For me, the first programmer’s game was Colobot – real-time strategy with 3D graphics. Players take on the role of an astronaut who must land on a planet and use robots to gather resources, construct buildings, and complete missions. It was Love at first sight – cool video game with programming. For a long time, I was sure it was the first programmer’s game at all (naive, I know). Later I’d found more and more programmer’s games; however, it was a big surprise to know that one of the first programmer’s games (maybe even the first one) was RobotWar, developed in the 70s and published in 1981. It’s a text-based game where players control robots using a simple programming language to fight against each other. Overall, it’s interesting to see the evolution of the programmer’s game genre, from the early text-based games like RobotWar to titles like Colobot with advanced 3D graphics and complex programming languages to modern programmer’s games.
P.S.: You can play RobotWar in your browser here: https://archive.org/details/wozaday_Robotwar
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