''Dukedom'' is a

turn-based strategy Strategy video game is a major video game genre that focuses on analyzing and strategizing over direct quick reaction in order to secure success. Although many types of video games can contain strategic elements, the strategy genre is most commo ...

text-based In computing, text-based user interfaces (TUI) (alternately terminal user interfaces, to reflect a dependence upon the properties of computer terminals and not just text), is a retronym describing a type of user interface (UI) common as an ear ...

video game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...

about land management and was created as an expanded version of '' Hamurabi''.

Gameplay

The player is one of several Dukes chosen by the High King to help run the Kingdom. Their Duchy is not in the best of shape, the gameplay goal is to build up its population, land holdings, and grain reserves, ultimately hoping to become powerful enough to overthrow the High King. The player has to manage their duchy, while paying taxes and sending, on occasion, peasants to the King's service, undergoing

epidemics An epidemic (from Ancient Greek, Greek ἐπί ''epi'' "upon or above" and δῆμος ''demos'' "people") is the rapid spread of disease to a large number of Host (biology), hosts in a given population within a short period of time. For example ...

locusts Locusts (derived from the Latin ''locusta'', locust or lobster) are various species of short-horned grasshoppers in the family Acrididae that have a Swarm behaviour, swarming phase. These insects are usually solitary, but under certain circu ...

and rival lords secretly helped by the High King; they can buy and sell land, itself divided in several categories depending on

fertility Fertility in colloquial terms refers the ability to have offspring. In demographic contexts, fertility refers to the actual production of offspring, rather than the physical capability to reproduce, which is termed fecundity. The fertility rate ...

, and engaging in offensive or

defensive war A defensive war () is one of the causes that justify war by the criteria of the Just War tradition. It means a war where at least one nation is mainly trying to defend itself from another, as opposed to a war where both sides are trying to invade ...

fare, sending both subjects and

mercenaries A mercenary is a private individual who joins an War, armed conflict for personal profit, is otherwise an outsider to the conflict, and is not a member of any other official military. Mercenaries fight for money or other forms of payment rath ...

against the enemy and winning land and grain.

Development

Dukedom was written in

PL/I PL/I (Programming Language One, pronounced and sometimes written PL/1) is a procedural, imperative computer programming language initially developed by IBM. It is designed for scientific, engineering, business and system programming. It has b ...

D by Vince Talbot in 1976 as an expanded version of ''Kingdom'', which itself is an expanded version of '' Hamurabi''. The game was rewritten (with extensive revision) in I.T.S. EXBASIC by Jamie E. Hanrahan. It was adapted for /GAMES/ by David C. Barber. It was re-written from I.T.S. EXBASIC to

Hewlett-Packard The Hewlett-Packard Company, commonly shortened to Hewlett-Packard ( ) or HP, was an American multinational information technology company. It was founded by Bill Hewlett and David Packard in 1939 in a one-car garage in Palo Alto, California ...

level F BASIC then to DEC

RSTS/E RSTS () is a multi-user time-sharing operating system developed by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC, now part of Hewlett-Packard) for the PDP-11 series of 16-bit minicomputers. The first version of RSTS (RSTS-11, #Versions, Version 1) was implem ...

BASIC-PLUS BASIC-PLUS is an extended dialect of the BASIC programming language that was developed by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) for use on its RSTS/E time-sharing operating system for the PDP-11 series of 16-bit minicomputers in the early 1970s thro ...

. The game was converted to

Microsoft BASIC Microsoft BASIC is the foundation software product of the Microsoft company and evolved into a line of BASIC interpreters and compiler(s) adapted for many different microcomputers. It first appeared in 1975 as Altair BASIC, which was the first v ...

by Richard A. Kaapke. The BASIC version appeared in

Creative Computing ''Creative Computing'' was one of the earliest magazines covering the microcomputer revolution. Published from October 1974 until December 1985, the magazine covered the spectrum of hobbyist/home/personal computing in a more accessible format t ...

in February 1980 and was republished in ''Big Computer Games'' (1984). A Small Basic version called ''Dukedom Small Basic Version'' exists in

source code In computing, source code, or simply code or source, is a plain text computer program written in a programming language. A programmer writes the human readable source code to control the behavior of a computer. Since a computer, at base, only ...

form on

GitHub GitHub () is a Proprietary software, proprietary developer platform that allows developers to create, store, manage, and share their code. It uses Git to provide distributed version control and GitHub itself provides access control, bug trackin ...

. A complete

Python Python may refer to: Snakes * Pythonidae, a family of nonvenomous snakes found in Africa, Asia, and Australia ** ''Python'' (genus), a genus of Pythonidae found in Africa and Asia * Python (mythology), a mythical serpent Computing * Python (prog ...

version is also available on

. It inspired the game ''Manor'', which purported to be more historically accurate.

References

{{reflist, 30em

External links

1984 Big Computer Games
edited by

David H. Ahl David H. Ahl (born May 17, 1939) is an American author who is the founder of ''Creative Computing'' magazine. He is also the author of many how-to books, including ''BASIC Computer Games'', the first computer book to sell more than a million cop ...

Strategy video games City-building games 1976 video games Video games set in the Middle Ages Video games with textual graphics Public-domain software with source code Video games developed in the United States Video games with available source code