Early on, the visionary geeks among us at these institutes of higher education realized that these computing machines were great for games, and a whole lot more fun than a slide rule.
These side projects took on a life of their own, and resulted in the popularity of games like “Adventure” and “Colossal Cave.” —Tom Leuold —Games with no pictures? Yes, they really did exist (InsideBayArea.com)
Uh… “Adventure” and “Colossal Cave” are different names for the same game, which is also known as “Colossal Cave Adventure.”
Of course, the Crowther/Woods collaboration that spread on the internet begat numerous modifications, so it’s entirely possible that one game that presented itself as “Colossal Cave” and another that presented itself as “Adventure” opened so differently that they might be remembered as separate games.
For fun, here’s a comic in which a T-Rex talks about text adventure games.
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Thanks for the feedback, Dennis. The best way to play the game (non weapon) is to have an in-class race with prizes at the end. The shooter version is way cooler, though :-)
Yes, that sounds more like it!!
In the full version of UT2004, correct answers are rewarded with health, ammo and new weapons. An incorrect answer leads to death from a fall in a pit.
Update -- I've gotten Beth's Unreal 2 comma game to work. It's a variation of a multiple choice game, where you find yourself in a room with slides containing writing samples on the wall. You're supposed to run through the slide containing the right answer. If you choose wrong, you're teleported back to a starting area that contains the rules you're supposed to be following.
A multi-player version might make it more fun, so that you can race against classmates. I wonder also about the possibility of adding powerups and the like... so, if, for instance, you get 10 right in a row, you get to move up to a higher level, where instead of running through a room you are, I don't know, swimming or doing something else that will be a bit more intrinsically fun than just walking.
Beth, thanks for the links. I've already downloaded the educational version of Unreal2, though I haven't yet gotten it to work.
Bobby, I'm sorry you're not happy where you are... best of luck finding your niche.
Dennis, clever comic find! I use dinosaurs as part of my "Jurassic Park" metaphor when explaining my feelings as a graduate student in a conservative English department. Unfortunately, I cannot phrase it well enough to appear on my blog, so it only comes up in discussions. Needless to say, I am extremely unhappy at my current institution, so I am looking for another university to do PhD work at.
I just started using games to teach comma rules and ind/dep clauses. Jean-Claude Bradley (Drexel) taught me how to do it. He uses these games to teach Organic Chemistry. I am trying to create cool Developmental English games. We use free EduFrag software (an educational version of UnReal Tournament 2004). This is a non-commercial (no weapons) game. They are open source materials, so please feel free to distribute with attribution :-)
Here is the wiki where you can download the game:
http://edufrag.wikispaces.com/?token=56026fc959c54f74836eea18bb76ea89
Here is the blog where you can download the maps (follow the wiki tutorial on how to install).
http://edufrag.blogspot.com/2006/04/comma-game.html
http://edufrag.blogspot.com/2006/04/independentdependent-clause-game.html
One of Drexel's amazing students (Mike Aquino) just created a weapons version using the commercial software. If you have the game, you can load the comma maps here:
http://edufrag.blogspot.com/2006/05/edufragwith-weapons.html