Adventureland: Scott Adams Adventure 1

While I'm trying to run through the various Colossal Cave variants, I wanted to talk about the first of the Scott Adams "Original Twelve" - Adventureland. 

I didn't play Adventureland on my Texas Instruments; my introduction to it was via the Apple IIc, although not the graphics version pictured above.  In many ways, it's a truncated variation of the original Colossal Cave, with a number of recurring features - a Dragon atop one of the treasures, a Bear (although this one not being so friendly) and magic words transporting you places.  There's even a repeat of the whole "Ming Vase must be dropped only in a location with the Velvet Pillow" puzzle.

Having a more compact map is actually something of a relief here.  While there's a maze, it's a easily mapped one (many of the rooms have unique features).  The small map is also useful in that it's a fairly lethal game, as they tended to be at the time.  Many of the puzzles are clever, and only a few are head-scratchers (the puzzle with the bear where you YELL to have him fall off the cliff, for instance).  There's the old 'light source timer' issue, although you can refill the lamp without hanging a game-losing scenario.  The only real negative comment I have about the game is an overreliance on randomness - one of the last puzzles you have to do revolves around smelly mud (which randomly dries and falls off) and dangerous bees captured in a bottle (which randomly suffocate and die).  It becomes a rather tedious back-and-forth to finally make it happen, to get that last treasure.

All in all, "Adventureland" is one of the better immediate 'children' of the original Adventure, even if some of the treasures are suspect (Golden Fish are rather goofy, and one can't help feel that maybe snatching a dragon's eggs shouldn't be a treasure?)   Much like "Zork", it's its own thing. 

And, as the first of the Scott Adams adventures, it ranks as one of the better ones.  While there's no real storyline like some of them (in a limited fashion), or innovative concepts like the 'night/day' of "The Count", it holds up as a reasonable challenge.