Computer Wargames Computer WargamesOne way to get a better handle on where computer wargames came from, and where they are headed, is to take a look at the development of computer wargames in terms of their computer technology. The chapter on the History of Wargames covers this subject in a more general way. Here is where you find the juicy details.
Not surprisingly, the first computer wargames were developed unofficially by students at universities specializing in computer research. The earliest known game of this type was Space War, in 1961 by Steve (Slug) Russell at MIT. About the same time, the Army was developing ATLAS, the first of the theater level wargames on the possible war in Europe between NATO and Warsaw Pact. The big difference between ATLAS and Space War was that Space War was more of a game, with the player being constantly involved. ATLAS was more of a model; you set it up and it played out the situation without human intervention. ATLAS was not created by students, but by professionals. Space War was the ancestor of all PC based wargames. ATLAS was something of a dead end.
In the late 1960s came the first of the "Adventure" series of wargames. These were a combination of role playing games (which hadn't been invented yet) and puzzles that were only tangentially wargames because they involved combat and the kind of strategy successful generals are supposed to be capable of. These were text only games, whereby the program presented the player with a "world" to move around in and a lot of prizes to grab and dangers to avoid.
Also in the late 1960s, the first Star Trek game appeared, although this was basically a spiffed up version of the earlier Space War. Also found on many mainframe and minicomputers was an artillery game which, like Space War and Star Trek, used crude graphics and a lot of math to depict combat situations.
The first computer wargame available to the public was Nolan Bushnells 1971 Computer Space (a version of Space War). Mr Bushnell later unleashed "Pong" and "Asteroids" on the public. These were extremely primitive games run by about as much computing power as you'll find in a 1992 digital watch. Many younger gamers today have never even seen these early games, other than the more glitzy variations that appeared in early Nintendo games.
In the early 1970s, young wargamers like Chris Crawford attempted to convert commercial manual wargames. But the hardware, and to a certain extent the development software, just wasn't there yet. I spoke with many gamers in the early 1970s who were trying to create computerized wargames. I was well aware of the basic problem, which was the cost of the machines to play the games on. The introduction of PCs in 1977 resulted in an astounding decline in the cost of computing power. In 1973 I leased a minicomputer that had 16K of memory and used punched cards to get information into it. This device cost $136,000 (1992 dollars). Five years later you got four times as much memory and keyboard input for under $5,000.
In those early days, much of the action was at places where the computer resources were, essentially, "free" to developers and users alike. One such location for wargamers who were programmers (including Chris Crawford), was the PLATO project, a multi-user educational system then under development at the University of Illinois (at Urbana) and heavily supported by supercomputer manufacturer CDC. Begun in the late 1960s, by the mid-1970s there were up to a thousand users on the system at once. The system was quite advanced for its time, with graphics equal to the early Macintosh computers ten years in the future. I was invited out to the university in 1969 to give a lecture and wasn't all that surprised that so many wargamers were working on the system, or that wargames would appear on PLATO eventually. During this period a number of innovative games were developed for PLATO system, including a 3D Star Trek game and more elaborate versions of Adventure. By the late 1970s, PLATO had multi-player games, something that did not see commercial availability until the early 1980s on the CompuServe network. Many of the PLATO games eventually turned up as commercial products (Collapsar, Empire, plus tank and flight simulators). In some cases, the PLATO games served as models for later commercial products.
In 1977, PLATO put on line the first tank simulator (Panzer Plato). This game was done for the US Army Armor School at Fort Knox and was quite detailed and accurate. It was basically an improved version of the earlier (and much less detailed) Panther PLATO. Panzer Plato was a very accurate simulation of armored vehicles. Even cannon shells were accurately modeled, so you smoke shells for sighting purposes.
Also in 1977, Chris Crawford published a tactical armor game (TANKTICS) which was redone and published for the Commodore PET PC in 1978 and thus became the first published wargame. TANKTICS was not in the same class with Panzer Plato, but at least TANKTICS could be played by anyone with a PET PC. TANKTICS finally appeared in an improved form as an Avalon Hill computer wargame in 1981. The game was not a big success. This was largely due to the limitations of the then current "8 bit" PCs (TRS80, Apple, Commodore). Poor graphics, low computing power and only a few million PC owners made it difficult for any computer game to make a lot of money.
But publishers were encouraged, and from 1978 on there was a relative flood of wargame releases. This was brought on by the steadily increasing sales of PCs. It was at this time that publishers began to realize that science fiction and fantasy games had greater sales potential than wargames. In the early years, the most popular computer games of these genres were the "adventure" games. These were interactive stories, without graphics, where you travelled around an unknown landscape (which you had to map on a piece of paper as you played) and asked the computer questions. These "text adventures" disappeared when better graphics became available in the mid 1980s and "graphic adventures" became the norm. The adventure game format made the most of the PCs limited capabilities and this style of gaming was never successfully applied to wargames. When better graphics capabilities became available, it was natural (and very successful) for the text based adventures to move into graphic formats.
A year before the first PCs became available, Atari released the first game console, the Atari 2600. This 1976 bit of technology was basically a stripped down PC, using an 8 bit microprocessor. It had no additional memory, that was in the cartridges. The 2600 didn't have a keyboard either, just a connector for a joystick and other simple game control devices. The 2600 did have more powerful graphic routines than most PCs, because graphics were what these early arcade games were all about. The "arcade game" market grew enormously until 1981. In that year Commodore came out with its very inexpensive PC, the C-64. In that year Atari came out with an upgraded game console, the Atari 5200. Gamers weaned on the 2600 opted for PCs and the C-64 outsold every other PC for the next few years. It wasn't until 1985, with the introduction of the Nintendo (with better software) that the arcade game market recovered. The recovery took several years, but now the PCs were able to hold their own against the game consoles. The 16 bit game consoles introduced in 1990 were even capable of running vehicle PC class simulator wargames.
As the 1980s began, there were several striking computer wargame designs. The earliest, and easily the most impressive, was Eastern Front 1941. Programmed by Chris Crawford on the Atari 800 PC, this game had outstanding graphics and featured the first "scrolling map." That is, the PC screen showed only a portion of the entire map, but by using the joystick, you could move this "window" around to show other parts of the map. The capability to do this was built into the Atari machines which, unlike Radio Shack or IBM, used processors (the computers "brains") that had much greater graphics power. Although the Atari 800 series never became a great commercial success, it did demonstrate what could be done with the right hardware.
Before, and after, IBM arrived on the scene, game programmers performed minor (and sometimes major) miracles. Bruce Artwick brought out the first flight simulator in 1980. He even got it run on the primitive TRS80 Mod I, an impressive programming feat by any standard. There were also several primitive tank simulators, generally with a science fiction slant. Even then, publishers realized that the wargamers were a demanding lot. Do it right, or they won't buy it. The introduction of these first flight simulators, despite their primitive implementation, demonstrated how wargames would manage to compete with the more popular science fiction and fantasy type games. On average, a fantasy or science fiction game will sell three to ten times as much as a wargame, except for the simulators. The only reason non-simulator wargames were published at all and continued to be published was because they would sell enough to make a profit and, from time to time, there was one that sold very well. Another important factor was that a wargame did not require as much programming effort as a more graphics intensive science fiction or fantasy title.
This period, the early 1980s, was a watershed for computer wargames. While most of the potential customers were using Apple II or Commodore 64 PCs, and these machines were selling to millions of new PC users each year, the new IBM PC was beginning its inexorable climb to the top of the heap. Although the more powerful IBM machine had the potential to offer better graphics, this potential was not realized for over five years. Through the late 1980s, most PCs were thus stuck with primitive graphics capabilities. This was to the wargames advantage, as a wargame did not need fancy graphics, or fancy anything else like sound effects. An individual programmer could still put together a marketable wargame on his own, and they were mainly men doing the programming. So wargame programming, somewhat more than other types, became something of a labor of love for the creators. Low sales were kept viable by low costs. Wargamers should be more aware how important the underpaid programmers (themselves wargamers) were to keeping computer wargames on the market during the early and mid-1980s.
It took the computer wargames industry several years, indeed most of the late 1980s, to fully digest the switch to the IBM standard. It was not a willing switch. Many, if not most, computer wargame programmers favored the superior technology found in the Apple (Macintosh), Atari (ST) and Commodore (Amiga) PCs. But IBM had the numbers, and the Intel microprocessors that were the guts of the IBM type PCs weren't all that bad. The programmers proved what the Intel chips could do, and produced ever more striking computer wargames from the late 1980s on.
Oddly enough, this march of technology produced ever more games on the IBM type machines that had the same (easier to use) "look" long found on the Macintosh, ST and Amiga machines. Indeed, the cutting edge of "ease of use" PC technology was to be found in game software. If a programmer wanted some "ease of use" ideas for his new word processor or accounting program, all he had to do was look at the latest games. That's precisely what a lot of non-game programmers did. After all, programmers were some of the most eager computer game users. It was the perfect way to take a break without leaving the keyboard.
As the 1990s dawned, computer wargames were ready to take advantage of a number of new technologies.
The
Perils of Computer Wargame Publishing
