When we think of computer games today, we almost always imagine a lushly illustrated game taking place on some form of fluid electronic screen like an LCD monitor or TV set. But few know today that many of the earliest computer games played out solely on a hardcopy medium—of ink struck on paper.
In the land before video terminals were common, many computer users interfaced with computers via teleprinters—commonly called "teletypes"—which gained that name from the Teletype Corporation, creator of the most popular models.
Teletypes began as specialized typewriters that could be commanded to print from over telegraph or telephone lines, allowing for the efficient and accurate transmission of text-based information. Not long after the creation of the first mainframe computers, engineers figured out a way to rig up teletypes to computers as a form of input and output, making the first economical interactive computer interfaces.
And naturally, as humans do, people figured out a way to have fun with the new medium. Many famous computer game genres we know today originated in a form that was played via teletype—adventure games, board games, 4X strategy games, business simulations, physics simulations, economic trading games, puzzle games, baseball games, and more.
In the annotated gallery ahead, we'll take a look at just a handful of some of the most interesting and important teletype games, most of which hail from the early 1970s. When you're done reading, I'd love to hear from any of the veterans out there who played teletype games back in the day. Which games were your favorite? Let us know.
1.
The Oregon Trail (1971)
Although thousands of American kids remember The Oregon Trail, a simulation of American pioneer life, as the most iconic educational game for the Apple II, it actually originated as a text-based title programmed on an HP2100 minicomputer by Don Rawitsch, Bill Heinemann, and Paul Dillenberger in Minnesota. Players interacted with this first version of the game by typing commands after reading a printout from a teletype—a popular model of which (the ASR-33) can be seen here in the lower right corner.
At GDC 2017, Rawitsch gave an
in-depth post-mortem on the development of The Oregon Trail that describes how the game evolved over time—and how it became a breakout hit for educational game maker MECC.
(Photos: Don Rawitsch, CCSU)
2.
Lunar Lander (1969)
It's exciting to think that only a few months after men first landed on the moon, a high school student named Jim Storer programmed the first version of the now iconic computer game Lunar Lander on a PDP-8 minicomputer in FOCAL. After Storer's version gained distribution, many others expanded on Storer's concept and even introduced graphical versions of the game. If you're interesting in learning more, I recommend reading this
detailed history of the game that I wrote for Technologizer in 2009.
(Photo: Jim Storer)
3.
Colossal Cave Adventure (1976)
Although potentially predated by a game engine called
Wander from 1974, Colossal Cave Adventure by Will Crowther and Don Woods (1976) was undoubtedly the primary inspiration for the interactive fiction genre that we know today. It was the first text-parser adventure game that most people encountered, inspiring many similar text adventure works—including a famous game we will see ahead.
4.
Dungeon (1977)
Any fan of the interactive fiction genre is no doubt familiar with Infocom, a computer game firm that created some of the most polished examples of the art form during the 1980s. That company got its start with one minicomputer game, Dungeon, which started as a PDP-10 program in 1977 and was expanded and modified over several years by Tim Anderson, Marc Blank, Dave Lebling, and Bruce Daniels. In 1980 and 1981, the game received a port to early home PCs, became split into three parts, and re-titled as Zork I, II, and III.
5.
Hunt the Wumpus (1972)
Hunt the Wumpus is somewhat of a legend in the mainframe community, although few outside that realm have heard of it. It's a strategy game where players must deduce the location of the "Wumpus" (and shoot it successfully) based on a series of secondary environmental clues. In many ways, it reminds me of an early version of Minesweeper.
Gregory Yob originally wrote Hunt the Wumpus in BASIC while attending the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth. After publication of the source in Creative Computing, the game took on a life of its own, inspiring many games that came after it.
(Photo: Creative Computing)
6.
Star Trek (1971)
Who hasn't wanted to hunt down Klingons a la Captain Kirk in the famous 1960's sci-fi television series? Players of "Star Trek" for mainframe computers could do just that, although the game's origins are slightly murky. According to some reports, a high school senior named Mike Mayfield created the first version of the game in 1971 on an SDS Sigma 7 mainframe computer. Many variations by different authors followed as it was ported and modified for different computer systems all the way up to the 1980s.
(Photo: Lawrence Hall of Science)
7.
Empire (1972)
As the granddaddy of the nation-building, turn-based-strategy computer game genre, Empire has had a long and influential life—without Empire, we would not have Sid Meier's Civilization, for example, as Meier has cited it as an inspiration. Peter Langston first created the game in 1972 on an HP2000 at Evergreen State College in Washington. This deep multiplayer war game (whose sessions could last up to a year or longer) soon spread to other systems and spawned many variations, some of which people are still obsessed with today. Although these days, they play it on video displays.
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