Posted on 04/06/2005 7:13:26 AM PDT by grundle
http://www.ataritimes.com/features/ataritop20_6.html
Why Atari 2600 Adventure is such a fun game
by Warren Robinett
First of all, let's not forget the game that directly inspired me -- the original text adventure game (also named "Adventure") which was created by Don Woods and Willie Crowther. They invented the idea of moving from room to room, carrying objects that you could use to get past obstacles, and creatures that moved around and did things in the game world. Their game was pure text -- the user typed text commands and then received text descriptions of the room he or she was in, and the objects being carried.
My main breakthrough, I think, was figuring out how to do this kind of game -- rooms, objects and creatures -- in the video game medium -- with animation, color, sounds, and joystick controllers. There are 3 powerful ideas in this that were, at the time, different from how most video games were done.
1. Exploring a large space (in this case, the network of rooms).
2. Objects that the player could pick up and move around, and which functioned as tools to do things in the game world.
3. Creatures which moved around on their own, initiating actions. ("AI's", in modern terminology) Putting these elements together in a video game produced what we now call an action-adventure game, which has shown, over the last few decades, that it is a very fertile genre.
At the time, game designers were trying to figure out what you could do that was cool with this new medium of interactive computer graphics, so I think you could now say that I discovered one of the "sweet spots" in the medium.
Of course, all the details were important -- what the objects and creatures did, and what they looked like, how the game world was laid out, how the controls worked. I dug out a list I made once for myself of why I thought Adventure worked well. Here it is.
1. Game world good size (30 rooms, 8 regions). Closed -- can explore it all. Having regions (eg castle interior or catacombs). Regions can be (temporarily) inaccessible.
2. Object permanence -- objects and creatures are never created or destroyed. Each one is always somewhere in the game world.
3. No randomness during game-play. Algorithmically- generated complex behavior is more interesting and understandable than just generating a new monster every so often based on a random number generator.
4. Fairly consistent fantasy (Dungeons and Dragons).
5. Creatures (objects that moved around on their own, initiating actions). The creatures in the game were similar to animals in real life -- they move around, they do things, they have motivations which can be inferred from their behavior. Each creature had a subroutine that controlled what it did, which was executed 20 times per second. I came up with a data structure to represent a creature's goals -- a prioritized list of objects and whether to go toward or away from that object. The creature went down its priority list until it found an object on the list in the same room with it. Then it went towards the object, or away from. (I called this chasing and fleeing.) Each creature had its own priority list, and so had different behaviors. There were 4 creatures altogether -- three dragons and one bat. This was a pretty good scheme, because it modeled limited perception (couldn't "see" across room boundaries), and allowed a creature to "change its mind" when a new object came into the room.
6. Objects as tools to get past obstacles. Problem-solving. I chose not to have a timer in the game to emphasize exploration and problem-solving, which I felt would not be enhanced by arbitrary time limits.
7. You can win the game. In many video games at the time, you just kept playing until you finally got killed.
8. Mazes. The multi-screen, non-planar mazes were interesting. Having isolated parts that you needed the bridge to get to added further interest to the mazes.
9. Progressive difficulty levels. Level 1 was designed for beginners, and Levels 2 and 3 were harder. Flipping the difficulty switches made the dragons significantly more challenging.
10. Variety. Random object placement at the start of Level 3 (similar to shuffling the cards before a hand of bridge) gave it much more variety. The bat, which moved around objects, kept the game from being *too* predictable. It had enough variety to not be a pure puzzle, which can be solved the same way every time.
11. Grabbing objects. There was something simple and satisfying about grabbing objects and carrying them around. Allowing only one object to be carried at a time was a good decision. It simplified the user-interface. It meant the game could stay always in real-time (never going to an inventory screen). It created strategic choices (carry the weapon or the treasure?).
12. Simple, understandable story, theme, and goal. Good manual. Nice-looking box which conveys theme. (Well, the theme was a quest for the Holy Grail. But the Atari marketing department renamed the Holy Grail to be the Enchanted Chalice.)
13. Controls intuitive. I used the joystick for what it is best at -- moving an icon in 2D on the screen. The user interface for grabbing and dropping objects was very easy to learn and remember.
14. Object-object interaction was easy to understand. (example: sword killing dragon). These were triggered by overlap of object shapes (which were called "collisions"). This is like in the real world when two objects touch each other, they affect one another.
15. Restarting (re-incarnating) when killed. Simple and understandable. Leaving all the objects where they were was a good decision. This meant getting killed did not cause you to start over. But it did penalize you. Bringing all dead dragons back to life when the player re-incarnated was analogous to being vulnerable in the game of bridge. You have more to lose in some situations.
16. Sounds. The sounds were fairly good, given the hardware. They changed over time, which not all 2600 sound effects did. Tying short sound effects to game events was effective.
17. Square cursor and walls. Most games since Adventure have used a character as the user's avatar. An advantage to the square cursor is that it is easy to see when the cursor will run into a wall, and where the paths are. The visual feedback (jiggling cursor) when running into a wall was valuable. You could also slide along a wall when the joystick was attempting a diagonal movement. Since you spent most of your time moving through mazes, it was important to have this interaction smooth, intuitive, and glitch-free.
18. Some objects could not be picked up. (eg dragon carcass).
19. Jokes. Bat steals your sword. Bat carries dragon. (This always got a laugh the first time someone saw it.)
20. Bat and dragons could go through walls, but you have to follow the maze paths. Good balance since the player is actually smarter than the simple AI routines of the bat and dragons.
21. The secret room. Having a really hard-to-find secret place in the game, that was so secret it was secret even from Atari was kind of cool. It fueled a good rumor buzz. Maybe the kids could appreciate the programmer (little guy -- me) getting away with something (putting my signature in the game).
big snip…
…
YOU’RE IN NUGGET OF GOLD ROOM.
A THREE FOOT BLACK ROD WITH A RUSTY STAR ON AN END LIES NEARBY.
TAKE
OK
N
YOU ARE AT ONE END OF A VAST HALL STRETCHING FORWARD OUT OF SIGHT TO THE WEST. THERE ARE OPENINGS TO EITHER SIDE. NEARBY, A WIDE STONE STAIRCASE LEADS DOWNWARD. THE HALL IS FILLED WITH WISPS OF WHITE MIST SWAYING TO AND FRO ALMOST AS IF ALIVE. A COLD WIND BLOWS UP THE STAIRCASE THERE IS A PASSAGE AT THE TOP OF THE DOME BEHIND YOU.
ROUGH STONE STEPS LEAD UP THE DOME.
W
YOU’RE ON ‘EAST’ BANK OF FISSURE.
THROW ROD
OK
E
YOUR LAMP IS GETTING DIM. YOU’D BEST START WRAPPING THIS UP, UNLESS YOU CAN FIND SOME FRESH BATTERIES. I SEEM TO RECALL THERE’S A VENDING MACHINE IN THE MAZE. BRING SOME COINS WITH YOU.
YOU’RE IN THE HALL OF MISTS.
ROUGH STONE STEPS LEAD UP THE DOME.
D
YOU’RE IN THE HALL OF THE MOUNTAIN KING WITH PASSAGES OFF IN ALL DIRECTIONS.
N
YOU ARE IN A LOW N/S PASSAGE AT A HOLE IN THE FLOOR. THE HOLE GOES DOWN TO AN E/W PASSAGE.
D
YOU ARE IN DIRTY PASSAGE.
W
YOU’RE IN DUSTY ROCK ROOM.
D
THE SEPULCHRAL VOICE INTONES, ‘THE CAVE IS NOW CLOSED!’ AS THE ECHOES FADE, THERE IS A BLINDING FLASH OF LIGHT (AND A SMALL PUFF OF ORANGE SMOKE) . . . . AS YOUR EYES REFOCUS, YOU LOOK AROUND AND FIND…
YOU ARE AT THE NORTHEAST END OF AN IMMENSE ROOM, EVEN LARGER THAN THE GIANT ROOM. IT APPEARS TO BE A REPOSITORY FOR THE ‘ADVENTURE’ PROGRAM. MASSIVE TORCHES FAR OVERHEAD BATHE THE ROOM WITH SMOKY YELLOW LIGHT. SCATTERED ABOUT YOU CAN BE SEEN A PILE OF BOTTLES (ALL OF THEM EMPTY), A NURSERY OF YOUNG BEANSTALKS MURMERING QUIETLY, A BED OF OYSTERS, A BUNDLE OF BLACK RODS WITH RUSTY STARS ON THEIR ENDS, AND A COLLECTION OF BRASS LANTERNS. OFF TO ONE SIDE A GREAT MANY DWARVES ARE SLEEPING ON THE FLOOR, SNORING LOUDLY. A SIGN NEARBY READS – ‘DO NOT DISTURB THE DWARVES!’ AN IMMENSE MIRROR IS HANGING AGAINST ONE WALL, AND STRETCHES TO THE OTHER END OF THE ROOM, WHERE VARIOUS OTHER SUNDRY OBJECTS CAN BE GLIMPSED DIMLY IN THE DISTANCE
SW
YOU ARE AT THE SOUTHWEST END OF THE REPOSITORY. TO ONE SIDE IS A PIT FULL OF FIERCE GREEN SNAKES. ON THE OTHER SIDE IS A ROW OF SMALL WICKER CAGES, EACH OF WHICH CONTAINS A LITTLE SULKING BIRD. IN ONE CORNER IS A BUNDLE OF BLACK RODS WITH RUSTY MARKS ON THEIR ENDS. A LARGE NUMBER OF VELVET PILLOWS ARE SCATTERED ABOUT ON THE FLOOR. A VAST MIRROR STRETCHES OFF TO THE NORTHEAST. AT YOUR FEET IS A LARGE STEEL GRATE NEXT TO WHICH IS A SIGN WHICH READS – ‘TREASURE VAULT. KEYS IN THE MAIN OFFICE.’
THE GRATE IS LOCKED.
TAKE ROD
OK
NE
YOU’RE AT NE END.
DROP ROD
SW
YOU’RE AT SW END.
THE GRATE IS LOCKED.
BLAST
THERE IS A LOUD EXPLOSION, AND A 20 – FOOT HOLE APPEARS IN THE FAR WALL, BURYING THE DWARVES IN THE RUBBLE. YOU MARCH THROUGH THE HOLE AND FIND YOURSELF IN THE MAIN OFFICE, WHERE A CHEERING BAND OF FRIENDLY ELVES CARRY THE CONQUERING ADVENTURER OFF INTO THE ORANGE SUNSET.
YOU SCORED 350 OUT OF A POSSIBLE 350 USING 365 TURNS.
ALL OF ADVENTUREDOM GIVES TRIBUTE TO YOU, ADVENTURE GRANDMASTER!
TO ACHIEVE THE NEXT HIGHER RATING WOULD BE A NEAT TRICK! CONGRATULATIONS!!
DO YOU WANT TO PLAY AGAIN?
N
--------
And that is all.
I've moved on to World of Warcraft. It rocks.
The guy who played Tim in the BBC series The Office plays Arthur Dent. It should be great!
That #@*%&! sword stealing b@st@!# !@#@$@!@
Zork was a great text game too.
I bought those games as soon as they came out on the Osborne I which was before the Apple.
I the originial Zork better that I had played a few years before. Unfortunately, it could not be put on a 5.25" floppy. I had played it on a DEC20. (It had been written for a DEC10 at MIT.)
I played Adventure on the 2600 with such obsession, that 20 years later you put a joystick in my hand and I can cruise right through the mazes without even thinking.
Still have the entire area stored as a cognitive map in my head. Seriously.
Lucas released one with star wars episode III related games that is in the shape of Darth Vaders Helmet.
I have.
I have the lapel button from the Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy (the one that says 'Don't Panic' on it) mounted on the corner of the monitor of my main PC. Based on my wife's standard response to all computer application errors, I felt I had too.
By the by...did you get the Babel fish? I did. Got the tee-shirt to prove it.
3,800 in a little tabletop box like that? wow. what kinds of games are we talking about, and what kind of system did you have to build into the box to make it run?
Cool! I still remember my way around the maze. (at least on level one)
I never had a any atari system, although we did have pong, I think that was intellivision. But it was built into the system. I fell in love with rpg's while playing legend of zelda on the snes or famicom to you nipponese out there.
I never understood the adoration for that game. Back in the day, I read constant glowing reviews of it, so I got it for my Atari 800XL (which replaced my Atari 400). It seemed like most of the time I was just staring at stars flying by...
For the 2600, my favorite games were Kaboom and Yar's Revenge.
I had Yar before it was even in stores. My dad had a friend who worked at a chip fabrication plant and he would swipe a handful of ROMs. He had a little business going of "converting" Atari cartridges from one game to another. For example, he could take your Asteroids and "convert" it to Pac Man for $15. He would take out the Asteroids ROM and put in a Pac Man ROM - then he had the Asteroids ROM to "convert" someone else.
I was his "salesman" at my school. :-) In return for my sales, he gave me a cartridge that had a type of ZIF socket (Zero Insertion Force) sticking out of it and ROMs for all of the 2600 games. So I would just have this special cartridge inserted into the 2600 and pop in and out the ROM chips to play different games.
"Put the string in the brick" was the silliest command in all three Zorks."
AMEN! I was able to get through all 3 Zorks without having to seek help (not saying it was easy, just saying I was -able- to). But the stupid "put the string in the brick" (isn't it obvious that makes dynamite?!), with no variation in syntax accepted, was just utterly ridiculous.
Infocom games were the -best-.
Does anyone else remember "A Mind Forever Voyaging"? Yeah, it was a liberal anti-conservative propaganda piece, but at the time I was too young to recognize that, and at the time I thought it was quite fun and well written.
I'm still pissed that they never made a sequel to Hitchhiker's Guide. (speaking of which, has anyone seen the promos for the movie? I caught the promo for the first time yesterday - looks awesome!)
Qwinn
You can play them again. Well, at least THHGTTG.
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