#037 - Cube: 3D Minesweeper (Except Not Really)

Release Date: July 1973

Platform: Mainframe (BASIC type-in)

Genre: Puzzle

Developer(s): Jerimac Ratliff

Publisher(s): Digital Equipment Corporation

We're back to playing actual games now, and here's one that's entirely original. It bears some similarity to the prototype text-based adventures I've played before, like Hunt the Wumpus and Lost in the Caves, but Cube, today's game, possesses its own identity.

Cube is, once again, a game that was accepted for inclusion into David Ahl's 101 BASIC Computer Games, which was first published in July of 1973. The submission was originally made by a Fort Worth Texan named Jerimac Ratliff. This is his only game credit. However, according to his IMDb profile, Ratliff went on to produce a 2009 comedic horror film titled Growing Out. Now, whether it's actually the same Jerimac Ratliff is potentially debatable. However, it's a rather unique name, so it seems somewhat likely to me that they're the same person. I can also tell you that Ratliff was probably a college student when he wrote Cube, as there's photo evidence of him online, which also tells us he was 13 in 1966, meaning he would've been probably 19 or 20 in 1973.

It's not much, but, you know what? I'll take it. That's way more info than I can find on most game developers from this time frame.

On to the game itself. It's been interesting doing the research for Cube, as when I first played the game and read its description, I thought to myself, "Gee, that sounds an awful lot like Minesweeper." Turns out, I wasn't the only person thinking that. Several other sites make the claim that Cube is the earliest known ancestor of Minesweeper. I can certainly see that - both games involve dodging mines laid out randomly on a grid. Whether or not Cube was a direct influence on Minesweeper seems less clear to me.

Shouldn't the y-axis be the middle number?

As stated, Cube involves avoiding landmines laid out on a grid. Where this game differs from Minesweeper is that the grid is three-dimensional. You'll start from point 1,1,1 on a 2x2 cube, with the aim to get to point 3,3,3 without being blown to smithereens. There's an odd tension here, with the game saying that it's a 2x2 cube, but it seems to treat it more like a 3x3 cube; each point on the cube is where the grid lines intersect, rather than being the squares the grid creates, like in most other grid-based games I've played so far.

The rules for movement are that you can only move one point at a time, so from 1,1,1 -> 1,1,2 -> 2,1,2 and so on and so forth; you can't move diagonally. Also, if you make a mistake and change two of the co-ordinates, the game mercilessly disqualifies you. I think that's a bit rough, don't you?

Not much changed from the '73 version. Must've thought this one was a dud.

As for the landmines, well there are five of them randomly scattered across the cube. Step on one, and you're a goner. How do you know where these mines are? 

Well, that's the great thing... you don't. 

No hint system, no line of text noting a faint breeze, or the smell of a Wumpus - nothing. Whether you make it to your destination or not is effectively up to luck, which all my regular readers should know by this point is something I'm really not a fan of. It just makes any choice you could make in the game moot - just find the shortest route and hope you don't become giblets. No skill or strategy required.

Cube refuses to take "yes" or "no" for an answer.

Ratliff did try to up the stakes in Cube by adding a wager system to the game. It gives you a purse of $500 to start, and asks you to bet on if you'll make it through the cube. It's kind of like a high score system, in a sense, but is also like a roulette wheel in another. Honestly, it's a bit of a superfluous system that doesn't really add much to the game. It certainly doesn't add any tension for making high bets, when you know that you have no choice in the matter of winning or losing.

Oh, would you look at that - I died.

I'm not going to do a play-by-play commentary on Cube, as I don't really see much point in doing so. There's no true decision-making to talk about, so I don't know what I could actually say. I think we're better of going into the scores now, and drilling down on what exactly makes this game suck.

Time Played: 15 minutes

Difficulty: 0 (RNG)

I can't say there's any real difficulty or challenge, as your success in navigating the cube is entirely up to luck.

Gameplay: 1

Cube is honestly quite poorly designed; it's like a really bad version of Hunt the Wumpus. The game gives you no hints to where the landmines are, meaning that success is entirely up to luck. I don't find that the wager mechanic adds anything to the game, either - it's literally something that you and your mates could do with any game, "hey, bet you $50 that you can't beat that game."

Controls: 4

Text-based co-ordinates are already kind of annoying to deal with, but here they add a third dimension. They're not in order, either: the dimensions are ordered x,z,y. That's even more confusing. Not like it matters, anyway. The game also refuses to let you type in "yes" or "no" to binary questions - it must be 1 = yes, 0 = no, or it has a hissy fit at you.

Visual: 1

No effort was put into the formatting here, so it gets the standard text-based score.

Functionality: 5

The game gets annoyed with you if you don't use the right controls, but that's the game functioning the way it intended, so no unintentional glitches from what I can tell.

Accessibility: 2

3-D co-ordinates in a text-based setting with no visual aid? No thanks.

Fun Factor: 0

Nothing is really ever fun when it's entirely up to luck. There's no sense of accomplishment for winning when you don't feel like you earned it.

My hopes and dreams from the last article have been mercilessly crushed. Cube is one of the worst games I've played for the blog so far, getting a miserable score of 13, planting it well at the bottom of the F-tier. As of writing, it's the third-worst game on the list, after tie-breaker rules.

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