Futurewar

Futurewar represents a change of pace from the PLATO games of the era, it’s a sci-fi entry instead of the default D&D inspired fantasy setting. Futurewar is sometimes hailed as the first, first person shooting game but it has a lot of CPRG traits. Oh, and being on PLATO, it’s multiplayer!

Futurewar was created by two highschool students Erik Witz and Nick Boland and first playable in 1977. Erik was around 14 when he first starting working on the game and chose a sci-fi theme to differentiate it from other PLATO games of the time. Like many PLATO games it was continually developed over it’s lifetime.

The game is a multiplayer, dungeon delver, similar to Moria or Oubliette but with a sci-fi setting. It has a first person perspective with simple line art for the walls. Where it differs from it’s contemporaries is the gun at the bottom center of the viewport. If you press S and have enough power (i.e. ammo), a real time bullet is animated launching from the barrel of the gun and into the 3D world. It has a number of preauthored levels to explore, there are stats and an equipment system. It’s not particularly playable for modern audiences but can be found on the cyber1 PLATO system.

Gameplay Screenshots

You can see some gameplay screenshots in the gallery below.

Setting

Futurewar is set in the post-apocalyptic year of “2020” where humans are forced to live underground. The outbreak of the Covid pandemic in 2020 did make it feel more apocalyptic than most.

The game setting has you teleported from the year of 1978 to 2020 chasing a villian called “Doctor Brain”. By 2020 there’s already been a nuclear holocaust and the survivors live underground. You must descend the levels of the underground, battling mutants to defeat Dr Brain.

Setting-wise this is a refreshing break from the Dungeons Dragons derived PLATO games. The inspirations for the setting are hard to pin down but were probably an amalgamation of the 70s zeitgeist as filtered through a couple of 14 years old. It has elements that foreshadow Doom; mutants, radioative waste, shotguns, machine guns, rocket launchers and so on. Though as noted by Brain Dear in The Friendly Orange Glow, the developers of Doom never interacted with the PLATO system. There are references to nuclear weapons perhaps due to the relative closeness to political events like the cold war. Some enemies are inspired from comics books and sci-fi movies.

Goal

The goal as described by the help manual is to defeat Doctor Brain but I’m not sure if that’s a possbility in the game. The levels get harder as the player descends and the last documented level is “The Pits” but there’s a secret “Hell” level below that.

The bottom level of Futurewar was called Hell and featured the Devil

I’d be interested to know if the game is completable and what the win condition is.

The main gameplay loop is like those of other PLATO RPGs; delve into the dungeon, collect money and loot, head to the exit to gain levels and repeat.

Character Creation

Futurewar has a familiar character creation system but with a sci-fi theme.

You are first invited to choose a “team” which would be equivalent to a species or race in a fantasy game, then the occupation equivalent to choosing a class, then you can enter the name and your character is made and you can start a new game.

Team

The player may choose a team from the following:

• Americans
• Guerillas
• Barbarians
• Martians
• Cyborgs

A character’s team plays a similar role to race in a fantasy game; determining stat distribution, and possibly unlocking certain occupation / class choices. The team you choose also determines your starting area.

The help text describes all the teams as basically human but they’re separated into different groups. The Americans are “rednecks, bikers and convicts” assumed to have surived the nuclear blast. The Guerillas are police and military that have teamed up. Barbarians are surviors who have become more beast like. Martians are colonists that have returned from Mars, so they’re not aliens but humans who lived on Mars. Finally there are cyborgs that are humans with some machine parts.

The specifics of the team differences are only hinted at in the documentation. Once you’ve chosen a team the next screen displays your stats.

Stats

The game has the following stats:

• Strength
• Agility
• Endurance
• Intellect
• Technology
• Hits
• Power
• Rating

The names differ from Dungeons and Dragons but most of the stats are similar. Technology must be used with the technology skill only available to some classes and is basically a sci-fi version of spells.

Hits are hitpoints.

Power is like ammo and used when shooting weapons.

The group you pick determines which zone of the underworld you start in, and seems to affect your starting stats as well. […] Weapons use up power when you fire them, so you only have a limited number of shots before you have to return to base and recharge.

Rating I don’t know, perhaps an overall rating of the stats that have been rolled? The stat screen in the character creation flow allows you to reroll as much as you want. Once you’re happy with your stats you can move on to choosing an occupation.

Occupation / Class

The occupations are all quite novel as this is the first ever sci-fi RPG. Certain classes are stat locked and require minmum rolls.

You have a choice from:

• Leader
• Techno
• Soldier
• Hunter
• Spy
• Medic
• Assassin
• Holy Man

After choosing your occupation, you’re invited to enter a name and dumped back to the start screen to begin a new game.

Exploration

The game has grid based movement, a first person perspective, sprites for monsters and simple line art to draw the level geometry. Levels are preauthored not randomly generated. There is a suprising amount of animation which is something previous PLATO RPGs didn’t do. For instance if you find battery is moves down the screen and rotates.

Levels have different monsters associated with each and the starting levels have a few monster but are relatively safe.

The player can use the W, A, D and X keys as arrow keys to move around the 3D world and shift-w is used to move through a door. Like many PLATO games moving through a door is a special action which is a legacy of Dungeons and Dragons. The walls graphics have a bit more flavour to them than the likes of Moria or Oubliette. The doors have boards nailed across them, a confusing bit of visual language, the board suggests you can’t pass but you can. Once you pass through a door, the board remains over it.

The levels themselves have various special grid positions such as elevators, staircases, rubble, land mines and toxic waste, to name a few.

Landmines can be shot with your gun to trigger them, an interaction that is suprisingly modern.

In the explore state there are numerous actions a player can take, most are involved with equipment, using items or technology and dealing with multiplayer parties.

Combat

Due to the multiplayer aspect of Futurewar the combat is semi-realtime. This means if you stand there doing nothing, then enemy will continual attack you until you die.

Futurewar has ranged combat with the gun and you can also use this in close quarters when you enter combat. In close combat you may use a melee weapon to attack. It’s the standard RPG fare; equipped armor reduces the damage the enemy inflicts and the weapons you have increase the damage you deal out.

The combat is round based, you can choose to fight, then shoot on your next round or choose to flee. This is an innovation that came in with Moria. Earlier RPGs ran the entire combat state automatically and to the death.

The monsters include lice, grubs, skeletons, robots and mutants. Quite a carnival of opponents.

Below there’s a list of the technology, items, weapons and armor to be discovered.

Progression

Progression is similar to other PLATO RPGs you need to leave the dungeon and at that point any money you’ve found is converted to XP and any levels you’ve gain by collecting XP are awarded.

Each level gives a boost to Hits and Power. Stats may also be increased but that doesn’t happen everytime.

Killing monsters earns you experience, which can be used to gain levels when you return to base to recharge. Gaining levels increases Hits and Power, and also grants the occasional boost to your stats. Some monsters I’ve fought only grant a single point of experience, while others are worth hundreds. My current character, an American named Chuck, has 34,726 experience and has reached 6th level. […] the money you take back to base converts into experience points, at a rate of one experience per dollar.

Legacy

Futurewar doesn’t get mentioned much when creators talk about influences but it had a number of firsts.

Sci-fi Setting - the first CRPG to break away from a fantasy setting.

Anticipates the FPS genre - running around a maze, shooting mutants with a shotgun, it’s a story as old as 1977.