Even the winged birds and the two-footed and four-footed, o silvery
Dawn, have set forth following your regulations of time, from the ends of heaven—
For, dawning forth with your rays, you illuminate the whole luminous realm.
— Rig Veda, I.49 Dawn
I was stalled by, once again, spelling. But in a different way this time! (For my previous antics, see my writeup of Circus.)
You see, I was somehow mentally shelving this game having as a three-letter parser, I think because of the spelling “albotross”; ALB was fine for me mentally, ALBO or ALBOTROSS slightly broke my brain. So I went through what turned out to be correct (KILL) but typed it as KILL ALB and not KILL ALBO (whereupon you must specify throwing the knife).
The manual’s hint specified flying; looking at the dead alb– grr, let’s say, “bird”, the game says it has a hole. Miraculously, probably form playing too many Sierra games, I quickly came up with
LIGHT MATCH
MELT WAX
WITH MATCH
which was sufficient to plug the hole.
THE WING IS NOW SUITABLE FOR FLIGHT.
So just to be clear, we’re toting around a dead bird and using it to fly. Sure? You can then go back to the cold lake and fly your way across, but before showing you the next spot, I should mention this is probably the part closest to the Vedas. The gods can “fly like birds” and get constantly compared to them. In a portion on the Maruts (storm deities):
With your chariots fitted with lightning bolts and with spears, whose wings are horses, accompanied by lovely chants, drive here, o Maruts.
Fly here like birds, with highest refreshment for us, you masters of artifice.
In the literature from this period generally there’s enough references to flying and magical Vimānas (flying palaces or chariots) that modern conspiracy theories have developed around them. The 20th century book Vaimānika Shāstra claims the magic is in reality advanced technology; UFO enthusiasts go on to make claims about ancient astronauts and/or aliens depending on their inclination.
My wondering about a random American in the Midwest picking this as a topic could be resolved by this mythology, as it is one of the most famous pieces of cultural lore to come out of the Vedas. It still easily could be by accident but the moment of grabbing a gigantic bird from the sky and using it to fly did feel just a little bit like a moment of the gods (fly, not glide, we’re launching from ground level).
Across the lake is a narrow island. In the middle a soldier blocks the way.
The soldier has armor so you can’t just use KILL; a quick item roll call:
cup with water, knife, matches, shovel, dead bird, two Vedas, coin
I didn’t have the water before, but while frustrated by the bird I tested TAKE WATER at the lake and it worked. The coin came from looking at one of the Vedas (a bookmark, I suppose) and can be given to the soldier who will take it as a bribe and leave. This is followed by the other end of the island, where you can fly yet again.
No more lake: you’ve landed in a desert, which is fairly empty except for a cactus in the center. I tried various attempts to apply the KNIFE to the cactus before simply attempting a DIG instead.
This leads to an underground chamber and the Yagur Veda.
A bit further is a locked door; the game lets you PICK LOCK and specify you want to use the knife. I appreciate the amount of item re-use this has had.
Then comes the last obstacle, a TOMB ENTRANCE with a zombie and some burning leaves. I didn’t have much to work with but I was still carrying water; pouring it led to the leaves being extinguished and the zombie disappearing with the leaves (??).
Finally the fourth book can be claimed.
The locations for all the Morgan games have generally lacked depth, including this one, although somehow the format of a quasi-mystical challenge made it more playable; I had an easier time than Miner 49’er, certainly, and only got stalled by the bird.
Part of the Yajur Veda, via Wikipedia.
I finally made a breakthrough on the mysterious ASD&D. I was poking about in this catalog which has the RPG Wizard’s Domain mentioned, and the name Thomas Johnson. This ended up being a much better lead than Scott Morgan, and I eventually landed on a timeline page which supposedly has a full story:
A Third-Party software house owned by Tom Johnson and run out of P.O. Box 46 Cottage Grove, MN 55016. The company seems to have surfaced in 1981 and disappeared in 1984, shortly after the 99/4A was abandoned by Texas Instruments. Among the dozen or so BASIC and Extended BASIC educational and entertainment products the company manufactured, perhaps the most remembered were Wizard’s Dominion and Entrapment. Wizard’s Dominion was an extremely popular fantasy adventure type game written by Johnson himself. Entrapment, another Tom Johnson creation, was a Mini Memory assembly language coded game that was so well written Texas Instruments had decided in early 1983 to pick it up and market it. Unfortunately, the big “bailout” of October 28th, 1983 took place first and Entrapment never came to market under the TI banner. It did surface through Tenex Computer Express in 1986 however.
The October date is when the TI-99/4A was discontinued.
There’s no sourcing on the connection and I haven’t been able to unearth anything definitively saying Johnson owned the company, but I’ve found enough products with Johnson’s name attached I’m comfortable saying the paragraph is mostly accurate. Previously I speculated
Still, I get the vibe we’re dealing with a 2 or at most 3 person operation here.
which is right, it’s just there’s really only one person (Johnson) who published Morgan’s work.
Coming up: Windmere Estate, for Apple II.
Now the Lord of the Sacred Formulation proclaims the mantra worthy to be spoken,
in which Indra, Varuṇa, Mitra, Aryaman, and the gods have made their home.
Just that would we speak at the rites—the faultless mantra that brings good fortune, o gods.
And if you gladly receive this speech, o noble men, it will attain all things of yours worth winning.
— Rig Veda, I.40 Brahmaṇaspati, Jamison and Brereton translation
Scott Morgan of Eden Prairie, Minnesota produced a series of six games for Texas Instruments computers in 1982 published under the name American Software Design and Distribution (ASD&D).
007 Aqua Base
Haunted House
Miner 49’er
In Search of the Four Vedas (right here!)
Fun House
Stone Age
I am not clear on the intended order. I started with the “beginner” game (Aqua Base) which said at the end to play Haunted House, and the ending of Haunted house said to play Miner, and the end of Miner said to play Vedas, so I’m just following the chain. I should find out at the end of this game whether I’m playing Fun House or Stone Age next.
From the Museum of Computer Adventure Games.
In Search of the Four Vedas is one of the two games (along with Fun House) marked as “advanced” although at least the start of the game is straightforward.
During this adventure you must find the ancient books that your tribe lost many years ago. They contain great knowledge of magic and the past.
Your goal is to find the four Vedas of Hinduism: the Rig Veda, the Yajur Veda, the Sama Veda and the Atharva Veda.
I don’t think there’s world-verse integration like we had with El Diablero; it’s just the four books form the “treasures” of the game and are a little more interesting than the usual *RUBY*, *DIAMOND*, and *GOLD NECKLACE*. I am not sure why a random American in the Midwest latched onto the Vedas as a good goal, but I appreciate the variety.
A 450-year old copy of the Rig Veda written on bark. The Rig Veda is the oldest of the four, with it being passed orally from somewhere in the second millennium BC. It includes mantras which allegedly are linked to the creation of the cosmos.
The action kicks off on a beach next to a lake too cold to swim in.
The anchor can be nabbed, the X can be dealt with later, and tree can be climbed.
The manual hints about flying a bird, and FLY ALB says “CAN’T FLY…YET!” so I assume there’s some way of setting it up. Here’s the remainder of my currently accessible map:
While quite small I already have two of the Vedas! The first can be found by retrieving a rope from a nearby cave, tying it to the anchor, and then throwing the anchor while next to a “very large tree”. This allows entering a treehouse.
The shovel can then be carted over to the beach where the X sits; digging reveals a chest and the second of the four treasures.
That went rather quickly, but perhaps the treasure distribution is “imbalanced” and the third and fourth will raise serious difficult. As things go I am stuck as there is not much to noodle around with. The Rig Veda had a coin inside; a hut had matches, wax, and a cup. Other than those I still have the shovel for digging as well as a knife, but that’s it. There doesn’t seem to be any places for secret exits, and the “albotross” is not cooperating with any verbs I’ve tried to throw at it. My guess is, structurally, the bird takes us to Part 2 and that’s where things get complicated or at least Advanced.
About now is when I’d trudge through my verb list but the parser treats every valid command in a bespoke way, so there’s no way to find out (say) LASSO is a valid word without testing it in context.
In 1988, a contest was run by the Adventureland BBS out of Lexington, Kentucky called The Great American Adventure Search.
ADVENTURELAND, the largest public domain Adventure base in America, is looking for a few good adventures. And we are offering a prize for the best! From September 1, 1988 to October 30, 1988 we’re offering a prize for the best adventure uploaded! What sort of a prize? How about the Adventure of your choice? Want a copy of Ultima IV? How about Kings Quest III? You might choose a paid-up license for the Adventure Game Toolkit. Any adventure game you’d like (up to $70.00 in value) can be yours IF the adventure YOU upload is chosen as the best!
Adventureland was a BBS up from the mid-80s until at least 1995 which lived up to its name by housing a large number of adventures (over 10 MB in the same year the contest was run). The author, Douglas C. Rogers, also encouraged the writing of more adventures with software for the toolkit AGT called Adventurer’s Aid; in addition, he wrote a guide on how to write adventures in BASIC.
It seems to me that there have got to be others out there in modem country who have adventure running around in their heads. If you are like me, you are brimming over with plots, and just can’t fathom how to code them. Well, since I started writing adventures in 1981, I’ve learned alot about how to code.
The tutorial package I just mentioned includes, as a sample game from the author, The Case at KAXL. We played that game here already; it’s notable for trying to model a “real” environment as opposed to a puzzle-laden one, with locations that only exist because they’d be part of a real radio station and not in service of a story. At the time I didn’t have any other information on the author, but I now can say not only was Douglas C. Rogers responsible for all the BBS activity above, he was the one who wrote today’s game, Drive-In. My suspicion of his involvement with radio was correct; while running the BBS he was a professor at Eastern Kentucky University in Communications.
A news story where Doug Rogers discusses campus radio. Source.
Drive-In is a much different game than The Case at KAXL. It is, as The Adventurer’s Guild calls it, smut. In fact, I’m going to drop a not safe for certain work environments warning.
Beware of anything past the magazine cover below.
Adventureland BBS gets a mention in this 1992 magazine for being a member of Fidonet, a communications network for BBSes with different communities.
As Rogers was rather dedicated to the public domain model of adventure distribution, Drive-In didn’t need to follow the same path as Bawdy Adventure with sales in a New Orleans-published book; rather, Rogers himself could simply distribute the game on his own BBS once it got started.
Well, here it is! The big evening
Your buddy Arnie set you up with this little number named Andrea, and here you are
There are multiple versions as noted by CASA:
- the 1982 original for Commodore 64
- an incomplete version for Tandy CoCo
- a 1987 version for Coleco ADAM by “ADAMafic Software”
- a PC port in 1987 (almost certainly by the author himself, as he ported his other C64 adventure game Nectar of the Gods using the same company name, Program Dynamics)
- a port by Alan Pilon in 1988 called Passion Pit with a randomized female companion
- a shortened 1990 version called Crusin
I went with the Rogers ’87 port. (The C64 original has a moment mentioned in the Adventurer’s Guild writeup that the author clearly re-considered.)
Before moving on to “the big evening” I’m going to interrupt with a question: is this also “the first” text adventure smut? Not exactly: first of all there’s all the mainframe games we’ve now visited, like Castle ending in a three-way, or Haunt’s “touchdown”, but there’s a general lack of detail. The other early candidate is a game called Porno Adventure (1981) which I haven’t written about yet, and probably isn’t worth a post on its own, so here’s the sidebar–
This game is more a “simulator” than an adventure game and has serious customization involved as the player is able to have a “UNINHIBITED, UNCENSORED ADVENTURE” with “ANY WOMAN THEY CHOOSE”. Unusually, the game lets you swap who you are giving commands to, so while start as a man having an uninhibited adventure with a custom woman, it is possible to change to the woman at any time by typing “0”.
SINCE THIS IS A FREE ADVENTURE, WE SPARED ALL COSTS AND PROGRAMMING SHORTCUTS TO BRING YOU THE PROGRAM IN THE CHEAPEST, QUICKEST WAY POSSIBLE. THEREFORE THIS PROGRAM NILL NOT RECOGNIZE ANY ABBREVIATED COMMANDS.
You are then asked the woman’s name, measurements, clothing, what she calls you, where it takes place, and some other details. You then have a selection of items like “Vaseline”, “priest robe” and “whip” you can pick up before entering the scene.
GENTLY, I TAKE INSERTNAMEHERE’S FACE IN MY HANDS AND DRAW HER TOWARDS ME. SHE TREMBLES AS I PRESS MY MOUTH AGAINST HERS, THEN PARTS HER LIPS, INVITING MY EAGER TONGUE TO EXPLORE THE WARM AND SENSUOUS WETNESS OF HER SOFT MOUTH.
The reaction to KISS is shown above. Sex scenes are also possible. If you swap perspectives, the actions are still done from “I” perspective — it’s just you can specify the command UNDRESS or whatnot and see the result.
Again, this is really a “fantasy simulator” and anything you try succeeds (if the parser understands it). While you are still “in a world” delivering commands like an adventure game, it doesn’t play like one. I’m also unclear if Otto Bresser is a pseudonym. A DOS port in the late 80s changes his name to Dr. Otto Bresser. It does, for certain, qualify as “smut” far more than other games we’ve seen; I think the distinguishing factor is that there’s no “movie cut” past whatever scene gets initiated, and you instead can describe a sequence of actions in detail.
Drive-In is firmly an adventure game. Just like “Dr.” Bresser’s creation it has the player describe actions in detail, as they visit a drive-in with Andrea and attempt to score a touchdown. Very much unlike the Bresser game, you can’t just do whatever you want.
You are in the front seat of your car
You see: ANDREA, wearing halter-top and shorts. loudspeaker. radio (OFF).
Trying to turn on the radio led to a curious response.
WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE TO DO ? TURN ON RADIO
ARE YOU TRYING TO DEAL WITH THE LOADSPEAKER OR THE RADIO? YES
TRY A NOUN-VERB COMBINATION INSTEAD OF VERB-NOUN
The parser here wants LOUDSPEAKER OFF, RADIO ON, or RADIO OFF. The game comes close to understanding the command, it’d be nice if it went all the way! The game hints (when typing HELP, which I relied on quite a bit) that you want to switch from the movie sound (loudspeaker) to music, so the right acts here are LOUDSPEAKER OFF (“I dropped it out the window…”) and RADIO ON. You are then instructed you can HOLD HANDS…
SHE SLIDES CLOSER TO YOU.
…at which point the HELP feature gives no further direction. My other attempts at interaction were either not understood (the game does not understand conversation at all) or lightly rebuffed, so I got out of the car and went searching. (I thought possibly the game was one-room up to that point; the variation Crusin I mentioned puts all the action inside the car.)
You are Outside, next to YOUR car
You see: YOUR car.
YOU CAN GO: NORTH EAST SOUTH WEST
The map is essentially a straight north/south line. You can wander away from it but that either lands you in a VACANT space or LOST, at which point you are stuck there forever until you restart the game. I always like a little existential dread with my dating simulators.
Again, most locations let you go east or west but reach a vacant location or LOST. Once I found a not-useful broken speaker.
There’s a playground along the way with a slide, and on top there is a note via Arnie (who set up the blind date) saying “I forgot to tell you! Andrea is NOT on the pill! BE CAREFUL”; this is an indication a condom is needed.
To the far north is a “snackbar COUNTER” and I was unable to read the sign or find out any kind of menu. (It kept repeating the message on the note from the slide.) The player avatar has a billfold with a dollar and popcorn costs 50 cents, but that’s just by guesswork, I’m sure they have other items.
YOU ARE HOLDING:
shirt which you are wearing.
slacks which you are wearing.
briefs which you are wearing.
billfold.
.50 in CHANGE.
popcorn.
The change is enough to go outside, go to a men’s room (deceptively as a drawn arrow, but going “west” is VOID, sorry, you need to GO MENS) and buy a condom from the machine (except the game only understands RUBBER, by this point I was checking the walkthrough).
After all that, I had nothing left to do but go back to the car. Based on the walkthrough I was missing PUT ARM after HOLD HANDS; the parser is very finicky.
WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE TO DO ? PUT ARM
AROUND WHAT (1 WORD)?
The player is now free to start kissing. FACE isn’t a recognized word. Andrea isn’t into going for the lips right away, but she’s fine with neck kissing. From there the player can move into blowing into her ear, and then she’s fine with kissing lips.
Any further steps mention it getting “cramped” and the idea here is to (without any real mention this even counts as a location) GO BACKSEAT followed by CALL ANDREA.
From here I’m not going to go into intricate detail on each step after. I’m unclear how fixed the walkthrough is and how much is simply “freestyle” choices. (At least some choices the HELP command comes back, at least.) The idea behind the game is to avoid messages like “pushing you away” eventually finally getting to use the rubber. I found it interesting how many different body parts were accounted for (and how easy it was to nonetheless run into an error parser message with an unrecognized part) but the parser made it very difficult to get any progress.
The Case at KAXL was a much better game, but that was a game where the action all clearly fell within the parameters of standard text adventure commands; here, the author was trying something relatively new. The game opened up — due to its nature — a wide potential list of actions, but only understood a fraction of them.
Rogers might have played Otto Bresser’s game first given his TRS-80 background and voracious habit of collecting public domain software. There’s unfortunately no way to ask; while he made a brief appearance at the Adventurer’s Guild post about the game and posted contact information, he died a year later, in 2022.
Renga in Blue 