Lode Runner, a game many of us logged hundreds of hours upon. Lode Runner has a great deal of replay value thanks to its great map editor. The game was first published by Broderbund in 1983, but was first prototyped by Douglas Smith, an architecture student at the University of Washington.
The Lode Runner prototype was called Kong and was originally written for a Prime Computer 550 minicomputer on campus, but shortly after it was ported to the VAX minicomputer. Originally programmed in FORTRAN and utilized only ASCII character graphics (the most basic of characters).
In September of 1982 Smith was able to port it to the Apple II+ (in assembly language) and renamed it to Miner. In October of that same year he submitted a rough copy to Broderbund and he’s said to have received a one-line rejection letter, “Sorry, your game doesn’t fit into our product line; please feel free to submit future products.”
The original title had no joystick support and was developed in full black and white…not exactly exciting. So, Smith then borrowed money to purchase a color monitor and joystick and continued to improve the game. Around Christmas of 1982, he submitted the game, now renamed Lode Runner, to four publishers and quickly received offers from all four: Sierra, Sirius, Synergistic, and Brøderbund.
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Hi guys
Thanks as Always 🙂
I did Not Play that much Games besides hundreds hours of Parh of Exile 2 and I started Ender Lillie. Yesterday the new WWE 2K25 arrived and I will dive into that the next days. I still try to finish Hogwarts Legacy
Regarding your topics: I like the awards, because I think that are all great games, even if I don’t play Rainbow six or Metaphor Refantasia (?). I watched as much as possible, and it’s interesting to see all the games.
Next Xbox: let’s see what Xbox only titles will be released. I don’t get all the games done I already own and want to play, so I have to think twice to pick up another console 🙂
Switch 2: I am more looking forward for this than the new Xbox (even if there are possible 2 years between). I like most of the Nintendo games, because they are easier, shorter and in my opinion most of their games are more casual and you can play for an hour and put it away for some days without forgetting everything.
I played around a lot with my 3D printer, but I think that’s not gaming as meant in this podcast 🙂
So keep the good work going!
Stay healthy and I am looking forward to the next episode!
Greetings.
Ralf