An old VAX/VmsOperatingSystem, terminal based war game. It was written in the early '80s and ported to DOS. It was extremely addictive. I've long since lost my copy. Does anyone know where to find it anymore? I did a search and all I could find was this: http://www.decus.org/libcatalog/description_html/v00012.html If you remember this game read the docs that this page links too. It'll bring back fond memories. -- PhilGoodwin

The links on the DECUS website are broken, but the folder you're after lives at ftp://ftp.decus.org/lib/v00012/ and I've put a copy of that (modulo a corefile and WS-FTP logfile) up at http://fortran-empire.fit2.bur.st/ in case the DECUS archive becomes permanently unavailable -- LeonBrooks

See also http://www.classicempire.com/ for some interesting history, including stuff like a PDP-11 version written in MACRO-11, and modern (but copyrighted) descendents of the game. -- LeonBrooks

EricRaymond converted it to CeeLanguage. Source at: http://www.ibiblio.org/linsearch/lsms/vms-empire.html

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There was also a MacOs version of Empire in the mid '80s. It was based on the VAX/PDP10 version, but adding a few twists, such as nuclear bombers whose blast radius increased every 100 turns.

I could have sworn the Mac version was called Global Conquest (there's something out there if you google it, but it doesn't look the same). -- OrbFish

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From the man page:
       Apparently, this game was originally  written  outside  of
       Digital, probably at a university.  The game was ported to
       DEC's VAX/VMS from the TOPS-10/20 FORTRAN  sources  avail�
       able  around fall 1979.  The original authors listed in my
       old documentation are Mario De''''''Nobili and Thomas  N.  Paul�
       son.   Support  for  different terminal types was added by
       Craig` Leres.
 
       Ed James got hold of the sources at Berkeley and converted
       portions  of  the  code to C, mostly to use curses for the
       screen handling.  He published his modified sources on the
       net  in  December  1986.   Because  this  game  ran on VMS
       machines for so long, a previous version is known  as  VMS
       Empire.
 
       In  1987  Chuck  Simmons  at Amdahl reverse engineered the
       program and wrote a version completely written in  C.   In
       doing  so,  he  completely modified the computer strategy,
       the  commands,  the  piece  types,  many  of   the   piece
       attributes, and the algorithm for creating maps.

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The name "Empire" has been re-used for a modern, multi-player game.  It's not the same thing as the old VAX/VMS game.  Here are some pages google found ("empire faq") for the new one:

 * http://www.landfield.com/faqs/games/empire/faq/
 * http://www.empire.cx/~uesugi/FAQ.html#Q1.1
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My friends and I played empire at digital in '79 and '80, and it wasn't new then. As I recall, it ran under RSX and RSTS on PDP11's long before it ran under VmsOperatingSystem. My friend StoneyBallard, when Stoney got turned on by fractals after reading Mandelbrot in 1980 or so, created a fractal-based map generator for Empire, so that a game could be played on a realistic but fresh map. Part of the fun was exploring the world: for the first few turns, neither player knew where the other was nor even what the geography of the world looked like. Fighters and carriers were thus very helpful for surveillance.

I suppose I can contact Stoney and find out if he has access to any old game-code.

-- TomStambaugh

What ever happened with this?

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There's a version, with source, available at http://catb.org/~esr/vms-empire/

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CategoryGame