Dungeon Campaign - Synergistic Software, 1978 - Apple II (4K)
7A playthrough of Robert Clardy's Dungeon Campaign, released in late 1978 by his Synergistic Software.
Dungeon Campaign, alongside Don Worth's Beneath Apple Manor, is now regarded as the earliest example of Roguelike roleplaying games for the personal computer.
While greatly inspired by the hugely successful pen-and-paper Dungeons & Dragons, there were no proven concepts or templates for how roleplaying games best operated in the digital realm of computers. It was very much a trial-and-error effort to figure out what features and elements would work and just as importantly what was achievable with the limited technology at the time. Today this pioneering game might seem extremely primitive and somewhat quirky, especially from what we now perceive as the standard template in computerized versions of roleplaying games but this was truly innovative at the time.
The objective was to explore the four levels of the dungeon, fight monsters, find treasures, and escape at the lowest level before the last member of your party was killed.
The party consisted of 13 human warriors alongside an elf and a dwarf, each adding one hitpoint to the party. The dwarf was able to map out the dungeon as you progressed and the dwarf could sense certain dangers ahead when either was lost so were their abilities. Killing monsters would add to your party's strength and help whenever you had to roll the dice.
I'm playing the version released with Wilderness Campaign in 1980.
Bits from my personal collection – Robert Clardy, Synergistic Software, and the birth of the personal home computer roleplaying game
https://retro365.blog/2019/12/20/bits-from-my-personal-collection-robert-clardy-synergistic-software-and-the-birth-of-the-personal-home-computer-roleplaying-game/
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