Dry Gulch

In 1980, Mark Johnson created Dry Gulch, a PLATO multiplayer RPG set in the Wild West. It drew on elements from other Dungeons and Dragons-style RPGs on the PLATO platform.

Dry Gulch is a “lost” game; it cannot be played today and the source code isn’t publicly available. The only information about the game comes from former players who have shared their memories. There is one, somewhat blurry, screenshot available on CRPG Addict’s Site here. This articles leans on the write-ups from both CRPG Addict and ExploradorRPG for the details of what features the game had.

Games of the era are heavily inspired by D&D and typically feature a fantasy setting. Drygulch stands out as an early exception to this trend, alongside Futurewar, by exploring the western genre instead. D&D inspired games are combat focused, but Drygulch manages to steer a little away from this. Combat exists in Drygulch, but the gameplay is primarily about prospecting for gold. The game also introduces social mechanics such as elections and the ability to hold offices that grant special abilities.

Stats

The game has familiar attributes like strength, dexterity and carrying capacity but it also tracks injuries, thirst and hunger.

Money and Ore are also tracked. Each player starts the game with a sum to money to buy equipment in order to go prospecting for ore.

Exploration

The game is based in a small mining town. The mine in the game is shown from a first-person perspective like similar PLATO dungeon crawlers of the time. The other locations are shown in 2d.

Game locations include:

• The Town Hall
• General Store
• Bank
• Metal Assay Office
• Kitty’s Saloon
• Stable
• Hotel
• Jail
• Boot Hill Cemetery
• The Gold Mine

Each location allows the player to take different actions. The metal assay office is where gold can be exchanged for money. In the metal assay office the option was also given to shooting the assay office’s proprietor. In Kitty’s Saloon you can order a drink and overhear rumours that might provide hints on how to succeed in the game.

In the stable players can buy a mule which also had a number of stats. The mule could used to carry ore from the mine.

The player can end up in jail or the cemetery if they die. According to ExploradorRPG’s article there was a way to resurrect players in the cemetery by the use of a spell.

The Gold Mine

Drygulch on Plato had a gold mine that served as the dungeon, it had a 3D line-drawing display like Oubliette and Avatar but I think it was fancier and would display more squares of the dungeon if walls were open to reveal them.

The mine’s levels were likely pre-authored and grid-based, with players exploring one tile at a time. Enemies can be encounter in the mine including: rats, bats, spiders, bears and coyotes. When an encounter with an enemy occurs the player is presented with a list of actions:

• Fight
• Swear (scare it away)
• Ignore (hope it will do the same)
• Evade (skill check based on dexterity)
• Run

The success of these actions is semi-random taking into account the stats of the player. Dry Gulch is multiplayer and other players can be encountered in the mine where they’re displayed as line drawings.

Secret Town

The game had a secret alternate town “reachable only via an unmarked, dangerous route.” Very few players found it, but they got rich when they did. “The town’s name was subject to change at the whim of the elected mayor.”

The Atari magazine mentions “wastelands” around the starting town perhaps crossing the wastelands would lead to the secret, or maybe via the gold mines. We can only speculate.

Systems

Plato’s Drygulch is set in an Old West town. You are a miner trying to live long and prosper, which is not easy when hazards abound in the mines and in the wastelands surrounding the town. You must eat and drink enough to keep healthy, make sure you have enough prospecting equipment, etc. There are elections for sheriff, mayor and mine inspector. Each position offers potential for added fun and profit, election usually requires 10 to 12 votes.

• Day / Night Cycle - during the night the foreground color was white and the background black, reversing to black-on-white during the day.
• Election System - Elections allow players to run for mayor, sheriff and inspector. Each role granted certain abilities. Players in the game could vote in these elections. The Sheriff could assign rewards to the capture of other players that broke the law and send them to jail. The major had the power to rename the mine.
• Hunger System - To stay healthy the character must eat and drink but exactly how this was implemented isn’t clear.

The town had multiple shops that had 2D line art illustrating the inside of the shop. Among them were the sheriff’s office and the jail. The sheriff could assign rewards for the capture of players that broke the law and administer the jail in some way. He was chosen by election, and easily removed by the “veto” of any one player - you could go into his office when he was logged off and shoot him dead, and not being online there was no way he could defend himself from that!

Final Words

From all the descriptions Dry Gulch appears to have been an innovative game but there are many open questions about how everything fit together. Hopefully in the future those who experienced the game might share more details or the game might become playable again.