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I was 15yo in 1977 when our two school paper terminals connected to a Milwaukee Public Schools PDP-11 provided access to the FORTRAN version of DUNGEO, aka main

I was 15yo in 1977 when our two school paper terminals connected to a Milwaukee Public Schools PDP-11 provided access to the FORTRAN version of DUNGEO, aka mainframe Zork. Memorizing the map was considered a high calling among the half dozen students who became obsessed with the games (ADVENT aka Adventure or Colossal Cave was also on the PDP). At that time, death was just a part of the puzzles of the game. Repetition was not a hindrance. Of course we did learn how to save, but you could only have one save file at a time. Then we learned how to “detach” our session (RSTS/E operating system) and rename save files as well as holding a current game’s state until we later reattached that session. Mind you this was all on green bar paper. I’m still involved in the IF community, board member of the IFTF, and will occasionally try to play Dungeon from memory. Even made a map a few years ago. https://plover.net/~dave/DungeonMap.pdf https://plover.net/~dave/DungeonMap.pdf I think any gamer worth their salt should take on the challenge. I also think Dungeon would be a great challenge for teenagers in a computer science class.

m463 2y ago
I had almost the exact same experience/environment in another state. It was on a vax though. and green bar paper reminds me of part of dungeon where they had the stack of listings: There is an enormous stack of line-printer paper here. It is barely readable and totally unintelligible. and <DEFINE FEEL-FREE (LOSER) <TELL "FEEL FREE, CHOMPER!"> <MEMQ ...... The rest is, alas, unintelligible (as were the implementers). the original source can be found here: https://simh.trailing-edge.com/software.html https://simh.trailing-edge.com/software.html
Terr_ 2y ago
> At that time, death was just a part of the puzzles of the game. Repetition was not a hindrance. Some of this design philosophy continued into arcade games (where inserting a new token was profitable) and onwards to early home consoles. ("Nintendo Hard.")
7thaccount 2y ago
That is one of the better maps I've seen. Thanks for the lovely historical insight! I wish these games were still popular in my youth as it would have been a blast to play with friends (although GoldenEye was fun too).

m463 2y ago

I had almost the exact same experience/environment in another state. It was on a vax though. and green bar paper reminds me of part of dungeon where they had the stack of listings: There is an enormous stack of line-printer paper here. It is barely readable and totally unintelligible. and <DEFINE FEEL-FREE (LOSER) <TELL "FEEL FREE, CHOMPER!"> <MEMQ ...... The rest is, alas, unintelligible (as were the implementers). the original source can be found here: https://simh.trailing-edge.com/software.html https://simh.trailing-edge.com/software.html

Terr_ 2y ago

> At that time, death was just a part of the puzzles of the game. Repetition was not a hindrance. Some of this design philosophy continued into arcade games (where inserting a new token was profitable) and onwards to early home consoles. ("Nintendo Hard.")

7thaccount 2y ago

That is one of the better maps I've seen. Thanks for the lovely historical insight! I wish these games were still popular in my youth as it would have been a blast to play with friends (although GoldenEye was fun too).