Akalabeth: World of Doom
Early role-playing game that launched the Ultima series.
Akalabeth: World of Doom is a role-playing video game that Richard Garriott created in 1979 for the Apple II, with California Pacific Computer Company publishing it in 1980. Garriott built the game as a hobbyist project, and it is now regarded as one of the earliest role-playing video games and a forerunner to the Ultima series, which launched his career. Garriott is the game's sole creator, except for the title artwork, which was drawn by his mother.
The game aims to translate pen-and-paper role-playing into a computer format. Players receive quests from Lord British—Garriott's high school nickname and alter-ego—to defeat ten increasingly difficult monsters in sequence. Most action occurs in an underground dungeon, supplemented by a simple above-ground world map and text descriptions. Players can visit the Adventure Shop to buy food, weapons, a shield, and a magic amulet, and also view their statistics. Concepts that later became standard in the Ultima series appear here, including first-person dungeon gameplay, a food requirement for survival, a top-down overhead world view, hotkey commands, and the use of Elizabethan English.
Teenager Garriott wrote the game in Applesoft BASIC for the Apple II while attending high school in the Houston, Texas suburbs. It began as a junior-year school project on a school DEC PDP-11 mainframe, evolving over two years under the working title DND with help from friends and regular Dungeons & Dragons partners who play-tested it. Final development started after he first encountered Apple computers in summer 1979, using an Apple II his father bought him and later an Apple II Plus; Garriott did not expect the public to see his work. Early versions used an overhead view with ASCII characters for items and monsters, but after playing *Escape*, an early Apple II maze game, he switched to a wire-frame, first-person view for dungeons, making it the first computer role-playing game with such graphics. The game asks for a "lucky number" as a random seed to procedurally generate dungeons and player stats; using the same number returns players to a given world. The *Ultima Collection* version added savegame support while retaining a similar random seed.
Quick Facts
- Title
- Akalabeth: World of Doom
- Developer
- Richard Garriott
- Publisher
- California Pacific Computer Company
- Released
- 1980: Apple II / 1980: Apple / California Pacific re-release / February 17th, 1998: MS-DOS
- Genre
- Role-playing
- Modes
- Single-player
- Platforms
- Apple II, MS-DOS
Facts from the source article.
Lore & Background
Richard Garriott, a teenager in the Houston, Texas suburbs, created Akalabeth as a hobbyist project while attending high school. The game began as a school project on a DEC PDP-11 mainframe under the working title DND, evolving over two years with help from friends who acted as play-testers. After encountering Apple computers in summer 1979, Garriott switched to an Apple II and later an Apple II Plus, developing the game in Applesoft BASIC. He did not expect the public to see his work.
Garriott demoed the game—then renamed Akalabeth—for his boss at a ComputerLand store, who suggested selling it. Garriott spent $200 to package the game in Ziploc bags with photocopied instructions and a cover drawn by his mother. California Pacific Computer Company received a copy and contacted Garriott to publish it. The retail price was $35, and Garriott claims the game sold 30,000 copies, earning him $150,000.
The game was inspired by Dungeons & Dragons and the works of J. R. R. Tolkien. Its name derives from Tolkien's Akallabêth, though the game is not based on that story. The last monster on the kill list is called 'Balrog,' like the demon from The Lord of the Rings.
Reader's Guide
Akalabeth: World of Doom holds significance as one of the earliest role-playing video games and the direct predecessor of the Ultima series, which became highly influential. It introduced concepts that later became standard in the series, including first-person dungeon gameplay, a top-down overhead world view, the need to manage food, hotkey commands, and the use of Elizabethan English. The game was also the first computer RPG to feature wire-frame, first-person dungeon graphics, a choice Garriott made after playing the maze game Escape.
Despite mixed contemporary reviews—some critics called it a 'poor cousin' to games like Wizardry—Akalabeth is often considered the first game of the Ultima series. It was included in the 1998 Ultima Collection under the nickname 'Ultima 0,' with a version ported to MS-DOS by a fan. The game's use of a 'lucky number' as a random seed for procedural generation was an early example of that technique. Sales figures are disputed: Garriott claims 30,000 copies, but some analysts suggest 10,000 may be more accurate based on Softalk chart appearances. Original copies remain rare.
Did You Know?
- The game's name derives from Tolkien's Akallabêth, part of The Silmarillion.
- Garriott sold the first copies in Ziploc bags for $20, with photocopied instructions and a cover drawn by his mother.
- Akalabeth is often considered the first game of the Ultima series, later nicknamed 'Ultima 0' in the 1998 Ultima Collection.
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