Clean up function argument.

[open-adventure.git] / history.adoc

diff --git a/history.adoc b/history.adoc
index ec3739c005d3df0c8a65e8450acd4af28aaaee5d..8a0f8bf4b8b694bae802aaba3900d3f88dcb64f0 100644 (file)
--- a/history.adoc
+++ b/history.adoc
@@ -1,9 +1,9 @@
 = A brief history of Colossal Cave Adventure =
 by Eric S. Raymond
 
 = A brief history of Colossal Cave Adventure =
 by Eric S. Raymond
 

-Adventure is the fons et origo of all later dungeon-crawling games,
-the grandaddy of interactive fiction, and one of the hallowed artifacts
-of hacker folklore.
+Adventure is the fons et origo of all later dungeon-crawling computer
+games, the grandaddy of interactive fiction, and one of the hallowed
+artifacts of hacker folklore.

 
 The very first version was released by Crowther in 1976, in FORTRAN on
 the PDP-10 at Bolt, Beranek, and Newman. (Crowther was at the time
 
 The very first version was released by Crowther in 1976, in FORTRAN on
 the PDP-10 at Bolt, Beranek, and Newman. (Crowther was at the time


@@ -13,7 +13,7 @@ Kentucky, including fewer of the D&D-like elements now associated with
 the game.
 
 Adventure as we now know it, the ancestor of all later versions, was
 the game.
 
 Adventure as we now know it, the ancestor of all later versions, was

-was released on a PDP-10 at the Stanford AI Lab by Don Woods in 1977
+released on a PDP-10 at the Stanford AI Lab by Don Woods in 1977

 (some sources, apparently erroneously, say 1976). That version is
 sometimes known as 350-point Adventure.
 
 (some sources, apparently erroneously, say 1976). That version is
 sometimes known as 350-point Adventure.
 


@@ -108,6 +108,33 @@ and 2.5:
 > also details like just what _can_ you do in the dark...?
 ............................................................................
 
 > also details like just what _can_ you do in the dark...?
 ............................................................................
 

+== Earlier non-influences ==
+
+There is record of one earlier dungeon-crawling game called "dnd",
+written in 1974-75 on the PLATO system at University of Illinois
+<<DND>>.  This was in some ways similar to later roguelike games but
+not to Adventure.  The designers of later roguelikes frequently site
+Adventure as an influence, but not dnd; like PLATO itself, dnd seems
+not to have become known outside of its own user community until
+rediscovered by computer historians many years after Adventure
+shipped.
+
+There was also Hunt The Wumpus <<WUMPUS>>, written by Gregory Yob in
+1972. There is no evidence that Yob's original (circulated
+in BASIC among microcomputer enthusiasts) was known to the ARPANET-
+and minicomputer-centered culture Crowther and Woods were part of
+until well after Adventure was written.
+
+(I was a developer of the Nethack roguelike early in that game's
+history; we knew of Hunt The Wumpus then from its early Unix port, but
+it didn't influence us either, nor in any apparent way the designers
+of other early roguelikes. After my time the wumpus was included as a
+monster in Nethack, but this was done in a spirit of conscious
+museumization after historians rediscovered Yob's game.)
+
+Neither of these games used an attempt at a natural-language parser
+even as primitive as Adventure's.
+

 == Nomenclature ==
 
 This project is called "Open Adventure" because it's not at all clear
 == Nomenclature ==
 
 This project is called "Open Adventure" because it's not at all clear


@@ -124,7 +151,7 @@ with the BSD Games version.
 
 By default, advent issues "> " as a command prompt.  This feature
 became common in many variants after the original 350-point version,
 
 By default, advent issues "> " as a command prompt.  This feature
 became common in many variants after the original 350-point version,

-but was never backported into Crowther & Wood's main line before now.
+but was never backported into Crowther & Woods's main line before now.

 The "-o" (oldstyle) version reverts the behavior.
 
 A "seed" command has been added.  This is not intended for human use
 The "-o" (oldstyle) version reverts the behavior.
 
 A "seed" command has been added.  This is not intended for human use


@@ -146,6 +173,13 @@ The adventure.text file is no longer required at runtime.  Instead, it
 is compiled at build time to a source module containing C structures,
 which is then linked to the advent binary.
 
 is compiled at build time to a source module containing C structures,
 which is then linked to the advent binary.
 

+The game-save format has changed.  This was done to simplify
+FORTRAN-derived code that formerly implemented these functions;
+without C's fread(3)/fwrite() and structs it was necessarily pretty
+ugly by modern stabdards. Encryption and checksumming have been
+discarded - it's pointless to try tamper-prooing saves when everyone
+has the source code.
+

 == Sources ==
 
 [bibliography]
 == Sources ==
 
 [bibliography]


@@ -155,3 +189,7 @@ which is then linked to the advent binary.
 - [[[DA]]] http://www.filfre.net/sitemap/
 
 - [[[SN]]] http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/1/2/000009/000009.html
 - [[[DA]]] http://www.filfre.net/sitemap/
 
 - [[[SN]]] http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/1/2/000009/000009.html

+
+- [[[DND]]] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dnd_(video_game)
+
+- [[[WUMPUS]]] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunt_the_Wumpus