Retrieved from https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/alt.folklore.computers/gjp3P4IWuDg/gGzTeAhpZK4J on 2016-01-25. Email addresses have been mangled by Google Groups; I've repaired the ones that can be unambiguously deduced. Any instance of "...@" in this text should be considered suspect. This is part of a thread from alt.folklore.computers, between November 26 and December 8, 1990. Rick Smith claims that "an extended form with new rooms and puzzles was produced by Eric Roberts while at BBN around 1980." I don't know anything about this version. Further down, Bernie Cosell challenges the Roberts claim as well: Roberts was their D&D DM, but didn't code any "Adventure" variants. Art Evans worked at BBN contemporary with Crowther. He had a transcript of some Long-descended game "in December 1982 on a DEC-20". Robert E. Seastrom adds: "It should be noted that the UChicago version of Adventure is specific to certain types of DEC hardware (probably '10 or '20, but I do recall playing it on the 11/55 at Delta years ago)." Paul Evans links to comp.sources.games/volume9/adven (that is, ANON0501). Nothing directly relevant to Long or LONG0751 happens in this thread. =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!uupsi!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!src.honeywell.com!msi.umn.edu!sctc.com!smith From: smith@sctc.com (Rick Smith) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> Date: 26 Nov 90 17:36:00 GMT Organization: Secure Computing Technology Corporation Lines: 58 Posted: Mon Nov 26 18:36:00 1990 Here's a patchwork of Adventure history I've pieced together over the years. I try to note conjectures where appropriate. Please fill in holes, anyone.. Willie Crowther was a caver, as were several other BBNers back in the 70s. I was once told that there's a Crowther Pass in one of the big caves (maybe Mammoth Cave), though I think it was named after his (ex?) wife. People at BBN became interested in developing computerized cave maps. I remember Bill Mann with some version of a cave map at BBN around 1980. Willie took the computerized map and made a sort of game out of it. You could move between the rooms, using the names and directions for the actual cave (Mammoth Cave?). While I don't remember much about the Adventure source code myself, I vaguely recall that it was heavily data dependent. The cave arrangement and the things inside were all set up as program data. From this I'd conjecture that Willie's first Adventure might well have lived on the PDP-1, since that would have been a logical place for working on *visual representations* of cave maps. After all, it had that nice, big CRT. Since the cave map was a data structure rather than a chunk of code, moving from the PDP-1 to Tenex and Fortran would not have been a major trauma. In any case, people spoke reverently of Willie's programming prowess (though not so reverently of his commenting/documentation skills). The classic 350 point Adventure emerged after Don Woods at Stanford got his hands on Willie's cave map game. According to legend, the Arpanet played a crucial role in that development. An extended form with new rooms and puzzles was produced by Eric Roberts while at BBN around 1980. The last I heard he's now with DEC in their Silicon Gulch facility, and is also a heavy with CPSR. I've seen a few written things about Adventure. One of the Help or Info commands in the classic 350 point game talks about Willie and Don. There was also peculiar article by Scott Adams in Creative Computing around 1980. The article includes a photo of Scott that names him and calls him the "creator of Adventure." The editors of Creative Computing added a discreet box of comment to the article that doesn't call Scott a liar, but strongly emphasizes the efforts of Willie and Don. Another brief article appeared in "Buss, The Independent Newsletter of Heath Computing" when Adventure began appearing on H8's and H89's (1982?). I believe it was written by Walt Bilofsky, founder of Software Toolworks. This one outlines some of the things I said above. Gordon Letwin made his name writing OS software for Heathkit ("Type spaces to determine baud rate"). As an "implementer" of Adventure, he probably wrote the driver program for interpreting the Adventure database. I remember he did a version for Heath in which the "Spelunker Today" magazine was replaced by "REMark," Heath's user magazine. If any of the folks mentioned above read this, accept my greetings and a "long time no see" to many, and fill in or fix details as appropriate. Bye. Rick. smith@sctc.com Arden Hills, Minnesota =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!bionet!uwm.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!unix.cis.pitt.edu!dsinc!netnews.upenn.edu!netnews!mjd From: m...@saul.cis.upenn.edu (Mark-Jason Dominus) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: Date: 26 Nov 90 21:19:26 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> Sender: ne...@netnews.upenn.edu Organization: University of Pennsylvania Lines: 33 Posted: Mon Nov 26 22:19:26 1990 In-reply-to: smith@sctc.com's message of 26 Nov 90 17:36:00 GMT In article <1990Nov26.1...@sctc.com> smith@sctc.com (Rick Smith) writes: > Willie Crowther was a caver, as were several other > BBNers back in the 70s. I was once told that there's a > Crowther Pass in one of the big caves (maybe Mammoth > Cave), though I think it was named after his (ex?) wife. The Crowthers did some of the exploration of the Mammoth / Flint Ridge system, which is the largest cave in the world; they were there right about the time that the big breakthrough from the Flint Ridge part to the Mammoth part happened. Part of the Flint Ridge system is called `Colossal Cave', and there is in fact a building, a Bedquilt, and a Y2. (Pat Wilcox says no breath-taking view with a live volcano, though. Bummer.) If you're interested, you can go read ``The Longest Cave'' (Roger Brucker and Richard Watson) and ``The Caves Beyond'' (Roger Brucker). You can see a picture of Willie Crowther examining a hardcopy of the cave map on some kind of a plotter. (Someone else may be able to say what kind of plotter it is.) Thanks to Pat Wilcox for putting me on to these references last time this subject cropped up in alt.folklore.computers. > I've seen a few written things about Adventure. One of the Help or Info > commands in the classic 350 point game talks about Willie and Don. The version I played about fourteen years ago told me to report bugs to `don@su-ai'. Heh. Is it time for alt.adventure yet? -- In some sense a stochastic process can do better; at least it has a chance. Mark-Jason Dominus m...@central.cis.upenn.edu =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!bionet!uwm.edu!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!pt.cs.cmu.edu!sei!ae From: a...@sei.cmu.edu (Arthur Evans) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <9665@fy.sei.cmu.edu> Date: 26 Nov 90 21:31:54 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University (Software Engineering Institute), Pgh, PA Lines: 38 Posted: Mon Nov 26 22:31:54 1990 In-reply-to: smith@sctc.com's message of 26 Nov 90 17:36:00 GMT To: smith@sctc.com Fcc: inbox Rick Smith (smith@sctc.com) writes at length about the history of Adventure. Herewith a few more comments. Bill Mann was doing cave mapping on a computer when I arrived at BBN in 1975. Doing 3-dimensional mapping is hard enough; finding a useful way to represent the resulting map is still more fun. As Joel Levin has already remarked, Adventure never ran on the PDP-1. I guesed wrong about that in an earlier post here. I found over the weekend my file on the game, including a listing of playing it. I quote: Adventure was originally written by William Crowther, and later substantially rewritten and expanded by Don Woods at Stanford Univ. The latest additions were done throughout 1978 by David Long while at the University of Chicago, Graduate School of Business. This listing was made in December 1982 on a DEC-20. There's been some talk about xyzzy. A few rooms inside the entrance is the Debris Room, which has on the wall a note reading "Magic Word XYZZY". If you say the word there, you are back on the surface inside the building; saying the word in the building takes you to to the Debris Room. The word does nothing anything else. It's best to have light before entering the cave. BARREN moves you to the bear room, if you are already pretty close. BUILDING moves you to the building from some places on the surface. PHUCE is part of the puzzle just past the River Styx. (This is only in a later, augmented, version of the game.) PLUGH moves you from the building to Y2, deep in the cave. Y2 also moves you to Y2, but only if you are already near to it. Ah, I hate to think of the time I put into that game. Perhaps almost as much as I spend now reading these news groups... Eric Roberts is on the faculty at Stanford. He's still in CPSR. Art Evans =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!bbn.com!levin From: le...@bbn.com (Joel B Levin) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> Date: 26 Nov 90 21:55:25 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> Sender: ne...@bbn.com Reply-To: le...@BBN.COM (Joel B Levin) Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc., Cambridge MA Lines: 33 Posted: Mon Nov 26 22:55:25 1990 In article <1990Nov26.1...@sctc.com> smith@sctc.com (Rick Smith) writes: Hi, Rick! |Here's a patchwork of Adventure history I've pieced together over the years. |I try to note conjectures where appropriate. Please fill in holes, anyone.. | |While I don't remember much about the Adventure source code myself, I vaguely |recall that it was heavily data dependent. The cave arrangement and the |things inside were all set up as program data. From this I'd conjecture |that Willie's first Adventure might well have lived on the PDP-1, since that |would have been a logical place for working on *visual representations* of |cave maps. After all, it had that nice, big CRT. Our PDP-1 had no CRT. Further, Adventure was never anything but a text game. Bill, Pat and Willy did the (real) cave plotting on the PDP-1 and got software running that plotted the caves on a Calcomp plotter attached to a terminal port on our prototype TIP. |In any case, people spoke reverently of Willie's programming prowess (though |not so reverently of his commenting/documentation skills). (He gave me some pencilled flow charts of the Arpanet IMP from 1970 and before, which I still have...) I suppose I could always call Willy up and ask him about some of this stuff... as far as I know he doesn't read the network. /JBL = Nets: le...@bbn.com | "There were sweetheart roses on Yancey Wilmerding's or {...}!bbn!levin | bureau that morning. Wide-eyed and distraught, she POTS: (617)873-3463 | stood with all her faculties rooted to the floor." =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!bionet!uwm.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!maverick.ksu.ksu.edu!unmvax!uokmax!bateman From: bat...@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu (Monte Bateman) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Summary: How about Zork!?! Message-ID: <1990Nov27.075651.13819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> Date: 27 Nov 90 07:56:51 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> Sender: ne...@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu (Nets) Organization: National Severe Storms Laboratory Lines: 33 Posted: Tue Nov 27 08:56:51 1990 I have really enjoyed reading about the folklore behind "Adventure". I guess I'm such a neophyte - I never played it! I recently got a copy for my PC from "overseas" (thanks, Magnus!) so I guess I'll spend some time over Christmas break playing with it. What I *DID* spend a lot of time on was the ZORK dungeon. Took me several years to finish it all; seems like it was around 570 points total. I first played it on a 11/44 running V7, then an 11/70 running RT-11. What fun. Now those guys have become InfoCom, and are selling many of these types of games for $$$. I have about 20 of 'em! Any good folklore on ZORK? What I do know (from the DECUS/RT-11 docs) * credit was given to "Crowther & Woods 'Adventure' " * written as a project at the MIT-AI lab (I think) * written in a special language called MDL ("muddle") for "mumble-dungeon-language". * the DECUS/RT-11 version was converted to FORTRAN by "a somewhat nervous DEC engineer, who prefers to remain nameless!" Since we had the source, I compiled a version in which I knew the "wizard" password, and could bring up the "GDT", the game debugger tool. First time I had seen an interactive debuggin interface...learned alot from that code! All the strings were in RADIX-50....never have figured that out...just use a lookup table! Anyone have any to add to all this rambling? Monte Bateman WB5RZX @ WB5RZX bateman @ nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu National Severe Storms Laboratory, Norman, OK! 73069 =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!lth.se!newsuser From: magnus%t...@Urd.lth.se (Magnus Olsson) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <1990Nov27.112510.6448@lth.se> Date: 27 Nov 90 11:25:10 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> Sender: news...@lth.se (LTH network news server) Organization: Theoretical Physics, Lund University, Sweden Lines: 27 Posted: Tue Nov 27 12:25:10 1990 In article <1990Nov26.1...@sctc.com> smith@sctc.com (Rick Smith) writes: >Gordon Letwin made his name writing OS software for Heathkit ("Type spaces >to determine baud rate"). As an "implementer" of Adventure, he probably >wrote the driver program for interpreting the Adventure database. Probably, he didn't even do that. I've played the Letwin version on an IBM PC, and it seems to be a rather exact copy of the 350 point Fortran version. The only differences that I've seen was that there's a new room (the Computer Room, next to the Soft Room, with "a centerfold of a nude supercomputer hanging on a wall"), and that you got some cute messages when you restored a saved game from disk, like "Did you have to interrupt me right now? I was having an interesting diskussion with a bootstrap loader!". May I guess that all Letwin did was to make a few changes to the code, add his name and a copyright notice and compile it? As far as I know, the legislation is like that; making some small modifications to a PD program entitles you to copyright it as your own creation. Note: This is just my guess, based on what I've seen of the program (I don't own it myself and it's several years since I last played this version). I do not intend any offence to Mr. Letwin. Magnus Olsson | \e+ /_ Dept. of Theoretical Physics | \ Z / q University of Lund, Sweden | >----< Internet: mag...@thep.lu.se | / \===== g Bitnet: THEPMO@SELDC52 | /e- \q =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!lth.se!newsuser From: magnus%t...@Urd.lth.se (Magnus Olsson) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <1990Nov27.115437.6728@lth.se> Date: 27 Nov 90 11:54:37 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <9665@fy.sei.cmu.edu> Sender: news...@lth.se (LTH network news server) Organization: Theoretical Physics, Lund University, Sweden Lines: 23 Posted: Tue Nov 27 12:54:37 1990 When discussing the magic teleportation words in Adventure (XYZZY and PLUGH), sewveral people have mentioned things like "BUILDIUNG takes you to the building if you're sufficiently close". These words aren't really "magic words", it's just a feature of the game (which is explained in the documentation): when it's reasonably clear how you get to a place (i.e. if you are within a few rooms' distance of it), it suffices to say the name of the room to get there. This is in contrast to the "real magic words", which are totally counterintuitive and have to be found out (it's not very difficult, but still...). Myself, I've always imagined the first category, like BUILDING, just to be a kind of shorthand for finding your way around, while the words like XYZZY really teleport you in some magical way. Btw, how do people pronounce XYZZY? I've always pronounced it the way it's spelled [ksizzi], but in the 'Jargon File', it says that it's pronounced as five separate letters X-Y-Z-Z-Y. Magnus Olsson | \e+ /_ Dept. of Theoretical Physics | \ Z / q University of Lund, Sweden | >----< Internet: magnus@thep.lu.se | / \===== g Bitnet: THEPMO@SELDC52 | /e- \q =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!rs From: r...@eddie.mit.edu (Robert E. Seastrom) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <1990Nov27.155329.4693@eddie.mit.edu> Date: 27 Nov 90 15:53:29 GMT Reply-To: r...@eddie.MIT.EDU (Robert E. Seastrom) Organization: MIT EE/CS Computer Facilities, Cambridge, MA Lines: 13 Posted: Tue Nov 27 16:53:29 1990 It should be noted that the UChicago version of Adventure is specific to certain types of DEC hardware (probably '10 or '20, but I do recall playing it on the 11/55 at Delta years ago). Anyway, if someone has already gone to the trouble of porting it to Unix so it compiles right, it would save a lot of work if you could advertise it... ---Rob -- Internet: r...@eddie.mit.edu | Copyright: Protecting your right to Bitnet: RS@SESTAK | copy software. X.25: PSI%0240200101905::KICKI::RS | ---gu...@cygnus.com =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!bionet!uwm.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!lavaca.uh.edu!menudo.uh.edu!lobster!mwk!gleason From: gleason@mwk.uucp (Lee K. Gleason, Control-G Consultants) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <6946@mwk.uucp> Date: 27 Nov 90 17:11:25 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <1990Nov27.075651.13819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> Organization: M. W. Kellogg, Houston TX Lines: 33 Posted: Tue Nov 27 18:11:25 1990 In article <1990Nov27.0...@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu>, bat...@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu (Monte Bateman) writes: > > What I *DID* spend a lot of time on was the ZORK dungeon. Took me > several years to finish it all; seems like it was around 570 points . . . > > * the DECUS/RT-11 version was converted to FORTRAN by "a somewhat > nervous DEC engineer, who prefers to remain nameless!" > That would have been Bob Supnik - in earlier versions it mentioned him by name, later versions took it out, presumably because he got too many calls and letters. > Since we had the source, I compiled a version in which I knew the > "wizard" password, and could bring up the "GDT", the game debugger tool. In early versions, the password was Supnik's name, his cat's name, and his zip code. Later versions used a prompt/response technique, which was not susceptible to gussing, but easy enough to patch out. Anyone ever figure out what all of the GDT commands did? Some were easy, like TK for take object, and the one that would put you in any room, but others I never could figure out... Man, did I spend a lot of time playing this - never did get around to getting all of the points, since I spent too much time taking it apart to see what made it work...One amusing thing I recall, your rank was determined by your score. If youyr score was high enough, it awarded you the title of "CHEATER", since it was unlikely you could have gotten that many points without dissasembly, etc. =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!hsdndev!bbn.com!cosell From: cos...@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <61127@bbn.BBN.COM> Date: 27 Nov 90 17:37:10 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> Sender: ne...@bbn.com Lines: 148 Posted: Tue Nov 27 18:37:10 1990 smith@sctc.com (Rick Smith) writes: }Here's a patchwork of Adventure history I've pieced together over the years. }I try to note conjectures where appropriate. Please fill in holes, anyone.. OK... LOTS more than you, or anyone else wants to know.... }Willie Crowther was a caver, as were several other BBNers back in the 70s. ... }People at BBN became interested in developing computerized cave maps. }I remember Bill Mann with some version of a cave map at BBN around 1980. Will was primarily working on this problem --- another out of the blue crazy-seeming quest that Will set off on. Caving notebooks are huge streams of incremental 'surveys', a smallish number of feet at a time, of the passages of a cave. Errors creep in at every juncture [Ask any student who has to take a course in surveying how hard it is to do it carefully enough to survey a largish-loop and have it actually *close* when you're done. And that's with a transit, plenty of time to set things up, being able to stand up to take the measurement, having adequate light, etc... You can imagine what a mess the caving data points are. Will wanted to do two things: first was to actually draw the maps from the raw data [not an easy task in itself], and beyond that, he wanted the program to 'fix' the data. For example, he had some kind of hack so that if you surveed between two known reference points, he'd 'tune' the data to make them actualy _connect_ the two references. }Willie took the computerized map and made a sort of game out of it. You }could move between the rooms, using the names and directions for the }actual cave (Mammoth Cave?). This is a mix of two things. YES, adventure was patterned on Colossal cave [see below], but the mapping hackery was completely independent of the genesis of Adventure [also see below]. I think that for the purposes of the history-of-Adventure, the whole matter of Will's mapping hack can be omitted --- it really doesn't figure in. [Will's caving does, of course, though]. }While I don't remember much about the Adventure source code myself, I vaguely }recall that it was heavily data dependent. The cave arrangement and the }things inside were all set up as program data.... Just so: a programming technique that is quite common now, but was hardly common back then. Even the puzzles were table-driven. }.. After all, it had that nice, big CRT. Unfortunately, our PDP-1 did *not* come with the nice type 30 display that some PDP-1's did. It was born to be a timesharing system [and it was!] and so mostly interacted with the outside world on Mod 33 TTYs on its scanner [and a clumsy Soroban for a console that no one except the system hackers [e.g, me] ever did much of anything with]. This PDP-1 was Serial #45. BBN at that time also had another pdp-1, serial number *2* [and #1 stayed inside DEC, so I'm pretty sure this was the *first* real PDP-1]. That one _did_ have the nice display, and I logged a lot of hours over in the other building playing spacewar when I should have been back in my own building fixing/finishing the timesharing system. }The classic 350 point Adventure emerged after Don Woods at Stanford got his }hands on Willie's cave map game. According to legend, the Arpanet played }a crucial role in that development. Actually, Will's leaving BBN and going to PARC [and taking Adventure with him] helped a *whole* lot. Don doesn't come into the picture until after Will has arrived on the West Coast. On the other hand, I never have quite understood how Don even heard about it, much less tracked down a copy. Can anyone from PARC [or Stanford] fill in the next steps? [I supposed I could break down and just _ask_ Will, but that'd be cheating: this is a folklore newsgroup, not a history-of-computing newsgroup....:-)] The only figuring-in of the ARPANET that I know of, is that it spread the program from coast to coast and brings it before the eyes of hackers nearly everywhere [just like my "doctor" program. It was a re-do of Wizenbaum's "Eliza" program, but as far as I know his never travelled much outside of MIT, and being written in SLIP wasn't particularly exportable, by contrast mine was written in BBNLisp and travelled the country as TENEXes did] }An extended form with new rooms and puzzles was produced by Eric Roberts while }at BBN around 1980. I don't remember this part. I didn't think Eric had anything to do with the program, itself [but he does figure into its birth... see below], and once it goes west [which is before 1980] nothing more that I know of was ever done to it at BBN. As for Eric's involvement, at the time, Eric was a new employee at BBN and was also a house-resident or some such in a dorm at Harvard [at which he was still a PhD candidate]. As such, he was a real 'bridge' between the exciting world of the undergraduates and us dull, old professionals. In particular, an odd new game had just appeared, "Dungeons and Dragons", and a few intrepid gamers were discovering the magic of one of the first of the 'role playing games'. Eric was a born dungeonmaster, and was running a game at Harvard in his dorm, and was *sure* it would be neat to try one out on us. And so it happened: there were something like seven or eight of us, mostly the IMP development team and a few others, as the merry band running through Eric's Dungeon. Well, apparently unlike his dorm-team (and D&D'ers in general, I gather), our team had no taste for real role playing and questing and such. We weren't interesting in killing things, or in having parts of the team plot against other parts. Basically, we had no desire for any kind of 'every man for himself' type of game and hardly cared about who "won", and instead cooperated ruthlessly to 'beat' the dungeon. But for all of our dislike of plotting and bloodshed, we were VERY good problem solvers and planners. This thrust of ours apparently sat just fine with Eric: the dungeon became a set of puzzles, and a challenge for the wits. We essentially did away with the 'dice', since the tedious probability tables were of no interest to us. [I point this out because this is something of an innovative side-excursion off of the typical D&D genre, where ever-more-reality is the goal, with more and more complicated battle systems, more weapons, etc, etc, but it is this excursion that gives rise to Adventure]. We all loved the game: Eric kept making more and more complicated dungeons and more and more complicated puzzles and obstacles therein, and we'ed soldier along with it. Will saw two drawbacks to the game, though, wonderful as it was: (a) it required a dungeon master to run things, and (b) you needed to get a fairly large (and stable) group of people to get together on a regular basis [which was getting trickier at the time]. Well, as for (b), since we had pretty much done away with the 'individual persona' part of the game [we were a team,and that we had different capabilities jsut meant that we added different strengths to the mix... it was the *team* that was doing the questing], it hardly made a difference that there was one or more than one of us. As for (a), Will wondered if he could write a *program* that would serve as a dungeon master for a one-player dungeon. [TA DAAAH] Since he was deeply steeped his Mammoth caving exercise, it was a natural for him to use the actual caves, more or less, as the locale for the program. Strew about assorted puzzles and opponents and tricks and traps, a pretty clever (albeit dumb as a rock) command-line parser, and history is in the making... /Bernie\ =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!usc!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wuarchive!udel!rochester!pt.cs.cmu.edu!o.gp.cs.cmu.edu!andrew.cmu.edu!ap1i+ From: ap...@andrew.cmu.edu (Andrew C. Plotkin) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: Date: 27 Nov 90 19:46:03 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <1990Nov27.075651.13819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu>, <9671@fy.sei.cmu.edu> Organization: Class of '92, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA Lines: 24 Posted: Tue Nov 27 20:46:03 1990 In-Reply-To: <9671@fy.sei.cmu.edu> Oh boy, Zork lore.... > Excerpts from netnews.alt.folklore.computers: 27-Nov-90 Zork (was > Adventure) Arthur Ev...@sei.cmu.edu (776) > Zork was a great game, and there are a few puzzles I never did solve. I > hadn't made any progress for a while, went off and did other things, and > then the game was no longer available. Bateman's message suggests that > InfoCom has a commercial version. I hope it's available for the MAC. > What I really want is something pretty much like what I used to play, so > I can finally work out those last few puzzles. Infocom did publish Zork for home computers. They split the original game up, modified it somewhat, and added a considerable amount of stuff, winding up with three games: Zork I, II, and III. I believe that all of the original puzzles stayed in, albeit rearranged a little. They later published several other games set in the same universe. All of these were, and probably still are, available for just about every home computer imaginable. Pure-text games are nice that way. Infocom still exists, but it was taken over by Activision a few years ago, and all of the original programmers have left by now. (As far as I know.) --Z =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!uunet!attcan!utgpu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sdd.hp.com!hplabs!hpcc05!hpdmd48!ritchie From: rit...@hpdmd48.boi.hp.com (David Ritchie) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: <18390011@hpdmd48.boi.hp.com> Date: 27 Nov 90 23:35:07 GMT References: <9671@fy.sei.cmu.edu> Organization: Hewlett Packard - Boise, ID Lines: 13 Posted: Wed Nov 28 00:35:07 1990 >Years ago DECUS (I think) published a double-page (11x14) color map of >the Zork playing area. (I don't say "cave" as a lot of it was above >ground.) I must have a copy somewhere, though I didn't find it the >other day when I found my Adventure maps. DEC Professional, actually. I still have that copy :^>. What is the current status of Infocom games? I understand that the programmers were all let go a few years ago. Did anyone pick up the Infocom games line? -- Dave Ritchie ritchie@hpdmd48.boi.hp.com =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!bionet!uwm.edu!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!pt.cs.cmu.edu!sei!ae From: a...@sei.cmu.edu (Arthur Evans) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: <9671@fy.sei.cmu.edu> Date: 27 Nov 90 14:13:35 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <1990Nov27.075651.13819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University (Software Engineering Institute), Pgh, PA Lines: 16 Posted: Tue Nov 27 15:13:35 1990 In-reply-to: bateman@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu's message of 27 Nov 90 07:56:51 GMT Monte Bateman (bat...@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu) has finally brought up Zork. I've been waiting for that. Years ago DECUS (I think) published a double-page (11x14) color map of the Zork playing area. (I don't say "cave" as a lot of it was above ground.) I must have a copy somewhere, though I didn't find it the other day when I found my Adventure maps. Zork was a great game, and there are a few puzzles I never did solve. I hadn't made any progress for a while, went off and did other things, and then the game was no longer available. Bateman's message suggests that InfoCom has a commercial version. I hope it's available for the MAC. What I really want is something pretty much like what I used to play, so I can finally work out those last few puzzles. Art Evans =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!hp4nl!charon!dik From: d...@cwi.nl (Dik T. Winter) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <2615@charon.cwi.nl> Date: 28 Nov 90 02:20:42 GMT References: <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <1990Nov27.075651.13819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> <1990Nov27.175924.16098@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov> Sender: ne...@cwi.nl Organization: CWI, Amsterdam Lines: 24 Posted: Wed Nov 28 03:20:42 1990 In article <1990Nov27.1...@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov> p...@euclid.jpl.nasa.gov writes: > In article <1990Nov27.0...@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu>, bat...@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu (Monte Bateman) writes: > > Since we had the source, I compiled a version in which I knew the > > "wizard" password, and could bring up the "GDT", the game debugger tool. > > First time I had seen an interactive debuggin interface...learned alot > > from that code! All the strings were in RADIX-50....never have figured that > > out...just use a lookup table! > Not necessary to have the source... ... > PATCH>update > > Some of us were desperate enough... Right, that is the spirit. The version that was running on Unix V7 was in fact a patched RT11 version. The version that was running on BSD 4.0 was in fact a patched V7 version. And we had a version on V7 that was a patched BSD version, because it was easier to do than to restore the original V7 patch (I know, I did it, on purpose leaving in a security hole: ^A would give you a shell). On the other hand, I decompiled the stuff to pseudo-Fortran (easy to do because it was threaded code), recompiled it to some form of Pascal to run it on a CDC Cyber. That version was a bit faster :-). -- dik t. winter, cwi, amsterdam, nederland dik@cwi.nl =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!ukc!edcastle!cs.ed.ac.uk!cs.edinburgh.ac.uk!nick From: ni...@cs.edinburgh.ac.uk (Nick Rothwell) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <2632@skye.cs.ed.ac.uk> Date: 28 Nov 90 11:59:38 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <1990Nov27.075651.13819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> Sender: nn...@cs.ed.ac.uk Reply-To: ni...@lfcs.ed.ac.uk Organization: Wavetables 'R' Us Lines: 19 Posted: Wed Nov 28 12:59:38 1990 In article <1990Nov27.0...@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu>, bat...@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu (Monte Bateman) writes: > Since we had the source, I compiled a version in which I knew the > "wizard" password, and could bring up the "GDT", the game debugger tool. > > Anyone have any to add to all this rambling? We disassembled the GDT password scheme - it was something pretty simple (like add 1 to first character, 2 to second and so on). We also found the flag it used to remember whether it had asked for the password already, and set this directly (location 5978, if I recall...). Interesting to have a character wandering around the dungeon carrying a rainbow and a window frame... -- Nick Rothwell, Laboratory for Foundations of Computer Science, Edinburgh. ni...@lfcs.ed.ac.uk !mcsun!ukc!lfcs!nick ~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ ~~ "You ain't seen nothing yet. I can take this floor out too, no trouble." =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!bionet!uwm.edu!wuarchive!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!euclid.jpl.nasa.gov!pjs From: p...@euclid.jpl.nasa.gov (Peter Scott) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <1990Nov27.175924.16098@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov> Date: 27 Nov 90 17:59:24 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <1990Nov27.075651.13819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> Sender: ne...@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov (Usenet) Reply-To: p...@euclid.jpl.nasa.gov Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA/Caltech Lines: 35 Posted: Tue Nov 27 18:59:24 1990 Nntp-Posting-Host: euclid.jpl.nasa.gov In article <1990Nov27.0...@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu>, bat...@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu (Monte Bateman) writes: > > Since we had the source, I compiled a version in which I knew the > "wizard" password, and could bring up the "GDT", the game debugger tool. > First time I had seen an interactive debuggin interface...learned alot > from that code! All the strings were in RADIX-50....never have figured that > out...just use a lookup table! > > Anyone have any to add to all this rambling? Not necessary to have the source... PATCH Version 3-00 15-Mar-1982 IMAGE FILE BEING PATCHED: "USER$DISK2:[PJS.MISC.DUNGEON]DUNGEON.EXE;1" JOURNAL FILE: "USER$DISK2:[PJS.MISC.DUNGEON]DUNGEON.JNL;1" DATE/TIME OF PATCH: 6-MAR-1984 15:44:53.23 %PATCH-I-NOGBL, some or all global symbols not accessible PATCH>set modu/all PATCH>set scope gdt PATCH>dep/ins gdt+17 NEW> 'NOP' NEW> 'NOP' NEW> exit old: GDT\GDT+17: BEQL GDT\GDT+1C new: GDT\GDT+17: NOP new: GDT\GDT+18: NOP PATCH>update Some of us were desperate enough... -- This is news. This is your | Peter Scott, NASA/JPL/Caltech brain on news. Any questions? | (p...@euclid.jpl.nasa.gov) =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!uunet!zephyr.ens.tek.com!tekchips!tekgvs!toma From: to...@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: <8499@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM> Date: 28 Nov 90 18:47:20 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <1990Nov27.075651.13819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> <9671@fy.sei.cmu.edu> Reply-To: to...@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy) Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton, OR. Lines: 49 Posted: Wed Nov 28 19:47:20 1990 In article <96...@fy.sei.cmu.edu> a...@sei.cmu.edu (Arthur Evans) writes: >Monte Bateman (bat...@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu) has finally brought up >Zork. I've been waiting for that. >Zork was a great game, and there are a few puzzles I never did solve. I >hadn't made any progress for a while, went off and did other things, and >then the game was no longer available. Bateman's message suggests that >InfoCom has a commercial version. I hope it's available for the MAC. >What I really want is something pretty much like what I used to play, so >I can finally work out those last few puzzles. Well, I have bad news. Infocom was bought out and their line of text adventures was dropped. This was over a year ago. It seems that people don't like to read -- they gotta play graphic adventures (inferior IMHO). You might find someone with a copy to sell/lend/pirate (:-). It is a shame there is no market for these anymore. I still have a few Infocom games to finish up, and unfortunately didn't buy the remaining titles when they closed them out. I also had all the Scott Adams games (originally in Basic, then in assembler, for Apples and TRS-80's) and played all but the last three before I lost my system. These were like Adventure, were very clever, and made to fit in 16k! Years ago Adventure hit our mainframe, and everyone had fun working on it and comparing notes. When Dungeon (later called Zork) appeared one day, a bunch of us came in that night to play it. When we went to compare notes we were shocked -- we were in different parts of the cave. That room with the strong magnetic field send us all off in different directions! Incredible game! Later the mainframe version was enlarged adding the Bank of Zork, the Puzzle Room, and an endgame. When Infocom was formed and Zork was ported to microcomputers (then the Apple II, TRS-80, and CP/M) they had to split it in pieces to make it fit on the small floppies. Thus there were three: Zork I -- Every part was in the original mainframe Zork. Zork II -- About half was from the mainframe version, including the Bank of Zork. Zork III -- The puzzle room and endgame from the mainframe version, the machine room, plus a few additional puzzles. The mainframe version was posted to the net several years ago (it is in Fortran), and probably is available at various archive sites. I got it running (successfully) on a PC. Tom Almy to...@tekgvs.labs.tek.com Standard Disclaimers Apply =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!mit-eddie!bbn.com!nic!chaos.cs.brandeis.edu!chaos!zippy From: zi...@chaos.cs.brandeis.edu (Patrick Tufts) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: Date: 28 Nov 90 00:56:11 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <1990Nov27.075651.13819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> Sender: @chaos.cs.brandeis.edu Organization: Brandeis University Computer Science Dept Lines: 12 Posted: Wed Nov 28 01:56:11 1990 In-Reply-To: bateman@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu's message of 27 Nov 90 07:56:51 GMT Any good folklore on ZORK? What I do know (from the DECUS/RT-11 docs) * credit was given to "Crowther & Woods 'Adventure' " * written as a project at the MIT-AI lab (I think) * written in a special language called MDL ("muddle") for "mumble-dungeon-language". MDL is a lisp-like interpreter that I believe is still used with Infocom games. When they port from one system to another, they just write a MDL for the new machine. --Pat =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!bionet!agate!linus!linus!mwunix.mitre.org!jcmorris From: jcmo...@mwunix.mitre.org (Joe Morris) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: Date: 28 Nov 90 14:43:47 GMT References: <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <1990Nov27.075651.13819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> <1990Nov27.175924.16098@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov> Sender: use...@linus.mitre.org Lines: 30 Posted: Wed Nov 28 15:43:47 1990 p...@euclid.jpl.nasa.gov (Peter Scott) writes: >In article <1990Nov27.0...@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu>, bat...@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu (Monte Bateman) writes: >> >> Since we had the source, I compiled a version in which I knew the >> "wizard" password, and could bring up the "GDT", the game debugger tool. >Not necessary to have the source... [console listing for patching a cheap way to wizard mode] >Some of us were desperate enough... Way back in the dark ages (our lantern batteries were low) I was running Adventure on a brand-new KL10 and a slightly older 370/148. The IBM version was interesting in that you could not become a wizard if you were running a 3278 terminal (the secret word was ^W^I^Z^Z^A^R, and the 3270 had no way to send control characters), but the corker was that our TOPS-10 guru wasn't able to figure out the wizard-mode sequence for the DEC version even with the FORTRAN source. We never really sat down to dedicate real time to the question (there were a few things the university wanted us to do, like keep the system up) and somehow the issue was never resolved. As I recall it you had to deny that you were a wizard, then take a number the system typed, manipulate it in some way dependent on the time of day and return it on the next challenge. Does anyone recall the procedure for declaring yourself a wizard on the DECsystem-10 version of Adventure? Joe Morris =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!uupsi!psivax!woof From: wo...@Pacesetter.COM (Harold C. ( Hal ) Schloss) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <1990Nov28.170408.8319@Pacesetter.COM> Date: 28 Nov 90 17:04:08 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <1990Nov27.075651.13819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> <1990Nov27.175924.16098@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov> Organization: Pacesetter Systems Inc., Sylmar, CA Lines: 50 Posted: Wed Nov 28 18:04:08 1990 In article <1990Nov27.1...@elroy.jpl.nasa.gov> p...@euclid.jpl.nasa.gov writes: >In article <1990Nov27.0...@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu>, bat...@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu (Monte Bateman) writes: >> >> Since we had the source, I compiled a version in which I knew the >> "wizard" password, and could bring up the "GDT", the game debugger tool. >> First time I had seen an interactive debuggin interface...learned alot >> from that code! All the strings were in RADIX-50....never have figured that >> out...just use a lookup table! >> >> Anyone have any to add to all this rambling? > >Not necessary to have the source... > > PATCH Version 3-00 15-Mar-1982 etc. etc. Sigh. I remember spending many hours/days/weeks working on adventure. As a high school student I used to dial into the ARPANET and find various friendly computers that would allow one to play it. In college (Harvard) there were several of us at that time (ca. 1979-1980) that would exchange hints and maps. It seems to me that the gdt command was part of "zork" though, and not adventure. (I still have a hard copy of the Fortran source to adventure somewhere.) To make a long story short, after many intense days of us playing zork my junior year (instead of studying for finals) my roommate typed "gdt" instead of "get" when trying to get some object. We immediately realized what he had stumbled into, since we couldn't figure out any other meaning for "gdt". Now one when issues the gdt command, it issues a challenge and then asks for a response. If my memory serves me right, when one enters the end game of the original zork, one was asked to create such a challenge and response pair so that one could easily get back to the end game in the future. (I think one would have to "incant" the challenge or something like that.) Through either the end game or the help of a friendly wizard (it has been a LONG time since this happenned) we discovered that if one typed gdt as the FIRST command to zork, that the challenge was always "DNZHUO", and that the correct response was "IDEQTQ". There were many different things one could do in gdt mode, and I spent a very happy summer that year at TRW writing the equivalent of shell scripts (in TECO!) to talk to a zork process, put it into gdt mode, and dump everything I could think of. I still the printouts somewhere. (No the system at TRW was not a UNIX system, it was some kind of DEC system though, I think a DECSYSTEM-10 which actually resided at Boeing in Washington, and was accessed through phone lines from Manhattan Beach in California, but that is another story.) -- Hal Schloss Pacesetter Systems Inc., A Siemens Company {uupsi|siemens|hoptoad|hacgate|bellcore|harvard|quad1|mtxinu| ashtate|cetacea|otto|uunet}!psivax!woof Internet: wo...@pacesetter.com or wo...@psi.siemens.com =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!bu.edu!shelby!apple!bbn.com!levin From: le...@bbn.com (Joel B Levin) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure (forwarded message) Message-ID: <61185@bbn.BBN.COM> Date: 29 Nov 90 15:06:52 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> Sender: ne...@bbn.com Reply-To: le...@BBN.COM (Joel B Levin) Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc., Cambridge MA Lines: 32 Posted: Thu Nov 29 16:06:52 1990 Date: Wed, 28 Nov 90 21:21:34 PST From: p...@ama.caltech.edu (Paul Hardy) Message-Id: <9011290521.AA07468@ama> To: le...@bbn.com, a...@sei.cmu.edu In-Reply-To: le...@bbn.com's message of 21 Nov 90 16:00:37 GMT Subject: Re: Adventure You can download what claims to be the original Tenex adventure via anonymous ftp from uunet.uu.net, in the directory comp.sources.games/volume9/adven. I'm bringing up a new version of news on this machine and don't seem to be able to post right now; pass this along to alt.folklore.computers if you feel like it. This sort of thing should be propogated, especially to that group! --Paul I have looked at the source code there. I found at least one comment with an author's name and a date in 1978, which is certainly later than Will's code. It is not compatible with Sun 3.4 f77, which is what I have handy. If it was is in fact Tenex fortran compatible, it is probably DEC's F40 (Fortran IV); I think their extended F10 was still pretty new (and maybe a little buggy) at that time. I didn't check to see if f77 has a compiler switch to compile fortran IV, but I doubt it. /JBL = Nets: le...@bbn.com | "There were sweetheart roses on Yancey Wilmerding's or {...}!bbn!levin | bureau that morning. Wide-eyed and distraught, she POTS: (617)873-3463 | stood with all her faculties rooted to the floor." =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!apple!usc!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!van-bc!rsoft!mindlink!a218 From: a218@mindlink.UUCP (Charlie Gibbs) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: <3993@mindlink.UUCP> Date: 29 Nov 90 21:18:51 GMT Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada Lines: 23 Posted: Thu Nov 29 22:18:51 1990 In article <90334.021...@psuvm.psu.edu> KXH...@psuvm.psu.edu (Ken Hornstein) writes: >Here's something that I've always wanted ... does anyone have the source >to Zork? I've love to port it to our IBM mainframe, if someone hasn't already >done it. > >Does anyone know where I could get the source? Hopefully it would be in >Fortran .. I managed to get my hands on the source, and after removing all the PDP-11-specific extensions managed to get it running on our small mainframe. I've still got it around here somewhere... >Hypocrisy is the Vaseline of social intercourse. > >Ken Hornstein kxh...@psuvm.psu.edu Phone: 814/862-7007 Bureaucracies are the epoxy which lubricates the wheels of government. -- James Boren: Fuzzify! Charlie_Gibbs@mindlink.UUCP =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!uunet!nuchat!lobster!mwk!gleason From: gleason@mwk.uucp (Lee K. Gleason, Control-G Consultants) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: <7092@mwk.uucp> Date: 30 Nov 90 11:29:22 GMT References: <9671@fy.sei.cmu.edu> <18390013@hpdmd48.boi.hp.com> Organization: M. W. Kellogg, Houston TX Lines: 64 Posted: Fri Nov 30 12:29:22 1990 For those of you who never saw the Game Debugging Tool in Dungeon, here's the help menu from my patched version that doesn't require a password... BTW, SUpnik's cat was named Barney, if I recall from the earlier version. Welcome to Dungeon. This version created 3-NOV-78. You are in an open field west of a big white house with a boarded front door. There is a small mailbox here. >GDT GDT>HE Valid commands are: AA- Alter ADVS AC- Alter CEVENT AF- Alter FINDEX AH- Alter HERE AN- Alter switches AO- Alter OBJCTS AR- Alter ROOMS AV- Alter VILLS AX- Alter EXITS AZ- Alter PUZZLE DA- Display ADVS DC- Display CEVENT DF- Display FINDEX DH- Display HACKS DL- Display lengths DM- Display RTEXT DN- Display switches DO- Display OBJCTS DP- Display parser DR- Display ROOMS DS- Display state DT- Display text DV- Display VILLS DX- Display EXITS DZ- Display PUZZLE D2- Display ROOM2 EX- Exit HE- Type this message NC- No cyclops ND- No deaths NR- No robber NT- No troll PD- Program detail RC- Restore cyclops RD- Restore deaths RR- Restore robber RT- Restore troll TK- Take. GDT>EX > WHat some of these do is pretty obvious...some are more cryptic. I'd like to hear from other GDT hackers if they figured out some of the tougher ones... Lee K. Gleason Control-G Consultants gleason@mwk.uucp =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!apple!olivea!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!van-bc!sl From: s...@van-bc.wimsey.bc.ca (Stuart Lynne) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure (forwarded message) Message-ID: <720@van-bc.wimsey.bc.ca> Date: 1 Dec 90 09:14:45 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <61185@bbn.BBN.COM> Organization: USENET Public Access, Vancouver, B.C., Canada Lines: 20 Posted: Sat Dec 1 10:14:45 1990 In article <61...@bbn.BBN.COM> le...@BBN.COM (Joel B Levin) writes: } You can download what claims to be the original Tenex adventure via } anonymous ftp from uunet.uu.net, in the directory } comp.sources.games/volume9/adven. I'm bringing up a new version of } news on this machine and don't seem to be able to post right now; pass } this along to alt.folklore.computers if you feel like it. This sort } of thing should be propogated, especially to that group! There is also a C version of the 550 point version on uunet in: /usr/spool/ftp/games/adventure.[0-7].Z It only took a few minutes to get running under XENIX with gcc (a few odd bsd'isms cropped up). Lots of fun. -- Stuart Lynne Unifax Communications Inc. ...!van-bc!sl 604-937-7532(voice) s...@wimsey.bc.ca =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!bu.edu!bbn.com!cosell From: cos...@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: <61269@bbn.BBN.COM> Date: 2 Dec 90 14:06:21 GMT References: <92924@aerospace.AERO.ORG> Sender: ne...@bbn.com Lines: 24 Posted: Sun Dec 2 15:06:21 1990 gold...@arecibo.aero.org (Fogbound Child) writes: }In article <84...@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM>, to...@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy) writes... }> }>The mainframe version was posted to the net several years ago (it is in }>Fortran), and probably is available at various archive sites. I got it }>running (successfully) on a PC. }>Tom Almy }>to...@tekgvs.labs.tek.com }>Standard Disclaimers Apply }I remember playing a tweaked version (still called Dungeon) on one of JPL's ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ }machines ... I think you are mistaken here. Far as I know [and we [BBN] were pretty well wired into Laibling and friens [some of us were virtually beta-testers for some of the hackery], zork was *born* named "zork" and never existed under any other name. There _was_ an adventure-like game called 'dungeon', but i don't think it had anything to do wither with Zork or with Adventure. /Bernie\ =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!uunet!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!pt.cs.cmu.edu!o.gp.cs.cmu.edu!andrew.cmu.edu!ap1i+ From: ap...@andrew.cmu.edu (Andrew C. Plotkin) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: Date: 2 Dec 90 20:35:21 GMT References: <92924@aerospace.AERO.ORG>, <61269@bbn.BBN.COM> Organization: Class of '92, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA Lines: 20 Posted: Sun Dec 2 21:35:21 1990 In-Reply-To: <61269@bbn.BBN.COM> > Excerpts from netnews.alt.folklore.computers: 2-Dec-90 Re: Zork (was > Adventure) Bernie Cos...@bbn.com (932) > }I remember playing a tweaked version (still called Dungeon) on one of > }JPL's machines ... > I think you are mistaken here. Far as I know [and we [BBN] were pretty > well wired into Lebling and friens [some of us were virtually > beta-testers for some of the hackery], zork was *born* named "zork" and > never existed under any other name. No, we've got it here at CMU. At least, the filename is "dungeon"; I don't recall what the game says when you run it. (I'd check now, but I'm logged onto a decstation and it's only compiled for the sun-3 and ibm RT.) I haven't played it much, but it's the same as Zork as far as the axe-wielding nasty in the cellar. --Z =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!usc!apple!uokmax!bateman From: bat...@nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu (Monte Bateman) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: <1990Dec3.064534.11819@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> Date: 3 Dec 90 06:45:34 GMT References: <92924@aerospace.AERO.ORG> <61269@bbn.BBN.COM> Sender: ne...@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu (Nets) Organization: National Severe Storms Laboratory Lines: 103 Posted: Mon Dec 3 07:45:34 1990 >>The mainframe version was posted to the net several years ago (it is in >>Fortran), and probably is available at various archive sites. I got it >>running (successfully) on a PC. >>Tom Almy >>to...@tekgvs.labs.tek.com >>Standard Disclaimers Apply >>I remember playing a tweaked version (still called Dungeon) on one of JPL's > ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ >>machines ... > >I think you are mistaken here. Far as I know [and we [BBN] were pretty >well wired into Laibling and friens [some of us were virtually >beta-testers for some of the hackery], zork was *born* named "zork" and >never existed under any other name. There _was_ an adventure-like game >called 'dungeon', but i don't think it had anything to do wither with >Zork or with Adventure. > > /Bernie\ Whoa /Bernie\....here is an excerpt from the Dungeon Text data file... The first line is the greeting the player gets when the game is started: Welcome to Dungeon. This version created 17-SEP-87. And here are some lines from later on in the file.... %%%%%%% reminisce mode ON %%%%%%%% US NEWS & DUNGEON REPORT 17-SEP-87 Late Dungeon Edition --- LATE NEWS FLASH!! --- The endgame is here! (Somewhere) There have been some puzzling new discoveries near the Thief's hideaway. --- BACKGROUND INFORMATION --- This version of Dungeon for the PDP-11/VAX-11 has been completely reimplemented in FORTRAN-IV from the original MDL sources created at MIT. The parser in this version is somewhat simpler than the parser in the ARPAnet version; within this limit, this version is fully congruent with the current version on the ARPAnet. If you encounter problems, please report them IN WRITING to: Digital Equipment Computer Users Society (DECUS) One Iron Way, MR2-3/E55 Marlboro, Mass. 01752 Attention: Dungeon Maintenance PHONE CALLS AND IN-PERSON VISITS WILL BE RUDELY REJECTED! This version has been converted from FORTRAN-IV to f77 suitable for Unix Vaxen and PDPs. If you have any problems, please report them to: bi...@tekred.tek.com (Bill Randle) Welcome to Dungeon! Dungeon is a game of adventure, danger, and low cunning. In it you will explore some of the most amazing territory ever seen by mortal man. Hardened adventurers have run screaming from the terrors contained within. In Dungeon, the intrepid explorer delves into the forgotten secrets of a lost labyrinth deep in the bowels of the earth, searching for vast treasures long hidden from prying eyes, treasures guarded by fearsome monsters and diabolical traps! No DECsystem should be without one! Dungeon was created at the Programming Technology Division of the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science by Tim Anderson, Marc Blank, Bruce Daniels, and Dave Lebling. It was inspired by the Adventure game of Crowther and Woods, and the Dungeons and Dragons game of Gygax and Arneson. The original version was written in MDL (alias MUDDLE). The current version was translated from MDL into FORTRAN IV by a somewhat paranoid DEC engineer who prefers to remain anonymous. On-line information may be obtained with the commands HELP and INFO. And, from the beginning of the endgame, Suddenly, as you wait in the dark, you begin to feel somewhat disoriented. The feeling passes, but something seems different. As you regain your composure, the cloaked figure appears before you and says, "You are now ready to face the ultimate challenge of Zork. Should you wish to do this somewhat more quickly in the future, you will be given a magic phrase which will at any time transport you by magic to this point. To select the phrase, say INCANT, and you will be told your own magic phrase to use by saying INCANT, Good luck, and choose wisely!" %%%%%%% reminisce mode OFF %%%%%%%%%%% many more great things in this file....maybe more later, if I don't get flamed too much for this LOOONG rambling! Monte -- Monte Bateman WB5RZX @ WB5RZX bateman @ nsslsun.gcn.uoknor.edu National Severe Storms Laboratory, Norman, OK! 73069 =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!uunet!zephyr.ens.tek.com!tekchips!tekgvs!toma From: to...@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: <8531@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM> Date: 3 Dec 90 19:40:24 GMT References: <92924@aerospace.AERO.ORG> <61269@bbn.BBN.COM> Reply-To: to...@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy) Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton, OR. Lines: 37 Posted: Mon Dec 3 20:40:24 1990 In article <61...@bbn.BBN.COM> cos...@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell) writes: >gold...@arecibo.aero.org (Fogbound Child) writes: > >}In article <84...@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM>, to...@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy) writes... >}> >}>The mainframe version was posted to the net several years ago (it is in >}>Fortran), and probably is available at various archive sites. I got it >}>running (successfully) on a PC. >}I remember playing a tweaked version (still called Dungeon) on one of JPL's > ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ >}machines ... >I think you are mistaken here. Far as I know [and we [BBN] were pretty >well wired into Laibling and friens [some of us were virtually >beta-testers for some of the hackery], zork was *born* named "zork" and >never existed under any other name. There _was_ an adventure-like game >called 'dungeon', but i don't think it had anything to do wither with >Zork or with Adventure. Well in the formentioned version I have, if you type the command "zork" it responds: That word is henceforth replaced with DUNGEON. and if you type "dungeon" it says: At your service! plus as has already been pointed out, the on-line documentation refers to it as dungeon. When we got it (about 1978-1979?) it was called dungeon. I never heard it referred to as Zork until the Infocom version came out. As far as I know, Zork was just the name of the Great Underground Empire. Tom Almy to...@tekgvs.labs.tek.com Standard Disclaimers Apply =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!uupsi!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sdd.hp.com!ucsd!ucbvax!mtxinu!rtech!ingres!simutis From: sim...@ingres.com (John Simutis ) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: <1990Dec5.203930.22805@ingres.Ingres.COM> Date: 5 Dec 90 20:39:30 GMT References: <92924@aerospace.AERO.ORG> <61269@bbn.BBN.COM> Reply-To: sim...@ws80s.Ingres.COM (John Simutis ) Organization: Ingres Corporation, Alameda CA 94501 Lines: 11 Posted: Wed Dec 5 21:39:30 1990 In 1979, my PDP 11/70, RSTS 6.3 had a FORTRAN .TSK called DUNGEO - when I ran it, it responded to the command "zork" with something akin to "That word is hearby replaced by DUNGEON". As nearly as I can tell, it was the full zork game ( without the 'endgame' one was supposed to find past the Gates of Hell - _I_ never got that far. JS -- -------- < standard disclaimer > John Simutis, simutis @ingres.com Alms! Alms for the vi-impaired! =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!uupsi!rpi!julius.cs.uiuc.edu!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!osiris.cso.uiuc.edu!dpgerdes From: dpge...@osiris.cso.uiuc.edu (Dave Gerdes) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <1990Dec5.192843.4917@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> Date: 5 Dec 90 19:28:43 GMT References: <61113@bbn.BBN.COM> <61185@bbn.BBN.COM> <720@van-bc.wimsey.bc.ca> Sender: ne...@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu (News) Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana Lines: 7 Posted: Wed Dec 5 20:28:43 1990 I was just looking through some old 80-Micro mags that had some reviews on the Pyramid program that RS sold. It basically a clone of Adventure, only the names were changed to protect RS. That got me thinking, I used to have a nice hand drawn map to the entire dungeon of Adventure, and managed to lose it during my college days. Where could one get their hands on a good map of Adventure? =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!sunic!hagbard!eru!bloom-beacon!mintaka!think.com!sdd.hp.com!usc!apple!bbn.com!cosell From: cos...@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Zork (was Adventure) Message-ID: <61346@bbn.BBN.COM> Date: 5 Dec 90 12:05:10 GMT References: <92924@aerospace.AERO.ORG> <61269@bbn.BBN.COM> <8531@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM> Sender: ne...@bbn.com Lines: 35 Posted: Wed Dec 5 13:05:10 1990 to...@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy) writes: }In article <61...@bbn.BBN.COM> cos...@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell) writes: }>gold...@arecibo.aero.org (Fogbound Child) writes: }> }>}In article <84...@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM>, to...@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy) writes... }>}> }>}>The mainframe version was posted to the net several years ago (it is in }>}>Fortran), and probably is available at various archive sites. I got it }>}>running (successfully) on a PC. }>}I remember playing a tweaked version (still called Dungeon) on one of JPL's }> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ }>}machines ... }>I think you are mistaken here. Far as I know [and we [BBN] were pretty }>well wired into Laibling and friens [some of us were virtually }>beta-testers for some of the hackery], zork was *born* named "zork" and }>never existed under any other name. There _was_ an adventure-like game }>called 'dungeon', but i don't think it had anything to do wither with }>Zork or with Adventure. }Well in the formentioned version I have, if you type the command "zork" }it responds: } That word is henceforth replaced with DUNGEON. } ... I stand corrected. Apparently, the original Zork developed in two directions: one was done by DEC [by someone at DECUS perhaps? dunno...], and survived as "dungeon". The other was the rewrite that pdl and friends did that became 'zork' for the IBMPC and "Infocom". /Bernie\ =========================================================================== Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!julius.cs.uiuc.edu!apple!mrspoc!starnet!mzellers From: mzellers@starnet.uucp (Mark Zellers) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Adventure Message-ID: <1990Dec8.190159.9787@starnet.uucp> Date: 8 Dec 90 19:01:59 GMT References: <1990Nov26.173600.25607@sctc.com> <16721@paperboy.OSF.ORG> Reply-To: mzellers@starnet.UUCP (Mark Zellers) Organization: Starnet Connections---Public Access UNIX Lines: 18 Posted: Sat Dec 8 20:01:59 1990 In article <16...@paperboy.OSF.ORG> dbr...@osf.org (David Brooks) writes: > >I just found the map I made, though. There are three places in the >maze off the Hall of Mists where it's not quite "right". If you go >North from either of two nodes (South from another), you end up at >the same node. Now, either the tunnel branches and loops back, which >would be another node, or there are two exits North, connected to >each other. Not quite orthogonal. > I am reminded of the mnemonic we used to use to get to the Pirate's chest once you get into the maze: "Even Silly Sleepy Slugs Never Ever Eat Bannanas" Where bannanas = North West. Mark H. Zellers decwrl.dec.com!batgirl!mark