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showing 1 - 50 of 58 games

name	publisher(developer)	year	description
Rhino	?	?
War of the Samurai	Krell	?
Circle World	Aardvark	19??
Baseball	Commodore	1977
Kingdom	Commodore (Commodore User)	1977	Kingdom is an enhanced conversion of the game Hamurabi. The player is the ruler of a medieval kingdom and must try to lead it to prosperity. Like in the original the game is played in turns and each turn the player must select: How many acres of land to buy or sell How many bushels of grain to feed to his people How many bushels of grain to plant Various random events will try to throw the player off course in his calculations. Doing badly will lead the kingdom to ruin, but doing well can turn it into a large empire. Slight differences exist between different versions on different mainframes, including the ability to have the computer play the game itself and the ability to save the current state of the game to continue later on.
ARITHMETIC	Dilithium Press	1978
Civil War	Creative Computing	1978	Civil War is a war strategy simulation. You play as the confederacy in the American Civil War, and need to allocate funds and decide on a strategy to win as many battles as you can. Each turn will provide a brief overview of the battle, and allow you to allocate funds for food, salaries, and weapons as well as choose the offensive or defensive strategy you wish to use. The computer will then display the results of the battle which depend on the choices you make. The battles used in the game are actual battles from the war, and the computer will compare the results of the choices you made to the actual historical results.***[media=youtube]6Mi0eyQo7qc[/media]
DECODE	Dilithium Press	1978
FLASHCARD	Dilithium Press	1978
French Fur Trader	Commodore	1978	French Fur Trader is a text-based trading simulation that takes place in 1776 North America. The player must try to earn money trading furs at the three different forts in the surroundings. Money is used to buy supplies for the next year. The game continues until the player runs out of goods to trade.***[media=youtube]ErzCLf6Kbeo[/media]
Golf	Creative Computing	1978	Golf is a text-based golfing game for multiple players. Each turn the player must choose a club which makes the ball go closer (or further) from the hole. The distance is randomly generated based on the club used. There are 9 different clubs that can be used.***[media=youtube]Su0118qBMAk[/media]
GROAN	Dilithium Press	1978
JOT	Dilithium Press	1978
Kingdom	Contemporary Marketing Inc	1978	Kingdom is an enhanced conversion of the game Hamurabi. The player is the ruler of a medieval kingdom and must try to lead it to prosperity. Like in the original the game is played in turns and each turn the player must select: How many acres of land to buy or sell How many bushels of grain to feed to his people How many bushels of grain to plant Various random events will try to throw the player off course in his calculations. Doing badly will lead the kingdom to ruin, but doing well can turn it into a large empire. Slight differences exist between different versions on different mainframes, including the ability to have the computer play the game itself and the ability to save the current state of the game to continue later on.***[media=youtube]EIk4SlwLB_w[/media]
Letter: A Letter Guessing Game	Dr. Daley	1978	Letter: A Letter Guessing Game is a simple guessing game. The computer thinks of a letter and the player must try to guess which. The computer will tell if the letter comes later or earlier in the alphabet.
Matches	Dr. Daley	1978	In Matches the computer challenges the player in a simple two-player strategy game. There's a pile of matches (the player decides the size) and each turn the player and computer may take one, two or three matches from the pile. The player to take the last match loses.
METRIC	Dilithium Press	1978
Mugwump	Creative Computing	1978	Mugwump is a textual game in which the player's spatial reasoning skills are put to the test. In a 10x10 grid four Mugwumps are hidden, it's up to the player to find them all in as few guesses as possible. Each turn the player may guess a coordinate and consequently is told if a Mugwump was hidden on the location and the distance to all the remaining Mugwumps.***[media=youtube]CFXFzNys4HE[/media]
NUMBERS	Dilithium Press	1978
OBSTACLE	Dilithium Press	1978
ROADRACE	Dilithium Press	1978
Stimulating Simulations	Personal	1978
TACHIST	Dilithium Press	1978
Tanktics: Computer Game of Armored Combat on the Eastern Front	Avalon Hill;PLEDIADES Game Co (Microcomputer Games;PLEDIADES Game Co)	1978	In the book [i]Chris Crawford on game design[/i] (by Chris Crawford) is a photocopy of an ad he created and paid to put in BYTE, Kilobaud, and Creative Computing magazines showing it as available from "PLEDIADES Game Co" (which was Chris Crawford). Avalon Hill approached him in 1981 to professionally publish the game. He ported it to Atari 8-bit, Bob Smith did the TRS-80 port, Todd Frye did the Apple ][ port. A later unrelated game called Tanktics was published by Interplay. The 1130 version was Human-vs-AI only but the KIM-1 version included turn based PvP mode. For speed purposes, parts of the KIM-1 version were ported to machine code for the PET by Chris Crawford while the 1130 FORTRAN was ported to BASIC for the PET by Dave Mencon. Crawford integrated the two pieces.***The "Giant List of Game Programmers" reports: Tanktics (1978, PET, self-published)
Tic-Tac-Toe	Creative Software	1978	This version of the classic pen and paper game Tic-Tac-Toe allows the player to play against the computer. The player enters coordinates to make a move. The goal of the game is to get three in a row on a 3x3 board. The player and computer alternates turns placing a marker in an empty field.
VOCAB	Dilithium Press	1978
WARI	Dilithium Press	1978
Life	A B Computers	1978	The Game of Life was originally described in Scientific American, October 1970, in an article by Martin Gardner. The game itself was originated by John Conway of Gonvi11e and Caius College, University of Cambridge, England.
Nim	PET User Group	1978	Nim is a Nim variant. The player plays against the computer and must take objects from any of N piles (where N=3 by default). The player who takes the last item wins.
Hammurabi	Commodore User;PET User Group (Commodore User)	1978	The great grand-daddy of all god games, Hamurabi puts the player in the shoes (well, sandals) of Hammurabi the Wise, ruler of ancient Sumeria. Though this king is best known historically for his codification of laws and edicts, composed and engraved in cuneiform tablets ~1780 BC, the game veers away from lawmaking and the pursuit of justice in favour of guiding your population of subjects to stable, contented growth. The game puts it, somewhat blandly, in other words: YOUR TASK IS TO DEVELOP A STABLE ECONOMY BY THE WISE MANAGEMENT OF YOUR RESOURCES. YOU WILL BE BESET FROM TIME TO TIME BY NATURAL EVENTS. Results of your actions are narrated to you in plain text; player input primarily consists of punching in numbers and selecting the occasional YES and NO (the end of every turn typically asking you DO YOU WISH TO ABDICATE?) into your keyboard, touchscreen -- or TeleType terminal. Gameplay and interaction are restrictive, but the minimalist number-crunching is foundational for all the managerial leadership games that followed: You can buy and sell acres of land, purchasing extra bushels of grain to sow in your fields or feed your populace if so needed. Between turns (only 10 on the iPhone version), citizens starve and are laid low by plagues, peasants immigrate to replace them, and vermin deplete your stores of grain reserves. One year is much the same as the next, though the particular numerical values shift according to elegant algorithms the deeper understanding of which will lead you to a fruitful and harmonious reign, concluding with enthusiastic congratulations from the computer: A FANTASTIC PERFORMANCE!!! CHARLEMAGNE, DISRAELI, AND JEFFERSON COMBINED COULD NOT HAVE DONE BETTER!
Animal	Creative Computing (Author)	1978	Animal is a animal guessing game where the computer tries to guess which animal the player is thinking of. When the computer doesn't know the animal it asks the player for a differentiating question and saves that information for future plays.
Batnum	Creative Computing (Author)	1978	Batnum is a "battle of numbers" against the computer. There is a distinct number of items on a pile and the player and computer take turns removing items. Depending on the choices made at the start of the game whoever picks the first or last item wins the game. The player can also determine the maximum number of items that can be taken in a turn.
Even-Wins	Creative Computing	1978	Even Wins is a game in which the computer and player take turns picking a number of items from a limited odd-numbered stack. Each turn a participant can take between one and four objects. When all objects are gone, whoever has an even number wins. The computer uses an optimal strategy.
Hi-Lo	Creative Computing	1978
Hi-Q	Creative Computing	1978	Hi-Q is a peg solitaire game. Pegs are placed on a cross shaped board and the player must try to remove all (except the last one) from the board by jumping over them. Each jumped peg is removed from the board.
Letter	Creative Computing	1978	LETTER is similar to the game GUESS in which you guess a number chosen by the computer; in this program, the computer picks a random letter of the alphabet and you must guess which one it is using the clues provided as you go along. It should not take you more than five guesses to get the mystery letter.
NIM	Creative Computing	1978
Rotate	Creative Computing	1978
Stock Market	Creative Computing	1978	Stock: Stock Market Simulation is a stock trading game. Every trading day the stock prices change (randomly). The player can buy and sell. Each brokerage fee of 1% is charged for all transactions. The goal is to earn as much virtual money as possible.
Strike-9	Creative Computing	1978
Bug	PET User Group (Author)	1979	Bug is a game of chance. The player and computer alternate in rolling a dice. Each number represents a body part of a bug. When that number is thrown the corresponding body part can be drawn, but only if the body part it connects to is already drawn. The first player to draw the bug wins the game.
Button, Button, Who's Got the Button?	People's Computer Company	1979	Button, Button, Who's Got the Button? is a guessing game in which seven people sit in a circle with the player in the middle. The player must find out who has the button. After each guess the guessed person tells the player if he has the button, a direct neighbour has it or gives no information. The button then either stays where it is or is passed on by the person who has it to a direct neighbour. The player wins when the button is found.
Hamurabi	Benwill Publishing Corp.	1979	The great grand-daddy of all god games, Hamurabi puts the player in the shoes (well, sandals) of Hammurabi the Wise, ruler of ancient Sumeria. Though this king is best known historically for his codification of laws and edicts, composed and engraved in cuneiform tablets ~1780 BC, the game veers away from lawmaking and the pursuit of justice in favour of guiding your population of subjects to stable, contented growth. The game puts it, somewhat blandly, in other words: YOUR TASK IS TO DEVELOP A STABLE ECONOMY BY THE WISE MANAGEMENT OF YOUR RESOURCES. YOU WILL BE BESET FROM TIME TO TIME BY NATURAL EVENTS. Results of your actions are narrated to you in plain text; player input primarily consists of punching in numbers and selecting the occasional YES and NO (the end of every turn typically asking you DO YOU WISH TO ABDICATE?) into your keyboard, touchscreen -- or TeleType terminal. Gameplay and interaction are restrictive, but the minimalist number-crunching is foundational for all the managerial leadership games that followed: You can buy and sell acres of land, purchasing extra bushels of grain to sow in your fields or feed your populace if so needed. Between turns (only 10 on the iPhone version), citizens starve and are laid low by plagues, peasants immigrate to replace them, and vermin deplete your stores of grain reserves. One year is much the same as the next, though the particular numerical values shift according to elegant algorithms the deeper understanding of which will lead you to a fruitful and harmonious reign, concluding with enthusiastic congratulations from the computer: A FANTASTIC PERFORMANCE!!! CHARLEMAGNE, DISRAELI, AND JEFFERSON COMBINED COULD NOT HAVE DONE BETTER!
Kingdom	Personal Software	1979	Kingdom is an enhanced conversion of the game Hamurabi. The player is the ruler of a medieval kingdom and must try to lead it to prosperity. Like in the original the game is played in turns and each turn the player must select: How many acres of land to buy or sell How many bushels of grain to feed to his people How many bushels of grain to plant Various random events will try to throw the player off course in his calculations. Doing badly will lead the kingdom to ruin, but doing well can turn it into a large empire. Slight differences exist between different versions on different mainframes, including the ability to have the computer play the game itself and the ability to save the current state of the game to continue later on.
Nim	University of San Francisco (Author)	1979	This document is the second of seven units developed by the Math Network Curriculum Project. Each unit, designed to be a 2-week module, is a teacher's guide which includes detailed directions along with the courseware and software needed. Teacher intervention in the non-computer activities that begin each unit is required, and the consistent use of small-group instruction makes the units usable in a standard classroom if two microcomputers are present. Continuing the exploration of Easy Speak which students began in the Input-Output Unit, the Strategies Unit emphasizes discovering, inventing, and expressing in the Easy Speak language strategies for playing the game of Nim. At the beginning of the unit, students play Nim informally and then try to guess strategies which various computer programs use. The emphasis is not on finding one best strategy, but on discovering and inventing different kinds of strategies through pattern recognition and invention. Printed copies of the code for the Guess My Strategy, Nim Speak, Nim Rater, and Calendar Game computer programs are included. Guess My Strategy is a continuation of the attempt to guess the strategies used by the computer. Nim Speak allows students to teach the computer to play Nim using some strategy. With Nim Rater (written by Jerry Lane), students try for one of three ratings; they must win three games against the computer, which is using a perfect strategy. In the Calendar program (written by Lynne Alper and Bill Finzer), a variation of Nim, students take turns choosing dates later in the year; the one who arrives at December 31 wins. It thus challenges students who know the winning strategy for Nim. The programs were developed for use on a Commodore PET Computer with at least 16K of RAM using 4.0 BASIC. (MNS)*https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED284542.pdf*This implementation of Nim has an AI that uses a strategy as presented in "Games of Fun and Strategy". The player decides upfront how many piles of sticks are in play and how many sticks are in each pile. After that, the player and computer take turns taking one or more sticks from a pile. Whoever takes the last stick is the winner.
Pirate Adventure	Adventure International	1979
Flip-Flop	Creative Computing	1979	Flip-Flop Game is a puzzle game in which the player needs to change a row of Xs to Os. To do so the player can flip one to the other. To make it difficult, some positions are tied to others and thus will flip two locations at a time. The goal for the player is to get a row of Os in 12 turns or fewer.
The Wizard's Castle	author	1980
Isaac Newton	Krell	1981
Maxit	Cursor Magazine	1981

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