricky game to rate. I don't think I've encountered a game on the blog so far that's had so many aspects, both positive and negative, to consider. Then end result is a middling, but appropriate score of 29, which puts Slalom very far away from a podium finish (11th overall,) near the bottom of D-tier, just ahead of Warfish. The result is another proof of my scoring system working, as Warfish was the game I ended up comparing Slalom to the most in terms of where and how to grade it. That, at least, is quite satisfying.

Before closing out this article, I have a couple of updates to share:

For anyone wondering, the PLATO article is still in progress. The development history segment is complete, and I'm in the process of recording game footage for the game library section. If you don't know PLATO, you're mind's gonna be blown at what's on that system.

Also, by way of reminder, there's now an OGC Discord and Patreon where you can get involved in the growing community and support the work I do here. Links are in the sidebar.

Don't forget - if you enjoy my blog, be sure to leave a comment and follow so you don't miss any updates!

Update: Good News Everyone! I Have A Discord Server and Patreon Now!

Good or bad, depending on your point of view, I suppose.

This is quite the significant update for the blog. I had been contemplating doing this for quite some time, but was hesitant on whether anyone would actually be interested in supporting what I do here.

I'm still not sure about that, but I'm jumping into this regardless. Better to try and know, rather than never try and not know.

First, I have established a Discord server, Chronology Club, for you lovely readers to join. It may be an easier method for communicating with me, and for building this community up, by enabling you all to participate with me in this strange little endeavour of mine. It's free to join, too, so that's nice.

Secondly, I also have a Patreon now. For any of my regular readers who desire to support the work that I do - you now can! I have two tiers set up currently that allow you to support me, and they also get you access to special channels in the Discord server - namely the V.I.P. Archaeology Team text and voice chats. The higher tier also permits access to video chat, in case you want to see my ugly face for whatever reason (disclaimer: not likely to happen, I'd prefer to keep my identity anonymous for now. I'm a naturally private, deeply introverted person.)

Discord link is here, Patreon here. Both will also be linked in the blog sidebar.

If you do decide to support me financially, know that I am incredibly grateful for it, and you kindness will not be forgotten.

God bless.

#015 - The Game of Chomp (Not of the Chain Variety)

Release Date: February 1973

Platform: Mainframe

Genre: Puzzle

Developer(s): David Gale, Peter Sessions

Publisher(s): People's Computer Company

It's not this Chomp either, sadly (but the concept is strangely related.)

You know, when I thought of this joke, I didn't realise that it's oddly appropriate for The Game of Chomp - a game about eating (this might also be the first food-themed game, come to think of it...)

The Game of Chomp is yet another game that comes to us from the same People's Computer Company February 1973 newsletter as Mugwump and Hurkle, only on the next page over. Like those two, it's also an adaptation from previous source material, and not an original PCC game. 

Unlike Hurkle and Mugwump, Chomp gets an entire page dedicated to it.

Chomp, as it was originally called, was invented by David Gale, mathematician and economist who worked at the University of California in Berkeley (Gale also invented a board game in 1960 called Bridg-it, as a side note.) The concept of Chomp was first described in the January 1973 edition of Scientific American, in the "Mathematical Games" section. Originally, it was conceived as a pen & paper or tabletop game that could be played with counters. It's somewhat reminiscent of Nim-like games, as it's a game where players take turns removing objects from a pile - or, in this case, a grid. The objective was to force your opponent to take the last object, which was in the bottom-left corner.

The reason the game got the name Chomp was from the rules governing the removal of counters from the grid. Every counter within the north-east right angle of the selected counter get removed from the field. The analogy given in Scientific American is like taking a bite out of a cracker, if biting from the north-east corner of the cracker. Hence, Chomp.

PCC took this and modified the game slightly. In their rendition, written by Peter Sessions, the grid is a cookie, and the players take turns taking bites out of the cookie. Yes, this is a multiplayer game - though it can be played solo (the computer doesn't play against you, it only keeps score.) The objective is to avoid the top-left square (instead of bottom-left; the right angle system was also adjusted to suit) of the cookie, because it's poisoned. This is the most high-stakes, gladiatorial eating competition out there, folks.

I suppose the question now is: since this is a multiplayer game, how am I playing it? My rules for the blog do permit me to skip multiplayer-only games. 

Well, that last phrase is the key here: multiplayer-only. Technically, this isn't exclusively a multiplayer game. Singleplayer is an option in-game, even if, technically, the game is meant to be played with multiple people. So, what I can do is select to have two players, and I choose which of the two I want to win, and play accordingly.

Did ya get all that?

For the first, tester round, I didn't do this. I only decided on the above standard after testing the game with one player. The game's instructions are slightly unclear in some respects. I was unsure whether the game saying that "No fair chomping squares that have already been chomped" meant that I couldn't make any moves that involved previously removed squares. So I umm-ed and ahh-ed a bit before realising that the game would probably be impossible to play if that were the case, and continued on as normal. There's nothing else of interest to report from the tester run.

Congratulations, you just played yourself.

So for the second round, I selected a two-player game, and I wanted Player 1 to win. I was successful in this goal, though I felt as if I had no idea what I was doing throughout. It was a lot of back-and-forth, semi-randomly selecting sections of the cookie to remove, until it got closer to the end, where I tried to be more intentionally strategic. Well, as much as I could be, at least.

I got caught out trying to cheat at one point.

I'm aware that the game's Scientific American article explains some strategies, but I'm not really interested in reading it, to be honest. For this game, it's not worth it. It's not compelling enough.

At this stage, I'm stumped. I'm struggling to come up with anything else to say. Even doing up the scores for Chomp, I had a hard time thinking of what can be said about this game.

Time Played: 5 minutes

Difficulty: N/A

I'm throwing an N/A on this because it's technically multiplayer, so the challenge is theoretically variable; only equal to your own skill vs. your opponent's skill.

Gameplay: 2/20

In reality, Chomp is just "visual Nim," i.e. remove objects from a pile, but with an extra step. The extra step doesn't really add much to the base Nim experience. It's nice that there's a small amount of customisation for grid size, but it's mostly superfluous.

Controls: 5/10

As expected for a grid-based game.

Visual: 5/10

You'd expect for Chomp to have the grid visible on-screen, and it does. Good. Does it make the effort to make it look more than basic? No.

Functionality: 5/5

Nothing to see here. Vintage BASIC's version's "play again?" bit at the end doesn't work, but that's (probably) not the game's fault.

Accessibility: 2/5

It's problematic that Chomp is best enjoyed with multiple players. Finding someone else who'd actually want to play this with you seems highly unlikely.

Fun Factor: 0/20

Nah. I don't like it. It was a dreary, aimless experience.

So, after a pair of decent games, we're back down in the dumps again. The Game of Chomp earns a pitiful score of 19, which banishes it to the depths of the E-tier, alongside Digits and Letter. Chomp splits the two on the tie-breaker, and lands in 26th spot overall. That's 26th out of 32, for reference to how poorly this game did.

We're off the People's Computer Company train for the next couple of games. The next one, Slalom, is an odd concept for a text-based game. Maybe it'll make for a good game? Only if it can ski between the flags, I guess.

Don't forget - if you enjoy my blog, be sure to leave a comment and follow so you don't miss any updates!

#014: Hurkle - The Solitary Relative of the Mugwump

Release Date: February 1972

Platform: Mainframe

Genre: Puzzle

Developer(s): Bob Albrecht

Publisher(s): People's Computer Company

Nobody knows what a Mugwump is - much less a Hurkle. According to BASIC Computer Games, a Hurkle is an alien creature created by author Theodore Sturgeon for a story his book, A Way Home.

Why are we seeking the Hurkle? How did we even get to the planet it lives on?

In seriousness, this is going to be a pretty short article that functions almost as a companion to the Mugwump article.

For instance, both share the exact same historical data. All of the authorship and dating details relating to Hurkle are as covered in the Mugwump article. As such, I won't be going into detail here, but I'll summarise in case you haven't read Mugwump's article. Hurkle was created by Bob Albrecht, and published in the February 1972 edition of the People's Computer Company newsletter alongside Mugwump. Both games are derived from an earlier, educational game called Hide and Seek, written by school teacher Martin "Bud" Valenti and his students as part of Project SOLO, an educational program created by the University of Pittsburgh designed to explore the use of computers in education.

So, obviously Hurkle is going to be directly compared to Mugwump throughout. Which one is superior? Or do both have their own merits?

While Mugwump is almost identical to the source material, Hurkle differs more significantly. There are multiple gameplay differences, which I've summarised in this handy-dandy table:

I've just discovered that I can paste in tables I make in LibreOffice, and I love it. You can be sure I'll be making plenty good use of this in the future.

I think most of these differences are self-explanatory. For the guesses, instead of providing the distance of the Mugwumps from a guess in units, Hurkle just gives you the direction the Hurkle is in. It literally just tells you "GO NORTH" or "GO EAST."

I got into a spot of bother with this on my first attempt at the game. I carried over my winning strategy from Mugwump, thinking it would work just as well - or at least it would be a solid base to start from. Starting from 0,0, I was told to "GO NORTHEAST." Here, I realised that the directional clues are laid out backwards compared to the co-ordinate system. North - the y-axis - is first, whereas the first co-ordinate number is the x-axis. My mind tricked me into assuming that the first co-ordinate was the y-axis, and so I ended going in the complete opposite direction to the clues.

Yeah, they meant your other northwest, mate.

I figured out what I was doing wrong on my second attempt, which was more of a "feeling things out" type of round. However, this issue persisted throughout my entire time playing the game for this article. I just could not wrap my head around it - it was like playing a platformer with the controls reversed - disorienting and making me feel very, very silly.

Slowly figuring it out.

On my third attempt, I managed to score a win on a relatively easy round. I started at 0,0, and the game kept telling me to go north-east, which I did until I found the Hurkle at 6,6 on my fourth guess.

There we go. Found the mongrel.

I wasn't particularly satisfied with this win, so I kept playing. I fell agonisingly short of the target in my fourth attempt, before earning a more satisfying win with my final guess in my fifth game.

This thing isn't easy to find.

When I came back the following day to get a good round for the final recording, I became increasingly more frustrated with the game. As I said before, this disconnect between the clues and input kept scrambling my mind, and I wasn't having a good time.

One strategic change I made in the end was to go back to my original Mugwump strategy of starting at 5,5. The thinking was that it would actually be better to have all directions available, but less distance in those directions. The guessing strategy from there was one similar to playing a number-guessing game. If the game said to go south-west, I'd go as far as was possible in that direction, while still leaving one space in case I needed to keep going. For example, if starting at 5,5, the game said to go south-west, I'd want to move to 1,1. It's likely that the game would tell me to go back north-east, and so I'd go back to 3,3, and so on and so forth until the game gave me a different clue or I found the Hurkle. That was the theory, in practice I had a hard time with it.

I asked the question at the beginning of the article of which of the two - Mugwump or Hurkle - would end up the superior game. I think that the answer's fairly obvious to you all by now, but let's see anyway.

Time Played: 20 minutes (approx.)

Difficulty: 5/10 (Low-Moderate)

I rate Hurkle a point higher than Mugwump on difficulty because of the clues-versus-input disorientation.

Gameplay: 5/20

-3 compared to Mugwump. It's amazing how small changes make a huge difference in how a game plays. Most notably is the change in the clues, which I won't keep talking about. There's far less strategy and room for taking informed risks in Hurkle due to the changes, and the game suffers greatly as a result. It's far less interesting and engaging than its counterpart.

Controls: 5/10

Exactly the same as Mugwump; and thus just as appropriate.

Visual: 5/10

Functionally the same as Mugwump, too. I prefer Mugwump, but there's not enough difference between the two for Hurkle to lose a point.

Functionality: 5/5

No problems.

Accessibility: 2/5

I think Hurkle is likely a harder game to process for most, as cardinal directions don't always come easy. The lack of any visual aid provided by the game accentuates the issue, and certainly the potential disconnect between clues and input factors into it as well. 

Fun Factor: 2/20

The more I played, the more I hated the game in all honesty. I constantly struggled with the clues, and it made me feel like an idiot. Could just be a me thing in this instance, but remember these scores are based on my own personal experience with the game.

So how does Hurkle compare to Mugwump in the final analysis? Mugwump ended with a score of 36. Hurkle... well, it only got 24. Two little gameplay changes result in a swing of minus twelve. Ouch. That puts Hurkle a full tier lower than Mugwump, sitting near the top of the E-tier, just behind Dartmouth Championship Football in the 13th overall position as it stands now.

We're done with the mythical-animal-hunting games for a bit now. But we're not done with People's Computer Company games.

Don't forget - if you enjoy my blog, be sure to leave a comment and follow so you don't miss any updates!