Akalabeth: World of Doom
1980 · RPG · Apple II
Overview
Akalabeth (1980) is the Apple II role-playing game Richard Garriott wrote as a Houston teenager, often counted as the first Ultima and nicknamed "Ultima 0".
Deep Dive
Lord British sends the player to kill ten monsters, each harder than the last. Most of the game takes place in underground dungeons drawn in first-person wireframe, with an overhead map of the world above. Each world is generated from a "lucky number" the player types in at the start.
Developer Story
Garriott began it as a school project on a PDP-11 under the working title DND, then finished it in Applesoft BASIC on an Apple II his father bought. Staff at a ComputerLand where he showed it suggested selling it, and he packed copies in Ziploc bags with photocopied instructions before California Pacific picked it up.
Did You Know?
- The name comes from Tolkien's Akallabêth, although the game does not follow Tolkien's story.
- Garriott claims about 30,000 copies sold at $5 each to him; historian Jimmy Maher thinks the real figure was nearer 10,000.
Sources & further reading
- Akalabeth: World of Doom — Wikipedia
