''Panther'', a battle

tank A tank is an armoured fighting vehicle intended as a primary offensive weapon in front-line ground combat. Tank designs are a balance of heavy firepower, strong armour, and battlefield mobility provided by tracks and a powerful engine; ...

driving simulation Driving simulators are used for entertainment as well as in training of driver's education courses taught in educational institutions and private businesses. They are also used for research purposes in the area of human factors and medical rese ...

named after the

Panther tank The Panther tank, officially ''Panzerkampfwagen V Panther'' (abbreviated Pz.Kpfw. V) with Sonderkraftfahrzeug, ordnance inventory designation: ''Sd.Kfz.'' 171, is a German medium tank of World War II. It was used in most European theatre of ...

, was one of a handful of early first-person

computer 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, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual feedback from a display device, mo ...

s developed by John Edo Haefeli and Nelson Bridwell in 1975 at

Northwestern University Northwestern University (NU) is a Private university, private research university in Evanston, Illinois, United States. Established in 1851 to serve the historic Northwest Territory, it is the oldest University charter, chartered university in ...

. The game was developed for the multi-user interactive computer-based education

PLATO system PLATO (Programmed Logic for Automatic Teaching Operations), also known as Project Plato and Project PLATO, was the first generalized computer-assisted instruction system. Starting in 1960, it ran on the University of Illinois's ILLIAC I compu ...

and programmed in the TUTOR programming language and utilized scalable

vector graphics Vector graphics are a form of computer graphics in which visual images are created directly from geometric shapes defined on a Cartesian plane, such as points, lines, curves and polygons. The associated mechanisms may include vector displ ...

called linesets. A 1977 development of ''Panther'', with more refined graphics, was named ''Panzer'', the

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

word for armour and tank. Version A (1975) of ''Panther'' has been restored to active status on the Cyber1 CYBIS-based (a PLATO descendant) system, with direct permission of the developer.

References

{{reflist 1975 video games Tank simulation video games PLATO (computer system) games Video games developed in the United States

See also

References