| Colossal Cave Adventure | ||
|---|---|---|
| No Screenshot Available | ||
| First release | 1976 | |
| Also known as | Adventure, ADVENT (350 points) Adventure II (440 points) Adventure 3 / 550 (550 points) Adventure 4 (660 points) Adventure 5 (501 points) Adventure 6 (551 points) 370 Point Adventure (370 points) | |
| Developed by | Will Crowther, Don Woods Peter Luckett, Jack Pike (440 points) David Platt (550 points) Mike Arnautov (660 points) David Long (501/551 points) Paul Munoz-Colman (370 points) | |
| Published by | Will Crowther, Don Woods | |
| Distributed by | Will Crowther, Don Woods | |
| Platforms | PDP-10 | |
| Resolution | (unknown) | |
| Engine | Frotz | |
| Support | Not yet. | |
| Available for Purchase |
Free to download at IF Archive | |
Colossal Cave Adventure is the text adventure that started the adventure game genre. Will Crowther, a rock climber and cave explorer, mapped portions of the colossal cave and bedquilt cave areas of the Mammoth Cave system in Kentucky in 1972. After his divorce in 1975, he began to write Colossal Cave Adventure to better connect with his daughters. In 1976, Don Woods discovered Colossal Cave Adventure on a computer at Stanford University and received permission from Will Crowther to extend it. Don Woods extended version, which awarded players a maximum of 350 points, was then shared on the ARPANET in 1977, a precursor to the internet, and kickstarted the adventure genre.
It was originally written in FORTRAN for PDP-10 mainframe computers. The 1977 350-point Crowther and Woods version has been ported to many different systems and to many different programming languages, including Z-machine.
It has also been extended multiple times:
- A 440 point version, also known as Adventure II, was developed by Peter Luckett and Jack Pike, of Royal Aircraft Establishment Farnborough, from 1978 to 1981.
- A 430 point version, also known as Adventure 2.5, was developed by Don Woods in 1995.
- A 550 point version, also known as Adventure 3 or Adventure 550, was developed by David Platt in 1978.
- A 660 point version, also known as Adventure 4, was developed by Mike Arnautov in 1995, combining Adventure II and 3 into a single game.
- A 501 point version, also known as Adventure 5, was developed by David Long at the University of Chicago in 1978.
- A 551 point version, also known as Adventure 6, was developed by David Long and an anonymous coder in 1984.
- A 370 point version, also known as 370 Point Adventure, was developed by Paul Munoz-Colman in 1993.