![]() Not only is Starfleet Orion two-player only, but it requires quite a time commitment the manual estimates the climactic scenario to require about six hours to play, with no provision for saving state. ![]() In a touch that seems particularly bizarre to modern sensibilities, the BASIC source code for the game itself is also given in full in the manual, in case the player wants to tinker or the cassette on which the game is housed gets corrupted. The setup and order of battle for each of these is given, tabletop wargame style, in the manual as the first step before actually playing one must key all of this data into the program and save it to a blank cassette using a separate program called BUILDER. Its manual lays out an elaborate back story to justify a dozen space-battles scenarios between two alien races. Starfleet Orion looks rather bizarre when viewed through modern eyes, seeming more a sort of ludic construction set than a completed videogame. To release it, Connelley and Freeman formed Automated Simulations, the first software publisher dedicated solely to games. The first fruit of this union appeared before the end of the year in the form of a space strategy game called Starfleet Orion. And so a marriage of convenience was born. ![]() Freeman was in just the opposite boat: he had been working for several years as a freelance games journalist and had a strong aptitude for game design, but knew nothing about programming. In the end he turned to one of his D&D players, Jon Freeman, for help. Even if he didn’t sell enough copies to make any real money, he could at least use the project to justify writing the PET off on his taxes as a “business expense.” Unfortunately, Connelley was a better programmer than a game designer, and so his initial attempts went nowhere. Since he loved games, he hit upon the idea of writing one for the machine. When he got the thing home and perhaps realized that the 8 K wonder’s utility for such a purpose was limited at best, he was afflicted with a bit of buyer’s remorse at the money he’d spent on it. ![]() In 1978 a fellow named John Connelley purchased a Commodore PET to aid in the bookkeeping of the Dungeons and Dragons campaign he was running. ![]()
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