Adventure Construction Set (ACS) is a program used to construct Ultima-type games, written by graphic adventure game pioneer
Stuart Smith and published in 1985 by
Electronic Arts. The game was produced by Don
Daglow, with art by Smith and Connie Goldman and music by Dave
Warhol. It was initially developed for the Commodore 64 and Apple II, but then ported to the Amiga in 1986 and DOS in 1987.
The program concept was inspired by the groundbreaking Pinball Construction
Set (PCS) that had come out in 1983. It provided a graphical editor for the construction
of maps, placement of creatures, etc, then let the designer use those to create a standalone game that can be shared with
friends. The resulting game was a top-down view similar to Ultima-type games. The
ACS came with a complete predesigned game (comparable to other games then on the market), Rivers of Light, and a
compendium of sample adventures to show off the design program's capability. Rivers of Light was based on the legend of
Gilgamesh, continuing with Smith's theme of basing his games on classical mythology.
Stuart Smith was a pioneer in the graphical adventure game world, earlier creating the seminal game Return of Herakles (the Greek spelling of Hercules). Although the graphics in these games were primitive by today's standards, in a time when any
graphics at all were an innovation in adventure games the work of Smith stands out as thoughtful and original. His clear writing
style and focus on literature and history also stood in sharp contrast to many other adventure games of this era.
Goldman and Warhol, who had worked with Daglow on the Intellivision game development
team at Mattel, also provided art and music respectively for Racing Destruction Set, which was produced in parallel to the development of Adventure
Construction Set.
The game was one of Electronic Arts biggest hits of 1985, earning an SPA Gold Disk
award.
As technology continued to improve, ACS was followed over the years by more powerful construction kits, culminating in
the current world of the shooter game and their mods.
ACS also displayed a key truth reflected in later adventure building systems: they only automated the mechanical parts
of game construction; good game design was still difficult and time-consuming. The option to
allow the computer to create a random adventure produced treasure-hunt mazes and compounds, but no story or logical succession of
challenges to link them together. Many users would use the random function to save time and create large, relatively empty
canvases and then build their adventures by modifying them.
Electronic Arts Contest
Shortly after Adventure Construction Set's release, announcements were included in the packaging for players to submit their
adventures for a contest to be judged by Electronic Arts and their playtesters. Approximately 50 games were submitted and winners
chosen for three categories:
- Fantasy - Festival by R.C. Purrenhage written for the Commodore 64
- Science Fiction - Cosmos by Albert Jerng written for the C-64
- Contemporary - Panama by Will Bryant for the C-64 and Codename:Viper by Peter Schroeder for the Apple
II
Many of the winning games and submitted games were turned over to game designer Ken St.
Andre and turned into a library of games and a fan club in which players could purchase or trade for copies of the games
and royalties were given to the game authors. According to St. Andre all of the old adventures have been discarded.[citation needed]
See also
External links
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