akalabeth/RPG.TXT

                       My Life as a RPGer'
                      By: Mark R. Percival
  
  I  absolutely  love  to talk about "the old days"  of  personal
computers.  I am also keenly aware that often when I do, I am the
person  who is most interested in what I have to say.  So  please
allow me to indulge myself and I'll try to keep this short.  I do
believe that this will help anyone reading this to understand why
I  feel the way I do about these games.  Looking back on it now I
can see how Richard Garriott's, Akalabeth played a key role in my
RPG  interest.  Booting it up today, there is almost  nothing  to
the game.  But in its day it was a phenomena.
  In 1977 I was a student at Dawson College here in Montreal.   I
hung  out  with  the  "computer center geeks"  at  the  Richeleau
Campus.  This site was located a few miles from the main computer
center  and had six DEC Writer terminal's (paper fed)  that  were
connected  to the Perkin Elmer mini computer at the  main  campus
via a 300 baud line.  The computer center operator, Jim, happened
upon  a  tape of the source code for the Colossal Caves Adventure
by  Willie Crowthers.  Jim modified the code so that it would run
on  the  schools mini and he would allow the geeks to play  after
hours  (5PM-10PM).  It  was the best; running  around  the  cave,
grabbing  treasures  while being chased  by  dwarves  armed  with
knives.
  In  the summer of 1979, my best friend (and fellow geek)  Pete,
bought  an Apple II+ computer with what he saved with his  summer
job.   I  had never seen a home computer before and I was stunned
by  what  its capabilities.  We spent many a night at his  place,
loading  games  off  cassette tapes  and  playing  such  gems  as
"Lemonade Stand" all night.
  I  guess  it was sometime in 1980 that Pete and I went  to  the
local  computer store (also a popular geek hangout) to check  out
prices  on  floppy  disk  drives.   Crowded  around  one  of  the
computers were all the salespeople playing the latest game.  This
game  was  Akalabeth by Lord British (aka Richard Garriott).   We
scraped  together enough money (I seem to remember $40 being  the
price)  and  bought a cassette copy.  There wasn't  much  to  the
packaging for the game.  A small manual and the cassette in a zip
lock bag was all you got.  But the game was brilliant, there  was
nothing  else like it.  Nobody (at least that I'm aware  of)  had
done  a 3D dungeon before.  Being written in Basic, we could list
it,  see  how it worked and even modify it to suit our whims.   A
favorite was to change our Rapier from a 1-10 damage weapon to  a
"Rapier  of  Destruction", doing 1-1000 damage instead.   It  was
kind of cool blowing away a Balrog with a single hit.
  Pete  did  get his floppy disk drive that summer and  the  next
summer he picked up a second disk drive and a printer.  1981  was
also the year I managed to get enough cash together to buy my own
Apple  II and disk drive.  That fall Pete, Jim and myself chipped
in  on Ultima, the latest offering from Lord British.  Again,  we
were blown away by the game, and it created the standard that all
RPG games would be measured against for some time to come.
  The  following year, Pete moved to Toronto.  I kept up with the
Ultima releases until 1987 when my Apple died.  Recently however,
I've  rediscovered Ultima and have purchased the Ultima  I-VI  CD
and  joined the Ultima Dragons Internet Chapter.  I am  replaying
the entire series (currently at Ultima II) and am looking forward
to Ultima V (I never finished that one).
  It  was kind of neat in the beginning and I'm really glad I was
there.