Title page of version 8 of dnd (running on a PLATO emulator in 2006).

A portion of the source code (title page) to version 2.8 of dnd.

dnd is a computer role playing game written in the TUTOR programming language for the PLATO System by Gary Whisenhunt and Ray Wood at Southern Illinois University in 1974 and 1975. Dirk Pellett of Iowa State University and Flint Pellett of University of Illinois made substantial enhancements to the game from 1976 to 1985. Image File history File links Dnd8. ... Image File history File links Dnd8. ... An emulator reproducing a console games playable atmosphere on a Windows computer. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (800x810, 118 KB) Summary A portion of the source code to dnd, scanned from a printout made October 30th, 1976, showing the file name, date, original authors, version (2. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (800x810, 118 KB) Summary A portion of the source code to dnd, scanned from a printout made October 30th, 1976, showing the file name, date, original authors, version (2. ... Computer role-playing games (CRPGs), often shortened to simply role-playing games (RPGs), are a type of video or computer game that traditionally use gameplay elements found in paper-and-pencil role-playing games. ... The TUTOR programming language is a language developed for use on the PLATO system at the University of Illinois around 1965. ... For other uses, see Plato (disambiguation). ... Southern Illinois University is a university in southern Illinois with two institutions and multiple campuses. ... 1974 (MCMLXXIV) was a common year starting on Tuesday. ... 1975 (MCMLXXV) was a common year starting on Wednesday. ... Fountain of Four Seasons by Christian Petersen with the Campanile in the background Iowa State University (ISU) is a public land-grant and space-grant university located in Ames, Iowa. ... The University of Illinois is the set of three public universities in Illinois. ... 1976 (MCMLXXVI) was a leap year starting on Thursday. ... 1985 (MCMLXXXV) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

The name dnd is derived from the abbreviation "DND" (D&D) for the print-based tabletop role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons, which was first published in 1974. Tabletop role-playing games are a particular form of role-playing game. ... It has been suggested that this article be split into multiple articles. ...

Origins

dnd was probably the third dungeon crawl game written for PLATO. The first such game, known as pedit5, was deleted just a few months after it was created. The second game, m199h, was created in a lesson unit (i.e., space on a fixed drive) reserved for foreign language instruction. It was similarly deleted as soon as the illicit program was discovered. dnd was the first PLATO lesson space created for the express purpose of being a dungeon game. This article is about the computer game. ... pedit5 was the first dungeon crawl. ...

The Game

In dnd, a player would create a character and then venture into the multi-level Whisenwood Dungeon in search of treasure and the famous 'orb'. The dungeon was populated by an assortment of monsters and treasures.

The game implemented many of the basic concepts of Dungeons and Dragons.

Teleporters moved characters between dungeon levels (especially the Excelsior Transporter, which first appeared in dnd on PLATO). High level monsters, similar to boss monsters in coin-op video games, are found at the end of each dungeon. dnd also allowed a player to leave the dungeon to recuperate and regain spells and return later. Flag Ship from the video game Gorf In video games, a boss is a particularly challenging computer-controlled character that must be defeated at the end of a segment of a game, whether it be for a level, an episode, or the very end of the game itself (final boss). ... Centipede by Atari is a typical example of a 1980s era arcade game. ... This article is about computer and video games. ...

Traditionally in D&D (the paper-and-pencil game), a large dungeon or campaign would end with a confrontation with a dragon or perhaps some other powerful monster, which would be guarding the largest treasure find in the game. In this game, a Dragon assumes this role, guarding an Orb. If the character defeated the Golden Dragon, retrieved the Orb and made it out of the dungeon, the character would be retired to the Elysian Fields. The character's name would then be inscribed for all to see when others visited dnd. In the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game, Elysium, or more fully, the Blessed Fields of Elysium, is a strongly good-aligned plane of existence. ...

Version history

Player about to win dnd: character is shown in the maze, with both the Orb and Grail (as well as most other magic items and a charmed dragon).

Subsequent revisions of the game added more dungeons, such as The Caverns and The Tomb, with different creatures guarding different treasures (such as the Grim Reaper guarding The Fountain), and the player had to obtain both The Orb and The Grail to win. Also, many different types of miscellaneous treasures were added over the years, with their icons added to the game's original graphical display. Image File history File links Dnd8won. ... Image File history File links Dnd8won. ... Death, personified is an anthropomorphic figure or a fictional character who has existed in mythology and popular culture since the earliest days of storytelling. ...

Later PLATO games, such as avatar, oubliette, baradur, moria, dndworld, bnd, and sorcery, were heavily influenced by dnd (and each other) while adding innovative features of their own, from 1976 to 1979. Some games on non-PLATO computers were directly derived from dnd and other PLATO games by authors who copied the PLATO versions (in particular, the non-PLATO game named "dnd" with its goal of finding "the orb"), while other games, such as Rogue, were most likely independently created several years later. Avatar is a text-based & graphics-based multi-user highly interactive role-playing computer game, created on the Control Data Corporation PLATO computer system. ... Rogue is a dungeon crawling computer game dating from 1980. ...

The game proved enormously popular on PLATO and continued to be played until PLATO was finally deactivated.

References

• "Retro Playing Games", Computer Games, April, 2006, p. 36-37.