The Sumerian Game A digital resurrection
Date: 2024-10-31T23:00:00+00:00
Description: The Sumerian Game A Digital Resurrection Andrea Contato Copertina Paul Stinson Impaginazione Mauro Corbetta © 2024 Andrea Contato All rights reserved No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in, or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission.
Publisher: Retroedicola Videoludica Editore

The Sumerian Game:

A Digital Resurrection

Andrea Contato

(2024)

Preface

The Sumerian Game is one of the earliest known computer games and one of the most influential, alongside Spacewar! and Colossal Cave Adventure. However, its successor, Hamurabi, gained widespread popularity following the trajectory of the games by Steve Russell and Will Crowther, while The Sumerian Game remained confined to a small circle and eventually faded into obscurity.

The rediscovery of The Sumerian Game is relatively recent, and its strong appeal to enthusiasts and researchers is partly due to its undeniable importance and partly to its status as a game seemingly lost forever.

But is that really the case?

By the mid-1960s, the first terminals equipped with displays became available, but they were costly and delicate, and teletypes remained the primary and most widespread interface between users and computers, especially in schools where cost was a decisive factor. If this hadn't happened, we would have lost forever much of our current understanding of The Sumerian Game. However, despite the loss of its source code, parts of The Sumerian Game survived thanks to long printouts of gameplay outputs, some published in official reports and others preserved by participants in the joint IBM and BOCES experiment.

Studying these output listings allows us to understand in detail how the games unfolded, what the main challenges were for students, and what caused them the most difficulty. By carefully analyzing the few surviving pages, we can accurately extract the text and the narrative techniques that transformed the educational game from classroom activities to printed paper using a sophisticated computer system.

Once the surviving listings were found and thoroughly studied, some important questions remained: Can the game be restored? To what degree of precision? What has been lost forever, and what can be reconstructed?

After spending many years studying The Sumerian Game, I came to the conclusion that in order to answer these questions, we must first attempt to reconstruct the game and then, in retrospect, assess what has survived and what has not. This also led to another, perhaps even more important, question: Is it meaningful to reconstruct The Sumerian Game?

I leave the answer of this question to the readers and players.

Part I: The Sumerian Game

Apart from the lack of available sources, one of the difficulties in describing the events that led to the creation of The Sumerian Game is the inability to pinpoint a precise date of its completion. In the absence of a commercial release date and due to conflicting dates in surviving documents regarding different versions of the game, it is currently impossible to definitively state when the developers considered it complete or in a satisfactory state. Contrary to popular belief, the development of The Sumerian Game continued for at least five years beyond the significant date of 1967, often regarded as the final year.

It is easier, however, to give an approximate start date for the project, often cited as the summer of 1962. During this time, representatives from the Westchester County school district, IBM delegates, and researchers from the Boards of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES) of New York met for a workshop with the intent of exploring the use of computers to teach young students in the area. However, even in this case, the chain of events that led to the creation of The Sumerian Game had already been set in motion at least two years earlier, by two men who, since 1960, had been contemplating, with high expectations, the possibility of introducing computers into schools to teach in a more effective and personalized way.

These two individuals were Bruce Moncreiff and Noble Gividen.

Born in Nashville, Tennessee, on May 26, 1919, Moncreiff was the son of William Franklin Moncreiff and Edna Lovina Bruse, both teachers. This is a curious detail given the interest their descendant would later show in education and the role he would play in the story of The Sumerian Game.

Moncreiff: “Both parents were teachers and school administrators. My father was a University of Chicago trained mathematician and one time head of the Mathematics Department of the Nashville Public schools. My mother, thirty years his junior, was trained at the Dekalb Normal School. They were separated soon after I was born; mother returning to her parents home, where I was raised. She taught the rest of her life, serving as principal of a large elementary school in Melrose Park, Illinois in the 20s and 30s. Teachers sample textbooks and the N.E.A.[1] Journal were all commonplace in our home. My grandfather, a surrogate father, was a church leader, a unionist and a political liberal.”[2]

The absence of his father and undiagnosed vision problems until the age of 11 marked Moncreiff's childhood, hindering his performance in primary school and leading teachers to label him as unruly and problematic. His mother resolved the situation by transferring him to the school under her supervision, citing his high IQ and her teaching skills as justification. In this new environment, despite attending advanced courses, Moncreiff excelled. He later attended Proviso Township High School in Maywood (1931-1936), where he pursued a college preparatory course. However, as he later wrote in his autobiography, Moncreiff “'took' a college preparatory course, but really majored in 'Band' and 'Orchestra,' playing the French Horn.”[3]

Picture 1: The Proviso Township High School band, as pictured in the 1936 yearbook. Bruce Moncreiff is standing, second from the right.

Too young to enroll directly in university, he attended Oak Park Jr. College for a year, benefiting from small classes and inspiring teachers, a rarity in his previous experience. After this brief period, in September 1937, Moncreiff entered the University of Illinois, majoring in philosophy. It was at this institution that he made a significant and formative discovery that would lead his life in an unpredictable direction.

Moncreiff: “My Three years at Illinois were distinguished only by discovery of formal philosophy, to which I immediately became addicted.”[4]

After earning a bachelor's degree in philosophy in 1940, Moncreiff, encouraged by his tutors at the University of Illinois, accepted an offer from the University of Chicago, where he transferred to complete his studies with a scholarship. Unfortunately, his mother Edna became seriously ill and died six months later, on January 16, 1942, at only 51 years old. Moncreiff had no choice but to return to the University of Illinois to continue his studies part-time, finding employment at General Electric in Fort Wayne. There, in addition to learning the basics of industrial engineering, he had the fortune of meeting his future first wife, Virginia Elizabeth Sanders. In 1943, he was enlisted in the US Navy and assigned to the Inductee Special Assignment; he remained in the service until 1946, when he was discharged with the final rank of Pharmacy Mate, 2nd Class, and returned to his studies, completing them at Harvard.

Picture 2: Profile of Brise Moncreiff, from the yearbook of Proviso Township High School, year 1936.

Moncreiff noted in his autobiography: “After the Second World War, he pursued a graduate program in Philosophy and the History of Science at Harvard University, where he was discovered by Edmund Berkeley[5] who recruited him for the Prudential Insurance Company.”[6]

Berkeley had also graduated in mathematics and logic from Harvard, after which he began working for an insurance company, Prudential Insurance, eventually becoming head of research. He also served in the US Navy during the war years, working in research laboratories on the development of the Harvard Mark II, a large computer that used relay technology to help the Navy perform complex ballistic calculations.

After the war, Berkeley returned to Prudential but stayed only long enough to recruit Moncreiff into a management training program. Upon completing the one-year course, Berkeley had already left Prudential due to serious disagreements with the company's management, who were reluctant to support the researcher's interests, particularly his strong advocacy of the nuclear threat. Nevertheless, Moncreiff decided to follow in the footsteps of his mentor.

Moncreiff: “My request for assignment to the Methods Department was approved, where I worked on a variety of preparatory planning for the advent of large scale computers, in particular the Univac. I did systems planning, functional specifications, and programming designed to test machine codes. In the six years at the Prudential I was promoted several times, ultimately to Senior Methods Analyst in charge of a department of approximately 65 people engaged in systems research and development.”[7]

Despite the brief stint at GE in the early 1950s, Moncreiff began to desire a return to research and considered seeking employment at IBM. The opportunity didn't arise immediately. First, Moncreiff decided to leave Prudential to spend a year at the Battelle Memorial Institute, where he worked on a logistics research project for the Air Force. The project moved to the RAND Corporation in 1953, prompting Moncreiff to relocate to Santa Monica.

Moncreiff: “Two months after moving to Santa Monica, I contracted polio; returning to work part time after six months. RAND was kind through all these troubles, but it was my feeling that they would be slow to give me any managerial responsibility. So, after almost two years, I accepted a position as Data Processing Manager with AiResearch Manufacturing Company in Los Angeles. The project was to help them get a computer system installed to do manufacturing control.”[8]

Though unfortunate, his time at RAND gave Moncreiff valuable opportunities to gain experience and grow professionally. RAND Corporation did not have the machines familiar to Moncreiff, like the UNIVAC, but instead had a new mainframe from a competitor: the IBM 702. The project, which began at Battelle Memorial Institute and concluded at RAND Corporation, was particularly fruitful for Moncreiff because it allowed him to familiarize himself with IBM's new computer—something that would later help him realize his desire to work for the Armonk-based company. On the other hand, working with the IBM 702 led him to certain realizations that would unexpectedly shape his future.

While technologically advanced, the IBM computer was still quite rudimentary. Due to its high cost, it was essential to keep the machine running continuously. Yet, to operate nonstop, it required constant monitoring and intervention by highly specialized technicians, who had to swap magnetic tapes, oversee task execution, and ensure the computer's functionality. This was a complex task, now automated by operating systems in modern computers. Back then, it was often repetitive, with long periods of downtime followed by bursts of frantic activity, creating an environment prone to human error. Moncreiff noticed this and began contemplating the possibility of automating these operations, allowing the machine to manage itself. He called it “automatic supervisor” and presented the concept in a paper at the Western Joint Computer Conference from February 7 to 9, 1956.

Moncreiff: “Very little experience has been accumulated in the operation of a large commercial data-processing center. However, reflection on the subject has led to the conclusion that, in the large-scale operation of such a system, there will be a different emphasis from the one usually present in the operation of a large-scale computing installation. The general administrative problem in both cases is, of course, to keep both staff and equipment operating efficiently. In the latter case, however, the emphasis is on new problem preparation, while in the case of the business application the emphasis must be on the efficient day-after-day operation of the same routines. The automatic supervisory routine described here is an attempt to solve those operating and programming problems peculiar to this routine-dominated situation. The excuse for solving these problems with a machine program, rather than by instructions to the operator, is two fold: 1. The human operator cannot compete in speed with the machine in making routine decisions and in controlling the processing operations. 2. The human operator is more likely to make mistakes in carrying out routine instructions. The purpose of a supervisory routine is, therefore, to keep the machine running efficiently in spite of the slowness and fallibility of the human operator. The various aspects of the proposed supervisory routine will be approached by looking at these problems of both operator and programmer which the routine helps solve. A summary description of the way the routine works will follow.”[9]

His theories proved useful when he led a team of programmers to develop an automatic production control system for jet engines at AiResearch Manufacturing Company, a division of Garrett Corporation. After completing this task, in the fall of 1957, he joined IBM, working on the IBM 7030, known as Stretch. This was IBM's first attempt at building a fully transistorized machine, more compact, lightweight, cost-effective, and powerful than bulky vacuum-tube mainframes. However, the project faltered to the point that IBM's management decided to cancel it, delivering only the pre-ordered machines and scrapping the commercial launch.

With the closure of the Stretch project, Moncreiff was transferred to the Advanced Systems Development Division (ASDD) and assigned to work on “a new integrated programming language and operating system,” which later became known as PL/I. Shortly thereafter, at his specific request, he was moved to research in the field of educational technology. In this role, whenever a school or research institute expressed interest in exploring, alongside IBM, the possibility of using computers for education, Moncreiff became the point of reference for various projects. In the following years, until his early retirement from IBM—due to dissatisfaction over the lack of recognition for his contributions and philosophical differences regarding the goals of ASDD research—Moncreiff was extremely prolific in initiating research projects across the United States.

Picture 3: Bruce Moncreiff, as portrayed in the biweekly magazine The Reporter of New York. IBM purchased a two-page spread in the December 14, 1967 edition to showcase the company's dedication to student education, selecting Moncreiff as the public face of the initiative. The headline read: “This philosopher wants tomorrow's students to get the best teaching possible—with or without computers. What's he doing at IBM?”

In California, at UCLA, he collaborated with music professor Wolfgang Kuhn and IBM colleague Jerome D. Harr to create an interface for the IBM 1620, installed at the Advanced Systems Development Division in Los Gatos, to recognize students' solfeggio, indicate their voice type (“low” or “high” for male or female), and calculate the deviation from the perfect note with a margin of error between 1% and 4%. The system functioned by playing a taped recording, instructing the student to sing the notes into a computer-connected microphone. The program analyzed the students' singing, asking them to repeat the exercise if necessary or moving on to the next task, eventually providing a detailed report on the results of the entire exercise. According to Professor Kuhn, the system worked reliably, producing only one erroneous output out of 10,000 tests.

Kuhn was an advocate of the Suzuki method of music teaching, based on listening, imitation, and repetition. In the final report, it was noted that “Professor Kuhn, who used a small Music Department allocation for his study, foresees the day when a complete curriculum in melodic, rhythmic, and harmonic sight-singing and dictation could be computerized and adapted for any level of musical development. He also envisions instructional systems for learning to play instruments.”[10]

And so it was, a few years later, when the system developed by Kuhn, Moncreiff, and Harr, completed by 1967 and quickly dubbed by the press as the “singing computer,” became the foundation for MusicMaster, a software for the Apple II. Thanks to an accessory card produced by Mountain Computer, MusicMaster could interface with an alphaSyntauri keyboard to teach music to users.

In Texas, Moncreiff spearheaded the development of software designed to simulate a chemistry lab, described as follows: “The University of Texas has done some very interesting work in CAI[11] in various areas. They have a simulated chemistry laboratory for freshman students in which a CAI terminal is used in place of laboratory experience. The student goes to the terminal just as he would go to the laboratory. He may be shown a slide or told by the typewriter that he has a test tube of colorless liquid. The computer simulates the laboratory experiment. In another program, Math preskill CAI courses are made available to students to teach the mathematical skills necessary to pass freshman chemistry.”[12]

Moncreiff was set along this path after IBM was contacted by a New York school official by the name of Noble Gividen.

Born just a few months before Moncreiff, on February 9, 1919, in Jericho, Kentucky, Gividen was the son of a carpenter, Noble Streeter Gividen, and Cecelia Elizabeth Barnes. From a young age, Noble had embarked on the educational path that would lead him to become a young and brilliant school administrator, launching a multi-decade career in institutions across various American states. After attending Middletown High School, he moved to Indiana, to Taylor University, where he obtained a BA in Education.

The army called him up for military service in February 1942, sent him to Fort Wayne for training, and then stationed him in Grand Rapids, Michigan, for meteorological service. Gividen's life and plans remained unaffected by his three-year military stint until 1945; he continued his studies and even found time to play basketball, a sport he excelled in, earning selection for both the school's representative team and the Army's Goldbricks team. Furthermore, on June 23, 1942, he tied the knot with Frances Knight, a fellow student from Taylor University who went on to become a teacher.

Picture 4: The league-winning team, the Goldbricks, in a photo published in Chanute Fields Wings on April 7, 1945. From the caption: “BOMBER LEAGUE CHAMPIONS, the 'Goldbricks,' have won five, dropped one-and that was on forfeit because they didn't know the game was to be played that day. They are, left to right, Noble Gividen (high scorer), Leon Stewart, Bennett Silver, Norton Karp, Frank Ault, and Louis P. Cundiff.”

After being discharged in 1945 with the rank of Staff Sgt., Gividen returned to university, this time at Teachers College, Columbia University, where he earned an MA and an Ed.D. He then immediately obtained his first position as principal of Rock Falls High School, Iowa. Interestingly, in addition to running the school, he also became the basketball coach.

In the following years, Gividen continued his career as a school administrator, becoming the principal of Ventura High School. In 1953, Gividen tied the knot for the second time with Mariys Jean Christinsen. The following year, he secured his first appointment as a school superintendent at Norway High School. In June, he secured another position as a superintendent at Audubon High School, before assuming the role of County Superintendent of Schools in 1955. Helen Vianna Teter[13], who had previously served as the superintendent of the elementary school and a teacher in the country's rural schools, took his place at Audubon High School. The meeting with Teter was particularly timely because throughout 1956 Gividen found himself at the center of a series of major reforms to reorganize and merge 7 school districts and 23 rural schools into a single entity that would be named Exira Community School District.

After organizing the votes to allow citizens to express their opinions on the reform, in the summer of 1956, Gividen resigned from Superintendent of Schools to become a consultant for the Iowa State Department of Public Instruction. Gividen received this prestigious position at a critical juncture, as the reorganization he spearheaded in his supervised schools had expanded to the entire state of Iowa, aiming to control costs and improve the quality of education for students, particularly those in rural areas. Yet, after just under two years, in May 1958, Gividen decided to leave the office and move to Columbia University in New York to step away from practical work, step back, and return to study and research.

The Ford Foundation's funding enabled Columbia University to launch an important project in 1956 that aimed to reorganize schools, particularly smaller ones. The project was named the Catskill Area Project in Small School Design (CAPSSD), and Gividen, already a part-time lecturer at Columbia, was offered the prestigious role of director of the study group. The challenges that CAPSSD faced were numerous and demanding.

Picture 5: Young people study different courses in the same classroom, from the article Ford Foundation Renews Catskill Teaching Grant in the Press and Sun Bulletin, August 16, 1960. The caption: “LEARNING MULTIPLIED – Pupils in a multiple class in English at Margaretville Central School wear headphones to hear a recorded version of a Shakespeare play without disturbing nearby students. Multiple class techniques allow one teacher to instruct more than one class in a single room. The Catskill Area Project in Small School Design is developing multiple class techniques.”

Citing the final report from the 1944 White House Conference on Rural Education, Gividen wrote: “Every rural child has the right to a satisfactory, modern secondary education. This education should ensure continued progress in their general, physical, social, civic, and cultural development begun in elementary school, provide initial training for farming or other occupations, and offer an open door to college and professions.”

The situation in non-metropolitan New York schools was very similar to what Gividen had encountered in Iowa. A single teacher often taught students in rural areas in tiny school buildings, known as “one-room schools,” alongside pupils of various ages. The teacher was responsible for instructing mixed-age groups of students in various subjects, often using limited resources such as a blackboard, textbooks, and wooden desks. A stove was located in the center of the room to heat the building.

When school administrations faced these enormous challenges, their most common solution was to consolidate students into larger institutions by closing the smaller ones. This was a cost-cutting policy, but it did not bring significant benefits to students, who had to travel longer distances to attend school and still lacked increased educational opportunities.

Gividen: “There has been considerable progress in school district reorganization, teachers' salaries, transportational the educational attainment of rural adults, and in development of the intermediate unit. There is still much to be done about school mergers, teacher improvement, the problems of the disadvantaged. groups - but the primary problem of secondary education in rural areas is curricular improvement of the small high school (under 300 students in grades 9-12). While continued attention to school district reorganization is needed, too many states have allowed their merger programs to be the only approach to the improvement of rural secondary education. Except for those schools fortunate enough to be significantly influenced by the Catskill Area Project in Small School Design, The Rocky Mountain Area Project, The Texas Small Schools Project and the Western States Small Schools Project, most small high schools will continue to have woefully weak educational programs.”[14]

Over the next two years, Gividen's team developed a series of solutions to provide teachers in small schools with better tools to operate under challenging circumstances. One of the most effective approaches was the use of audio courses recorded on vinyl, which students could listen to with headphones. This method allowed students of different ages to study in the same room without causing disruption. Teachers soon adapted it for groups of the same age but with varying learning levels, enabling them to tailor lessons to students' abilities: basic, intermediate, and advanced.

New technologies were not only a tool for improving teaching but also for school administration. In 1959, Gividen became involved in a study on using computers for school scheduling. The results, presented in the report Guidebook on Flexible Scheduling: A Report of the Study Group on Flexible Scheduling, were promising, but the study group noted that despite rapidly declining costs, computer use was still too expensive to be practical for smaller schools, which were the focus of CAPSSD's research: “The mathematician [Dr. Nathan Jaspen] then went on to explain that the use of the electronic computer to assist in scheduling is not financially realistic at the present time. Were it not for Jasper's special access to the IBM machines he would have lost a considerable sum in the scheduling he has done to date (at a cost of one dollar per student). It takes about one minute of machine time to process each student, but the rent on the computer (the IBM #650) is eighty dollars per hour. This alone would represent a loss of one dollar for every three students. However, continued study should lower the machinetime to twenty or thirty seconds per student, thus making the process more reasonable financially. [...] The use of the computer in scheduling small schools is apparently not currently feasible”[15]

In the second half of 1960, without abandoning his research on teaching in rural schools, Gividen made the final step that would lead him to his historical appointment. In September, he resigned from the CAPSSD to become the superintendent of the Westchester County school district.

Picture 6: From the Press and Sun Bulletin of October 22, 1960: “Dr. Royal F. Netzer, left, president of the State University College of Education in Oneonta, congratulates Dr. Noble J. Gividen, center, who is leaving his role as coordinator of the Catskill Area Project in Small School Design for a new position. The new coordinator is Dr. James J. Samson, right.”

The issues he encountered were similar to those he had faced in Iowa and those for which he had prepared at Columbia University and researched at CAPSSD. Westchester County, comprising the districts of Yorktown, Somers, Montrose, Katonah-Lewisboro, North Salem, Croton-Harmon, Briarcliff, Lakeland, Chappaqua, and Bedford Central, was predominantly rural, with many small settlements. Schools were already undergoing reorganization, with the closure of smaller schools and the relocation of students to larger facilities in more populated centers. As Gividen and his team had envisioned, this operation solved only part of the problem, as the educational offerings remained inadequate—a point Gividen was eager to address immediately.

One of Gividen's first initiatives was to secure funds to improve school facilities and educational offerings. In the first half of 1961, his efforts began to bear fruit in the form of a federal grant of $50,000 to study new teaching systems. With this initial funding, Gividen promoted a series of workshops with teachers to gather and evaluate new ideas, such as “team teaching, length of school days and length of class periods, teaching machines, use of such adjuncts as TV, language laboratories, small group instruction, advanced courses for possible college credit, and a dozen other things.”[16]

Additionally, Mohansic School in Yorktown established two special rooms with teaching tools for disabled children.

For Gividen, the search for new tools was crucial.

Since the 1920s, researchers have explored the experimental use of training machines, but World War II significantly accelerated research into fast and effective systems when it became necessary to call up and train a large number of people. One of the most commonly used techniques was the projection of short informational films. In some areas, this technique proved quite effective, but in training for practical operations, the lack of interactivity negatively impacted the personnel's learning.

During the 1950s, the influence of the pioneering work of behaviorist Burrhus Frederic Skinner[17] was strong in the United States. Practically speaking, one of Skinner's core theories was that teaching was more effective when done in small, incremental steps, followed by immediate rewards or gratification as positive reinforcement.

Numerous researchers, including Gividen, began to consider how to leverage new technologies after Skinner's work laid the foundation for what would later be known as Programmed Learning. One of the most innovative and promising tools was the computer, due to its versatility and ability to manage non-linear learning paths, regardless of the subject. Always up to date on the topic, Gividen knew that computers had already been successfully used to train highly specialized personnel, such as airplane pilots. Remembering the work of his colleague Nathan Jaspen, he also knew that costs were rapidly decreasing and that computers would soon be a valuable tool for administrative tasks, freeing up resources to be directly dedicated to students.

Gividen: “In the future rural youth will be served by larger consolidated schools and by small schools which are physically patterned after the schools shown in Designs for Small High Schools [...] Students will be able to work in simulated and research environments such as university laboratories centers, the Library of Congress, atomic energy laboratories. They may be able to play the role of a priest-king in Sumeria and study problems of agricultural productivity, storage of crops, transportation methods, communications and technology, and they can make decisions and see the consequences of their decisions with respect to the economy and culture of the ancient country. Computerized courses are used by industry to train employees, why should they not be used in rural education? Some students will travel to central facilities operated by an intermediate unit for special or technical education. Specialized testing will be handled by the computer and specialized counseling handled by regular staff members or by itinerant persons from the intermediate unit. Schedules of teaching-learning activity will be modular and quite irregular. Time will become the servant of the student, accommodating his need for field trips, and for remedial attention to some subjects. Short and frequent periods of practice will be provided in skill subjects and longer periods will allow reflection and discussion of important concepts, problems and issues with peers and teachers. The French Student in a remote mountain school may see his 'live' teacher only on Monday mornings (she will be teaching in three or four other schools on the other days) but he will have synchronized audio and visual practice sessions with the computer and be able to talk periodically with the teacher by phones either by voice, typewriter, or both. Teachers in small rural schools will be versatile and be able to assist students in several subjects, but they will be relieved of some of the information-giving tasks which can be handled automatically. They will thus have time to study individual students and their learning needs. Though the computer is at a central location the teacher can get inservice education at a carrel, and she can use the typewriter console to modify a particular computer program for a particular student due to react to the program the next day.”[18]

According to Gividen, this was the school of the future, but to achieve it, he needed more money and the support of a company with the necessary technical capabilities. He could use federal funds and the Ford Foundation, with which he had worked well during his two years as CAPSSD director, to overcome the first obstacle. For the second, the ideal company was fortunately very close, headquartered in the very district overseen by Gividen—International Business Machines Corporation, based in Armonk, better known as IBM.

Picture 7: The Gividen family, as depicted in The Reporter Dispatch on November 21, 1960: Noble Gividen with his third wife, Marlys Kroese, and their children Luke, Susie, and Kathy.

In early 1962, Gividen informally contacted IBM to see if conditions were favorable for initiating a research project on the use of computers in education and for starting an experimental program to digitize the administrative side. IBM officials immediately informed Bruce Moncreiff of the opportunity, and the philosopher moved with his wife and children to Katonah.

Moncreiff: “It was apparent in the Spring of 1962 that several people were working on the development of simulation models intended for teaching. The term 'simulated environment' was coined to describe these efforts, and a two-day seminar with that title was held in June, 1962 at the Thomas A. Watson Research Laboratory of IBM. This served to bring the then known investigators together. Plans were made for a summer workshop jointly sponsored by IBM and the Board of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES) of Northern Westchester. The goal of the summer session was the construction of several simulated environments using readily available audio-visual techniques; but developed in such a way that they could be converted for presentation by computer-teaching machine when these became available.”[19]

In the following August, at the BOCES facility in Yorktown, delegates from the Advanced Systems Development Division of Yorktown Heights met with a small delegation of ten teachers from Westchester County. Bruce Moncreiff and James Dineen, representing IBM, led the workshop with the assistance of Dr. Richard Lawrence Wing from BOCES, who would later lead the project as a supervisor and document all the process in his reports.

Born on July 11, 1918, in New Bedford, Massachusetts, to Lawrence Potter Wing, a veteran of both world wars and a cashier at the New Bedford Five Cents Savings Bank, and Mildred Cushman Deane, a distant descendant of the Mayflower passengers, Wing studied at Harvard, where he earned both his bachelor's degree and a doctorate in comparative education. After completing his studies, he served in the army during World War II and later in the Korean War. At the end of the two conflicts, discharged with the rank of captain, he returned to the United States, met his future wife Marcia Crichton, moved to California, and had his daughter Debbie. A lover of travel and deeply passionate about teaching, Wing never stayed in one place for too long. In the late 1950s, he returned to Europe for the first time since the war, spending two years in the Netherlands, where he had the opportunity to study the Dutch school system, and then lived for an extended period in Paris, France, as an educational consultant.

Picture 8: Richard Wing, portrayed by the Patent Trader on the occasion of his return to BOCES in the December 16, 1971 edition.

Throughout his career, Wing collaborated with William H. Burton[20] and Roland B. Kimball[21] on a significant study titled Education for Effective Thinking: An Introductory Text. The book aimed to guide teachers and educators, not to instruct readers on how to enhance their thinking skills. In response to the question, “Can we teach anyone how to think?” the authors explained, “We can aid individuals to improve the natural abilities they possess and the natural processes they use. We can aid individuals to recognize and be sensitive to certain conventions and processes of valid thought, to certain pitfalls, fallacies, and sources of error. Certain general methods can be developed by teachers. We have made an earnest effort in this volume to set forth the outlines of these general methods of teaching.”[22]

Upon returning to the United States, Wing moved north of New York and joined BOCES. His passion for teaching led to his appointment as Curriculum Research Coordinator in 1962, coinciding with the start of Gividen's project. Tasked with overseeing the collaboration with IBM, Wing was the impartial observer responsible for collecting and evaluating data to report to BOCES. His diligent work preserved much of the information about The Sumerian Game.

In the months leading up to the workshop, Moncreiff had thoroughly studied the available technology and reviewed the work of other researchers in creating teaching simulations. Many subjects had been considered for instruction, with Wing listing several in his report: architecture, arithmetic, biology, chemistry, programming, accounting, economics, electrical engineering, science, German language, mathematics, medicine, music, physics, career counseling, political science, psychology, reading, spelling, and statistics.

However, Wing noted that many of these projects were fragmented and mainly focused on older students in high school or college, while the current research targeted much younger students in elementary school. The assembly quickly narrowed down the list of possible subjects, but Moncreiff had something simpler in mind, yet more engaging for such young students.

Moncreiff: “The idea of construction a computer model of the ancient Sumerian civilization which could be used for teaching basic economics drew its inspiration from many sources: Rousseau's Emile; Dewey's emphasis on the problematic situation; a paper entitled Teaching through Participation in Micro-simulations of Social Organization by Richard L. Meier delivered at the AAAS meeting in 1961; the first chapter of Harrison Brown's The challenge of the Future, in which he discusses the origin of civilization in the Near East river valleys; a luncheon conversation with sociologist James Coleman of The John Hopkins University; and finally a PTA meeting at which the fourth-grade social studies curriculum was discussed.”[23]

The idea proposed by Moncreiff, a historical setting for an economic simulation game, was soon accepted by the assembly. The decision to set the simulation in the ancient land of Sumer had another reason besides the influence of the previously mentioned authors. Wing, quoting Moncreiff, noted this in his final report from 1967: “The immediate reason for the choice of the Sumerians was 'to protest against the growing tendency in school curricula to ignore the pre-Greek civilizations, in spite of the growing weight of scholarly evidence as to the important role which this prehistory and early history should play in our understanding of the processes by which our society has come to be what it is. Children and others have identified the development of settled farming - the domestication of food, plants and animals - as a necessary forerunner of urban, civilized, social organization. This transformation first occurred in lasting form in the river valleys of Mesopotamia, Egypt, and India. It is ironic that as scholarship was discovering the importance of understanding this technological, economic and social revolution, school authorities were dropping the topic from the social studies curriculum.'”[24]

Picture 9: Mabel Holmes, from the 1933 yearbook of Barnard College.

A teacher at the workshop, a young history graduate with a particular interest in the pre-classical period, shared Moncreiff's concern over the limited attention given to pre-classical societies in school curricula. Her name was Mabel Addis.

Born Mabel Lorene Holmes, she was the daughter of James P. Holmes, a veteran of the Spanish-American War of 1898 and a former soldier in the 71st New York Volunteers, and Mabel Wood Holmes. In 1911, James Holmes left the army as a First Lieutenant and found work in the building materials trade in Mt. Vernon, New York, where Mabel was born on May 21, 1912. The family moved to Brewster in 1922, actively participating in the small rural community's activities. Apart from James, who maintained close ties with the military, everyone in the family played an instrument: his wife and daughter played the piano, while their son Alden, a carpenter, played the violin.

From a young age, Mabel showed an early interest in music, theater, and especially history. She excelled in school, winning numerous spelling competitions, earning the title of lead pianist at the Brewster Grange, and frequently featured in the local paper, The Brewster Herald. At the age of seventeen, she had the privilege of delivering the valedictory speech at Brewster High School's graduation ceremony. Of all the opportunities open to her, Mabel chose two paths: pursuing her interest in history and making it her profession—teaching. From that moment on, she dedicated her life and energy to this choice.

Picture 10: Barnard College Basketball Team 1932-33. Mabel Holmes is standing, third from the right.

After graduating from Barnard College in New York City, she deepened her studies in history and psychology and earned a master's degree in education at Teachers College, Columbia University. Despite her academic success, her first job was quite humble: a one-room school in Duanesburg, where students of all ages had only her as their teacher. Two years later, in 1937, she began teaching at Hyatt Avenue School in Mt. Kisco, where she remained for eight years. The Bedford Central School District absorbed the school in 1950, and Mabel Holmes, by then married to Alexander Lobdell Addis and known as Mabel H. Addis, joined the Katonah-Lewisboro School District staff, a position she would hold until her retirement.

It was in the Katonah-Lewisboro district that Mabel Addis's life unexpectedly intertwined with the history of video games for a few years. Alexandra Johnson, Mabel Addis's daughter, said: "[When] I graduated from high school and because college expenses would be high, my mother took a summer job at the Board of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES). She was a fourth-grade teacher at Katonah Elementary School."

Addis shared a common bond with both Moncreiff and Wing, making her the ideal person to connect the two. Similar to Wing, Addis's passion for teaching and her search for effective methods to educate her students drove her. According to Addis, the best strategy for teaching was to engage her students by offering interactive activities and, at times, turning learning into play. Her lessons often included reenactments of historical events or representations of everyday life in different historical periods. Her activities were so varied that they often appeared in The Brewster Herald, accompanied by photos of young students dressed as Greek warriors or recreating a Parisian café. Like Moncreiff, Addis shared a deep interest in the history of Mesopotamia: at Barnard College, she had been a member of the Classics Club and had majored in ancient history. Motivated by financial necessity, she applied to lead the project; with her experience and degree in history, she was the ideal candidate to bring Moncreiff's ideas from the workshop to life.

Picture 11: Wedding photo of John Alden with Mary Elizabeth on September 3, 1933. From left to right: John Alden Holmes (Mabel's brother), Mary Elizabeth Russell, Mabel Holmes, Ernest J. H. Russell (Mary's brother).

Moncreiff's vision was very clear: “As usual, the objectives of the project were developed as we went along. Two concerns arose in connection with the content of the teaching unit. If the elementary economics of the period was to be taught, it must at least be based on the best information we could get. The major problem facing the investigators was to refrain from importing market structures and price mechanisms into the model of the Sumerian economy. It seems likely that prices or rates of exchange were set by holders of religious and political power and maintained by custom. This has been described as a prescriptive economy rather than a market economy.”[25]

Historically, Addis was well-prepared, but when it came to economics, it was her first time engaging with such themes. Moncreiff's request to create a simulation game not centered around common market dynamics forced Addis into a period of reflection and research to develop an adequate model. Alexandra Johnson: “I imagine she chose to write the game about Sumer because she majored in Ancient history at Barnard College in New York City. The economics part she wasn't so sure about. That summer she brought home stacks of books to study all she could on the subject.”

There was also another challenge. Moncreiff noted: “The second content problem was that of portraying the process of economic and social development, and avoiding the easier but unsatisfactory antiquarian approach. It takes more than a set of maps, king-names, customs, and potsherds to build a socio-economic model of a civilization. Of course, it would be falsifying not to present the model to the student in terms of Sumerian artifacts, but information about artifacts is just not enough. There must also be a model that includes the functional relationships between the major economic and social variables.”[26]

With these inputs, Addis began her work, consulting the most recent works on the subject, including Life in the Ancient World by Bart Winer, illustrated by Steele Savage (1961), Everyday Life in Ancient Times by H.M. Herget (1951 reprint), The First 3000 Years: Ancient Civilizations of the Tigris by Charles Buckles (1960), Land of the Two Rivers by Richard M. Powers (1962), and The Dawn of Civilization by Stuart Piggott (1961).

At this stage, the mission of Addis and the public school teachers from Northern Westchester was to formulate a simulation project to teach each of the eight subjects selected during the summer workshop. IBM provided them with audiovisual equipment, but the workshop lacked computers. As a result, the team developed formal rules and procedures to mimic the behavior of a hypothetical computer system, often referred to as a “paper computer.”

The workshop concluded with the selection and development of eight subjects for potential simulations. In a December 30, 1962 issue of Patent Trader, journalist Joan Booth detailed the process and announced the submission of the joint IBM-BOCES project to the Cooperative Research Branch of the U.S. Office of Education: “Last summer, as one of the areas under investigation, the study team set up a simple theoretical model and tried to program it. The results, as far as they went, were encouraging, but a computer will be needed before much more can be done. That study was called The Sumerian Play. A sort of game, it was based on a simple model of the ancient Sumerian economy. A student was assigned the role of Priest King. In lieu of a teaching machine, the role of adviser to the king was played by a teacher. The model - the assembled data taken into account - involved only population growth, productivity of land, amount of arable land, and capital invested in irrigation. The research team then telescoped 1.500 years of Sumerian technological innovation, listing inventions beginning with the wheel. A card would be handed to the student playing Priest King. It might say: 'The Wheel has been invented.' for example. The king would have to decide whether wheels should be put on all vehicles or any. Then the adviser would 'go aboard' in the land, look around, and report back on the effect of the king's wheel order. Getting crops to market sooner might step up the whole economy, create more leisure and lead to further inventions, for instance. In a fully programmed situation, the automatic device would take over the role of adviser, flashing effects reports for every decision the student makes.”

In addition to The Sumerian Game (then known as The Sumerian Play), Moncreiff also mentioned a second project to Booth—a virtual chemistry lab, a project that would later be completed by the Universities of Texas and Florida, driven by IBM's philosopher. Booth continues: “This concept, refined, could provide a far more sophisticated and realistic method of teaching economics, history, sociology and the like than present day classroom lecture and textbook methods. But to refine the concept, extremely complicated mathematical models would have to be created for each historical, economical, sociological or political era being studied in order to take account of a wide range of cause and effect relationships. This would be true whether the course was a junior, high school or college level. Surprisingly, to the layman at least, some science courses are easier to program. Last summer's study team went a long way towards assembling material for the standard qualitative analysis course in chemistry usually given to college sophomores. The aim of the course is to teach procedures for analyzing substances, thus demonstrating some fundamentals of chemistry. The research aim was to eliminate the necessity for the student to manipulate laboratory equipment - a distracting process to the novitiate - and leave him free to concentrate on the principles of chemistry. To do this, researchers made about 300 color slides, constituting a step-by-step demonstration of classic lab experiments for the course. The team also began tabulating all possible errors students could make as they go through the experiments. When this programming is finished, a student should be able to see the first slide in any given experiment, choose what he believes is the proper second step, and then see the result of this choice flashed on the screen, before him. There will even be 'explosion' slides, to confront the student who 'adds' a catastrophic precipitant to the initial chemical.”

During the long interview, Moncreiff explained to Booth the ultimate goal of the project, showing a clear alignment of his ideas with Gividen's vision for the future of education: “The teacher is, after all, only an audiovisual device with blood and veins, into which various information has been programmed. She simply repeats it to the pupil. This is the process we could automate. Then the teacher's role would be as a guidance specialist, to decide what particular phases of a subject the student should study, and to relate these subjects to others.”

Moncreiff's view did not sit well with a reader of The Patent Trader, Nancy Malawista from Pound Ridge, who wrote a letter to the editor published on January 6, 1963. In the letter, Malawista highlighted the autobiographical reference that Moncreiff had inadvertently mentioned in the interview with Booth: “I would like to question whether Mr. Moncreiff's characterization is an adequate one, or whether it is perhaps a generalization from a very particular learning situation (that of an advanced chemistry laboratory) to all learning situations, which essentially differ from one another according to the difference in content. [...] Mr. Moncreiff speaks of the proposed new system of programming as 'freeing the teacher for individual academic guidance.' I must ask whether the activity of direct teaching, from person to person, is truly a task from which it is desirable to be freed. [...] I do not wish to idealize the task of teaching or learning, nor to glorify an activity that is often lacking. I must confess that too often bad teaching harms the student. As Mr. Moncreiff says, 'many psychological difficulties can be attributed to early school and classroom experiences,' but I do not believe that eliminating classroom situations entirely is the solution to correcting these problems. One might as well say that the remedy for human evil in the world is to eliminate people. Unfortunately, humans are fallible, as a certain old story describes them.”

Malawista's criticism prompted the philosopher to respond with another letter to The Patent Trader: “What I intended to communicate was that one of the many tasks of a teacher is the lecturing function, and if this aspect of the teacher's role could be successfully separated from other functions, there is a real possibility that it could be automated. This would benefit both the teacher and the student since it would free the instructor to devote more time to other crucial aspects of the student-teacher relationship. From my own experience as a student and teacher, and more recently from my work with the teachers in Northern Westchester, I am certainly aware of the vital role the teacher plays in student development.”

Picture 12: In the 1960s, one of the locations of the Northern Westchester BOCES was on Fox Meadow Road in Yorktown Heights, housed in eight buildings that still exist today. Much of the development and testing work for The Sumerian Game took place in Building 6, now part of the Fox Meadow High School Campus. On the right, a photograph published by The Reporter Dispatch in the August 25, 1965 edition, depicting the sign that was then in front of Building 7; on the right, a satellite image taken in the early 2020s.

While Moncreiff was publicly defending the research, not only through interviews and letters to newspapers but also via seminars and training sessions (such as the one held on December 30, 1962, at the Unitarian Fellowship of Northern Westchester titled Social Implications of the New Educational Technology[27]), Gividen was working to advance the funding request, especially as he was determined to bring computers into his schools one way or another. IBM installed the first computer center at the BOCES facility in Yorktown Heights starting in January 1963, using the computers to handle “pupil accounting and business procedures including attendance, census, and pupil progress reports for all schools in the area except Bedford II, Chappaqua, and Croton-Harmon.”[28]

With the arrival of the first computers, Nathan Jaspen's project finally materialized, and for Gividen, this was the best moment to ensure better, more precise services and free up human resources for more productive work. Once again, the Ford Foundation provided the funding for the experimental computer center, with a grant of $25,000.

Moncreiff, Dineen, and Wing's project received acceptance and funding two months later with a grant of $103,824. On March 7, 1963, the press announced: “Nine teachers[29] who participated in a joint BOCES-IBM preliminary investigation of simulation techniques have been asked to submit plans for continuing the projects they started last summer. These teachers include: Mrs. Mabel Addis, Katonah-Lewisboro; Miss Audrey Bratman[30], Montrose; Milo Guisti[31], Mrs. Mary Robinson[32], and Frank Cassetta[33], Yorktown Heights; Dr. Don Nuccio[34], Somers; Dr. Stanley Kellerhouse[35], Croton-Harmon; Andrew Jass[36], Briarcliff, and Kenneth Tice[37], Chappaqua. The Advanced Systems Development Division of IBM will participate through consulting assistance and the loan of some audiovisual equipment used during the summer study. Most of the project work will be carried out at the Northern Westchester Technology and Educational Center, Foxe Meadow Road, Yorktown Heights. [...] Preliminary studies have indicated that simulation techniques may be applied to some kinds of learning activities in such subjects fields as French, music, chemistry, biology, physics, art, and social studies.”

With the federal funds allocated, Project 1948 officially began, lasting eighteen months. The selected teachers were tasked with translating the ideas and paper-based projects conceived during the workshop into computer simulations. On March 19, 1962, Moncreiff, who had been staying in Katonah with his family, prepared to move back to San Jose[38], California, where Professor Khun's music project awaited him. While he continued to follow the project and wrote an article on it in 1965, he no longer personally oversaw the development of the game and, in effect, exited the scene.

Once the necessary funds were secured, the teachers in the Westchester County district began refining the ideas and creating simulations that could be translated into computer programs. According to Booth's article in the Patent Trader, what was missing was a mathematical system to link the student's decisions to the results the computer would generate, allowing the simulation to progress. Multiple projects moved forward during this phase: economics, represented by The Sumerian Game and later by two additional games, along with the virtual chemistry lab. Interviews from that time also mention programs for teaching music and foreign languages. While detailed information about the chemistry lab is available, the specifics of the other projects remain unclear. However, it's certain that the work progressed to the point where IBM technicians were involved in creating the necessary programming to turn the teachers' ideas into software.

For instance, the task of developing a computer lesson to teach music fell to Professor Donald Nuccio, the head of the music department at Somers Central Schools. However, he requested and received a semester-long sabbatical in April 1964. The Reporter Dispatch announced: “Dr. Donald Nuccio [...] was granted a one-semester sabbatical last night by the Board of Education. [...] He will continue a study he has begun on the use of computer-programmed lessons in teaching youngsters to play musical instruments. He told the board he thought the program would bear fruit not only in Somers but throughout the country.”[39]

Picture 13: Mary Robinson conducts a chemistry experiment while a camera records the scene and broadcasts it via closed-circuit radio to other schools in the district. The experimentation did not continue beyond 1964, partly due to the teacher's sudden and premature passing.

Other ongoing projects could have a direct or indirect connection to the collaboration with IBM and Project 1948. These projects combined new audiovisual technologies—considered key factors to explore for the final implementation of computer-assisted lessons—with traditional teaching. One example was the lessons conducted by French teacher Milo Guisti, who used a radio system to stay in contact with Susan Gerathy[40], a student recovering from two delicate surgeries. Unable to attend school, she could still participate in class thanks to a transmitter that followed her schedule from room to room.

In 1963, science teacher Mary Robinson was involved in a project to record chemistry lessons and broadcast them in real time to various classrooms, even in distant schools. This experimentation was beneficial for the computerized chemistry lab project and aligned with Gividen's vision of future schools, where rural students could attend chemistry classes via audiovisual transmissions instead of in-person labs. The Reporter Dispatch mentioned this in its January 22, 1963 edition: “For this year, Mr. Leifheit said, plans call for key lessons in science in the fourth grade, taught by Mrs. Mary Robinson, science director. She will present an introductory lesson, an intermediate lesson and a summary lesson in science units. 'TV gives you a front row seat when you need it most,' Mr. Leifheit said. 'Science demonstrations can be seen by every student in the room, as can charts and tables.' The equipment which has been bought is portable so it can be interchanged freely between Mohansic and Crompond. 'This has been done successfully in White Plains,' MR Leifheit continued, 'and each of our schools is equipped with a master antenna which facilitates this kind of use.'”

Both Milo Guisti and Mary Robinson were part of the core group of teachers involved in Project 1948, along with art teacher Frank Cassetta. The latter collaborated with music teacher H. Stratton Swain on a multidisciplinary lesson, producing a two-hour piece that blended music, art, entertainment, and education for afternoon students.

In July 1963, James Edward Allen Jr.[41], the Commissioner of Education for New York State, visited the BOCES headquarters in Bedford Hills to review the status of Project 1948. Gividen and Wing welcomed him, showcasing only two projects: The Sumerian Game and the chemistry lab. According to The Patent Trader, both projects were still in their early stages. For The Sumerian Game, teachers and students improvised a dramatization of the gameplay, while for the chemistry lab, Wing presented prepared films. In both cases, computer implementation had not yet occurred. Toward the end of the visit, Allen asked many questions, showed interest, and even made a call to the Advanced Systems Development Laboratory at IBM. No mention was made of the other courses and projects.

Picture 14: Student Barry Carrano engaging with The Sumerian Game during the first phase of testing, late summer of 1964. From the caption of the article The Latest Innovation in Teaching, which appeared in the Patent Trader on October 8, 1964: “In playing a 'game' based on an economic model [...] the student would type directions for some change in economic factors. The computer quickly figures out what this would do to the country's economy and sends its verdict over the typewriter terminal's 'printer.' Eventually, a screen will be hooked into the terminal so the computer can reply by flashing a picture.”

For the rest of 1963 and early 1964, development continued. The Sumerian Game eventually advanced beyond its prototype phase, during which it was functioning as a "paper computer" and underwent programming to operate on an actual computer. IBM provided substantial resources, including a modified IBM 7090[42] configured with an experimental time-sharing system[43] developed in collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. This computing system was very costly, large, and impractical to transport, making it oversized for Project 1948, but IBM technicians installed an IBM 1050 teletypewriter at the BOCES offices in Fox Meadow Rd., Yorktown Heights, and connected it to the mainframe via an AT&T 103A Dataphone modem. Seated at the teletypewriter, students would read the printed text, wait for the green "proceed" button to light up, and type in their responses. The teletypewriter would transmit the input to the remote computer, which executed the program and printed the result back. Thanks to the time-sharing system, the powerful resources of the IBM 7090 weren't wasted because the computer was able to run multiple programs at the same time.

On September 18, 1964, a group of four students[44] (Laurie Hayes, Gale Carsen, Anne Russo, and Barry Carrano) visited the Technology Center in Yorktown to test The Sumerian Game for the first time. Mabel Addis accompanied them, and the first round of tests was supervised by Eugene McDonnell[45], whose name was printed at the end of one of the scrolls in Addis possession[46]; this document, found by researcher Devin Monnens, was later donated to The Strong Museum of Play by Addis's daughter Alexandra.

Picture 15: The other three students (from left: Laurie, Gale, and Anne) present at the first test of The Sumerian Game, accompanied by Mabel Addis. (Source: The New York Times, Overlooked No More: Mabel Addis, Who Pioneered Storytelling in Video Gaming. Copyright Alexandra Johnson)

William McKay programmed the tested version in Fortran under the name Sum9rx. It lacked audiovisual content and featured very sparse text, giving players only one minute to respond before displaying an error message prompting them to answer[47]. After a brief introduction informing the player of their role as King of Lagash, the game began by providing a semi-annual report, asking the player how to manage the harvest and grain in storage.

Available options included storing part of the harvest for the next season, allocating grain for food and seed, and possibly drawing from storage. After making these decisions, the program verified that the parameters were balanced (grain used + grain harvested + grain taken from storage = grain stored in the turn + grain used as seed + grain used for food), then validated the input, calculated the result, and proceeded to the next turn. Occasionally, minor disasters could reduce the population, damage crops, or result in grain loss, though poor management of the planting led to sparse yields and difficult years. Insufficient food could cause population decline. However, the system was generally generous with crop yields, making the most challenging aspect a mathematical one for players.

Alongside The Sumerian Game, a second game, the Sierra Leone Game, was developed, at least partially programmed, but not tested. Walter Goodman, a BOCES member, created it. Wing wrote: “The setting for the second game was selected by the author of the game, Walter Goodman, because he felt that the economic problems of newly-independent African countries were important for pupils to understand. Sierra Leone in 1964 seemed like a representative African state where political factors were less critical in determining economic developments than in other African lands. We were also fortunate to have Frank Karefa-Smart from the Sierra Leone U.N. staff available for consultation.”[48]

After The Sumerian Game test and the completion of Project 1948's 18-month timeline, BOCES reapplied for funds and received approval once more. However, the federal office mandated a narrowing of the focus to a single subject: economic simulations.

Wing: “Research Project 1948 [...] lasted from February 1963 to August '64. The results of this project were reported in 1965. Project 1948 was followed in two-weeks time by Project 2841, subject to the present report. At the suggestion of the U. S. Office of Education, our attention was narrowed from eight topics to one, economic games.”[49]

Newspapers reported the $177,269 arrival of federal funding, making headlines. As stated in the Patent Trader: “BOCES Awarded Grant For Computer 'Games' - The U.S. Office of Education this week granted upper Westchester's Board of Cooperative Educational Services $177.269 for the production of three computer-based economic games. They will be developed and evaluated over a two-year period by BOCES Research Director Richard Wing and his staff at the Technology Center in Yorktown. [...] The federally subsidized research project in upper Westchester will extend work already done on the economic model of ancient Sumer, where students have to decide whether they will put the 'newly invented' wheel on their chariots, for example. But the project will also move into the 20th century and develop an economic model of an emerging African nation; Sierra Leone is a possible prototype. A model of the ancient Greek economy is also being considered. All three models will be 'programmed' for use in sixth grade social studies classes. All possible economic causes and all possible economic effects would be fed into a computer. Appropriate slides would be filmed to illustrate 'effects'. When a student pushed a 'cause' button he would be able to see the effect on screen before him.”[50]

Picture 16: Karen Barrett, one of the eleven children selected for this test, is pictured while trying a computer-based reading lesson. From the article published in The Reporter Dispatch on August 25, 1965: “A pupil is given a brief test to determine his reading level. The instructor [...] registers him for the course on the computer at his reading level. The student sits down at a table with a machine resembling an electric typewriter in front of him. At his eye level is a screen where the text of the course and questions are projected. First, the pupil is shown the questions. Then he pushes a button and the computer displays the reading matter [...] Next, the multi-choice questions are shown again and the pupil selects a letter of the alphabet representing his answer and types it. [...] The computer processes the answers, indicates on the typewriter those that are correct.” Following the federal refinancing, nothing more was heard about the reading lessons developed by IBM researcher E. M. Quinn.

When all other projects were definitively discarded, including the chemistry lab one that had reached a certain level of development—enough to be shown to Allen during his 1963 visit—the BOCES found itself in the position of having to develop three games but only with two projects in advanced prototype stages, one of which was never programmed. As reported by the Patent Trader, the first proposal was to create another economic simulation game set in ancient Greece. However, within a few months, this project was definitively abandoned in favor of Toytown, a project proposed and developed by Jimmer Leonard of the Johns Hopkins University, Social Relations Department.

Wing then explained in the final report why they shelved the ancient Greece project in favor of Toytown, which later became The Free Enterprise Game: “There were two reasons why The Free Enterprise Game setting was selected: (1) it was desired that a completely different type of economic environment be simulated than that utilized in The Sumerian and, Sierra Leone Games, and (2) the emphasis was to be placed upon what might be described as 'practical' economic facts in conjunction with general, economic principles.”[51]

Picture 17: From left to right: Otto Schmidt, Robert E. Taylor, and James Witt, science teacher, pictured while working on creating a short stop-motion video to demonstrate the development of a storm. Schmidt and Taylor collaborated to create the slides used in The Sumerian Game and The Sierra Leone Game. (Source: Patent Trader, January 3, 1965)

In 1965, The Sumerian Game underwent a new round of testing, this time with a control group. The participants were divided into two groups, selected to consist of students with similar abilities. One group, accompanied by teacher Harriet Forsythe, was taken to the labs where the IBM terminal was installed and played the computer version of the game; the other group, accompanied by teacher Ronald Lundberg, conducted the experiment with the paper version of the game. Richard Wing described the procedure as follows: “Mr. Lundberg, teacher of the control class, received instruction from the authors of the two games that he was to teach certain principles of economics (see descriptions of the games) and acquaint his class with some of the conditions of life in ancient Sumer an modem Sierra Leone. He was given some pictures and printed materials about those two places. For three weeks during the fall of 1965 he used a technique essentially as follows to teach about the economics of ancient Sumer. The class was divided into three groups of equal ability. In two of the groups the children were assigned roles as members of an imaginary Sumerian community such as farmers, bakers, traders. In each group there was a priest-king who led a discussion. For three weeks, one-hour a day, these groups discussed. the problems of running the economy in ancient Sumer. The third group became planners and writers, preparing materials and procedures for the other two groups. [...] The Center for Educational Services and Research had at the time of the experiment three IBM 1050 terminals. The twenty-six pupils in the experimental group were transported from their School, about a half a mile away, to the Center, three at a time, to play the games. Each group worked for about ninety minutes and then was replaced by another group of three. The following day the same groups were brought back to continue where they had left off. This procedure continued until a pupil finished, both games and was replaced by a student who had not played a game. Some students started with the Sumerian Game and then played the Sierra Leone Game. Others started with the Sierra Leone Game and, when they had finished it, played the Sumerian Game. Since there was considerable variation in the time each student took to complete a game, the scheduling became quite complex, with some students finishing up one game while others were starting a new one.”[52]

With the new funds available and fewer projects in development, teachers and IBM technicians started working on the three games required by the U.S. Office of Education. The Sumerian Game, initially sparse in its Sum9rx version, underwent a complete rethought and expansion, incorporating elements hypothesized during the 1962 workshop, such as the management of technology and its impact on daily life and agricultural productivity. The Sierra Leone Game was finally tested with students and completed, while The Free Enterprise Game was designed but remained on paper, similar to The Sumerian Play. Both The Sumerian Game and The Sierra Leone Game were enhanced with audiovisual content.

Wing: “During each game about seventy-five pictures were displayed by the modified carousel projector and the random access film strip projector. In the case of The Sumerian Game the pictures were made by photographing a series of dioramas built by Otto Schmidt of the BOCES staff. In the Sierra Leone Game a variety of photographs, graphs, and maps were made into slides by Mr. Schmidt.”[53]

On March 20, 1966, Patent Trader published a major article titled Computer-Age 'Monopoly Game' Teaches Basic Economics to Sixth Grade Students, which gathered the experiences of a new group of students (including Scott McLaughlin, Donald Smith, and Mary Vicinanza) engaging with the latest version of the game, this time under the supervision of Christine Hartz, who had previously worked at IBM before becoming a teacher at Somers Elementary School.

Scott's game listing was later chosen by Wing to be included in his final report, and indeed the description Patent Trader provided of The Sumerian Game aligns with the description and game logic that Wing himself outlined in the same report. From Scott's game listing, the version tested in that session was recorded under the name Suilxr[54].

“Hello! Before we begin, will you please type your name, first name first, then your last name, and then press the Return key.

Now, SCOTT, you are ready to operate the Sumerian Economic Model.

Imagine that you have just been made Ruler of Lagash, a City-State of Sumer, in the year 3500 B.C. Twice yearly your Royal Steward, Urbaba, will report to you the economic condition of the kingdom. Guided by these reports, you will decide the use of your grain and other resources, trying to keep your population stable and well fed. Between reports, your court advisor will come to you with news of your kingdom.”[55]

Unlike the Sum9xr version, Suilxr featured more elaborate text and a richer introduction, incorporating elements designed by Addis to enhance the student's immersion. Additionally, it incorporated the player's name into the subsequent text introducing the game, making it an interactive experience. The role of the teacher-advisor, first conceived during the summer workshop of 1962, when the simulation was still called Sumerian Play and teachers had to perform the calculations instead of the computer (which was not yet available), had been integrated into the text that Addis had rewritten: the computer, declaring itself to be Urbaba, the advisor, addressed the player directly, informing them, congratulating them, or anxiously announcing the arrival of disasters and poor harvests.

Inventory management was less developed and rigorous: the player could no longer manage grain by years, but the system accounted for different rates of spoilage based on age, which, however, was hidden from the player. The mathematical calculations required from the students were fewer but more complex because the player—unlike the pilot group the previous year—had to reason with stricter variables: the numbers and factors at play, especially those related to the harvest, as highlighted by Wing, had been altered and made more realistic, making it harder to avoid the simulation spiraling into a cycle of poor harvests and population collapse, with more frequent and damaging disasters.

The focus of the game shifted from correctly managing inventory and consumption calculations to finding the right balance between sown and cultivated fields and between population and food. Moreover, during the game, the computer periodically posed multiple-choice questions designed to encourage the player to reflect on the game's mechanics, congratulating them for correct answers or highlighting errors in case of incorrect answers. Finally, The Sumerian Game came pre-equipped with slides.

Patent Trader: “Twenty-five sixth graders from Mrs. Harriet Forsythe's[56] class at Mohansic Elementary School spent a few hours a day at BOCES' Yorktown campus answering questions posed by an automatic typewriter (connected to a computer at IBM's Mohansic Laboratory), studying slides that set a scene, presented charts and tables or provided background information. [...] In addition, the Sumerian and Sierra Leone games will be refined and tried on new, probably older, groups of students if money is available. Changes under consideration include the addition of a tape recorder and improvement of the slides used.”[57]

Interestingly, an article about The Sumerian Game appeared in the Daily News on November 20, 1966, describing a game played by an 11-year-old student named Candy Lichty, with numbers and information clearly referencing the Sum9xr version. Unfortunately, it is impossible to determine whether this was a mistake by the journalist—who may have inadvertently published information about an older version—or if Sum9xr had never been entirely discontinued and was still occasionally played.

Pictures 18 and 19: Candy Lichty while trying The Sumerian Game. The setup of the workstation is identical to the one in the photo of Barry Carrano a few months earlier: modem on the right, a teletype printer in the center, and likely an audio or vinyl tape player on the left, with a monitor in front of the student. In the lower photo, taken with a wider angle, you can see the monitor showing a slide that is not among the known ones. (Sources: 17) Daily News, November 20, 1966 issue; 18) Play a Computer Game, The Instructor - The Instructor Publications)

There is no evidence that the group led by Harriett Forsythe tried anything different from the basic game described in the article, but according to Wing, by 1966, The Sumerian Game had already been developed enough to divide the simulation into three phases. In the first phase, which was played by Scott McLaughlin, the student simply had to manage the use of grain, deciding semester by semester how much to use for planting and how much for consumption. The remainder was stored in warehouses, or if the player used more than what was just harvested, grain from previous seasons was consumed. In the second phase, in addition to managing grain, the player had to handle workforce. In the third phase, the player had total control of the kingdom, including trade, defense, and city development.

During 1966, Richard Wing thoroughly tested The Sumerian Game and The Sierra Leone Game to report to BOCES on the progress of the project. While a group of about thirty students tested the game on the computer, a second control group tackled its paper version. It was Wing's responsibility to compare the results and assess the differences in the students' learning.

In mid-1966, according to Wing, The Sumerian Game underwent a thorough revision by Addis.

A recorded lesson on tape, lasting about twenty minutes, initiated the gaming session, introducing the student to the game's challenges and utilizing a projector to display specially created images. After the introductory lesson, the player was guided to the teleprinter, and the game began with the reign of Luduga I (first segment). The text was shortened, as were the game turns, while carefully selected images, not so much to create atmosphere but to convey educational information, along with charts illustrating economic mechanisms, were projected onto a screen.

The second phase, the reign of Luduga II, was also modified by removing the management of grain, assuming that the player, having already completed the first phase, was now skilled in the necessary calculations, allowing them to focus on new, specific challenges. For the third phase, Luduga III, Wing suggested possible changes: either giving full management control to the player or automating some of the calculations, as in the new version of the second phase. In any case, Wing believed it was necessary to continue improving the audio-visual content.

From time to time, to interrupt the game loop, the player was faced with questions related to the game's mechanics or difficult decisions regarding city development; in such cases, the game paused, and the player had the opportunity to listen to a short recorded discussion on tape in which some advisors gave their opinions on the issue, leaving the student with the responsibility of deciding what to do.

Despite the exhaustion of federal funds from Project 2841, the development of the games did not stop.

Pictures 20 and 21: Two of the three known images part of a promotional photo set published in the Newspaper Enterprise Association on February 15, 1968. The original caption read: “The front cover shows sixth grader Joanne Chomich trying her hand at running the ancient Mesopotamian city-state of Lagash with the aid of a computer. Projected on the wall is an artist's conception of what Lagash looked like in its heyday, about 3500 B.C.” The display of the slides on the side, presumably for better visual impact, differs from the setup at the Yorktown Heights offices. One of the three photos, illustration 20, showing the diorama, was part of the slides researcher Devin Monnens recovered from the Addis’ family. The other slide, presumably showing a worker sieving the river, is not part of the collection of slides saved by Mabel Addis, but its presence in the promotional set suggests it was part of the slides projected during the game. The student pictured, Joanne Chomich, passed away in 2016.

Wing: “In June 1966 BOCES received a grant under Title III of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act to become a center for demonstration of computer assisted instruction, a closed-circuit television system for training teachers, and a dial selection system. During the first year of the grant approximately one thousand people have visited the center to see demonstrations of the computer-based economics games and the uses of other complex media. Since January 1967, the computer-based economics games have been supported by a grant from the New York State Education Department.”[58]

IBM's direct involvement became less evident as the federal funds phased out. Whether BOCES lost access to the massive IBM 7090 at IBM's research center in Yorktown Heights from 1966 onward, or if they preferred a less powerful but more economical system, remains unclear. However, at the end of the federal project, Jimmer Leonard, who had been working on developing his idea of Toytown into The Free Enterprise Game, personally took on the task of programming his game directly in Assembly language with Autocode so it could run on the IBM 1401 installed at Johns Hopkins University.

He later also reprogrammed the first segment of The Sumerian Game for the IBM 1401, which, as Wing noted, allowed for significant savings: “Since we began our research in 1962, new systems have been devised which are more effective at lesser cost. Computer storage costs steadily decreased, CPU speed went up, new methods of programming cut the cost of preparing materials. Present costs estimates per student hour on the most economical systems now operate from one to three dollars. It is expected that these costs will diminish. If instructional terminals are eventually linked to large time-shared computers which are used for business and clerical applications as well, the costs could well be even further reduced.”[59]

It remained to be clarified whether the investment was worthwhile. At the conclusion of his research, comparing the measured parameters between students who had used the computers and those who had worked with the paper version of the game, Richard Wing found that the most gifted students benefited the most. The results also indicated that with the use of computers, students were more interested and attentive; they learned faster, although they tended to lose the skills they had acquired more quickly than the control group.

Debbie Wing, the daughter of Richard Wing, visited her father at his office and, despite not being a part of the program, had the opportunity to experience the computer simulations. She recalled: “I went to his office frequently and had met some of the players mentioned in the Wikipedia article (Bruse Moncreiff, Mabel Addis, Nobel Gividen, and especially Jimmer Leonard), and partly because I was one of the first kids to test it! There's no way of knowing which iteration of the game that would have been, but in 1964 I was 10 and was in 6th grade. I do know that I was at the BOCES office in Westchester when I played The Sumerian Game, not in a classroom, so it might have been an early form of the game. I also remember that I wasn't such a clever ruler and everyone in my kingdom died! I also think I played the Sierra Leone Game, too.”

After completing his final report, Richard Wing took a sabbatical and returned to Europe in August 1968, traveling to Germany, where he worked for the Central Educational Directorate of the United States Dependent Schools, European Area (USDSEA). Walter Goodman, who had been first appointed director of Title III, replaced Wing as head of the research department at BOCES and continued the project for a few more years, developing other educational games, both computer-based and board games, and oversaw keeping the center's exhibition open to the public.

Shortly before Wing's departure, The Reporter Dispatch published the following curious episode: “During a tour this week with a Parent Teacher Association group from the Montrose school district, housewives participated in The Sumerian Game. One lady, much to her own embarrassment, caused her country to experience hunger through her manipulation of grain planting, and when her computer people died of starvation, she was plainly mad at herself as well as chagrined!”[60]

Picture 22: Walter Goodman, pictured behind the bookshelf of computer-based educational games, The Reporter Dispatch, White Plains, February 21, 1968. The original caption read: “Game Player - Walter Goodman, Title III Project Director for BOCES' Center for Educational Research in Yorktown, explains one of the center's collection of computerized and board games now being developed at BOCES for use in the educational experience of young learners in the area schools. The games are part of the excitement generated by the busy center, which is a school-district and government sponsored project providing services of all kinds to local schools.”

In the same article, the progress made by Goodman after Wing's final report is illustrated: “It was found that the computer students took less time to understand the principles behind economics and developed more depth in their understanding of the concepts. Revisions of the game [The Sumerian Game] are in motion to improve them. [...] Walter Goodman, who is the director of the center's visitation program and Title III Project Director for BOCES had developed other computer games and board games which will ultimately be available on a individualized basis, using the potential of the computer. His development of the computer Sierra Leone Game, another economic problem game which charts the growth of a newly emerging 'flation' and the free enterprise game of a simulated toy store owner are bright innovations to help the under achiever gain knowledge. Other games Mr. Goodman is working with in his cubicle at the center are 'Diplomacy', the Game of Democracy (a 4-H game in which the child assumes the role of a congressman or legislator), and the Life Career game, structured for participation and not necessarily for win or lose.”

Unfortunately, the improvements made to The Sumerian Game after Wing's final report are not known, except for some details that emerge from another newspaper article, the Press and Sun-Bulletin of February 2, 1969. Reporting on the launch of the CAI experiment involving 6,000 students in New York City through the use of math learning programs running on an RCA Spectra 70 mainframe, journalist Michael Alain compares RCA's approach with that of the research center in Yorktown Heights: “The Yorktown Heights computer, however, employs a more creative, 'tutorial' approach in its economics course. Once its sixth-grade students have pushed the start-button and typed in their name and number, the computer raps back: 'YOU ARE READY TO PLAY THE SUMERIAN ECONOMIC GAME. IMAGINE THAT YOU HAVE JUST BEEN MADE RULER OF LAGASH, A CITY-STATE OF SUMER, IN THE YEAR 3500 B.C. IN ORDER TO BECOME FAMILIAR WITH THE SURROUNDING COUNTRY, LET'S EXAMINE A MAP OF SUMER [the map flashes on the attached video screen].'”

Picture 23: A photograph appeared in the article The Teacher Who 'Never Gets Angry' by Michael Alan. The article, which appeared in numerous magazines and newspapers throughout 1969, depicts a slightly different workstation setup from the previous photos, placing the monitor on the same level as the teleprinter. From the caption: “Will computers ever replace teachers? Here 11-year-old Kenneth Hack happily studies economics on a versatile computer in his classroom in Yorktown Heights, N.Y.”

The photographs of Candy Lichty and the information in David W. Zuckerman's 1974 book The Guide to Simulations/Games for Education and Training, which included all three economic games created during the BOCES projects, further confirm the replacement of the slide projector with a monitor.

Walter Goodman's Sierra Leone Game was cataloged under the name Sierra Leone Project, running on an IBM 360/40 with Coursewriter III[61], using an IBM 1051 teleprinter and the display system. The Sumerian Game, described as similar to The Sierra Leone Game but much more enjoyable, was listed in two different versions: one for the 12K IBM 1401 with Autocoder and another for the IBM 360/40 with Coursewriter III[62]. In both revisions, The Sumerian Game was stored on magnetic tape and included audio tapes and slides as accessories (operating on the display system, no longer on a projector). Interestingly, the third game, The Free Enterprise Game by Jimmer Leonard, was listed alongside the other two, but with the note "not published but can be played by contacting BOCES."

It is not known whether The Sumerian Game was ever requested or licensed in the United States, but it was certainly studied extensively in Canada at the University of Calgary by a team of researchers led by Herbert James Hallworth, who mentioned it for the first time as early as February 1968: “Computerized educational games may be regarded as a specific type of simulation. They have been produced for industrial and commercial training, and are already in use within the University of Calgary. A series of games has been developed by IBM and the Westchester School Board to teach economics at the elementary school level. One of these, The Sumerian Game, has been programmed in APL for experimental use in this University.”[63]

A year later, Hallworth announced that the university staff had also ported The Sumerian Game to the FOCAL language: “Using FOCAL, we have already written several programs to give drill in arithmetic. We have also written a version of The Sumerian Game devised by IBM and the Westchester School Board at Yorktown Heights. In each case, the writing of the programs was remarkably easy for a person with some previous experience in programming. However, there are limitations. FOCAL as presently available allows too small a memory for each student, particularly when it is necessary to print out messages on the teletype. Also, it is somewhat difficult to devise tutorial type programs in this language since it is difficult to deal with the input of words from a teletype.”[64]

The University of Calgary's laboratory installed the TSS-8 system, a time-sharing system based on a DEC PDP-8 minicomputer with 12K of core memory and access to a 250K disk[65], in the 1968-69 biennium. Despite the fact that the PDP-8, in its basic configuration with just 4 KB of memory, sold for $18,000, the TSS-8 system at the time offered relatively good performance in terms of processing power and memory at a very competitive price compared to other available solutions. The system came with an interpreter for Formulating On-Line Calculations in Algebraic Language (FOCAL).

Written by Richard Merrill for the PDP-8, FOCAL was a programming language specifically designed to save memory, making it suitable for platforms with limited memory, typically just a few KB. To minimize memory usage, Merrill based FOCAL on another programming language, JOSS, and modified it by simplifying the parser (the part of the code responsible for interpreting the command strings entered by the user) and cutting out a significant number of features. Merrill's simplification resulted in the reduction of commands (IF, TYPE, GOTO, etc.) to a single character, the initial one. FOCAL was intended for scientific applications and had a very convoluted structure, referred to disparagingly by programmers as “spaghetti code,” due to the tangled nature of the code, often unreadable by anyone who hadn't written it. When the TSS-8 installed at Calgary was used simultaneously by multiple students for a program like The Sumerian Game, which was highly complex, contained a lot of text, and had to perform operations on alphanumeric data strings, performance dropped significantly, as Hallworth noted, especially when the program was written in the FOCAL language.

Picture 24: Herbert James Hallworth. Circa 2010.

The first phase of The Sumerian Game, in its latest known version, was designed to encourage the student to analyze the available numbers and, through a trial-and-error mechanism, find the optimal ratio between population and food or between sown and cultivated land. Urbaba's feedback at the end of each season, which indicated when food was truly too little (resulting in the deaths of subjects), scarce, adequate, more than necessary, or excessive—so much so that it could even cause the death of some farmers—was the only clue the player had to reach the correct ratio. Addis and Wing believed that the more skilled players would quickly find the correct ratio, and to prevent them from getting bored, they included the option to shorten the game if the student demonstrated proficiency in calculating the correct quantities of grain to use for sowing and food.

The University of Calgary developed a rewritten version with a similar purpose: teaching algebra to students[66]. In any case, The Sumerian Game was just one of several experimental applications that Hallworth was working on. If not for a fortunate series of events, the APL and FOCAL versions of The Sumerian Game, like the original, which was losing popularity in New York, would have remained forgotten.

In the second half of 1968, Douglas Dyment, then Software Manager at DEC Canada and responsible for all DEC software developed in Canada, visited the University of Calgary on behalf of his company and learned about The Sumerian Game for the first time during his visit.

Dyment: “I got the idea from a grad student in Alberta, Canada, at either the University of Calgary or Edmonton (I've forgotten which), whom I had met while giving a talk there. She was very keen on the idea of business simulation games, and I thought that this would make a good demonstration program for FOCAL-8. I created the game entirely on my own, over the course of a week or so, and called it 'King of Sumeria'.”

According to researchers Devin Monnens and Kate Willaert, Dyment might have met researcher Ann Brebner, a colleague of Hallworth and the supervisor of the university's computer system, and inadvertently mistaken her for a student. The two may have discussed The Sumerian Game, and by the end of the conversation, Dyment could have learned the basic elements of the gameplay through an oral description. Alternatively, Dyment, in his role as DEC's software manager on a visit to the University of Calgary, which was an important customer due to its significant investment in DEC computers, might have seen The Sumerian Game in action—either in the APL version prepared the previous year or the one programmed in FOCAL that same year. In this second scenario, Dyment might have even had access to the source code and the original documentation. We will see elements supporting this hypothesis later.

In any case, the version of The Sumerian Game running at Calgary, based on Hallworth's description, was likely similar to the original, although used for slightly different purposes, partly because the university had developed other internal programs for mathematics. In addition to accepting numerical input, it also accepted alphanumeric strings, such as the student's name. Dyment decided that a much simpler program, based on the most basic mechanic of The Sumerian Game, would be very useful for demonstrating the potential of the new DEC machine. Developing a demonstration tool instead of an educational program necessitated stricter specifications, particularly because not all of the company's customers could afford a time-sharing system with 12K of memory, such as the University of Calgary.

Dyment: “DEC was trying to show people the power of the language, which was well suited for the extremely small (4K) memory of the PDP-8 computer on which it ran. So I set about to write a program that would demonstrate what was possible.”

The programmer got to work, and within a week of coding, he completed his version of The Sumerian Game, which he called King of Sumeria[67]. The code was difficult to read because it was written to save every byte. The output text was minimal, and instead of a lengthy introduction, the program greeted the player with a laconic message:

"Hamurabi:"[68]

Despite having minimal text, the game bore a strong resemblance to the original due to its mechanics, which were identical to those found in the first phase of The Sumerian Game. The game loop was almost the same as the original: allocate grain for human consumption or for sowing, wait for the system to calculate the result, and proceed to the next turn. The disaster routines were also implemented, but they were limited to pest infestations or occasional epidemics that halved the population.

However, there was one major difference from The Sumerian Game: simulating a sort of market with seasonal fluctuations[69], Dyment decided to equip the program with a routine that determined the cost of land from turn to turn, generating random numbers and asking the player whether they wanted to buy or sell. This small modification—and in general, a less deterministic and more stochastic approach to generating the consequences of the ruler-player's choices—made Dyment's software a true game, completely different from The Sumerian Game, which used entertainment to teach mathematical calculations.

Picture 25: Left to right: Juan A. Monico and Douglas Dyment, recently resigned from DEC to found Picker X-ray Engineering, where he served as vice president. (Source: Microcomputers 'in' by R.G. Gibbens, The Montreal Star, December 17, 1970, page 38)

After finishing the programming, Dyment submitted the code, and it was published along with other programs in a DEC manual titled Demonstration Program 1970 Focal-8. Interestingly, the accompanying text, which introduced Dyment's creation as “a fun game in which the player attempts to predict his consumer market,” repeated the error in the ruler's name[70].

At the end of 1968, the DECUS collections published the program with the code Focal 8-5 under a different name, The Sumer Game. Several PDP-8 users ordered a copy of the program, and after typing out the program, they were so impressed by the game that they began imagining variants and improvements. As had happened with other computer games like Advent by William Crowther or Spacewar! by Steve Russell, the game started circulating throughout the United States and was installed anywhere there was a system with a FOCAL interpreter.

One of the first variants was written in Belgium by J.F. Champarnaud and F.H. Bostem, which was sent and published in turn in DECUS in the FOCAL 8-186 issue under the name Sumer (French). Interestingly, the two programmers chose to set the game in the city of Larsa and added a few extra words to give the minimal text a vague archaic flavor. They even cited an ancient Middle Eastern god, an alias of the Sumerian Enlil:

“SALUT A TOI, GOUFFRE INSONDABLE DE TOUTE SAGESSE PAR MOI, ROI DES AMORRITES, DE SUMER ET D'ACCAD, SOIS MON FÉAL SUR LE TRÔNE DE LARSA [...] CRAINS LA COLÈRE DU DIEU DAGGAN VIL FÉAL, TU ES CONDAMNÉ À LA VINDICTE DU DIEU DAGGAN GARDES, QUE L'ON PRÉPARE LES ÉTRIVIÈRES MON CROCHET À PHYNANCES ET LE BUCHER!”

Incidentally, in the description, the game was presented as “the French version of HAMURABI (The Sumer game),” further contributing to the confusion of names.

Like Champarnaud and Bostem, many others began personalizing the game or using its gameplay to create games with different settings or more distinct variations while still adhering to the basic structure of The Sumerian Game. It didn't take long for the game to be ported into other programming languages, expanding the potential audience of enthusiastic players, driven in part by strong word-of-mouth.

Picture 26 and 27: Walter Koetke, math teacher and specialist in school computer systems, typing on a Teletype Model 33 and teaching in front of a DEC PDP-8. (Source: Lexington High School Yearbook 1970 and 1971)

The first documented transition of The Sumerian Game system from FOCAL to another language was made by a student at Lexington High School in Lexington, Massachusetts, where the LOCAL[71] project had been active since 1967. The project's objectives bore a striking resemblance to the collaboration between BOCES and IBM, except for the fact that DEC provided the computers.

The name of this young, brilliant programmer, already famous for another game, was James Storer.

Just a year earlier, Storer had gained recognition for programming a text-based game that simulated the landing of the Lunar Module, an event he had watched live on TV, along with millions of other American citizens and people around the world, on the evening of Sunday, July 20, 1969.

Storer's teacher, Walter Koetke, was impressed by his student's work and suggested that he submit it to DEC for publication, just like King of Sumeria. When Storer agreed, Koetke submitted the software, written in FOCAL, to DEC under the name Lunar Landing Simulation. DEC immediately accepted it and listed it in the catalog on January 20, 1970, with the identifier FOCAL8-81 and the description: “This program realistically simulates an Apollo moon landing using NASA figures. It begins with the module at 0 seconds, 120 miles above the moon, carrying 16,000 pounds of fuel, with a velocity of 2,600 miles per hour. Upon radar checks of velocity, altitude, remaining fuel, and time each 10 seconds, you may decide upon fuel rate for the next time interval. The object is to land safely on the moon.”

Picture 28: James 'Jim' Storer, posing for the 1971 Lexington High School Yearbook.

Thanks to the access to computers provided by the LOCAL project, Storer wasn't the only student at Lexington High School fascinated by early computer games. Other students were also creating games, including a trio of military history buffs—Larry Cram, Luther Goodie, and Doug Hibbard—who pooled their efforts to create a sophisticated Civil War battle simulator.

Doug Hibbard: “I believe it was for AP math class and we came up with the idea of the Civil War together. Actually, I was struggling with Basic and they were naturals so I convinced them I could provide all the history and they agreed to include me on their team. I can't remember exactly how long but I do know we worked for a while to get it right. Any class time that they let us on the terminals and after school when we could schedule time. Lawrence and Luther were really sharp, and I was a history buff so we worked mostly on our own, but I wouldn't be surprised if we received teacher assistance but I can't remember his name. Again, the three of us thought Civil War battles would make a good game so we went for it. Yes, Lawrence and Luther did share it with other kids and received positive feedback. I think we received a good grade on the project but I don't remember specific teacher feedback. I do know it was listed in a book of computer games in the early '70's.”

By the late 1960s, the computer systems at Lexington High School hosted a variety of games, some developed internally, such as the lunar landing simulator or Civil War by the Cram-Goodie-Hibbard trio, and others developed externally. Among these was Dyment's King of Sumeria, whose source code had been slightly modified by a student, Bob Becker, to run on the available computer.

In an internal newsletter dated September 9, 1969, instructions were published for loading and running the game, along with a brief description surprisingly similar in style and content to the introduction written by Mabel Addis for the first phase of The Sumerian Game: “A fascinating FOCAL program that simulates the decision making required in the management of a small city was written by Doug Dyment of DEC in Ontario, Canada. [...] Mr. Dyment has written the following rules of play: Imagine that you are living in the city of Sumer in the year 3000 B.C.[72] You are the king and each year you must decide how much of the city's store of grain will be given to the people as food, how much will be used for seed, and how much will be kept in storage. At the beginning of each year your steward, Hamurabi, makes a report and asks for your decisions.”

Storer also discovered Dyment's game, which so fascinated him that he used The Sumerian Game's gameplay (the need to feed the population by wisely managing available resources) to create an entirely new game, which he programmed in BASIC[73], a language that was gaining popularity.

Picture 29: Lawrence 'Larry' Cram, Douglas Hibbard, and Luther Goodie, authors of Civil War, the very first known wargame program capable of simulating an entire military campaign, accounting for money and supplies spent and soldiers losses. (Source: 1971 Lexington High School Yearbook)

Storer's new game was still entirely text-based but had a modern, almost dystopian setting: on an island, the communist government of Setats Detinu (United States spelled backward) was ruled by a military dictator—the player—who had to primarily manage land to ensure the survival of the local population and foster economic (and military) development. The player had acres of land and Rallods (Dollars spelled backward) instead of bushels of grain, and the simulation primarily focused on the impact of human activity on the island's ecosystem: the more land devoted to mines and weapons factories, the greater the pollution, leading to detrimental effects on tourism and public health.

Even though Storer had never played Mabel Addis's The Sumerian Game, his game was curiously endowed with a strong narrative force, vividly describing the effects of air and water pollution on tourists, birds, and mineral water. Through a series of internal counters, the game tracked the player's performance and provided constant feedback, describing the progressive deterioration of the Setats Detinu ecosystem. Consistently, Storer decided to call it Pollution Game. Aside from its dystopian, ironic, and at times tragic setting, the game was extremely punishing, making it very difficult for the player to complete their term in office without facing a firing squad.

Dyment decided not to set a limit on the game's duration in King of Sumeria, allowing the user to stop whenever they wanted or when poor management had wiped out the population. Storer, on the other hand, decided to use a system similar to the one he had already experimented with in Lunar Lander, where, depending on the landing speed, the player could receive different final feedback: from a soft landing to a rough one, from a crash with severe damage to the spacecraft to a catastrophic high-speed collision.

Picture 30: Robert 'Bob' Becker. He found a solution to run King of Sumeria on the school's PDP-8. Thanks to his work, students were able to play the game, and fellow Jim Storer, fascinated by Dyment's game, later created Pollution Game. (Source: 1970 Lexington High School Yearbook)

With the same irony—and the same mechanics—Storer implemented a system of different endings based on how the game progressed. If the player-dictator lost too many subjects in a single turn, a revolt would occur, removing them from power; if they gave too much land to mining companies, their government could be overthrown by foreign powers; if they governed adequately, they could finish their term, earning more or less resentment from their subjects. Adding a dash of irony, Storer envisioned the possibility of an overthrown dictator facing execution, imprisonment, or even suicide, and he established the needed checks to distinguish between these potential outcomes.

In June 1970, Storer also submitted the Pollution Game to DECUS. Like Lunar Lander, Storer's new game was published by DECUS, with catalog number 8-346 and the description: “The player is elected(?) premier of a small communist island and asked to administer it for several years.”

Although it didn't reach the popularity of Dyment's King of Sumeria, Storer's Pollution Game also began to circulate, along with numerous other versions inspired by one or the other. The fact that Storer had switched from FOCAL to BASIC certainly contributed to its easier spread. The language developed by Kemeny and Kurtz was already highly valued in the early 1970s by hobbyists, beginner programmers, and students[74].

The next step came thanks to David H. Ahl.

In 1969, with degrees in electrical engineering and business administration, he secured a job at Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC). Between the late 1960s and early 1970s, DEC had made enormous strides in its battle against competitors—mainly IBM and CDC—and a significant part of the company's success was due to the strong sales of the PDP-8 minicomputer series, which had shown an excellent balance between performance and cost. Just like at the University of Calgary, several institutions across North America realized that the combination of the PDP-8 with a time-sharing system was an excellent solution for equipping themselves with computers at relatively low costs, significantly lower than those of competing products. As a result of the positive response from schools and universities, DEC was optimistic about potential growth opportunities in the education sector. They initiated a hiring campaign, which resulted in the recruitment of Ahl, who was nearing completion of his third degree in educational psychology.

Upon joining DEC, Ahl quickly realized that the company was missing a unique opportunity. FOCAL was a powerful and compact language, but DEC management's decision to make it available only on DEC machines had the serious consequence of limiting the use and circulation of Merrill's language. In contrast, BASIC was making enormous strides, and without the need to navigate contracts and licenses, many companies were adopting it for their systems. This realization led Ahl to contact some contract developers to create interpreters for DEC systems.

The slow growth of FOCAL was just one of the problems Ahl had to tackle; the other was the lack of software, which clearly acted as a disincentive for any potential customer interested in buying a DEC minicomputer. To avoid losing customers, Ahl began to compile a library of third-party software to provide to new and existing buyers. He called the package EduSystem in reference to the user base he was personally overseeing.

The next step was to specifically target users involved in education and working in educational institutions with a newsletter. He named it EDU and initially imagined it would have a circulation of a couple of thousand copies. He was very surprised when the number turned out to be ten times higher[75].

Ahl: “What happened was that educators with non-DEC computers needed the very same information--so they subscribed too. I realized, too, that people used Edu to help decide whether to buy at all. It dawned on me then what a wonderful idea it would be to do an educational computing magazine that wasn't wedded to one particular computer manufacturer.”[76]

Many of his customers were more interested in programs written in BASIC than in FOCAL, which led Ahl to personally work on porting the most interesting software DEC had collected over the years. One of the first programs he worked on was Dyment's game, which Ahl translated into BASIC in 1971 under the (incorrect) name Hamurabi. As Education Product Line Manager, in 1971, Ahl launched a newsletter called EDU, specifically aimed at educators and schools. The enormous success of the newsletter—garnering more subscriptions than DEC had originally estimated—did not go unnoticed.

By February 1973, the macroeconomic situation had worsened rapidly due to the oil crisis. DEC, like many other companies, started cutting costs, and Ahl found himself on the list for layoffs. In an unexpected turn of events, just a few days after being let go, Ahl was contacted to be rehired: “I was back on the payroll before I was ever off. In my new position—I don't think I had a title—I was able to pull together some loose ends. I wrote a 24-page brochure for RSTS, a system with magnificent capability, but that few people in the field really understood. I also put together a bunch of games I had written and collected from others and put them into a book, 101 Basic Computer Games.”[77]

Ahl included the most popular games of the time in the first edition of 1973, published by DEC. He began with those already available in BASIC and rewrote the code for those in other languages, primarily FOCAL. Among the games Ahl chose were digital versions of card or luck-based games, simple math games (such as DIGITS, where the computer had to guess the number the player was thinking of, or GUESS, where the opposite happened), or games derived from board games, like Monopoly, and of course, a large number of simulation games. Notable among these were Storer's Lunar Lander (available in several different versions) and Civil War, created by the three classmates from Lexington High School.

Picture 31: David H. Ahl displays Creative Computing magazines at the spring meeting of the Michigan Association of Computer Users for Learning (MACUL) held at Grand Rapids Junior College. From the caption: “David Ahl is a computer showman who mixes science with humor.” (Source: The Grand Rapids Press, March 29, 1978, page 19.)

Storer's Pollution Game was also included, with the name changed to KING, and, inevitably, King of Sumeria, listed under the name of the advisor, Hamurabi, curiously written with the same misspelling made by Dyment and shortened to HMRABI.

While the other games were more or less faithful ports of the original, Ahl allowed himself to make a few modifications to Hamurabi, including reducing the game's duration from unlimited to a maximum of 10 turns, after which the game would end regardless. Inspired by Storer's Pollution Game, Ahl incorporated the potential for the ruler of Sumer to face overthrow if poor management led to more than 45% of the population dying in a single turn. Additionally, Ahl replaced the laconic “Goodbye!!” at the end of Dyment's version with a branching epilogue based on the player's performance. There were three possible outcomes: in good games, the player would be compared to statesmen Ahl considered excellent, such as Disraeli and Jefferson; in bad games, the player's performance would be compared to that of Ivan the Terrible and Nero; and in mediocre games, the player was informed that a number of former subjects wished to see them assassinated.

With the publication of Ahl's book and the conversion of Dyment's game into BASIC, the mechanics of The Sumerian Game became widely popular and spread. IBM's computer systems, and to a lesser extent the PDP-8, were very expensive and relatively rare, but computers with a BASIC interpreter were now widespread, and the code Ahl had written was much easier to read, interpret, and understand than the spaghetti code in FOCAL. As a result, numerous programmers and aspiring game developers started modifying Ahl's code or studying it for inspiration, leading to the proliferation of Hamurabi clones. Moreover, Richard L. Wing's prophecy had come true: the cost of CPUs had continuously dropped, and now the first microcomputers were affordable for families.

Picture 32: The first edition of Basic Computer Games was published by DEC in July 1973, featuring illustrations by Robert Becker. It was sold for 5$. Many more print runs followed until 1978, when Ahl had the new edition published by Workman Publishing of New York.

The potential audience for Ahl's book grew exponentially starting in 1977, the year the first mass-market microcomputers, such as the TRS-80, Apple II, and Commodore PET (all three equipped with a built-in BASIC interpreter), came out. This was particularly true for the first wave of microcomputer users, who had to make significant investments, by family budget standards, to purchase machines that lacked any software. Magazines like Creative Computing and books like 101 Basic Computer Games were the primary source of software; initially, readers bought them to find listings to type into their computers, but soon they began studying the listings to learn how BASIC worked, modify them, and eventually create entirely new games using tricks they had just learned or building on familiar game concepts.

Mike Mayfield's Star Trek, Storer's Lunar Lander, and Dyment's Hamurabi were among the most popular and modified games. Starting with Dyment's game—one of the most widespread—many felt the need to port it to their own system, modifying the BASIC code to adapt its syntax to the interpreter, personalizing it by creating a more varied and complex game, or setting it in a different environment. This led to the creation of Kingdom by Lee Schneider and Todd Voros, which later evolved into Dukedom by Vince Talbot. Others ported the game to different languages to run it on non-BASIC systems, including recent hardware, as in the case of Hamurabi in JavaScript or Alessandro Benedettini's version for the iPhone.

One of the most intriguing developments, however, was Santa Paravia and Fiumaccio by George Blank.

His interest in electronics, computing, and programming began by chance, starting with the simplest equipment and growing into a passion that led him to expand his studies.

Blank: “My first published game was Nine Games for Pre School Children[78]. I was a Presbyterian Minister, pastor of a small church outside Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. As a young pastor, I was on minimum salary, and Citizens Band radio was popular at the time. I originally was thinking about making extra money repairing and installing radios. So I took radio courses from Heathkit to start with. I did manage to get a FCC Second Class license that gave me the legal ability to repair radios, but developed an interest in electronics with the radio courses, continuing on with a course in Digital Techniques, which taught circuit design, and then Microprocessor Techniques.”

Like many others before and after him, Blank began learning programming on a kit-based computer called the Heathkit Microprocessor Trainer. It was an inexpensive and rudimentary device based on the Motorola 6800, with a hexadecimal keyboard and a small 6-digit LED display. The base model came with 256 bytes of memory, and Blank paid an extra five dollars to double the memory to 512 bytes, or 4096 bits, which was still too little for any programming language.

Blank: “You had to program in [...] machine code, typing it in in Hexadecimal. I remember when I first saw an Assembly Language, I thought it was a wonderful improvement. Hex programming was a great way to learn how to think mathematically, which is the basis for computer programming.”

As soon as he could, Blank considered buying one of the first commercially successful microcomputers, and among the available options, the Apple II seemed the most interesting in terms of potential, especially due to its graphics and audio capabilities, which the others lacked. However, the cost of the Apple II exceeded the young pastor's budget, forcing him to settle for the more affordable microcomputer manufactured by Tandy and sold by Radio Shack. The TRS-80 he purchased was one of the first, with serial number 7080.

With much more RAM than the single-board computer he had practiced on, the TRS-80 had Level 1 BASIC stored in its ROM. Blank wasn't familiar with this programming language, so to understand how it worked and to practice, he started with the work of other programmers, studying the code published in magazines, typing it in, and analyzing how it functioned.

Blank: “Shortly after I bought one of the first TRS 80 computers, I started typing in games in Basic. David Ahl's book was one of the first that I bought. [...] I then decided to try to write some of my own games.”[79]

Blank used the games he wrote for his children as the basis for his first commercial work, Nine Games for Pre-School Children, which he sold to Instant Software, a small publisher associated with Wayne Green's Kilobaud Microcomputing magazine. The latter was one of the earliest publications dedicated to computing, written for an audience with moderate skills and filled with practical information, such as code listings and operational advice—a characteristic that distinguished it from the more well-known Byte, also created by Green, whose articles were generally more complex and technical. Both Kilobaud Microcomputing and Byte were generalist magazines, not tied to any specific platform.

For practical reasons—mainly due to the incompatibility of the most popular microcomputers and the existence of many different BASIC dialects—the public showed growing interest in specialized magazines for specific platforms, where they could find useful information for their computer, practical advice, and ready-made software that didn't require conversion to make it compatible. This trend led to the creation of SoftSide magazine in late 1978, dedicated to TRS-80 users. Naturally, George Blank was one of its first readers.

The emerging microcomputer software market had an increasingly large user base, capable of generating economically significant demand, but the first software distribution networks were regional in nature, often connected to individual computer stores or computing fairs. Since the more enterprising programmers used computer magazines to advertise themselves and sell their software via mail order, SoftSide quickly offered programmers the opportunity to sell their software through a dedicated publisher connected to the magazine, named TRS-80 Software Exchange[80].

From the very first issue of SoftSide, published in October 1978, a section of the magazine was dedicated to a long list of software available for purchase by mail. The software offerings were roughly split between small utility programs for specific tasks, such as an electronic cash register or accounting software, and games. Among the games were the inevitable Star Trek clones and electronic versions of popular games like Blackjack, Tic-Tac-Toe, and Reversi. The main figure of the first series of titles, with no fewer than five games listed, was undoubtedly Lance Micklus, who would later become the programmer of the text adventure Dog Star Adventure[81].

For Blank, reading SoftSide provided additional motivation, both due to the numerous listings available for typing into his own computer and studying and because of the realization that game programming could be a potential source of income. This was especially timely, as he had been working for a while on a project to rewrite one of the games from Ahl's book, expanding its gameplay and utilizing the full potential of his computer.

Blank: “The ancestor of Santa Paravia was Hammurabi, a text guns and butter game published in David Ahl's 101 Basic Computer Games. Each turn you got resources and you had to decide how much to spend on guns and how much on butter. Eventually you won by keeping a balance, starved by spending too much on guns, or got invaded by spending too little on guns. All text, no graphics.”

The TRS-80 had very limited graphical capabilities[82], and Blank was still getting familiar with BASIC. Tandy started selling ROMs with Level II BASIC, Microsoft's dialect for the TRS-80, by mid-1978. The second version of TRS BASIC was more powerful than Steve Leininger's Level I. As a result, Level II quickly became more popular and Blank used it, taking full advantage of the 16K of RAM available in his configuration, which was significantly more than the 4K entry-level setup.

Pictures 33 and 34: Santa Paravia en Fiumaccio in the low-resolution monochrome version for TRS-80 (on the left) and in the 1988 version for IBM PC, with a typical 4 colors cyan-magenta palette of the CGA video card (on the right).

The core gameplay was very similar to Hammurabi, based on a turn-based system with limited resources, the seasonal cycle of planting and harvesting, and the option to store or reuse surplus for technological improvements (a feature shared with The Sumerian Game in phases II and III but absent in Dyment's game). However, in the numerous improved revisions Blank developed before he convinced himself he had a product ready for publication, he ended up adding several other features and mechanics, some of which were very similar to those devised by the team of Moncreiff, Wing, and Addis.

Moreover, Blank's game was designed from the outset to be multiplayer, as the programmer had multiple children and, to prevent them from fighting, he decided to create software that would allow them to play together. Blank explained: “Since I had 4 and 6 year old sons at the time, I started writing games for them to play. Since there were two of them, I wrote the games so that they could alternate playing.”

The gameplay featured the classic turn-based multiplayer system, where players took turns at the computer, a mechanic that later became known as “hotseat.” This wasn't entirely new—many multiplayer arcade games, such as Breakout, employed a similar method, with players alternating at the controls, determining the winner based on the final score. However it was a novelty in microcomputer, even predating Starfleet Orion by Automated Simulations by a few months. Most importantly, Blank envisioned up to six players in the game, with direct competition mechanics, not just through scores.

At the beginning of the game, the user had to define the number of players, from one to six. The first or only player controlled the town of Santa Paravia, while the others managed the towns of Fiumaccio, Torricella, Molinetto, Fontanile, and Romagna—all clearly Italian names, chosen by Blank due to his enormous passion for the works of Giovanni Guareschi, particularly the Don Camillo novels. In line with the names, Blank decided to shift the setting from the valleys of Mesopotamia to the Italy of the 1400s, during the era of the city-states, changing the unit of resource measurement from bushels of grain to florins.

In turn, players made the necessary decisions to manage their kingdom and then passed control to the next player. But it wasn't just a mere competition for points. Apart from purchasing and cultivating fields and providing food for the populace, the gamers of Blank's Santa Paravia en Fiumaccio[83] faced additional challenges. These included arming soldiers to safeguard their lands, enforcing justice by deciding between impartiality and corruption, and enhancing the town's wealth or productivity through the purchase or renovation of existing buildings. Managing the army was of particular importance, as it required both an initial investment and ongoing maintenance costs for each soldier, but it ensured protection from enemy attacks. Conversely, an underpowered army left the town vulnerable to invasions.

As far as we know, even The Sumerian Game had a system for managing soldiers. However, Blank's addition of multiplayer functionality changed the dynamics. The most militarized player's army would carry out the invasion of a weaker player. An army 2.5 times larger than the opponent's was sufficient to automatically invade, resulting in the destruction of part of the fields, the death of some soldiers, and potential damage to city structures. If there wasn't a strong enough player, those caught between turns with fewer than one soldier for every 500 inhabitants would be invaded by the fearsome Baron Peppone of Monterana, another homage to Guareschi.

Another major innovation in Santa Paravia en Fiumaccio was that, after the start-of-turn report, the player could actually see their city being slowly drawn on the screen. Since the TRS-80 lacked graphic capabilities, Blank used the medium-resolution mode in which each character in the 64×16 text grid could be broken down into 2x3 blocks, resulting in a maximum resolution of 128x48. Using a combination of text and these large blocks, Blank made the TRS-80 draw a rudimentary side view, slightly elevated, reminiscent of Italian Renaissance paintings and frescoes. The city's walls were proportionate to the cultivated lands, the castle tower was scaled to the number of soldiers, and additional structures such as the market, cathedral, wool factory, and palace could be added.

In October 1978, Santa Paravia en Fiumaccio was in its 6.2 version, and Blank attempted to contact Wayne to publish his game with Instant Software, as with the collection of nine educational mini-games. However, Wayne hesitated to make a decision, and Roger Robitaille, who had recently left Instant Software to become the editor of SoftSide, persuaded Blank to include the game in the Software Exchange and publish it as the main article in the next issue of the magazine. Blank agreed, and Santa Paravia en Fiumaccio appeared on the cover of the December 1978 issue of SoftSide.

Inside the magazine, a long article that took up a significant portion of the publication described the gameplay in detail, followed by the complete code for version 6.2 of the game, dated October 16, 1978. The program was carefully commented on and divided into sections.

The public greatly enjoyed Blank's game. Readers were impressed by the asynchronous multiplayer feature, the interactivity between players who could invade each other, and especially the rudimentary graphical representation of the city. This visual element quickly conveyed key features like the presence of specific buildings, army protection, and the extent of cultivated lands. Many readers wrote to the magazine to express their appreciation. Those who didn't feel like typing out the long code simply used the order form to purchase the game on tape.

Picture 35: M.U.L.E. for NES (1990)

A few months later, Wayne finally responded to Blank, expressing interest in the game. Blank informed him that the magazine had already published the software for free and offered it for sale on cassette via mail order. However, Wayne was so interested in the product that he still wanted to license it for his company, Instant Software, and was especially keen to release the game on other major platforms of the time, particularly the Apple II and, shortly after, the Atari computer. These two versions, along with later releases for the Commodore 64 and Atari ST, benefited from more advanced, high-resolution, and color graphics to represent the players' cities, which significantly contributed to the game's popularity.

The numerous innovations introduced by Blank, beyond being an evolution from Hamurabi, were often also new compared to The Sumerian Game, made possible by a generation of more versatile computers marketed to a growing audience of players hungry for new experiences. Even for the many players already familiar with and who had spent a lot of time playing Hamurabi, Santa Paravia was an innovative game with many new or refined mechanics and the possibility of winning through various strategies. The attention to detail was remarkable: players could choose their name and gender, and as the game progressed, they gained prestige, climbing the social ladder from baron to king.

More than anything, Santa Paravia was innovative due to its graphics, which impressed microcomputer users accustomed to text-only games or those with very few graphical elements, none of which could compare to the game's stylized city map. Positioned somewhere between the future God Game and City Building genres, Santa Paravia was the link between the educational experiment in Westchester County and the future video game industry, which would include two of the most popular genres of the 1990s. Other games later emerged, created by programmers directly inspired by Santa Paravia and thus indirectly by Hamurabi, King of Sumeria, and finally, The Sumerian Game. Among these was M.U.L.E. by Danielle Bunten Berry, who had already experimented with a multiplayer economic simulation, Cartels & Cutthroats, but with M.U.L.E. had further developed not only player interaction but also colony management. Another example was Anacreon, another multiplayer game with characteristics similar to Blank's game but set in a science fiction universe.

Without knowing it, Moncreiff, Gividen, Wing, Addis, McKay, Leonard, Goodman, Dyment, Blank, and Bunten had paved the way, laying the foundation for the blockbusters that would emerge decades later, like Sim City, Caesar, Anno 1602 and Cities: Skylines. They began by using rudimentary, then progressively more sophisticated and affordable computing tools, with the aim of first educating and later entertaining generations of students and players with games focused more on reasoning than skill. Yet, these pioneers were curiously connected by a common thread, reflected in their design choices and in Addis's words back in 1967, when The Sumerian Game encouraged players to reconsider solution A in favor of B, or, better yet, C.

“Bad news. Two months ago, 25 soldiers set out on a raiding expedition to bring back timber from the Taurus Mountains. They met with a surprise attack and were wiped out. This represents quite a loss to our armed forces. Will you (a) send more soldiers, (b) do nothing, or (c) try to acquire lumber by trade?”

Picture 36: One of the printouts from the Sum9rx version kept by Mabel Addis and recovered by Devin Monnens. (Source: Shannon Symonds via x.com)

Part II: The Digital Resurrection

Studying the games

As of October 2024, only four relatively complete listings of The Sumerian Game are known, along with a few fragments. Mabel Addis and her daughter Alexandra preserved three complete listings. Later, researcher Devin Monnens recovered them. Moreover, Richard Wing published a comprehensive listing in his final report. These printouts, with their vast amount of information, served as both the starting point for analysis and the primary source for the recovery of The Sumerian Game.

Upon comparing the available listings, it became evident that Mabel Addis had preserved three listings from a different version than the one Richard Wing published in his final report. The most intriguing differences included:

● The name of the program;
● The introduction;
● The initial parameters;

● Game mechanics related to inventory management;

● The management of grain spoilage;

● Disasters;

● The amount of text printed during the game cycles, including more detailed descriptive sections;

● The inclusion of questions between turns aimed at verifying student learning and providing hints about implicit game mechanics.

● The presence of feedback messages to help the user input correct values;

● The management of cultivated land.

The name of the Versions

In one of the listings recovered by Devin Monnens, there is the system output related to loading into memory and the program launch command. By analyzing these initial lines, not present in other printouts, it is possible to infer the existence of a version named Sum9rx, which had to be loaded into memory, selected, and launched. There is also a handwritten execution date—September 18, 1964—the day Mabel Addis went to the Yorktown Heights computer center with four students, marking the end of the 18-month Project 1948.

In the appendix of his report, Richard Wing decided to include a printout related to a different version, named Suilxr, as indicated at the beginning of the document by the launch command.

Both Sum9rx and Suilxr, which only require the player to manage the use of grain for feeding the population or for sowing without additional variables or mechanics, undoubtedly relate to Phase 1 of The Sumerian Game.

There was definitely at least a third version, with an unknown name, cited fragmentarily by Life magazine in its September 1967 issue. According to Richard Wing's final report, this third version aligns with Phase 3 of The Sumerian Game, where the player assumes full control over the city-state's administration, including population feeding, sowing, trade, and military expeditions.

Unfortunately, this listing is too short to allow for any in-depth analysis.

Launching the game

In Sum9rx, the initial output introducing the game is concise:

You are about to operate the sumerian economic model.

Imagine that you have just been made king of Lagash, a city-state of Sumer in our year 3400 B.C.

Twice yearly your royal steward will report to you the economic condition of the Kingdom.

Guided by these reports, you will decide the use of your resources (symbolized by grain), trying to keep your population stable and well-fed.

The steward will use the typewriter to report and ask for your decisions. When the “proceed” light comes on, type your answer in figures, and press “return”. (if you make a mistake, press “cancel” instead and try again.)

Good luck!

The Suilxr version is interactive. It requires the user to input their first and last name; the name is then processed by the program and included in the output.

Hello![84] Before we begin, will you please type your name, first name first, then your last name, and then press the Return key.

scott mclaughlin[85]

Now, SCOTT, you are ready to operate the Sumerian Economic Model.

Imagine that you have just been made Ruler of Lagash, a City-State of Sumer, in the year 3500 B.C. Twice yearly your Royal Steward, Urbaba, will report to you the economic condition of the kingdom. Guided by these reports, you will decide the use of your grain and other resources, trying to keep your population stable and well fed. Between reports, your court advisor will come to you with news of your kingdom.

The Steward will use the typewriter to report and ask for your decisions. When the “Proceed” light comes on, type your answer in figures and press “Return”. (If you make a mistake, press “Cancel” instead and try again). Good luck!

Starting Parameters

In the Sum9rx version, the initial parameters are fewer in number, with rounder figures that are easier to memorize or use for calculations.

Total population now                               500

Net harvest, bushels                              5000

Total farm land, acres                              2000

Land under cultivation, acres                   500

The Suilxr version has more numerous parameters with numbers that are less straightforward to handle.

Total population now                               500

Total farm land under cultivation, acres       600

Total grain in inventory, bushels                   900
one season old                                     900
two seasons old                                     0
three seasons old                                     0

Total grain just harvested, bushels       13000

Total resources, harvest + inventory       13900

Through comparison, several important considerations emerge:

● The initial population is always 500;

● The extent of cultivated land ranges between 500 and 600 acres, which makes the calculation of the ratio between sowing and cultivated land more complex in the Suilxr version. At the same time, this modification of the initial value reduces the chance of confusing the two parameters—population and cultivated land—which are identical in the Sum9rx version.

● Sum9rx only provides the player-student with data from the last harvest, leaving the storage empty. In contrast, Suilxr allows the user to start the game with the last harvest and an inventory of 900 bushels of unused grain from the previous year's harvest.

● The initial output of Suilxr provides the implicit clue that the game can manage and simulate the storage of grain up to three seasons old and that the simulation may require the expansion of cultivated land up to a maximum of 2,000 acres[86].

This last consideration leads us directly to the next point.

Inventory Mechanics

In Sum9rx, during the first turn of the game, the player is asked how much grain from the last harvest should be stored in the warehouses:

You must now decide how to use your resources

How many bushels of new grain do you want placed in storage?

In subsequent turns, if the warehouses are not empty, the player is asked how much grain they wish to withdraw.

You must now decide how to use your resources.

In the storehouse are 765 bushels of grain one period old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

after which the player must decide how much of the new harvest to store. The remaining portion, combined with any grain withdrawn from the warehouses, must be entirely used as seed for planting and distributed to the population as food.

The program then requires the player to be able to perform the necessary addition and subtraction operations mentally and independently. If the provided data is correct, the output is:

Your responses agree with current economic conditions.

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in six months with his next report.

Otherwise:

Your last two responses do not agree with the amount of grain to be distributed. Please satisfy the relation (FROM INVENTORY) + (FROM HARVEST) = (TO INVENTORY) + (PLANTED) + (FED).

How many bushels of grain do you want planted for the next crop?

The stored grain is kept in different records based on the seasons in which it was harvested. For each batch of grain, the user must decide how much to store and how much to withdraw from the warehouse. Grain older than two seasons can rot, and the student is informed of this circumstance:

In the storehouse are 387 bushels of grain three periods old and in immediate danger of spoilage.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

The player is then promptly informed of the imminent loss of the older grain and is implicitly encouraged to use it by withdrawing it from the warehouse and possibly replacing it with part of the latest harvest.

In the Suilxr version, inventory management is completely different, more implicit, and left to the player's memory, who must keep track of the turns that have already passed.

Initially, the starting inventory is shown to the player, consisting of 900 bushels of grain that are one season old.

Total grain in inventory, bushels                   900
one season old                                     900
two seasons old                                     0
three seasons old                                     0

Subsequently, however, this information is no longer made explicit. Reports from season two onward are as follows:

Previous inventory                              1301

Change in inventory                              -640

Present inventory                                     661

Total resources, harvest + inventory       15054

The player is no longer given the ability to precisely manage the grain's entry and exit from the warehouses based on its age but can only store the newly harvested and unused grain in the warehouses.

Harvest this season                        14393

Present inventory                               661

Total resources, harvest + inventory      15054

You must now decide how to use your resources.

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

3500

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

10000

This means that 893 bushels must be placed in storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

1

Resulting inventory                        13554

or—by using more grain than harvested—to withdraw part or all of the grain present in the warehouse.

Harvest this season                         2381

Present inventory                               5272

Total resources, harvest + inventory       8653

You must now decide how to use your resources.

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

4000

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

4500

This means that 6119 bushels must be removed from storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

1

Resulting inventory                         153

Grain Spoilage

Both versions of The Sumerian Game have a grain spoilage mechanic implemented, but their operation differs significantly, and these variations greatly affect the gameplay style.

In Sum9rx, the player receives precise notifications about the amount of stored grain at risk of spoilage starting from the third season after harvest. The storage management also allows the player to withdraw and immediately use the oldest grain to avoid the spoilage problem. In this case, the only challenge the player faces is purely mathematical, as they need to perform slightly more complex mental calculations. If they make a mistake, they receive output informing them of the correct mathematical formula to apply, and they can try again to input the correct addends and subtrahends.

In the Suilxr version, the player cannot specifically act on a particular year's grain by withdrawing and using it immediately to prevent spoilage. Each turn, the player's only option is to store grain, using less than harvested, or to withdraw it, using more than harvested. Without other control options, storage management is more straightforward but less precise, which inevitably leads to constant grain loss due to spoilage unless the player always plays with empty storage, a very risky strategy in case of disasters.

Moreover, in Suilxr, grain spoils in the first season after harvest, with an increasing rate each season until reaching 100% after the third season. This, along with the addition of rat losses each season, complicates storage management during disasters.

In Sum9rx, the best strategy is to consistently use the oldest grain before it becomes at risk of spoilage. Accumulating reserves is not complicated and does not have significant drawbacks.

Conversely, in Suilxr, unused grain is constantly subject to increasing losses up to 100% after the third season, making it more difficult and costly to store, pushing the player to better manage what is available by maintaining a minimal reserve for the most adverse circumstances.

The output text is also different. In Sum9rx:

Lost by spoilage                                          -100

In Suilxr, instead losses by rats and spoilage is added and shown in the same output line:

Sir, I am sorry to report that 26 bushels of grain have rotted or been eaten by rats this past season.

Disasters

Both versions have implemented disaster mechanics that randomly strike and produce negative effects. In Sum9rx, disasters can have an effect on food and population. Additionally, the food spoilage mechanic is formally framed as a disaster in the appropriate summary table. Sometimes the disasters are succinctly illustrated in their nature, or they are generic.

Population at previous report                        528

Disaster deaths this season

By misc.                                           15

Total                                                -15

Natural increase (births minus natural deaths)       8

Total population now                                    521

The quantity of food the people received last season was satisfactory.

Expected gross harvest (based on planting)       13568

Disaster crop losses this season

By misc.                                                 406

Total                                                -406

Net harvest, bushels                               13162

There are 4 types of disasters: plague (that hits only population), thief (that hits only warehouse inventory), pests (that hits both harvest and inventory) and misc (that hits population, harvest and inventory).

In Suilxr, only one disaster can occur per game turn and it exclusively impacts the harvest. The output message is detailed and explains the nature of the disaster, providing general indications about the severity of the event. Unlike in Sum9rx, the seasonal report does not numerically indicate the amount of grain lost, leaving the player to estimate the loss based on known factors (cultivated land, workers, seed) and the magnitude of the disaster.

Luduga, I fear that the people have angered our god, Ningirsa. He alone could have sent that fire across the fields to destroy half of your crops. This is a very serious loss. I trust you can cover it from your inventory.

[…]

Harvest last season                        2381

Harvest this season                        5659

Text and Questions

Overall, the Suilxr version is more verbose, both in terms of the introduction and the text printed between game cycles. A unique feature of Suilxr is that population loss is accompanied by an explanation that might suggest a disaster, but it is actually the result of the player's choices, specifically providing too little food to the population.

We-sag’s family became ill with a fever while cutting reeds in the marsh lands. I am sorry to report that he and four grown sons have died. Fortunately the disease did not spread, but any loss of farmers is not to be taken lightly.

The royal Steward is also mentioned in the introduction by the name Urbaba, and several times during the game, he addresses the student—using the title "Sir"—in a reverent tone, but questioning them on basic game mechanics, such as:

Luduga, I am seeking more information. If you want your population to increase, you should 1-feed them more grain 2-feed them less grain?

1

Yes, Luduga, you must feed the people more grain.

or:

As your friend and advisor I would like some information from you. If your people are being fed satisfactorily would you expect your population to 1-increase 2-decrease 3-stay the same?

1

Of course, you would expect an increase.

User Feedback

In Suilxr, the only instance where the player can make an error in entering data into the program is when the sum of the grain for sowing and for food exceeds the total of the harvest plus the inventory. In this case, the error message aligns with the greater characterization of the text as a dialogue between the ruler/student and their assistant:

Please sir you dont have that much available

In Sum9rx, the message is more educational:

Your last two responses do not agree with the amount of grain to be distributed. Please satisfy the relation (FROM INVENTORY) + (FROM HARVEST) = (TO INVENTORY) + (PLANTED) + (FED).

Additionally, in Suilxr, to help the student find a better ratio between grain used for food and the population, if there is still grain in the warehouse, an additional feedback message is provided to encourage the player to increase the food supply before the seasonal calculation:

Sir, your people don’t have enough food to eat and there are 1301 bushels in storage. Shall we not distribute it to them? How much?

In addition to data validation for mathematical purposes, the developers also took care to check for inappropriate inputs. Two messages of this type are known. The first occurred during the execution of Sum9rx when the user, after just submitting an input, typed a second number, receiving this error message:

Illegal response. Review instructions and try again.

The second case is reported by Life magazine and contains a different error, not documented elsewhere and possibly introduced by the journalist for narrative purposes.

507 BUSHELS OF GRAIN HAVE BEEN EATEN BY RATS

CATS

PLEASE RETYPE YOUR ANSWER.

Farmed land

None of the three listings of the Sum9rx version show the program's behavior in the case of large population variations. However, in the game that generated the only surviving Suilxr listing, the player lost 31% of the population in a single turn.

In this case, in the turn following the die-off, the royal Steward suggested that the player reduce the cultivated lands. The output was:

Sir, your population has decreased -31% while the size of your farm has not changed.

Should I ask the steward to change the number of acres of land under cultivation? 1-yes or 2-no.

1

You will have 413 acres under cultivation compared to 600 in the past.

In Sum9rx version, there's a mention to the maximum farmed lands as 2000 acres. The game mechanic of the land usage is unknown.

Ending

The only ending recorded in the listings is from the Sum9rx version:

Ye people of sumer, hear the sad proclamation of thy king’s steward.

After a long and glorious reign our noble king has gone to take his deserved place beside our god.

I now therefore proclaim his eldest son to be our rightful ruler henceforth. Let all the earth kneel before him.

The student’s turn is now over, and the game will stop.

Additionally, two other endings are known, one negative:

Your population has decreased to zero. Do not go on. Call the teacher.[87]

and the other positive:

You have done well, Luduga. The gods are pleased. Goodby.[88]

Analysis

Introduction

The two known versions, named Sum9rx and Suilxr, differ in many ways. The latter seems more advanced due to the larger amount of text, standardized output, and complex player challenges. Sum9rx, on the other hand, while showing many mechanics in common with Suilxr, presents simpler problems to the student player, with variables explicitly stated, whereas in Suilxr, these are disguised as output messages, such as the three levels of disasters.

When examining the gameplay from this angle, it's tempting to conclude that the Suilxr version preceded Sum9rx, a notion further reinforced by Richard Wing's inclusion of the sole Suilxr listing in the appendix of his 1967 final report. In the same report, as we will see later, Professor Wing meticulously described the mechanics of a version of The Sumerian Game that is perfectly consistent and compatible with the attached listing.

Yet, even after the first trial of Suilxr, Sum9rx was still used on at least one occasion, and Wing certainly described part of the Sum9rx version in his final report, though he later went on to detail the mathematics of the Suilxr version. All of this suggests that the developers never completely abandoned the Sum9rx version, occasionally presenting it to certain students based on selection criteria that remain unknown to us.

Wing noted that the revision process reduced the first phase of The Sumerian Game to 30 turns, although the original duration remains unknown. All three Sum9rx listings stop after a few turns and show less text compared to the sole Suilxr listing, which reaches the third year. Additionally, a fragment most likely printed from Sum9rx and published in William McKay's Computer-Directed Instructional Games reaches the autumn season of year 14 of Luduga I, further supporting the hypothesis that Suilxr was longer, probably at least 30 turns.

Of the two, Suilxr is undoubtedly the more well-known version, as Wing described it in his final report. Some of the mechanics illustrated by Wing are not present in the Sum9rx version.

In 1965 Moncreiff noted: “The development of this simulated environment is being carried out (as Project 28241) at the BOCES Center for Educational Services and Research, 845 Fox Meadow Road, Yorktown Heights, New York, under Cooperative Research grants. A shortened version has been programmed and is operating at IBM-Mohansic Laboratory. This version implements the basic agricultural cycle, and includes several catastrophes, grain deterioration, and population increases. This has proved sufficient to make an interesting game. Further elaboration needs to be done in order to meet the educational objectives in a satisfactory way.”[89]

Which Version to Rebuild

Of the two known versions related to the first phase of The Sumerian Game, the reign of Luduga I, the better-known one is certainly Suilxr due to Wing's numerous annotations, the algorithms, and the charts included in his final report.

As previously mentioned, Suilxr is also the more intriguing version because it presents the player with a greater number of variables, offers fewer control tools, and therefore provides a more complex challenge. To succeed in a game of Sum9rx, on the other hand, less intuition is required: the inventory management is so complete that it eliminates the possibility of food loss, except for random events related to the occasional disasters that struck the simulated city of Lagash. The player only needs to be proficient at addition and subtraction, using the oldest grain before it spoils, replacing it with newer grain, and gradually building up a reserve to handle any unforeseen events.

In Suilxr, this strategy is not possible, and with every turn, the game risks slipping out of the player's control. Deprived of the simple and powerful inventory management of Sum9rx, the player must constantly make the best use of the scarce resources available.

Sum9rx - The McDonnell Listing

Eugene Edward McDonnell was the test supervisor associated with this listing, which is reprinted in full below, with highlighting added to indicate what type of text or action is being displayed.

Turn number 1

You are about to operate the sumerian economic model.

Imagine that you have just been made King of Lagash, a city-state of sumer in our year 3400 b.c.

Twice yearly your royal steward will report to you the economic condition of the kingdom.

Guided by these reports, you will decide the use of your resources (symbolized by grain), trying to keep your population stable and well-fed.

The steward will use the typewriter to report and ask for your decisions. when the “proceed” light comes on, type your answer in figures, and press “return”. (if you make a mistake, press “cancel” instead and try again.)

Good luck!

Initial economic report made to the new King of Lagash by his humble steward:

Total population now                              500

Net harvest, bushels                              5000

Total farm land, acres                        2000

Land under cultivation, acres                  500[90]

You must now decide how to use your resources

How many bushels of new grain do you want placed in storage?[91]

765[92]

How many bushels of grain do you want planted for the next crop?

1235

Whatever grain yet remains undistributed should be fed to the people.

How many bushels of grain are to be fed to the people?

3000

Your responses agree with current economic conditions.[93]

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in six months with his next report.[94]

Economic report of the king's steward for the spring season in the year 1 of the king and the year 1 of the dynasty.

Population at previous report                              500

Natural increase (births minus natural deaths)                  10

Total population now                                          510

The quantity of food the people received last season was satisfactory.

Expected gross harvest (based on planting)                  5884

Net harvest, bushels                                          5884

Initial inventory                                          0

Added to inventory                                          765

Final inventory                                          765[95]

You must now decide how to use your resources.

In the storehouse are 765 bushels of grain one period old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?[96]

250

How many bushels of new grain do you want placed in storage?

1150

How many bushels of grain do you want planted for the next crop?

1984

Whatever grain yet remains undistributed should be fed to the people.

How many bushels of grain are to be fed to the people?

3000

Your responses agree with current economic conditions.

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in six months with his next report.

Economic report of the king's steward for the autumn season in the year 1 of the king and the year 1 of the dynasty.

population at previous report                        510
natural increase (births minus natural deaths)            9

the quantity of food the people received last season was satisfactory.

expected gross harvest (based on planting)            10485
net harvest, bushels                                    10485

initial inventory                                    765
removed from inventory                              -250
added to inventory                                    1150
final inventory                                    1665

You must now decide how to use your resources.

In the storehouse are 515 bushels of grain two periods old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

115

In the storehouse are 1150 bushels of grain one period old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

250

How many bushels of new grain do you want placed in storage?

5400

How many bushels of grain do you want planted for the next crop?

2450

Whatever grain yet remains undistributed should be fed to the people.

How many bushels of grain are to be fed to the people?

3000

Your responses agree with current economic conditions.

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in six months with his next report.

Economic report of the king's steward for the spring season in the year 2 of the king and the year 2 of the dynasty.

Population at previous report                        519

Natural increase (births minus natural deaths)            9

Total population now                                    528

The quantity of food the people received last season was satisfactory.

Expected gross harvest (based on planting)            12164

Disaster crop losses this season
by pests                                    221
total                                          -221

Net harvest, bushels                                    11943

Initial inventory                                    1665

Removed from inventory                              -365

Disaster inventory losses this season
by pests                                    114
total                                          -114

Added to inventory                                    5400

Final inventory                                    6587

You must now decide how to use your resources.

In the storehouse are 393 bushels of grain two periods old and in immediate danger of spoilage.[97]

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

293

In the storehouse are 885 bushels of grain two periods old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

485

In the storehouse are 5309 bushels of grain one period old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

3000

How many bushels of new grain do you want placed in storage?

10000

How many bushels of grain do you want planted for the next crop?

2711

Whatever grain yet remains undistributed should be fed to the people.

How many bushels of grain are to be fed to the people?

3010

Your responses agree with current economic conditions.

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in six months with his next report.

Economic report of the king's steward for the autumn season in the year 2 of the king and the year 2 of the dynasty.

Population at previous report                        528

Disaster deaths this season
by misc.                                    15
total                                          -15

Natural increase (births minus natural deaths)            8

Total population now                                    521

The quantity of food the people received last season was satisfactory.

Expected gross harvest (based on planting)            13568

Disaster crop losses this season
by misc.                                    406
total                                          -406

Net harvest, bushels                                    13162

Initial inventory                                    6587

Removed from inventory                              -3778

Lost by spoilage                                    -100

Disaster inventory losses this season
by misc.                                    390
total                                          -390

Added to inventory                                    10000

Final inventory                                    12320

You must now decide how to use your resources.

In the storehouse are 387 bushels of grain three periods old and in immediate danger of spoilage.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

287

In the storehouse are 2239 bushels of grain two periods old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

2230

In the storehouse are 9694 bushels of grain one period old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

9600

How many bushels of new grain do you want placed in storage?

20000

Amount entered exceeded amount allowable. Reconsider response and enter smaller amount.[98]

13162

How many bushels of grain do you want planted for the next crop?

2000

Whatever grain yet remains undistributed should be fed to the people.

How many bushels of grain are to be fed to the people?

10117

Your responses agree with current economic conditions.

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in six months with his next report.

Economic report of the king's steward for the spring season in the year 3 of the king and the year 3 of the dynasty.

Population at previous report                        521

Natural increase (births minus natural deaths)            -11

Total population now                                    510

The quantity of food the people received last season was very excessive.

Expected gross harvest (based on planting)            9130

Net harvest, bushels                                    9130

Initial inventory                                    12320

Removed from inventory                              -12117

Lost by spoilage                                    -100

Disaster inventory losses this season
by theft                                    85
total                                          -85

Added to inventory                                    13162

Final inventory                                    13180

You must now decide how to use your resources.

In the storehouse are 8 bushels of grain three periods old and in immediate danger of spoilage.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

0

In the storehouse are 94 bushels of grain two periods old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

1

In the storehouse are 13078 bushels of grain one period old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

4000

How many bushels of new grain do you want placed in storage?

1000

Whatever grain yet remains undistributed should be fed to the people.

How many bushels of grain are to be fed to the people?

12131

Your last two responses do not agree with the amount of grain to be distributed. Please satisfy the relation (from inventory) + (from harvest) = (to inventory) + (planted) + (fed).[99]

How many bushels of grain do you want planted for the next crop?

1000

Whatever grain yet remains undistributed should be fed to the people.

How many bushels of grain are to be fed to the people?

3001

Your responses agree with current economic conditions.

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in six months with his next report.

Economic report of the king's steward for the autumn season in the year 3 of the king and the year 3 of the dynasty.

Population at previous report                        510

Natural increase (births minus natural deaths)            9

Total population now                                    519

The quantity of food the people received last season was satisfactory.

Expected gross harvest (based on planting)            4845

Net harvest, bushels                                    4845

Initial inventory                                    13180

Removed from inventory                              -4001

Lost by spoilage                                    -8

Disaster inventory losses this season
by theft                                    427
total                                          -427

Added to inventory                                    9130

Final inventory                                    17874

Ye people of sumer, hear the sad proclamation of thy King's steward.

After a long and glorious reign our noble king has gone to take his deserved place beside our God.

I now therefore proclaim his eldest son to be our rightful ruler henceforth. Let all the earth kneel before him.

The student's turn is now over, and the game will stop.[100]

September 18, 1964. Test of sumerian economic model, E. McDonnell[101]

Analyzing The McDonnell Listing

The Sum9rx version of The Sumerian Game is much simpler than Suilxr in terms of game mechanics and produces far less output. Much of the gameplay revolves around the correct management of the inventory. By correctly performing addition and subtraction operations, the player must answer the computer's questions in order to proceed to the next turn. Each turn, the machine checks if the player has allocated every bushel of grain available, either by storing it in the warehouses or using it for food or sowing. The machine flags an error and restarts the questioning process if the calculations are incorrect.

The inventory management is more detailed, allowing the player to withdraw the oldest grain each year and replace it with new grain, minimizing the risk of losing it due to spoilage.

The textual output does not mention the type of disaster but instead groups the losses due to rats, grain spoilage, and disasters in the final report, providing precise information on the impact of the latter on what would have otherwise been the harvest.

Overall, this version is simpler, less interesting, and more suited to a less skilled audience, as it primarily involves executing operations—explicitly provided by the program itself when the user makes a mistake—with minimal strategic management.

Additional observations:

● In the first turn, the use of 3,000 bushels of grain for 500 inhabitants was considered adequate and led to a population increase of 10 units, or 2%. Under the same conditions, following the tables described by Wing in his final report, the population would have suffered a net decrease of 33%.

● The grain production and the impact of disasters do not align with the tables provided by Richard Wing.

McDonnell Listing Algorithm

Output A

You are about to operate the sumerian economic model.

Imagine that you have just been made King of Lagash, a city-state of sumer in our year 3400 b.c.

Twice yearly your royal steward will report to you the economic condition of the kingdom.

Guided by these reports, you will decide the use of your resources (symbolized by grain), trying to keep your population stable and well-fed.

The steward will use the typewriter to report and ask for your decisions. when the “proceed” light comes on, type your answer in figures, and press “return”. (if you make a mistake, press “cancel” instead and try again.)

Good luck!

Initial economic report made to the new King of Lagash by his humble steward:

Total population now                               500

Net harvest, bushels                              5000

Total farm land, acres                              2000

Land under cultivation, acres                         500

Output B

In the storehouse are XXX bushels of grain three periods old and in immediate danger of spoilage.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

Output C

In the storehouse are XXX bushels of grain two periods old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

Output D

In the storehouse are XXX bushels of grain one period old.

How many bushels of this grain do you want taken out?

Output E

How many bushels of new grain do you want placed in storage?

Output F

How many bushels of grain do you want planted for the next crop?

Output G

Whatever grain yet remains undistributed should be fed to the people.

How many bushels of grain are to be fed to the people?

Output H

Your last two responses do not agree with the amount of grain to be distributed. Please satisfy the relation (from inventory) + (from harvest) = (to inventory) + (planted) + (fed).

Output I

Your responses agree with current economic conditions.

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in six months with his next report.

Output L

Economic report of the king’s steward for the autumn season in the year X of the king and the year X of the dynasty.

Population at previous report                              XXX

Natural increase (births minus natural deaths)            XXX

Total population now                                    XXX

The quantity of food the people received last season was satisfactory.

Expected gross harvest (based on planting)            XXX

Net harvest, bushels                                    XXX

Initial inventory                                    XXX

Removed from inventory                                    XXX

Lost by spoilage                                          XXX

Disaster inventory losses this season
by theft                                          XXX
total                                          XXX

Added to inventory                                    XXX

Output M

Ye people of sumer, hear the sad proclamation of thy King’s steward.

After a long and glorious reign our noble king has gone to take his deserved place beside our God.

I now therefore proclaim his eldest son to be our rightful ruler henceforth. Let all the earth kneel before him.

The student’s turn is now over, and the game will stop.

Suilxr - The McLaughlin Listing

Scott McLaughlin was the name entered by the player on this listing, which is reprinted in full below, with highlighting added like the previously analyzed McDonnell Listing.

run 100

Suilxr is running.[102]

Slide 1, hit CR.[103]

Hello! Before we begin, will you please type your name, first name first, then your last name, and then press the Return key.

scott mclaughlin

Now, SCOTT, you ready to operate the Sumerian Economic Model.

Imagine that you have just been made Ruler of Lagash, a City-State of Sumer, in the year 3500 B.C. Twice yearly your Royal Steward, Urbaba, will report to you the economic condition of the kingdom. Guided by these reports, you will decide the use of your grain and other resources, trying to keep your population stable and well fed. Between reports, your court advisor will come to you with news of your kingdom.

The Steward will use the typewriter to report and ask for your decisions. When the “Proceed” light comes on, type your answer in figures and press “Return”. (If you make a mistake, press “Cancel” instead and try again). Good luck![104]

Initial Economic Report made to the New Ruler of Lagash by his Humble Steward:

Total population now                        500

Total farm land under cultivation, acres      600

Total grain in inventory, bushels            900
one season old                  900
two seasons old                  0
three seasons old                  0

Total grain just harvested, bushels            13000

Total resources, harvest + inventory      13900[105]

You must now decide how to use your resources.[106]

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

1000

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

2000

This means that 10,000 bushels must be placed in storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?[107]

2

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

2500

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

9000

This means that 1500 bushels must be placed in storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

2

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

2600

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

9999

This means that 401 bushels must be placed in storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

1

Resulting inventory                        1301[108]

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in 6 months.[109]

Sir, your people don't have enough food to eat and there are 1301 bushels in storage. Shall we not distribute it to them? How much?[110]

500

Sir, I am sorry to report that 140 bushels of grain have rotted or been eaten by rats this last season.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Economic Report of the Ruler's Steward for the SPRING Season in the year 1 of Luduga I.

Population at previous report                  500

Change in population                        -155

Total population now                        345

The quality of food the people received last season was far too little.

Harvest last season                        13000

Harvest this season                        14393

Previous inventory                        1301

Change in inventory                        -640

Present inventory                        661

Total resources, harvest + inventory      15054[111]

You must now decide how to use your resources.

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

3500

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

10000

This means that 893 bushels must be placed in storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

1

Resulting inventory                        13554

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in 6 months.

Sir, your population has decreased -31% while the size of your farm has not changed.

Should I ask the steward to change the number of acres of land under cultivation? 1-yes or 2-no.

1

You will have 413 acres under cultivation compared to 600 in the past.[112]

Sir, I am sorry to report that 405 bushels of grain have rotted or been eaten by rats this last season.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Economic Report of the Ruler's Steward for the FALL Season in the year 1 of Luduga I.

Population at previous report                  345

Change in population                        0

Total population now                        345

The quality of food the people received last season was too little.

Harvest last season                        14393

Harvest this season                        9824

Previous inventory                        1554

Change in inventory                        -405

Present inventory                        1149

Total resources, harvest + inventory      10973

You must now decide how to use your resources.

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

3600

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

9000

Please sir you dont have that much available[113]

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

3600

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

7000

This means that 776 bushels must be removed from storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

2

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

3600

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

6500

This means that 276 bushels must be removed from storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

2

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

3000

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

600

This means that 6224 bushels must be placed in storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

1

Resulting inventory                        7373

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in 6 months.

As you have noticed, Luduga, by changing your feeding and planting figures, you can change your population, harvest and inventory.

As your friend and advisor I would like some information from you. If your people are being fed satisfactorily would you expect your population to 1-increase 2-decrease 3-stay the same?

1

Of course, you would expect an increase.[114]

Sir, I am sorry to report that 1101 bushels of grain have rotted or been eaten by rats this last season.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Economic Report of the Ruler's Steward for the SPRING Season in the year 2 of Luduga I.

Population at previous report                  345

Change in population                        -11

Total population now                        334

The quality of food the people received last season was far too little.

Harvest last season                        9824

Harvest this season                        2381

Previous inventory                        7373

Change in inventory                        -1101

Present inventory                        5272

Total resources, harvest + inventory      8653

You must now decide how to use your resources.

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

4000

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

4500

This means that 6119 bushels must be removed from storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

1

Resulting inventory                        153

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in 6 months.

Remember, Luduga, any big change in population will affect your harvest because most of your people are farmers.[115]

Luduga, I fear that the people have angered our god, Ningirsa. He alone could have sent that fire across the fields to destroy half of your crops. This is a very serious loss. I trust you can cover it from your inventory.

Sir, I am sorry to report that 39 bushels of grain have rotted or been eaten by rats this past season.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Economic Report of the Ruler's Steward for the FALL Season in the year 2 of Luduga I.

Population at previous report                  334

Change in population                        0

Total population now                        334

The quality of food the people received last season was too little.

Harvest last season                        2381

Harvest this season                        5659

Previous inventory                        153

Change in inventory                        -39

Present inventory                        114

Total resources, harvest + inventory      5773

You must now decide how to use your resources.

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

4500

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

1300

Please sir you dont have that much available

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

4500

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

1000

This means that 159 bushels must be placed in storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

1

Resulting inventory                        273

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in 6 months.

Luduga, I am seeking more information. If you want your population to increase, you should 1-feed them more grain 2-feed them less grain?

1

Yes, Luduga, you must feed the people more grain.

Sir, I am sorry to report that 39 bushels of grain have rotted or been eaten by rats this past season.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Economic Report of the Ruler's Steward for the SPRING Season in the year 3 of Luduga I.

Population at previous report                  334

Change in population                        0

Total population now                        334

The quality of food the people received last season was too little.

Harvest last season                        5659

Harvest this season                        3812

Previous inventory                        273

Change in inventory                        -101

Present inventory                        172

Total resources, harvest + inventory      3984

You must now decide how to use your resources.

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

3000

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

300

This means that 512 bushels must be placed in storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

2

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

3009

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

3 003

Please retype the number.

3003

Please sir you dont have that much available

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

3000

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

458

This means that 354 bushels must be placed in storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

2

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

3000

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

700

This means that 112 bushels must be placed in storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

1

Resulting inventory                        284

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in 6 months.

We-sag's family became ill with a fever while cutting reeds in the marsh lands. I am sorry to report that he and four grown sons have died. Fortunately the disease did not spread, but any loss of farmers is not to be taken lightly.

Sir, I am sorry to report that 75 bushels of grain have rotted or been eaten by rats this past season.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Economic Report of the Ruler's Steward for the FALL Season in the year 3 of Luduga I.

Population at previous report                  334

Change in population                        -5

Total population now                        329

The quality of food the people received last season was far too little.

Harvest last season                        3812

Harvest this season                        2537

Previous inventory                        284

Change in inventory                        -75

Present inventory                        209

Total resources, harvest + inventory

2746

You must now decide how to use your resources.

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

2000

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

1200

Please sir you dont have that much available

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

1000

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

1500

This means that 37 bushels must be placed in storage. Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

1

Resulting inventory                        246

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in 6 months.

I lean heavily upon your wisdom, Luduga, but I am also here to help you. Tell me, if your population is increasing, would you expect the quantity of grain fed to your people to 1-increase 2-decrease?

1

Of course it should increase. Forgive me if my questions seem simple. It is my duty to urge you to see the relationships among the items in your Steward's reports.

Sir, your people don't have enough food to eat and there are 246 bushels in storage. Shall we not distribute it to them? How much?

120

A plague of locusts came upon our fields yesterday. Fortunately it was not as severe as it has been in the past.

Sir, I am sorry to report that 26 bushels of grain have rotted or been eaten by rats this past season.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Analyzing The McLaughlin Listing

The goal of Suilxr version seen in McLaughlin’s listing is to adequately use the available grain to feed the population and plant the harvest for the following year. To achieve this, the player must understand the right ratio between population and grain, and between seed and fields. In the printed text portion, the game provides some hints on how the game is progressing: if the food is scarce or excessive, the population decreases. If the food is within an intermediate range, the population does not change, and if it is in the optimal range, it grows by a maximum of 3% per season. In any case, each season, the program informs the player of how much grain was given to the population (too little, little, adequate, too much, far too much).

In the slides, the graphs referred to in the next section were shown, through which—by performing correct calculations—students could precisely calculate the amount of grain to distribute. Without the graphs, the game turned into a series of trial-and-error turns in search of optimal ratios.

The game ended when one of these two conditions occurred: the population was wiped out (negative ending) or the 30th turn was reached (15 years with two semiannual reports).

Upon reaching the 30th turn, phase 2 was loaded with reset initial conditions, not depending on how phase 1 was concluded.

McLaughlin Listing Algorithm

Table 1

Output A

Hello! Before we begin, will you please type your name, first name first, then your last name, and then press the Return key.

Output B

Now, XXXXXX, you ready to operate the Sumerian Economic Model.

Imagine that you have just been made Ruler of Lagash, a City-State of Sumer, in the year 3500 B.C. Twice yearly your Royal Steward, Urbaba, will report to you the economic condition of the kingdom. Guided by these reports, you will decide the use of your grain and other resources, trying to keep your population stable and well fed. Between reports, your court advisor will come to you with news of your kingdom.

The Steward will use the typewriter to report and ask for your decisions. When the “Proceed” light comes on, type your answer in figures and press “Return”. (If you make a mistake, press “Cancel” instead and try again). Good luck!

Initial Economic Report made to the New Ruler of Lagash by his Humble Steward:

Total population now                        500

Total farm land under cultivation, acres      600

Total grain in inventory, bushels            900
one season old                        900
two seasons old                         0
three seasons old                         0

Total grain just harvested, bushels       13000

Total resources, harvest + inventory       13900

Output C

You must now decide how to use your resources.

How many bushels of grain do you wish to FEED your people?

Output D

How many bushels of grain do you want PLANTED for the next crop?

Output E1

This means that XXXX bushels must be placed in storage.

Output E2

This means that XXXX bushels must be removed from storage.

Output F

Is this all right? Do you wish to 1-let your decisions stand or 2-revise them?

Output G

Please sir you dont have that much available

Output H

Resulting inventory                        XXXX

The steward will execute the royal commands and return in 6 months.

Output I

Sir, your people don’t have enough food to eat and there are XXXX bushels in storage. Shall we not distribute it to them? How much?

Output L

Please sir you dont have that much available

Table 2

Output A

Your population has decreased to zero. Do not go on.

Call the teacher.

Output B1

Sir, your population has increased XX% while the size of your farm has not changed.

Should I ask the Steward to change the number of acres of land under
cultivation? 1-yes or 2-no

Output B2

Sir, your population has decreased XX% while the size of your farm has not changed.

Should I ask the Steward to change the number of acres of land under
cultivation? 1-yes or 2-no

Output C

You will have XXX acres compared to XXX in the past.

Table 3

Output A

Sir, I am sorry to report that XXX bushels of grain have rotted or been eaten by rats this last season.

Table 4

Table 5

Output A

The output text consists of two parts: the first describes the type of disaster, and the second its severity. The final output is the combination of these two strings.

● Locusts:

A plague of locusts came upon our fields yesterday.

● Flood:

*missing text*

● Fire:

Luduga, I fear that the people have angered our God, Ningirsa. He
alone could have sent that fire across the fields to destroy your crops.

● Small disaster:

Fortunately it was not as severe as it has been in the past.

● Medium disaster:

*missing text*

● Serious disaster:

*missing text*

● Very serious disaster:

This is a very serious loss. I trust that you can cover it from your inventory.

Output B

The amount of food is described as:

● if the food/population ratio is less than or equal to 9

far too little.

● if greater than 9 and less than or equal to 15

too little.

● if greater than 15 and less than or equal to 21

satisfactory.

● if greater than 21 and less than or equal to 27

too much.

● if greater than 27.

far too much.

Output C

You have done well, Luduga. The gods are pleased. Goodbye.

Output D

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Economic Report of Ruler's Steward for the XXXX season in the
year XXXX of Luduga I.

Population at previous report             XXX

Change in population                    XXX

Total population now             XXX

The quantity of the food the people received last season was XXXXX

Harvest last season             XXX

Harvest this season             XXX

Previous inventory             XXX

Change in inventory                   XXX

Present inventory                   XXX

Total resources, harvest + inventory             XXX

You must now decide how to use your resources.

Random Numbers

In The Sumerian Game, Suilxr version, random numbers are used exclusively for calculating the food eaten by mice and managing disasters. In each case, a pseudo-random number R is generated and used in the formulas.

R is described as a floating-point number between 0 and 1.

What is Missing

Some parts of the game cannot be reconstructed. Specifically, in the McLaughlin listing, only a few disaster descriptions are present, including the Wrath of the Gods (field fire) and the locust invasion, along with descriptions of two out of the four severity levels.

Thus, the reconstruction is incomplete in this regard. However, using placeholder phrases, it is still possible to implement the game logic without having the complete output. Following this approach, one can imagine that the original game had a specific description for the flood disaster and that two phrases indicating the severity (medium and severe) of the disasters have also been lost.

Moreover, in Suilxr printed in McLaughlins listing, there are questions for the player/student every two turns designed to stimulate reasoning, help reflect on the game mechanics, and verify the understanding of concepts presented before the game during the initial lesson. Only three of these questions have survived, enough to understand the purpose and format of the quizzes (always based on closed responses with two options and an interface limited to using the numbers 1 and 2 to select the answer), but not enough to allow a faithful reconstruction. These quizzes are mentioned in Wing's final report, but without details or a list, other than 4 grades of difficulty. Therefore, unless more listings are found, they are lost forever.

Critical Issues and Observations

In the penultimate turn of McLaughlin's playthrough, there is a sequence of text placed before the semi-annual report, in the position usually occupied by disasters:

We-sag’s family became ill with a fever while cutting reeds in the marsh lands. I am sorry to report that he and four grown sons have died. Fortunately the disease did not spread, but any loss of farmers is not to be taken lightly.

Due to its text, position, and structure, this output could be interpreted as an undocumented disaster affecting the city's population. It is worth noting that the Sum9rx certainly includes such population-impacting disasters, which are not covered in Wing's final report. All disasters listed in the algorithm described by Wing exclusively affect the harvest. At some point during the game's development, the authors must have decided to introduce (or remove) disasters that directly reduced the population, leaving only those that impacted the harvest.

Additionally, analysis of McLaughlin's playthrough reveals a very interesting circumstance: in the turn in question, the food provided by McLaughlin to the population was insufficient, and according to the formula indicated by Wing in the final report, it would have led to a population decrease of exactly 5 people. This is indeed reflected in the immediately following report:

Economic Report of the Ruler’s Steward for the FALL Season in the year 3 of Luduga I.

Population at previous report                  334

Change in population                        -5

Total population now                        329

In light of this, it seems evident that the output signal regarding the death of We-sag's family was part of one of the many narrative phrases written by Mabel Addis to help student players empathize with the game and was not a random disaster. The program, in certain circumstances unfortunately not discernible from the available information, could generate additional output to prompt the player to reflect on the consequences of their actions and transform the numerical tables of the game into a narrative.

Interestingly, Wing's final report mentions that the excessive amount of text in some cases proved difficult for students to manage and was therefore progressively reduced in subsequent revisions. This clue also suggests that the Suilxr, though described in the final report, may not be the last version of the game, but rather the most complete and best documented. Unfortunately, there is not enough information to refute this hypothesis.

Part III: Legacy

King of Sumeria

The earliest known version of the software written by Dyment was included in the DEC libraries under the code FOCAL 8-5 with the title The Sumer Game. Written in FOCAL 68, it dates back to late 1968. The second version, still titled The Sumer Game, was released in late 1969 with minor modifications by Robert Backer of Lexington High School. The third version, significantly shortened in text, was released in 1970 by DEC under the title originally chosen by Dyment: King of Sumeria.

FOCAL source code for the DEC-1968 version

01.10 S P=95;S S=2800;S H=3000;S E=200;S Y=3;S A=1000;S I=5;S Q=1

02.10 S D=0

02.20 D 6;T "I BEG TO REPORT THAT LAST YEAR"D," DIED OF STARVATION,

02.25 T !I," PEOPLE CAME INTO THE CITY,";S P=P+I;I (-Q)2.3

02.27 S P=FITR(P/2);T !"HALF THE PEOPLE DIED FROM A PLAGUE EPIDEMIC,

02.30 T !"AND THE POPULATION IS NOW"P,!!"THE CITY NOW OWNS

02.35 T A," ACRES OF LAND."!!;I (H-1)2.5;T "WE HARVESTED

02.40 D 3.2;T " THE HARVEST WAS"H," BUSHELS."!E

02.50 T " BUSHELS OF GRAIN WERE DESTROYED BY RATS AND YOU NOW HAVE

02.60 T !S," BUSHELS IN STORE."!!!"DO YOU WISH TO CONTINUE?

02.70 A " (ANSWER YES OR NO)"Q,!;I (Q-0NO)2.8,7.4

02.80 I (Q-0YES)2.7,3.1,2.7

03.10 D 6;D 8;S Y=C+17;T "THIS YEAR, LAND MAY BE TRADED FOR

03.20 T Y," BUSHELS PER ACRE;";S C=1

03.30 A !"HOW MANY ACRES DO YOU WISH TO BUY?"!Q;I (Q)7.2,3.8

03.40 I (Y*Q-S)3.9,3.6;D 4.6;G 3.3

03.50 D 4.5;G 3.3

03.60 D 3.9;G 4.8

03.70 S A=A+Q;S S=S-Y*Q;S C=0

03.80 A !"TO SELL?"!Q;I (Q)7.2,3.9;S Q=-Q;I (A+Q)3.5

03.90 S A=A+Q;S S=S-Y*Q;S C=0

04.10 T !"HOW MANY BUSHELS OF GRAIN DO YOU WISH TO DISTRIBUTE

04.11 A " AS FOOD?"!Q;I (Q)7.2;I (Q-S)4.2,4.7;D 4.6;G 4.1

04.20 S S=S-Q;S C=1

04.30 A !"HOW MANY ACRES OF LAND DO YOU WISH TO PLANT WITH SEED?"!D

04.40 I (D)7.2;I (A-D)4.45;I (FITR(D/2)-S-1)4.65;D 4.6;G 4.3

04.45 D 4.5;G 4.3

04.50 D 7;T A," ACRES."!

04.60 D 7;T S," BUSHELS IN STORE."!

04.65 I (D-10*P-1)5.1;D 7;T P," PEOPLE."!;G 4.3

04.70 D 4.2

04.80 D 6;T "YOU NOW HAVE NO GRAIN LEFT IN STORE, SO YOU HAVE

04.90 T !"NONE LEFT TO USE AS SEED THIS YEAR."!;S D=0

05.10 S S=S-FITR(D/2);D 8;S Y=C;S H=D*Y

05.20 D 8;S E=0;I (FITR(C/2)-C/2)5.3;S E=S/C

05.30 S S=S-E+H;D 8;S I=FITR(C*(20*A+S)/P/100+1);S C=FITR(Q/20)

05.40 S Q=FITR(10*FABS(FRAN()));I (P-C)2.1;S D=P-C;S P=C;G 2.2

06.10 T !!"HAMURABI: "%5

07.10 I (C)7.2;S C=C-1;D 6;T "PLEASE THINK AGAIN. YOU HAVE ONLY";R

07.20 T !"HAMURABI HAS GONE ON STRIKE! YOU WILL HAVE TO STOP

07.30 T !"AND FIND YOURSELF ANOTHER STEWARD!"!!

07.40 T !"GOODBYE!"!!;Q

07.50 A ?A S P?;G 3.1

08.10 S C=FITR(5*FABS(FRAN()))+1

Observations

The earliest known version of Dyment's game has more text than the better-known 1970 version, which later became more wide spread. In an email interview conducted by Kate Willaert, Dyment recalled: “[...] the code when I finished with it was the absolute maximum that could run in a standard PDP-8 (4K × 12-bit words), literally down to the last bit, so not a single character could have been added. These longer text messages, then, could have only come from an earlier version (which would have lacked functionality) or something created later that did not run on a standard PDP-8.”

The 1968 version, however, has two features that were later partially or completely removed: the option to stop the game between turns by answering Yes or No to a dedicated prompt (lines 2.60-2.80), and a feature to customize starting parameters. This latter feature could be accessed by launching the program directly at line 7.50 with the command GO. In this case, the player could manually input the parameters A, S, and P, representing cultivated lands, grain in storage, and population.

The patience counter for Steward Hamurabi—whose name already displayed the famous typo missing an “m”—would lead to the unintended premature end of the game if it reached zero. In this case, the game’s exit message was humorous:

HAMURABI HAS GONE ON STRIKE! YOU WILL HAVE TO STOP

AND FIND YOURSELF ANOTHER STEWARD!

GOODBYE!

FOCAL source code for the Backer-1969 version

01.10 S P=95;S S=2800;S H=3000;S E=200;S Y=3;S A=1000;S I=5;S Q=1

02.10 S D=0

02.15 T !!!![116]

02.20 D 6;T "I BEG TO REPORT THAT LAST YEAR"D," DIED OF STARVATION,

02.25 T !I," PEOPLE CAME INTO THE CITY,";S P=P+I;I (-Q)2.3

02.27 S P=FITR(P/2);T !"HALF THE PEOPLE DIED FROM A CITY PLAGUE,”!

02.30 T "AND THE POPULATION IS NOW"P,!!"THE CITY NOW OWNS

02.35 T A," ACRES OF LAND."!!;I (H-1)2.5;T "WE HARVESTED

02.40 D 3.2;T " THE HARVEST WAS"H," BUSHELS."!E

02.50 T " BUSHELS OF GRAIN WERE DESTROYED BY RATS AND YOU NOW HAVE

02.60 T !S," BUSHELS IN STORE."!!!"DO YOU WISH TO CONTINUE?

02.70 A " (ANSWER YES OR NO)"Q,!;I (Q-0NO)2.8,7.4

02.80 I (Q-0YES)2.7,3.1,2.7

03.10 D 6;D 8;S Y=C+17;T "THIS YEAR, LAND MAY BE TRADED FOR

03.20 T Y," BUSHELS PER ACRE; ";S C=1

03.30 A !"HOW MANY ACRES DO YOU WISH TO BUY?"!Q;I (Q)7.2,3.8

03.40 I (Y*Q-S)3.9,3.6;D 4.6;G 3.3

03.50 D 4.5;G 3.3

03.60 D 3.9;G 4.8

03.70 S A=A+Q;S S=S-Y*Q;S C=0

03.80 A !"TO SELL?"!Q;I (Q)7.2,3.9;S Q=-Q;I (A+Q)3.5

03.90 S A=A+Q;S S=S-Y*Q;S C=0

04.10 T !"HOW MANY BUSHELS OF GRAIN DO YOU WISH TO DISTRIBUTE

04.11 A " AS FOOD?"!Q;I (Q)7.2;I (Q-S)4.2,4.7;D 4.6;G 4.1

04.20 S S=S-Q;S C=1

04.30 A !"HOW MANY ACRES OF LAND DO YOU WISH TO PLANT WITH SEED?"!D,!

04.40 I (D)7.2;I (A-D)4.45;I (FITR(D/2)-S-1)4.65;D 4.6;G 4.3

04.45 D 4.5;G 4.3

04.50 D 7;T A," ACRES."!

04.60 D 7;T S," BUSHELS IN STORE."!

04.65 I (D-10*P-1)5.1;D 7;T P," PEOPLE."!;G 4.3

04.70 D 4.2

04.80 D 6;T "YOU NOW HAVE NO GRAIN LEFT IN STORE, SO YOU HAVE

04.90 T !"NONE LEFT TO USE AS SEED THIS YEAR."!;S D=0

05.10 S S=S-FITR(D/2);D 8;S Y=C;S H=D*Y

05.20 D 8;S E=0;I (FITR(C/2)-C/2)5.3;S E=S/C

05.30 S S=S-E+H;D 8;S I=FITR(C*(20*A+S)/P/100+1);S C=FITR(Q/20)

05.40 S Q=FITR(10*FABS(FRAN()));I (P-C)2.1;S D=P-C;S P=C;G 2.15

06.10 T !!"HAMURABI:”!

07.10 I (C)7.2;S C=C-1;D 6;T "PLEASE THINK AGAIN. YOU HAVE ONLY";R

07.20 T !"HAMURABI HAS GONE ON STRIKE! YOU WILL HAVE TO STOP

07.30 T !"AND FIND YOURSELF ANOTHER STEWARD!"!!

07.40 T !"GOODBYE!"!!;QUIT

07.50 A ?A S P?;GOTO 3.1

08.10 S C=FITR(5*FABS(FRAN()*2))-4

Observations

Robert Backer introduced two types of corrections to the original program: aesthetic changes and functional changes related solely to mathematical calculations, particularly regarding the use of random numbers for end-of-turn calculations.

The aesthetic changes primarily involved formatting. Backer preferred to make greater use of the "!" command, which advances the teletype paper by one line, resulting in a more open and less compact text. In only one instance, line 2.27, he modified the output text slightly, changing it from "A PLAGUE EPIDEMIC" to "A CITY PLAGUE."

The functional changes, however, are more intriguing. The Focal 8-5 document states that the FOCAL version C-08-AJAD-PB (1968) featured a random number generation function (FRAN) that generated pseudorandom numbers. However, this function had a drawback: it generated pseudorandom sequences that were unsuitable for games, as they remained consistent each time the program launched, making them predictable for the player. To circumvent this problem, the documentation suggested applying four patches to the FOCAL interpreter, which would improve the FRAN command’s functionality. This issue was later resolved in subsequent versions of FOCAL, such as the one released in July 1969 (DEC-08-AJAE-PD), which no longer required patches to enhance the functioning of applications using random number generation commands.

The exact month when Backer tried running Dyment's game is unknown, so it’s unclear whether the modifications introduced by the student were intended to improve playability in the absence of the not-yet-released patches or to increase variability even with improved pseudorandom number generation by the FRAN command.

In any case, Backer significantly modified the generation of parameter C, which was frequently called by the program to introduce a random factor in calculating land prices, population changes, and land productivity. In Dyment’s original version, parameter C could fluctuate from 1 to 5, whereas in Backer’s version it ranged from -4 to 5.

This change made the game far less predictable, introducing the possibility of demographic decline even when sufficient food was provided to the population. Additionally, the generation of the land sale price varied drastically, shifting from 18-22 to 13-22, making timely buying and selling more profitable.

Overall, Backer's changes aimed to enhance and improve the random calculation system, making the game less predictable and providing players with a helpful boost through more advantageous land transactions, not to make the program functional, as suggested by the Lexington High School newsletter.

It is interesting to note that the game’s loading functionality with customized parameters was used by Lexington High School players to compensate for the lack of a save/load system. In fact, the newsletter suggested that players note the game state, pause the game, and then resume it later by starting the program at line 7.5 and entering the recorded data to continue playing.

FOCAL source code for the DEC-1970 version

01.10 S P=95;S S=2800;S H=3000;S E=200;S Y=3;S A=1000;S I=5;S Q=1

02.20 D 6;T !!!"LAST YEAR"!D," STARVED,"

02.25 T !I," ARRIVED,"; S P=P+I;I (-Q)2.3

02.27 S P=FITR(P/2);T !"**PLAGUE**"!

02.30 T !"POPULATION IS"P,!!"THE CITY OWNS"

02.35 T A," ACRES."!!;I (H-1)2.5;T "WE HARVESTED"

02.40 T 3.2

02.50 T !" RATS ATE "E," BUSHELS,YOU NOW HAVE"

02.60 T !S," BUSHELS IN STORE."!

03.10 D 6;D 8;S Y=C+17;T "LAND IS TRADING AT"

03.20 T Y," BUSHELS PER ACRE;";S C=1

03.30 D 4.3;A " BUY?"!Q;I (Q)7.2,3.8

03.40 I (Y*Q-S)3.9,3.6;D 4.6;G 3.3

03.50 D 4.5;G 3.3

03.60 D 3.9;G 4.8

03.70 S A=A+Q;S S=S-Y*Q;S C=0

03.80 A !"TO SELL?"!Q;I (Q)7.2,3.9;S Q=-Q;I (A+Q)3.5

03.90 S A=A+Q;S S=S-Y*Q;S C=0

04.10 T !"BUSHELS TO USE"

04.20 A " AS FOOD?"!Q;I (Q)7.2;I (Q-S)4.2,4.7;D 4.6;G 4.1

04.25 S S=S-Q;S C=1

04.30 A !"HOW MANY ACRES OF LAND DO YOU WISH TO"

04.35 A !"PLANT WITH SEED?"D

04.40 I (D)7.2;I (A-D)4.45;I (FITR(D/2)-S-1)4.65;D 4.6;G 4.3

04.45 D 4.5;G 4.3

04.50 D 7;T A," ACRES."!

04.60 D 7;D 2.6

04.65 I (D-10*P-1)5.1;D 7;T P," PEOPLE."!;G 4.3

04.70 D 4.2

04.80 D 6;T "YOU HAVE NO GRAIN LEFT AS SEED !!"!S D=0

05.10 S S=S-FITR(D/2);D 8;S Y=C;S H=D*Y

05.20 D 8;S E=0;I (FITR(C/2)-C/2)5.3;S E=S/C

05.30 S S=S-E+H;D 8;S I=FITR(C*(20+A+S)/P/100+1);S C=FITR(Q/20)

05.40 S Q=FITR(10*FABS(FRAN)));I (P-C)2.1;S D=P-C;S P=C;G 2.2

06.10 T !!"HAMURABI:"%5

07.10 I (C)7.2;S C=C-1;D 6;T "BUT YOU HAVE ONLY";R

07.20 D 6;T !"GOODBYE"!!;E A

08.10 S C=FITR(5*FABS(FRAN)))

Observations

The version published by DEC in 1970 is clearly an evolution of the 1968 version and does not inherit any of Backer’s modifications. The functionality for loading the game with customized parameters was removed, and the game became endless, eliminating the player’s ability to voluntarily stop the program. The text was significantly reduced, with the loss of numerous output phrases, including Hamurabi’s farewell, annoyed by the player’s repeated mistakes. Although the humorous line “Hamurabi has gone on strike” was absent, the game still kept track of the Steward’s patience, terminating the program after the player’s second consecutive error.

This version became the most popular and well-known.

Algorithm of DEC-1970 version

Analysis

Dyment's game shares several features with The Sumerian Game, including a game loop that revolves around using grain for food or planting, the ability to store grain for future seasons and disasters, and variables such as population growth or decline and cultivated lands.

However, the game introduces a completely new mechanic: land trading. The game informs the player of the current price of arable land each turn, giving them the option to buy or sell at the indicated rate. This rate fluctuates between 17 and 22 (from 14 to 22 in Backer’s version).

Land trading is an effective system for building reserves because, unlike grain, which is subject to a 50% chance of rat infestation causing significant loss (from ½ to ⅙ of stored grain), land is unaffected by such risks. After a few turns, the player can determine when the land price is low, which is a favorable time to buy, or when it is high, which allows for profitable sales. However, it is generally not advisable to sell unless additional grain is required to deal with disasters and unforeseen events in the current turn.

The crop yield calculation is also random, though influenced by variables such as workforce (current population) and planted fields.

Interestingly, DEC's publications introduced the public to King of Sumeria as a market simulation game. The very description of King of Sumeria emphasizes the aspect of land trading. Despite this focus, however, randomized elements—present in The Sumerian Game only during disaster events—appear in nearly every calculation in King of Sumeria: epidemic plagues, grain eaten by rats, incoming population and deaths from starvation, and crop yields. Rather than predicting outcomes, the player needs to observe the game, understand the probability of certain events occurring, and learn to control them.

The game did not have a maximum limit on the number of playable turns, but it continued until one of the following events occurred:

● The entire population had died.

● The player could pause the game (except in the 1970 version).

● The player entered a negative value in one of the input questions.

● The player made two mistakes by entering a value that the program calculated as unacceptable (for example, if the total amount of grain distributed as food exceeded the available amount or if the fields sold were greater than those cultivated).

It's interesting to observe that Dyment's implementation of mathematics bears some similarities to The Sumerian Game. Specifically, the key formulas are those related to harvest, population growth or decline, disasters, and losses due to pests.

In detail:

● In The Sumerian Game, disaster management is carried out using the Monte Carlo method[117] and two dice rolls: the first determines the severity of the disaster, and the second the type (with only descriptive differences). The probability of a disaster is 75%. The impact intensifies as the disaster worsens, yet it only reduces the current harvest.

In King of Sumeria, there is only one disaster: an epidemic, which occurs with a 15% probability each turn and halves the population;

● The Sumerian Game calculates the harvest based on the seed, cultivated land, and available workforce. In the best scenario, the ratio between seed and harvest is 1 to 4 in the first turn.

In King of Sumeria, the harvest is also calculated considering the seed, cultivated land, and workforce, along with a random factor that drastically impacts the result, causing the productivity of the seed to vary from 1 to 4;

● Additionally, in King of Sumeria, 1 inhabitant is needed to work each 10 acres of land. If there are not enough workers, the player must leave some land unproductive.

Similar to this, in The Sumerian Game, a lack of labor (usually following a population collapse) lowers productivity, but Urbaba's request to abandon land can counteract this.

● In The Sumerian Game, the ideal food range per inhabitant is between 18 and 21 bushels.

In King of Sumeria, it is at least 20, with no penalties for distributing much larger amounts.

Given the foregoing, it's quite striking how similar the chosen numbers and the formulas' writing are. These observations also suggest that Dyment may have had access to the source code of The Sumerian Game rather than just its oral description.

The Pollution Game

BASIC Source code

1 REM JIM STORER

9 PRINT "HOW MANY TIMES HAVE YOU PLAYED";

3 INPUT Z

5 LET N5=8

6 RANDOMIZE

12 IF Z=500 THEN 47

14 IF Z-1000 THEN 1960

17 FOR Y1=1 TO 10

18 PRINT

19 NEXT Y1

20 PRINT "CONGRATULATIONS! YOU'VE BEEN ELECTED PREMIER OF SETATS DETINU”

22 PRINT "A.SMALL COMMUNIST ISLAND 30 BY 70 MILES LONG. YOUR JOB IS TO”

24 PRINT "DECIDE UPON THE COUNTRY'S BUDGET AND DISTRIBUTE MONEY TO YOUR”

26 PRINT "COUNTRYMEN FROM THE COMMUNAL TREASURY.”;

27 IF Z<>0 THEN 47

28 PRINT " THE MONEY SYSTEM IS RALLODS"

30 PRINT "AND EACH PERSON NEEDS 100 RALLODS PER YEAR TO SURVIVE.”

32 PRINT ''YOUR COUNTRY'S INCOME COMES FROM FARM PRODUCE AND TOURISTS"

34 PRINT "VISITING YOUR MAGNIFICIENT FORESTS. HUNTING. FISHING. ETC. HALF”

36 PRINT "YOUR LAND IS FARM LAND WHICH ALSO HAS AN EXCELLENT MINERAL"

38 PRINT "CONTENT AND MAY BE SOLD TO FOREIGN INDUSTRY (STRIP MINING)”

39 PRINT "WHO IMPORT AND SUPPORT THEIR OWN WORKERS.. CROPS COST BETWEEN”

40 PRINT "10 AND 15 RALLODS PER SQ. MILE TO PLANT.”

42 PRINT "YOUR GOAL IS TO COMPLETE YOUR”;N5;"YEAR TERM OF OFFICE.”;

44 PRINT " GOOD LUCK!"

47 FOR Y1=1 TO 4

48 PRINT

49 NEXT Y1

50 LET A=INT(60000+(RND(1)*1000))-(RND(1)*1000))

55 LET B=INT(500+(RND(1)*10)-(RND(1)*10) )

65 LET D=2000

100 LET W=>INT(RND( 1 )*10+95)

101 FOR Yl=1 TO 8

102 PRINT

103 NEXT Y1

105 PRINT "YOU NOW HAVE”;A;"RALLODS IN THE TREASURY.”

110 PRINT INT(B);"COUNTRYMEN";

115 LET V9-INT(((RND(1)/2)*10+10))

120 IF C=0 THEN 140

130 PRINT INT(C);"FOREIGN WORKERS'';

140 PRINT “AND";INT(D);"SQ. MILES OF LAND.”

150 PRINT "THIS YEAR INDUSTRY WILL BUY LAND FOR”;W;"RALLODS PER SQ. MILE”

155 PRINT ''LAND CURRENTLY COSTS”;V9;"RALLODS PER - SQ. MILE TO PLANT.”

J60 FOR Y1 = 1 TO 3

162 PRINT

164 NEXT Y1

200 PRINT "HOW MANY SQ. MILES DO YOU WISH TO SELL TO INDUSTRY”;

210 INPUT H

215 IF H<0 THEN 200

220 IF H<=D-1000 THEN 300

230 PRINT ” THINK AGAIN YOU'VE ONLY”;D-1000;"SQ. MILES OF FARM LAND

240 IF X <> 0 THEN 200

250 PRINT "(FOREIGN INDUSTRY WILL ONLY BUY FARM LAND BECAUSE FOREST"

260 PRINT "LAND IS UNECONOMICAL TO STRIP MINE DUE TO TREES"

270 PRINT "THICKER, TOP SOIL, ETC.)"

280 LET X=1

299 GOTO 200

300 LET D=INT(D-H)

310 LET A=INT(A+(H*W))

320 PRINT "HOW MANY RALLODS DO YOU WISH TO DISTRIBUTE TO YOUR COUNTRYMEN”;

340 INPUT I

342 IF I<0 THEN 320

350 IF I<A THEN 400

360 IF I=A THEN 380

370 PRINT " THINK AGAIN, YOU'VE ONLY”;A;"RALLODS IN THE TREASURY"

375 GOTO 320.

380 LET J=0

390 LET K=0

395 LET A=0

399 GOTO 1000

400 LET A=INT(A-I)

410 PRINT "HOW MANY SQ. MILES DO YOU WISH TO PLANT”;

420 INPUT J

421 IF J<0 THEN 410

422 IF U<=B*2 THEN 426

423 PRINT " SORRY, BUT EACH COUNTRYMAN CAN ONLY PLANT 2 SQ. MILES"

424 GOTO 410

426 IF J< = D-1000 THEN 430

427 PRINT " SORRY, BUT YOU'VE ONLY";D-1000;"SQ. MILES OF FARM LAND"

428 GOTO 410

430 LET U1 = INT(J*V9)

435 IF U1<A THEN 500

440 IF U1=A THEN 490

450 PRINT “ THINK AGAIN, YOU'VE ONLY";A;"RALLODS LEFT IN THE TREASURY”

460 GOTO 410

490 LET K=0

495 LET A=0

499 GOTO 1000

500 LET A=A-U1 '

505' IF D=2000 THEN 1000

510 PRINT "HOW MANY RALLODS DO YOU WISH TO SPEND ON POLLUTION CONTROL”;

520 INPUT K

522 IF K<0 THEN 510

530 IF K<=A THEN 1000

540 PRINT " THINK AGAIN, YOU'VE ONLY";A;"RALLODS REMAINING"

550 GOTO 510

600 IF H<>0 THEN 1002

602 IF I<>0 THEN 1002

604 IF J<>0 THEN 1002

606 IF K<>0 THEN 1002

608 FOR Y1=1 TO 5

609 PRINT

610 NEXT Y1

612 PRINT "GOODBYE.”

614 PRINT “(IF YOU WISH TO CONTINUE THIS GAME AT A LATER DATE, ANSWER “

616 PRINT “1000 FOR HOW MANY TIMES YOU'VE PLAYED, AT THE BEGINNING OF NEXT“

617 PRINT “GAME.)”

618 GOTO 1590

1000 GOTO 600

1002 FOR Y1=1 TO 3

1003 PRINT

1004 NEXT Y1

1010 LET A=INT(A-K)

1020 LET A4=A

1100 IF INT(I/100-B)>=0 THEN 1120 .

1105 IF I/100<50 THEN 1700

1110 PRINT INT(B-(1/100));“COUNTRYMAN DIED OF STARVATION”

1120 LET F1=INT(RND(1)*(2000-D))

1122 IF K<25 THEN 1130

1125 LET F1=INT(F1/(K/25))

1130 IF F1<=0 THEN 1150

1140 PRINT F1;"COUNTRYMEN DIED OF CARBON-MONOXIDE AND DUST INHALATION”

1150 IF INT((I/100)-b)<0 THEN 1170

1160 IF F1>0 THEN 1180

1165 GOTO 1200

1170 PRINT ” YOU WERE FORCED TO SPEND”;INT((F1+(B-(I/100)))*9);

1172 PRINT ”RALLODS ON FUNERAL EXPENSES.”

1174 LET B5=lNT(F1+(B-(I/100)))

1175 LET A=lNT(A-((F1(B-(I/100)))*9))

1176 GOTO 1185

1180 PRINT ” YOU WERE FORCED TO SPEND”;INT(F1*9);"RALL0DS ON ”;

1181 PRINT "FUNERAL EXPENSES.”

1182 LET B5=F1

1183 LET A=INT(A-(F1*9))

1185 IF A>=0 THEN 1194

1187 PRINT ” INSUFFICIENT RESERVES TO COVER COST -LAND WAS SOLD”

1189 LET D=INT(D+(A/W))

1190 LET A=0

1194 LET B=INT(B-B5)

1200 IF H=0 THEN 1250

1220 LET C1=INT(H+(RND(1)*10-(RND(1)*20)

1224 IF C>0 THEN 1230

1226 LET C1=C1+20

1230 PRINT C1;”WORKERS CAME TO THE COUNTRY AND”;

1250 LET P1=INT(((I/100-B)/10)+(K/25)-((2000-D)/50)-(F1/2))

1255 PRINT ABS(P1);"COUNTRYMEN ”;

1260 IF P1<0 THEN 1275

1265 PRINT "CAME TO”;

1270 GOTO 1280

1275 PRINT "LEFT”;

1280 PRINT ” THE ISLAND.”

1290 LET B=INT(B+P1)

1292 LET C=INT(C+C1)

1305 LET U2=INT(((2000-C)*((RND(1)+1.5)/2)))

1310 IF C=0 THEN 1324

1320 PRINT " OF";INT(J);"SQ. MILES PLANTED,”;

1324 IF J>U2 THEN 1330

1326 LET U2=J

1330 PRINT " YOU HARVESTED";INT(J-U2);"SQ. MILES OF CROPS.”

1340 IF U2=0 THEN 1370

1344 IF T1>=2 THEN 1370

1350 PRINT ” (DUE TO “;.

1355 IF T1=0 THEN 1365

1360 PRINT "INCREASED ";

1365 PRINT "AIR AND WATER POLLUTION FROM FOREIGN INDUSTRY.)"

1367 LET T1=T1+1

1370 LET Q=INT((J-U2)*(W/2))

1380 PRINT " MAKING";INT(Q);”RALLODS."

1390 LET A=INT(A+Q)

1400 LET V1=INT(((B-P1)*22)+(RND(1)*500))

1405 LET V2=INT((2000-D)*15)

1410 PRINT ” YOU MADE";ABS(INT(V1-V2));"RALLODS FROM TOURIST TRADE."

1420 IF V2=0 THEN 1450

1425 IF V1-V2>=V3 THEN 1450

1430 PRINT " DECREASE BECAUSE ";

1435 LET G1=RND(1)*10

1440 IF G1<=2 THEN 1460

1442 IF G1<=4 THEN 1465

1444 IF G1<=6 THEN 1470

1446 IF G1<=8 THEN 1475

1448 IF G1<=10 THEN 1480

1450 LET V3=INT(V1-V2)

1451 LET A=INT(A+V3)

1452 GOTO 1500

1460 PRINT "FISH POPULATION HAS DWINDLED DUE TO WATER POLLUTION."

1462 GOTO 1450

1465 PRINT "AIR POLLUTION IS KILLING GAME BIRD POPULATION.”

1467 GOTO 1450

1470 PRINT "MINERAL BATHS ARE BEING RUINED BY WATER POLLUTION.”

1472 GOTO 1450

1475 PRINT "UNPLEASANT SMOG IS DISCOURAGING SUN BATHERS."

1477 GOTO 1450

1480 PRINT. "HOTELS ARE LOOKING SHABBY DUE TO SMOG GRIT.”

1482 GOTO 1450

1500 IF B5>200 THEN 1600

1505 IF B<343 THEN 1700

1510 IF (A4/100)>5 THEN 1800

1515 IF C>B THEN 1550

1520 IF N5-1=X5 THEN 1900

1545 GOTO 2000

1550 FOR Y1=1 TO 8

1552 PRINT

1555 NEXT Y1

1560 PRINT "THE NUMBER OF FOREIGN WORKERS HAS EXCEEDED THE NUMBER"

1562 PRINT "OF COUNTRYMEN. AS A MAJORITY THEY HAVE REVOLTED AND”

1564 PRINT "TAKEN OVER THE COUNTRY."

1570 IF RND(1)<=.5 THEN 1580

1574 PRINT "YOU HAVE BEEN THROWN OUT OF OFFICE AND YOU ARE NOW"

1576 PRINT "RESIDING IN PRISION."[118]

1578 GOTO 1590

1583 PRINT "YOU HAVE BEEN ASSASSINATED."

1590 FOR Y1=1 TO 18

1599 PRINT

1594 NEXT Y1

1596 STOP

1600 FOR Y1=1 TO 8

1609 PRINT

1605 NEXT Y1

1610 PRINT B5;''COUNTRYMEN DIED IN ONE YEAR!!!!!”

1615 PRINT "DUE TO THIS EXTREME MISMANAGEMENT YOU HAVE NOT ONLY”

1620 PRINT ”BEEN IMPEACHED AND THROWN OUT OF OFFICE BUT YOU”

1622 LET M6=INT(RND(1)*10)

1625 IF M6<=3 THEN 1670

1630 IF M6<=6 THEN 1680

1635 IF M6<=10 THEN 1690

1670 PRINT "ALSO HAD YOUR LEFT EYE GOUGED OUT.”

1672 GOTO 1590

1680 PRINT "HAVE ALSO GAINED A VERY BAD REPUTATION.”

1682 GOTO 1590

1690 PRINT "HAVE ALSO BEEN DECLARED NATIONAL FINK.”

1692 GOTO 1590

1700 FOR Y1=1 TO 8

1702 PRINT

1705 NEXT Y1

1710 PRINT "OVER ONE THIRD OF THE POPULATION HAS DIED SINCE YOU"

1715 PRINT "WERE ELECTED TO OFFICE. THE PROPLE[119] (REMAINING)”

1720 PRINT "HATE YOUR GUTS.”

1730 GOTO 1570

1800 IF B5-F1<2 THEN 1515

1805 FOR Y1=1 TO 8

1807 PRINT

1810 NEXT Y1

1815 PRINT "MONEY WAS LEFT OVER IN THE TREASURY WHICH YOU DID”

1820 PRINT "NOT SPEND. AS A RESULT SOME OF YOUR COUNTRYMEN DIED”

1825 PRINT "OF STARVATION. THE PUBLIC IS ENRAGED AND YOU HAVE”

1830 PRINT "BEEN FORCED TO EITHER RESIGN OR COMMIT SUCIDE”

1835 PRINT "THE CHOICE IS YOURS.”

1840 PRINT "IF YOU CHOOSE THE LATTER, PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR TTY”

1845 PRINT ” BEFORE PROCEEDING."

1850 GOTO 1590

1900 FOR Y1=1 TO 8

1902 PRINT

1905 NEXT Y1

1920 PRINT "CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

1925 "YOU HAVE SUCCESSFULLY COMPLETED YOUR”;N5;"YEAR TERM”

1930 "OF OFFICE. YOU WERE, OF COURSE, EXTREMELY LUCKY, BUT NEVER THE”

1935 "LESS, IT'S QUITE AN ACHIEVEMENT. GOODBY AND GOOD LUCK -YOU'LL”

1940 "PROBABLY NEED IT IF YOU'RE THE TYPE THAT PLAYS THIS GAME.”

1945 ” -FOR FURTHER THRILLS, TRY LANDING ON THE MOON”

1950 GOTO 1590

1960 PRINT "HOW MANY YEARS HAD YOU BEEN IN OFFICE WHEN INTERRUPTED”;

1961 INPUT X5

1962 IF X5<0 THEN 1590

1963 IF X5<8 THEN 1969

1965 PRINT “ COME ON, YOUR TERM OF OFFICE IS ONLY";N5;"YEARS”

1967 GOTO 1960

1969 PRINT "HOW MUCH DID YOU HAVE IN THE TREASURY";

1970 INPUT A

1971 IF A<0 THEN 1590

1975 PRINT "HOW MANY COUNTRYMEN";

1976 INPUT B

1977 IF B<0 THEN 1590

1980 PRINT "HOW MANY WORKERS";

1981 INPUT C

1982 IF C<0 THEN 1590

1990 PRINT "HOW MANY SQ. MILES OF LAND";

1991 INPUT D

1992 IF D<0 THEN 1590

1993 IF D>2000 THEN 1996

1994 IF D>1000 THEN 100

1996 PRINT " COME ON, YOU STARTED WITH 1000 SQ. MILES OF FARM LAND"

1997 PRINT ” AND 1000 SQ. MILES OF FOREST LAND"

1998 GOTO 1990

2000 LET X5=X5+1

2020 LET B5=0

2040 GOTO 100

2046 END

Analysis

Jim Storer’s Pollution Game is a clear evolution of King of Sumeria: some of its core mechanics (such as resource management for feeding the population and planting fields, seasonal harvest management, land trading, and the option to resume the game) are derived from Dyment’s game DEC-1968 version, while others were entirely new. The dystopian setting—a small island ruled by a communist regime named Setats Detinu (United States spelled backward)—opened the door to various mechanics related to resource management and the consequences of the player’s choices. Cultivated land could be sold to mining companies in a system similar to King of Sumeria, but without the option to repurchase the land later, resulting in increased pollution, deaths from environmental degradation, and an influx of foreign workers who could destabilize the country over time. Progressive pollution also impacted tourism, reducing income from foreign visitors in subsequent turns.

Another innovation in Pollution Game was the possibility of the game ending prematurely, not because of the Steward’s loss of patience but due to special game conditions. In King of Sumeria, the game ends only when the player decides; in contrast, Storer introduces various end conditions: the term of the dictator of Setats Detinu is initially set to eight turns[120], but the game can end abruptly at any time if, for example, the number of foreign workers exceeds that of residents or if a large number of residents die in a single turn due to the player’s poor management.

Another significant addition introduced by Storer, previously seen in his Lunar Lander, is a final evaluation of the player. If the game ends prematurely, the user is informed of their fate (such as imprisonment and possible torture or execution in a revolt), while if they reach the end of the term, they are greeted with an ironic congratulatory message: “Goodby and good luck—you’ll probably need it if you’re the type that plays this game.”

Lastly, it is interesting how Storer implemented a kind of “save” feature, allowing players to resume the game by inputting data from the interrupted session. In this case, the only check made by the game was on the turn number when the player claimed to have suspended the game. If the player entered a number higher than seven, the check failed, and the computer chided them with, “Come on, your term of office is only 8 years.”

Hamurabi

BASIC Source Code

10 PRINT TAB(32);"HAMURABI"

20 PRINT TAB(15);"CREATIVE COMPUTING MORRISTOWN, NEW JERSEY"

30 PRINT:PRINT:PRINT

80 PRINT "TRY YOUR HAND AT GOVERNING ANCIENT SUMERIA"

90 PRINT "FOR A TEN-YEAR TERM OF OFFICE.":PRINT

95 D1=0: P1=0

100 Z=0: P=95:S=2800: H=3000: E=H-S

110 Y=3: A=H/Y: I=5: Q=1

210 D=0

215 PRINT:PRINT:PRINT "HAMURABI: I BEG TO REPORT TO YOU,": Z=Z+1

217 PRINT "IN YEAR";Z;",";D;"PEOPLE STARVED,";I;"CAME TO THE CITY,"

218 P=P+I

227 IF Q>0 THEN 230

228 P=INT(P/2)

229 PRINT "A HORRIBLE PLAGUE STRUCK! HALF THE PEOPLE DIED."

230 PRINT "POPULATION IS NOW";P

232 PRINT "THE CITY NOW OWNS ";A;"ACRES."

235 PRINT "YOU HARVESTED";Y;"BUSHELS PER ACRE."

250 PRINT "THE RATS ATE";E;"BUSHELS."

260 PRINT "YOU NOW HAVE ";S;"BUSHELS IN STORE.": PRINT

270 IF Z=11 THEN 860

310 C=INT(10*RND(1)): Y=C+17

312 PRINT "LAND IS TRADING AT";Y;"BUSHELS PER ACRE."

320 PRINT "HOW MANY ACRES DO YOU WISH TO BUY";

321 INPUT Q: IF Q<0 THEN 850

322 IF Y*Q<=S THEN 330

323 GOSUB 710

324 GOTO 320

330 IF Q=0 THEN 340

331 A=A+Q: S=S-Y*Q: C=0

334 GOTO 400

340 PRINT "HOW MANY ACRES DO YOU WISH TO SELL";

341 INPUT Q: IF Q<0 THEN 850

342 IF Q<A THEN 350

343 GOSUB 720

344 GOTO 340

350 A=A-Q: S=S+Y*Q: C=0

400 PRINT

410 PRINT "HOW MANY BUSHELS DO YOU WISH TO FEED YOUR PEOPLE";

411 INPUT Q

412 IF Q<0 THEN 850

418 REM *** TRYING TO USE MORE GRAIN THAN IS IN SILOS?

420 IF Q<=S THEN 430

421 GOSUB 710

422 GOTO 410

430 S=S-Q: C=1: PRINT

440 PRINT "HOW MANY ACRES DO YOU WISH TO PLANT WITH SEED";

441 INPUT D: IF D=0 THEN 511

442 IF D<0 THEN 850

444 REM *** TRYING TO PLANT MORE ACRES THAN YOU OWN?

445 IF D<=A THEN 450

446 GOSUB 720

447 GOTO 440

449 REM *** ENOUGH GRAIN FOR SEED?

450 IF INT(D/2)<=S THEN 455

452 GOSUB 710

453 GOTO 440

454 REM *** ENOUGH PEOPLE TO TEND THE CROPS?

455 IF D<10*P THEN 510

460 PRINT "BUT YOU HAVE ONLY";P;"PEOPLE TO TEND THE FIELDS! NOW THEN,"

470 GOTO 440

510 S=S-INT(D/2)

511 GOSUB 800

512 REM *** A BOUNTIFUL HARVEST!

515 Y=C: H=D*Y: E=0

521 GOSUB 800

522 IF INT(C/2)<>C/2 THEN 530

523 REM *** RATS ARE RUNNING WILD!!

525 E=INT(S/C)

530 S=S-E+H

531 GOSUB 800

532 REM *** LET'S HAVE SOME BABIES

533 I=INT(C*(20*A+S)/P/100+1)

539 REM *** HOW MANY PEOPLE HAD FULL TUMMIES?

540 C=INT(Q/20)

541 REM *** HORROS, A 15% CHANCE OF PLAGUE

542 Q=INT(10*(2*RND(1)-.3))

550 IF P<C THEN 210

551 REM *** STARVE ENOUGH FOR IMPEACHMENT?

552 D=P-C: IF D>.45*P THEN 560

553 P1=((Z-1)*P1+D*100/P)/Z

555 P=C: D1=D1+D: GOTO 215

560 PRINT: PRINT "YOU STARVED";D;"PEOPLE IN ONE YEAR!!!"

565 PRINT "DUE TO THIS EXTREME MISMANAGEMENT YOU HAVE NOT ONLY"

566 PRINT "BEEN IMPEACHED AND THROWN OUT OF OFFICE BUT YOU HAVE"

567 PRINT "ALSO BEEN DECLARED NATIONAL FINK!!!!": GOTO 990

710 PRINT "HAMURABI: THINK AGAIN. YOU HAVE ONLY"

711 PRINT S;"BUSHELS OF GRAIN. NOW THEN,"

712 RETURN

720 PRINT "HAMURABI: THINK AGAIN. YOU OWN ONLY";A;"ACRES. NOW THEN,"

730 RETURN

800 C=INT(RND(1)*5)+1

801 RETURN

850 PRINT: PRINT "HAMURABI: I CANNOT DO WHAT YOU WISH."

855 PRINT "GET YOURSELF ANOTHER STEWARD!!!!!"

857 GOTO 990

860 PRINT "IN YOUR 10-YEAR TERM OF OFFICE,";P1;"PERCENT OF THE"

862 PRINT "POPULATION STARVED PER YEAR ON THE AVERAGE, I.E. A TOTAL OF"

865 PRINT D1;"PEOPLE DIED!!": L=A/P

870 PRINT "YOU STARTED WITH 10 ACRES PER PERSON AND ENDED WITH"

875 PRINT L;"ACRES PER PERSON.": PRINT

880 IF P1>33 THEN 565

885 IF L<7 THEN 565

890 IF P1>10 THEN 940

892 IF L<9 THEN 940

895 IF P1>3 THEN 960

896 IF L<10 THEN 960

900 PRINT "A FANTASTIC PERFORMANCE!!! CHARLEMANGE, DISRAELI, AND"

905 PRINT "JEFFERSON COMBINED COULD NOT HAVE DONE BETTER!":GOTO 990

940 PRINT "YOUR HEAVY-HANDED PERFORMANCE SMACKS OF NERO AND IVAN IV."

945 PRINT "THE PEOPLE (REMIANING) FIND YOU AN UNPLEASANT RULER, AND,"

950 PRINT "FRANKLY, HATE YOUR GUTS!!":GOTO 990

960 PRINT "YOUR PERFORMANCE COULD HAVE BEEN SOMEWHAT BETTER, BUT"

965 PRINT "REALLY WASN'T TOO BAD AT ALL. ";INT(P*.8*RND(1));"PEOPLE"

970 PRINT "WOULD DEARLY LIKE TO SEE YOU ASSASSINATED BUT WE ALL HAVE OUR"

975 PRINT "TRIVIAL PROBLEMS."

990 PRINT: FOR N=1 TO 10: PRINT CHR$(7);: NEXT N

995 PRINT "SO LONG FOR NOW.": PRINT

999 END

Analysis

Overall, David Ahl’s porting work is very faithful to the original, both in terms of game mechanics and the range of randomly generated variables. The output is more verbose, thanks in part to the fact that mid-1970s machines had more memory available. This allowed Ahl to give the game an ironic tone, largely inspired by Pollution Game, completing the transition from King of Sumeria (FOCAL) to Hamurabi (BASIC).

Among these modifications, the limited game duration of 10 years stands out, with the possibility of ending it earlier if the player loses too many inhabitants, triggering an Impeachment that removes them from the throne.

Like in King of Sumeria, the game ends when the player repeatedly enters data that the system does not accept. In this case, however, the royal Steward, with a touch of irony, addresses the player, saying that he cannot understand the royal intentions and suggests they find another assistant, as in the 1968 version of King of Sumeria. In terms of text quantity, it seems Ahl was more inspired by the 1970 version than the 1968 one, except for the fact that in Ahl’s game, Steward Hamurabi begins his report with the phrase “I beg to report,” which is present in the 1968 version and absent from the 1970 version.

Another significant innovation in Ahl’s Hamurabi is the game's tracking of population losses due to famines, which, at the game's conclusion, provides the player with an overall evaluation by comparing them to historical leaders. These include renowned figures (Charlemagne, Benjamin Disraeli, and Thomas Jefferson) as well as infamous ones (Nero and Ivan IV the Terrible). In some ways, this feature represents an evolution of Storer's mechanic from Lunar Lander and the Pollution Game. In that game, the outcome varies negatively based on how poorly the player navigates a system that slowly degrades both environmentally and socially. This system includes foreign companies buying land and stripping it for mineral extraction, foreign workers arriving and destabilizing the region, natives falling ill from pollution, and tourists abandoning the island. Possible outcomes in Pollution Game include imprisonment, torture, suicide, and execution.

Some lines in Hamurabi are even directly taken from the Pollution Game.

DUE TO THIS EXTREME MISMANAGEMENT YOU HAVE NOT ONLY

BEEN IMPEACHED AND THROWN OUT OF OFFICE BUT YOU

[...]

HAVE ALSO BEEN DECLARED NATIONAL FINK.[121]

DUE TO THIS EXTREME MISMANAGEMENT YOU HAVE NOT ONLY

BEEN IMPEACHED AND THROWN OUT OF OFFICE BUT YOU HAVE

ALSO BEEN DECLARED NATIONAL FINK!!!![122]

and

OVER ONE THIRD OF THE POPULATION HAS DIED SINCE YOU

WERE ELECTED TO OFFICE. THE PROPLE (REMAINING)

HATE YOUR GUTS.[123]

THE PEOPLE (REMAINING) FIND YOU AN UNPLEASANT RULER, AND,

FRANKLY, HATE YOUR GUTS!![124]

Ahl therefore definitely had access to both DEC versions of King of Sumeria as well as Pollution Game, and in porting Dyment’s game to BASIC, he selected the features he considered best, recombining them according to his own preferences.

Acknowledgments

My heartfelt thanks go to Bruse Moncreiff, Mabel Addis, Noble Gividen, Jimmer Leonard, Richard Wing, and William McKay for creating The Sumerian Game; to the families of Mabel Addis and Richard Wing for their assistance in the research; and to Douglas Dyment for taking the time to answer my questions.

I feel a deep sense of gratitude toward Devin Monnens for starting the journey that, almost fifteen years later, has led us to this point. Devin, besides initiating everything, undertook a patient effort in research and recovery, discovering four important listings and the slides kept by Mabel Addis and later by her daughter, Alexandra. Without him, little would be known about The Sumerian Game today. He blazed the trail that I have tried to follow to the end.

In the final stages of preparing this book, an unexpected teamwork effort emerged, led first and foremost by Kate Willaert, to whom I want to extend a heartfelt thank you. Not only did she connect me with Devin Monnens and Ethan Johnson, but she also undertook a long and patient process of reading and reviewing the text, with meticulous fact-checking that helped me eliminate some pesky inaccuracies. Kate also patiently replied to my many emails, often setting me on the right track.

I would also thank Tobias Winnerling for his previous work on The Sumerian Game.

Additionally, I would like to thank those involved in creating the Apple II, Commodore 64, and Steam versions: Paul Silson for the ziggurat artwork, Richard Pickles for the implementation in Applesoft BASIC and BASIC 4.0, Naera Studio Illustrations for the artwork of the Sumerian map, and Viola Zanga for the graphics for the achievements.

Appendix

The slides

Gallery

There are 35 known unique slides, mostly recovered by David Monnens from Mabel Addis's family and now held at The Strong museum.

1. Map of the so-called Fertile Crescent overlaid with the political boundaries of the 1960s.

2. A Sumerian scribe carving cuneiform characters on a small clay tablet. Image from the book Life in the Ancient World by Bart Winer, illustrated by Steele Savage, published in 1961. The original caption on page 23 reads: “A scribe for hire. At the market, a scribe presses his red stylus into a wet clay tablet to write a letter on behalf of a customer.”

3. A photograph of a farmer plowing a field with a simple plow pulled by an ox.

4. A drawing depicting a Sumerian village with brick houses and roofs made of woven reeds and mud.

5. Funeral rites of a ruler, image from the book Everyday Life in Ancient Times: Highlights of the Beginnings of Western Civilization in Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece, and Rome by H. M. Herget, page 59. The caption reads: “Ninth Century B.C. 'The Canals Wail, the watercourses Echo Them. Of Trees and Fruit the Face is Darkened' - From an Assyrian Funeral Text”

6. Sumerian chariot. Image from the book The First 3000 Years: Ancient Civilizations of the Tigris by Charles Buckles Falls, page 39. The caption describes the scene, “This four-wheeled Sumerian chariot is drawn by onagers ( wild asses ) . In it rides Mes-Kalam-Shar, a prince of Ur, wearing a golden helmet. An attendant drives, and four guards serve as royal escort. Our data for this scene come from the so-called "Standard of Ur" — a mosaic depicting peace and war, discovered in a royal tomb by the English archaeologist Sir Leonard Woolley.”

7. Baskets of grain spoiled by mold and bacteria. In The Sumerian Game, the mechanic of stored grain loss is central both in phase 1 and in later phases, where the player can reduce and eventually eliminate this factor by developing new storage technologies.

8. Scene of fieldwork and water extraction from wells called shadoofs. Image from the book The First 3000 Years: Ancient Civilizations of the Tigris by Charles Buckles Falls, page 45. The caption explains: “This is a 'shadoof' or well sweep, being used on the Nile. Also found in Mesopotamia, the device is still used in both lands. Historians argue as to which country invented it. Here, Egyptian workers are raising buckets of river water and emptying them into irrigation trenches. Two men are hoeing and, as always, an overseer watches the job.”

9. Portrait of Gilgamesh, from the book Land of the Two Rivers by Richard M. Powers, page 52. The drawing is inspired by the relief found at Dur-Sharrukin, dating back to the era of Sargon II and now housed in the Louvre Museum in Paris. The hero is depicted effortlessly holding a lion in one hand and a serpent in the other.

10. A Sumerian-Akkadian caravan from the book The First 3000 Years: Ancient Civilizations of the Tigris by Charles Buckles Falls, pages 45-46. The original image was spread across two pages. In the recovered slides, only the left side, featuring the front of the caravan, is present. From the caption: “Here you see a Sumerian-Akkadian caravan crossing the plain between the Two Rivers. Slaves and the patient donkey are the beasts of burden — two thousand years will pass before camels will be used.”

11. Two craftsmen engaged in making pots using a simple potter's wheel. The improvement of pottery technology was central to phases 2 and 3 to justify the enhancement of food storage capabilities.

12. Map of the land between the two rivers and drawing of a ziggurat, from the book Land of the Two Rivers by Richard M. Powers, page 24.

13. A weaver working with a vertical weighted loom.

14. A scene of daily life in the fields. Farmers use simple plows pulled by pairs of oxen.

15. Another scene of fieldwork.

16. A schematic depiction of a kiln used for burning wood to fire pottery.

17. Merchants use waterways to transport goods.

18. Male worshiper, votive figurine from the Tell Asmar hoard.

19. Farmer at work harvesting crops.

20. Head of Gudea, Ensi of Lagash.

21. Photograph of an origami model depicting the Mesopotamian irrigation system as seen from above. This photograph was most likely taken using a diorama produced internally at the institute by students involved in the project. The irrigation system appears to be of Akkadian origin rather than Sumerian. Cotton supported by wooden sticks was used to create the effect of clouds.

22. Illustration depicting kuphar, ancient Mesopotamian riverboats, notable for their round shape.

23. Night view of the Great Ziggurat of Ur. Image from the book The Dawn of Civilization: The First World Survey of Human Cultures in Early Times by Stuart Piggott, page 78. The same image, but in black and white, was also reproduced in the book The First 3000 Years: Ancient Civilizations of the Tigris by Falls by Charles Buckles, on page 54, with the caption: “The ziggurat — the hill of heaven, the mountain of God! Raised by Ur-Nammu and his son Shulgi of the Third Dynasty of Ur (2079-1960 b. c. ) on the ruins of an earlier ziggurat, its great base stood for fifteen hundred years. The last king to repair the ancient temple was Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon.”

24. Head of Gudea, Ensi of Lagash.

25. Photograph of another diorama, presumably built during school activities. The depicted scene shows a Sumerian village and some worshippers heading to the ziggurat. This slide was used in the photo session to promote The Sumerian Game and was also preserved by Mabel Addis.

26. Sumerian cylinder seals. They were used by rolling them over wet clay to imprint the engraved designs and served administrative purposes.

27. A potter using an advanced wheel operated by a foot pedal controlled by the craftsman.

28. Another male worshiper, votive figurine from the Tell Asmar hoard, side view.

29. Map of ancient Mesopotamia and the Indus Valley.

30. Workers making mud bricks.

31. Drawing of a fire. The signature might be that of Gerard Mergardt, a fellow teacher of Mabel Addis and later her husband from 1981 onwards.

32. An image showing the birth of a new member in a family with two parents and four children. The scene is displayed within a computer monitor.

33. A man, presumably the father from the previous slide, wearily drags a single child while holding his hand on his stomach in a gesture of suffering. Like the previous image, the scene is depicted within a computer monitor.

34. An adult—very similar to the man in the previous two scenes—runs away from the rapid advance of a flood.

35. A man uses a sieve. Unlike slide 25, this one only appears in the set of promotional photos taken in the mid-1960s for marketing purposes and was not found among the slides preserved by Addis. It is therefore uncertain—though likely—that it was actually used during the experiment.

36. Another slide can be glimpsed in a photo taken of Candy Lichty in 1967, which appears to depict two adult figures.

Analysis

According to Professor Wing's notes, we know that at a certain stage in the development of The Sumerian Game, slides were projected both before and during gameplay. In Mclaughlin's listing, there is an indicator for loading slide number 1. The recovered slides were unnumbered, so without further information, it's impossible to determine which slide was intended for the beginning of the game. However, it's plausible that the first slide was predetermined, with subsequent slides somehow tied to the game’s status.

Among the surviving slides, we can distinguish two different types of images: scenes of daily life showing Sumerian technology or culture, and illustrations directly related to game events (such as crop fires, population growth, famine, and floods).

The slides preserved by Mabel Addis may have been discarded during the 1966 revision, during which, according to Wing, certain slides were replaced. Additionally, slides 31 and 35 are incomplete and were likely intended to be part of a composite illustration featuring a terminal, similar to the integration seen with slides 33 and 34.

Peoples

Andrew Edward Rudolph Jass

1926 (New York City, New York, USA)

February 13, 2014 (Montrose, New York, USA)

Son of Andrew and Emma (Durr) Jass, he dedicated his career to education as a science teacher in the schools of Scarsdale and Brewster, later becoming the principal of Briarcliff High School until his retirement. Unfortunately, due to the cancellation of the computerized chemistry lab, no traces of his participation in the Project 1948 remain.

Audrey Bratman

A French language teacher, Bratman participated in the 1962 summer workshop and was involved in the initial stages of the 1948 project. When federal funding was renewed, her proposed program for teaching French was canceled without leaving any trace.

Bruse Moncreiff

May 26, 1919 (Nashville, Tennessee, USA)

September 18, 1985 (Santa Clara, California, USA)

From 1963 onward, he continued his research into the use of computers in education, participating in numerous successful projects, including, in addition to The Sumerian Game, the computerized chemistry lab and the music learning program initiated with Professor Khun. By the late 1960s, Moncreiff sensed that he had entered a critical phase in his career at IBM. An initial rift had occurred some time before, when Moncreiff felt he had not been properly credited for his contributions to the IBM 602A electromechanical calculator, which he had the opportunity to test in the late 1940s, right after its launch, when IBM's closed policy of not publishing operational schematics had created more obstacles than benefits. Over the years, Moncreiff's discontent grew, as he increasingly felt he was not receiving the proper recognition he deserved for his work.

Workplace challenges—confusion around the role and objectives of ASDD, difficulties convincing management to experiment with new products, and continual postponement of projects that Moncreiff found most interesting—led him to put his deep frustration into words. Moncreiff wrote: “It has been suggested that the prime mission of ASDD was to create new products and new products divisions. In the sense of a long-range view, this is axiomatic. As directly translated into a working program, this philosophy has led us into the blind alleys of hair-clipping machines and animal-like robots with vacuum cleaner attachments. There is something of a built-in contradiction in this approach, since any new product we could easily conceive today is most probably outside of IBM's traditional product line. If it isn't outside of our interest, it isn't a new idea. This business of creating new product ideas has so far not borne much fruit, nor does it seem promising. This is a long-range objective which does not translate into a development method.” And then, in his personal wishlist: “Would like to have ideas recognized and rewarded, as well as their implementation. Would like never to hear again the following comments: [...] Management won't buy it. [...] X may be right, but we need to do Y in order to buy us the opportunity to do X later.”

Due to irreconcilable philosophical differences, Moncreiff requested early retirement from IBM.

He passed away on September 18, 1985, in Santa Clara.

Christine Hartz

March 21, 1934 (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA)

July 1, 2003 (Frederick, Maryland, USA)

The eldest daughter of Everett and Irene Gaedeke Koehler of Frederick, Christine grew up in Ashby and attended The King's College in New York, graduating with a degree in history in 1964. She taught in New York State, where she was involved in the testing phases of The Sumerian Game due to her previous work experience with IBM. After the experiment, she moved to the Frederick area in 1968, where she continued teaching as a substitute in the school districts of Green Valley, Urbana, and Adamstown. In 1973, she opened “The Winner's Circle,” a tack and equestrian apparel shop, which she ran for 18 years. She also worked as a real estate agent for MacIntosh Realty and was active in volunteer work.

She was involved with the Central Maryland Saddle Club, where she served for many years as president and secretary. She rode with the New Market Hounds and had a deep love for animals, fostering cats for the Pet-4-Pets Cat Rescue Group. She was also a member of the First Baptist Church of Frederick.

She was buried at Mount Olivet Cemetery, Frederick, MD.

David H. Ahl

May 17, 1939

The BASIC Computer Games series was incredibly successful and was reprinted multiple times before being published in different editions, with the BASIC listings modified as needed to match the syntax of the most popular microcomputer interpreters of the time. His magazine, Creative Computing, was equally successful, remaining in print until 1985. After Creative Computing closed, Ahl, who had been the magazine's editor, stayed in publishing as a freelance journalist, consultant, or editorial director for other magazines, including some military ones. Now retired, he continues to write and maintains the website BibleStudyMen.com.

Donald Joseph Nuccio

June 27, 1927 (New York City, New York, USA)

September 17, 1981 (Mount Kisco, New York, USA)

The son of Antoinette and Joseph Nuccio of Pleasantville, he attended Pleasantville High School and enlisted in the army to serve in World War II. After the war, he earned a BA and an MA in music from Potsdam State Teachers College and a doctorate from Columbia University Teachers College. He also studied music in Italy at the University for Foreigners in Perugia.

He taught music in the Somers schools for 30 years before passing away prematurely in 1981, at the age of only 54.

Douglas Dyment

Shortly after completing King of Sumeria, Dyment left DEC to start a Canadian division of Data General Corp. Today he is retired but, upon request, still gives speeches — his great passion, for which he has received good recognition since his school days — and runs the website onebag.com, where he provides packing tips for travelers.

Frank Cassetta

May 21, 1921 (New York City, New York, USA)

September 29, 2017 (Kingston, New York, USA)

The son of Louis and Concetta (Duva) Cassetta, Frank served in the Air Force during World War II with the rank of Technician Fourth Grade. After the war, he found employment as an art teacher in the schools of Yorktown Heights and became involved in the 1948 project. Later, he went on to teach at Marist College, where he became Dean of Students.

George Blank

After the success of Santa Paravia en Fiumaccio, he met with David Ahl. Given the growth of specialized computer magazines, Ahl offered him the opportunity to become editor-in-chief, an opportunity Blank didn't want to miss. In 1981, he requested and received permission to dissolve his commitment with the Calvary United Presbyterian Church to work in publishing alongside David Ahl. The two are still on excellent terms.

Gerard Mergardt

June 30, 1913 (Brewster, New York, USA)

June 25, 1995 (Brewster, New York, USA)

The son of Charles Gerard and Nellie C. Holloway Mergerdt, Gerald initially considered taking religious vows and attending Cathedral High School of the Archdiocese of New York in New York City, but he later decided to pursue university studies and graduated from Notre Dame University. He then went on to work in the family businesses, Progress Market, from 1936 to 1960, and later opened a sporting goods store with his first wife, Jeannette Reppe, whom he married in 1938.

Teaching had always been his dream, something he wanted to pursue after graduating from Notre Dame, but family business obligations required his involvement, and Gerald set his plans aside for a while. His first step toward realizing his dream came in 1963, when, thanks to his tall and athletic build, Gerald began teaching physical education at Harrison Avenue School. Two years later, in 1965, he was transferred to Mount Kisco Elementary School, where he met Mabel Addis, assisting her in creating illustrations for The Sumerian Game. In 1966, he finally obtained a position teaching English at Carmel Central School District, where he remained until his retirement.

In 1991, Jeannette passed away, and at the end of that year, Gerald married Mabel Holmes Addis at St. Lawrence O'Toole Catholic Church in Brewster, settling in Amawalk with her for the remainder of his days.

Harriet Greenberg Forsythe

October 12, 1929 (Glen Cove, New York, USA)
August 28, 2012 (Peekskill, New York, USA)

Born in 1929 in Glen Cove, New York, to Philip and Rose Greenberg, Harriet Greenberg earned a Bachelor’s degree in Education from Michigan State University in 1951, followed by three Master’s degrees. In 1952, she married John E. Forsythe in Denver, Colorado. She taught in the schools of the Yorktown Heights school district for 33 years, retiring in 1992. She loved reading, was a talented writer, and enjoyed solving crossword puzzles. She was a member of a writing group and spent many years working on her memoirs, which remained unfinished.

Herbert James Hallworth

June 29, 1917 (Middleton, Greater Manchester, UK)

August 22, 2015 (Calgary, Alberta, Canada)

Born in Middleton, near Manchester, England, in 1917, he won a scholarship to King's College at the University of London. He worked as a high school teacher in North London, where he met the love of his life, Beryl Maybury. The two married in 1942. In 1950, he took on a role as an instructor for teacher training in Sheffield, in northern England, after which he became a Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Birmingham. In 1966, his family moved to Canada, where Herbert accepted a position as Professor of Computer Applications in Education at the University of Calgary and became one of the pioneers in the development of computers for educational purposes, contributing to the history of The Sumerian Game.

Jimmer Leonard

October 30, 1942 (Johnson City, New York, USA)

August 7, 1996 (Peekskill, New York, USA)

The son of Dudley Graham Leonard and Anne Martis Leonard, Jimmer Leonard graduated from Johns Hopkins University. He first joined the BOCES project on behalf of his university, which was also interested in research on the use of computers in education, and later served directly as a curriculum resource specialist, collaborating with Richard Wing and Walter Goodman in the development of new games and programming. Reserved and complex by nature, yet known for his sharp intellect and gentle, polite demeanor, Leonard passed away prematurely in 1996, at the age of only 56.

Kenneth Roswell Tice Sr

June 9, 1920 (Huntington, Massachusetts, USA)

February 26, 2014 (Westfield, Massachusetts, USA)

The son of William Leonard Tice and Lena Coral Gamble, Kenneth was named after the doctor who delivered him. The youngest of six children, he discovered his passion for music, singing, and faith during the Depression years. In 1943, he graduated from Aurora University with a BS in Biology and married fellow student Lois Clark before heading off to war. He served in the US Navy as an ensign, participating in the Normandy invasion and the campaign in southern France. Discharged in 1946, he returned to study at the University of Maine, where he earned an MA in Science. He moved to Yorktown Heights, where he began teaching science at Horace Greeley High School in Chappaqua. It was there that he was selected for the Project 1984. His teaching career continued until 1978, when he retired, though he remained active in volunteer work throughout his life.

Mabel Addis Mergardt

May 21, 1912 (Mt. Vernon, New York, USA)

August 13, 2004 (Purdys, New York, USA)

After the completion of The Sumerian Game project, she returned to teaching at the Katonah-Lewisboro Central School District until her retirement in 1976. In 1991, after the passing of her first husband, Alexander L. Addis, Mabel married her former colleague and teacher Gerard Mergardt on December 13, 1991; he also passed away four years later, in 1995.

Aside from her involvement in the Katonah United Methodist Church, where she taught Sunday School and actively participated in United Methodist Women's activities, Mabel took part in numerous organizations, including the Centennial Committee, Book Committee, and History Committee of the Katonah Village Improvement Society. She co-authored the book Katonah: A History of a New York Village and was involved in the Katonah Civic Club. She served as secretary/treasurer of the Bedford Farmers Club and co-authored Brewster Through the Years (a centennial book of Brewster, 1848-1948).

In the 1970s and 1980s, she served as president of the Somers Historical Society, chair of the museum committee, co-author of the bicentennial History of Somers, and was a member of the Somers Republican Committee. In the Brewster area, she was president of the Brewster Bicentennial, a volunteer at the Southeast Museum, a member of the Brewster Landmarks Preservation Society, and co-author of History of Southeast in 1988. An enthusiastic traveler, she shared her experiences through slide presentations for various local organizations.

Mary Grace Pethick Robinson

January 11, 1918 (Saigon, now Ho Chi Minh City, Indochina)

December 20, 1965 (Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA)

Born in Saigon, then part of French Indochina, in 1918 due to her father Harry H. Pethick's work with Standard Vacuum Oil Co., Mary attended Duke University and Hunter College, where she earned an MA in Science and met and married her husband, Roger W. Robinson. During the war, she served as an assistant administrator for training at the Case Institute in Cleveland.

After the war, she began teaching first at Scarborough Country Day School and later in the schools of Yorktown, where she became involved in experiments with IBM. In addition to participating in Project 1948 and experimenting with the use of televisions in chemistry labs, she was selected as a research assistant at Harvard to help write textbooks for high school students. It was at Harvard that she passed away suddenly on December 22, 1965, at the age of only 47.

Milo Guisti

October 21, 1924 (Yorktown Heights, New York, USA)

With a BA from Syracuse University and an MA from Middlebury College, after The Sumerian Game he continued teaching French until the late 1980s, distinguishing himself for his passion and talent for theater, which often led him to work as a director in theatrical productions.

Nathan Jaspen

October 21, 1917 (New York City, New York, USA)

January 7, 1996 (Cliffside Park, New Jersey, USA)

The son of Jacob Joseph Jaspen, a Lithuanian immigrant, and Sarah (Shifra) Hirsh Kantor, of New York, Nathan graduated in Science from City College of New York in 1942, then earned an MA from George Washington University in 1944 and a Ph.D. from Pennsylvania State University in 1949.

In his extensive career, spanning four decades, Jaspen worked for the United States Employment Service in Washington as an analyst, and as a researcher at Pennsylvania State University, where he later became an associate professor. He served as Director of Statistical Automation at the National League for Nursing in New York City, and subsequently as an associate professor at New York University, where he taught educational statistics. During the 1980s, he was appointed professor emeritus and department head of Mathematics, Science, and Statistics at New York University. He frequently took on consulting roles, and in one of these, he collaborated with New York's BOCES, working closely with Noble Gividen's team to study the use of computers in educational institutions.

Noble Gividen

February 9, 1919 (Jericho, Kentucky, USA)

June 1, 1999 (Lady Lake, Florida, USA)

Until 1992, he remained in New York overseeing the BOCES of Northern Westchester, after which he moved to Central Florida and became a member of the North Lake Presbyterian Church in Lady Lake. Even after retiring, he never fully left teaching, volunteering in prisons and at soup kitchens in rural areas of Florida. He passed away on June 1, 1999, in Lady Lake.

Otto Schmidt

July 15, 1926 (St. Louis, Missouri, USA)

September 16, 1980 (Shrub Oak, New York, USA)

Born in St. Louis to William Schmidt and Frieda Neumann, both of German origin and emigrants from Germany between the 1920s and 1930s, Otto moved to the Yorktown area in the late 1950s, where he worked for 22 years as the Supervisor of Educational Media at Westchester Community College in Valhalla. In this role, he became involved in Project 1948, producing the slides used in The Sumerian Game and the Sierra Leone Game.

He passed away in 1980 at only 54 years of age, on the morning of Tuesday, September 16.

Richard Wing

July 11, 1918 (New Bedford, Massachusetts, USA)

March 6, 2013 (West Yarmouth, Massachusetts, USA)

In mid-1968, he took a leave of absence from BOCES and returned to Europe, primarily to Germany, where he stayed for a period of three years. In 1971, he returned to New York and rejoined BOCES in Curriculum Research. He passed away in 2013, shortly after the death of his beloved wife.

Ronald Martin Lundberg

November 14, 1941 (Bronx, New York, USA)
October 21, 2014 (Macungie, Pennsylvania, USA)

Born in the Bronx to Edwin Hugo Lundberg and Marjorie Muriel Whitehead, Ronald knew from a young age that teaching was his calling. After moving with his family to New Rochelle in 1952, he graduated from Carmel High School, where he noted in his yearbook that he wanted to become a teacher. This goal drove him to further his studies at SUNY Oneonta, where he earned a BA, followed by an MA at SUNY New Paltz. Upon graduating in 1963, he began teaching at the middle schools in Yorktown Heights, where his life briefly intersected with the history of The Sumerian Game during the testing of the paper-based version with the control group. He remained in Yorktown Heights for the next 40 years, until his retirement in 2003. Many of his former students continued to stay in touch with him over the years, bringing him great joy in knowing he had played a part in their life successes. His passion for music kept him actively involved in the music program and led to his participation in the initiative to install a von Beckerath pipe organ. Even in retirement, he continued teaching English and citizenship courses to Burmese refugees, a role he found deeply rewarding and that was greatly appreciated by the refugees, many of whom became his friends and ultimately gained American citizenship thanks to his guidance.

Stanley Kellerhouse

May 16, 1915 (Pine Plains, New York, USA)

June 8, 1995 (Sleepy Hollow, New York, USA)

Born in Pine Plains and the son of Everett H. and Mollie Mattson Kellerhouse, he moved with his family to Poughkeepsie, where he grew up and began his schooling before attending the State University of New York at New Paltz, earning a BA and an MA in Education from Columbia University. He began his teaching career at Arlington High School and later at Croton-Harmon High School, where he served as Dean of Students until 1971. He was also the mayor of Croton from 1969 to 1975. After retiring, he volunteered at the local library. A respected member of the Croton community, he passed away in 1995 at the age of 80.

Walter Goodman

February 21, 1925 (New York City, New York, USA)

June 4, 2023 (Ridgefield, Connecticut, USA)

The son of Nathan and Mary Goodman, both Russian Jews who immigrated to the United States in the second decade of the 1900s to escape Soviet persecution, Walter experienced the Great Depression at a young age, from which he learned the value of education and saving. The youngest of four children and the only son, he attended New Rochelle High School and enlisted in the Navy in June 1943 as a Radioman Second Class in the amphibious corps deployed in the Pacific, participating in the battles of Saipan and Okinawa. During his service, he earned the Victory Medal, the American Theatre Medal, and the Asiatic Pacific Medal with 3 Stars.

After returning from the war, he enrolled at Elizabethtown College in Pennsylvania, taking advantage of the GI Bill. There he met his future wife, Ruth A. Ehrlen, whom he married in 1950. The two moved to Pleasantville, New York, in 1954, where they raised their two children. Walter began teaching in the schools of Briarcliff Manor, but his innovative ideas on teaching through games and other activities led him to establish an outdoor education center and to join the BOCES project. In the late 1960s, when interest in simulation games waned, Goodman became the head of the demonstration area at BOCES: in addition to keeping the simulators running and showing them to visitors and researchers, he continued to create educational games, both computer-based and tabletop. His growing antimilitarism inspired him to create a short film titled How to Kill.

After retiring, he dedicated himself to selling antiques alongside his beloved wife, who passed away in 1997. Walter passed away in 2023 at the age of 98, surrounded by the love of his children, four grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren. His funeral was held with military honors on September 23, 2023, at the State Veterans Cemetery in Middletown.

Walter Koetke

October 2, 1939 (Chicago, Illinois, USA)

January 25, 2013 (Bloomington, Indiana, USA)

The son of Walter J. Koetke Sr. and Olive Eleanor Loach Koetke, he studied at MIT, where he earned a BS in Mathematics, and at Harvard University, where he specialized with a Master's in Education. Thanks to his pioneering work in using computers in education, Lexington High School was at the forefront of the first wave of computer games programmed in BASIC. Koetke authored several educational books that advocated a playful approach to teaching mathematics, with or without computers, including Computer-Oriented Mathematics: Computers in Mathematics Education, Computers in the Classroom: Teacher's Resource Manual for Algebra, The Impact of Computing on the Teaching of Mathematics, Computers, Children, and Learning: One Complete Iteration, Scholastic Computers & Math: Problem Solving with BASIC, Geometric Delight, and Classic Thinking Games with Java.

For his work, he received numerous honors, including the Distinguished Teacher Award presented by the President's Commission on Academic Scholars.

William McKay

October 9, 1927 (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA)

March 7, 2012 (Tolland, Massachusetts, USA)

Born in Philadelphia on October 9, 1927, the son of John and Mary McKay, William McKay spent his early years in Tolland before moving to Putnam Valley and later to New York. He served in the United States Army during World War II, reaching the rank of TEC 4. After the war, he completed his studies in Electrical Engineering at Drexel University, earning a bachelor's degree, and went on to receive a Master's in Mathematics from the University of Pennsylvania. His first job was at the Franklin Institute of Technology. On January 2, 1960, he married Gertrude Tierney McKay from Bedford Village. Gertrude was a graduate of the University of Delaware and was employed by IBM in White Plains. After their marriage, William left the Franklin Institute of Technology and joined IBM, where he remained until retirement. After leaving IBM, he began teaching mathematics at S.U.N.Y. Plattsburgh, NY, and pursued his many interests, including sailing, skiing, and tennis. He passed away on March 7, 2012, in Tolland, Massachusetts, where he was buried with military honors at Twining Cemetery.

Wolfgang Erasmus Kuhn

April 12, 1914 (Leipzig, Saxony, German Empire)

March 10, 2003 (Stanford, California, USA)

Born in Germany shortly before the start of the Great War, Khun moved to the United States in 1927, initially to Illinois, where he attended the University of Illinois, earning a B.Mus in 1936, an MA in 1943, and an Ed.D. in 1953. He later moved to California, where he was hired by Stanford University in 1958 to oversee music education, a role he held for over 25 years until his retirement. After completing the project with Moncreiff and Harr, Khun attempted to commercialize a computer-aided music learning product. With the help of Paul Lorton, Jr., Khun produced MusicMaster, an educational software that could integrate an Apple II Plus with an AlphaSyntauri keyboard. Shortly after, he retired from teaching.

Khun passed away in 2003.

Bibliography

● Ahl, David. 101 BASIC Computer Games. Maynard, MA: Digital Equipment Corp. (1973)

● Wing, Richard L., Mabel Addis, Walter Goodman, Jimmer Leonard, and William McKay. The Production and Evaluation of Three Computer-Based Economics Games for the Sixth Grade. Cooperative Research Project 2841. U.S. Department of Health, Education & Welfare, Office of Education. (June 1967)

● Zuckerman, D.W., R.E. Horn, and Paula A. Twelker. The Guide to Simulation Games for Education and Training. Information Resources. (1970)

● Leonard, Jimmer M. & Richard L. Wing. Advantages of Using a Computer in Some Kinds of Educational Games. IEEE Transactions on Human Factors in Electronics. Vol. HFE-8, No.2 (Jun. 1967)

● McKay, William. Computer-Directed Instructional Games. Audiovisual Instruction. 14, No. 4. (Apr. 1969)

● Meier, Richard L. Explorations in the Realm of Organization Theory IV: The Simulation of Social Organization. Behavioral Science. 6, No. 3. (July 1961)

● Moncreiff, Bruse. An Automatic Supervisor the IBM 702. Managing Requirements Knowledge. (1956)

● Moncreiff, Bruse. Data Processing: For education, it comes at the right time. Audio-Visual Instruction. (Oct. 1963)

● Moncreiff, Bruse. The Simulated Environment Mode. IBM Advanced Systems Development Division White Plains. (Jun. 27, 1961)

● Moncreiff, Bruse. The Sumerian Game; Teaching Economics with a Computerized P.I. Program. Programed Instruction. 4. (April 1965)

● Wing, Richard L. Computer-Based Economics Games for Elementary Schools. Audiovisual Instruction (Dec. 1964)

● Wing, Richard L. Research in Advanced Teaching Methods: Computerized Games Helping New York Youngsters Learn to Run a Store, a Company, or a Country. Board of Cooperative Educational Services. (Mar. 19, 1968).

Note

[←1]

National Education Association, American voluntary association of teachers, administrators, and other educators associated with elementary and secondary schools and colleges and universities.

[←2]

Moncreiff, Bruise. Autobiographical Note, Learning Games Initiative Research Archive (LGIRA)

[←3]

Ibid.

[←4]

Ibid.

[←5]

February 22, 1909 (New York, New York, USA) – March 7, 1988 (Newton, Massachusetts, USA): American computer scientist.

[←6]

Moncreiff, Bruse. Personal History: Draft, Learning Games Initiative Research Archive (LGIRA)

[←7]

Moncreiff, Bruse. Resume: Bruse Moncreiff, Learning Games Initiative Research Archive (LGIRA)

[←8]

Ibid.

[←9]

Moncreiff, Bruse (1956). An Automatic Supervisor For The IBM 702

[←10]

Research and Development in the Computer and Information Sciences. NBS monograph 113, Vol 2. Processing, Storage, and Output Requirements in Information-Processing Systems A Selective Literature Review

[←11]

Computer Assisted Instruction, sometimes also named as Computer Assisted Learning (CAL).

[←12]

The association for educational data systems (1971). Layman's Guide to the Use of Computers.

[←13]

August 5, 1910 (Audubon County, Iowa, USA) – December 14, 2010 (Grinnell, Iowa, USA)

[←14]

Gividen, Noble J. (1963). High School Education For Rural Youth

[←15]

Catskill Area Project in Small School Design (1959). Guidebook on Flexible Scheduling. A Report of the Study Group on Flexible Scheduling.

[←16]

The Sunday News, June 9, 1961, page 18

[←17]

March 20, 1904 (Susquehanna, Pennsylvania, USA) – August 18, 1990 (Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA): American psychologist, behaviorist, inventor, and social philosopher.

[←18]

Gividen, Noble J. (1963). High School Education For Rural Youth

[←19]

Moncreiff, Bruse (1965). The 'Sumerian Game': Teaching Economics with a Computerized P.I. Program.

[←20]

1890 – 1964: Professor of Educational Sciences at Harvard.

[←21]

April 12, 1921 (Manchester, New Hampshire, USA) - January 27, 2008 (Riverwoods, New Hampshire, USA): Mathematician, professor, and chair of the Department of Education at the University of New Hampshire.

[←22]

Burton, William H; Kimball, Roland B.; Wing, Richard L. (1960). Education for effective thinking; an introductory text

[←23]

Moncreiff, Bruse (1965). The 'Sumerian Game': Teaching Economics with a Computerized P.I. Program.

[←24]

Wing, Richard L. (1967). The production and evaluation of three computer-based economics games for the sixth grade. Final report.

[←25]

Moncreiff, Bruse (1965). The 'Sumerian Game': Teaching Economics with a Computerized P.I. Program.

[←26]

Ibid.

[←27]

The North Westchester Times; New Castle Tribune, December 27, 1962

[←28]

The Reporter Dispatch. January 21, 1963

[←29]

Contrary to what was indicated by Wing's final report and Moncreiff's article, which mentioned ten teachers present at the summer workshop of 1962, the article only listed nine teachers, specifying their full names.

[←30]

French language teacher.

[←31]

French language teacher.

[←32]

Science teacher.

[←33]

Arts teacher.

[←34]

Music teacher.

[←35]

Dean of Croton-Harmon High School and Mayor of Croton-on-Hudson.

[←36]

Science teacher.

[←37]

Science teacher.

[←38]

The North Westchester Times; New Castle Tribune, March 7, 1963

[←39]

The Reporter Dispatch, April 22, 1964, page 29

[←40]

The Reporter Dispatch, January 8, 1964, page 4

[←41]

April 25, 1911 (Elkins, West Virginia, USA) - October 16, 1971 (Peach Springs, Arizona, USA)

[←42]

The IBM 7090, released at the end of 1959, was a transistorized version of the earlier IBM 709, which was built using vacuum tube technology. IBM sold this powerful and costly mainframe for just under 3 million dollars, or leased it for $63,500 per month.

[←43]

Compatible Time-Sharing System (CTSS)

[←44]

The Reporter Dispatch, October 2, 1964, page 18

[←45]

October 18, 1927 (Brooklyn, New York, USA) - August 17, 2010 (Palo Alto, California, USA): computer science pioneer and contributor to the programming languages APL and J.

[←46]

Refer to McDonnell's Game Analysis for more detailed information on the gameplay.

[←47]

In later versions, the time limit was removed, allowing students more time to view graphs and images on the screen and listen to audio tapes before making decisions and progressing in the game.

[←48]

Wing, Richard L. (1967). The production and evaluation of three computer-based economics games for the sixth grade. Final report.

[←49]

Ibid.

[←50]

Patent Trader, October 4, 1964

[←51]

Wing, Richard L. (1967). The production and evaluation of three computer-based economics games for the sixth grade. Final report.

[←52]

Ibid.

[←53]

Ibid.

[←54]

Refer to Scott's Game Analysis for more detailed information on the gameplay.

[←55]

Ibid.

[←56]

1929 (Glen Cove, New York, USA) - August 28, 2012 (Yorktown Heights, New York, USA): teacher in the Yorktown Central School District.

[←57]

Patent Trader. March 20, page 13.

[←58]

Wing, Richard L. (1967). The production and evaluation of three computer-based economics games for the sixth grade. Final report.

[←59]

Ibid.

[←60]

Taylor, Barbara (21 Febbraio 1968). The Reporter Dispatch. BOCES 'Games' Called Aid To Understanding

[←61]

Programming language developed by IBM for Computer Assisted Instruction on IBM 360 systems.

[←62]

For the port of The Sumerian Game using the Coursewriter III language, Walter Goodman sought specialized personnel through a series of job advertisements that appeared in the second half of 1969 in The Reporter Dispatch.

[←63]

Academic Planning Committee (APC), Norrie, D.H., Subcommittee on Information Resources and Educational Technology (SIRET), Task Group no. 2

[←64]

Hallworth, Herbert J. (1969). A Computer System for a Faculty of Education

[←65]

Ibid.

[←66]

Ibid.

[←67]

Later renamed to The Sumer Game in the DEC catalog.

[←68]

According to Dyment: ”You will find it extremely difficult (if not impossible) to decipher the code. The whole point was to squeeze as much functionality into a 4K computer as possible, and I used every short cut and programming trick I could think of to do so ... legibility be damned. The final program, as listed, was the largest piece of FOCAL-8 code that could fit in a 4K machine: there was literally not room for a single extra character (if there had been, I would likely have found some way to add functionality (like give 'Hamurabi' another 'm')!”. In the very first revision of King of Sumeria, repeating prompt was “Hamurabi: I bet to report you”

[←69]

Refer to King of Sumeria analysis for more detailed information on the gameplay.

[←70]

Regarding the missing 'm' in Hamurabi, years later, prompted by researcher Kate Willaert, Dale Geddes conducted an in-depth study of both available versions of King of Sumeria (1968 and 1969). He concluded that, in both cases, the program did not fully occupy the available memory, making it impossible that the addition of the 'm' was restricted by memory limitations, as Dyment recalled. (Willaert, Kate (2019). The Sumerian Game: The Most Important Video Game You've Never Heard Of)

[←71]

Laboratory Program for Computer-Assisted Learning (LOCAL), was a five-town cooperative endeavor set up to improve instruction by using the computer as a teaching aid.

[←72]

The similarity to the introduction of The Sumerian Game, along with the repeating prompt "I beg to report you," later removed from the game in 1969 and later versions, supports the hypothesis that Douglas Dyment may have played the game at the University of Calgary or may have even had access to the source code or the documentation of the game from BOCES of New York.

[←73]

Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code.

[←74]

Starting in 1975—the year the Altair 8800 was released—and thanks in part to Micro-Soft's publication of Altair BASIC, the language became extremely popular, eventually becoming the standard for the first wave of microcomputers in 1977. Its popularity continued to grow until the mid-1980s, leading to the integration of a BASIC interpreter in almost all Western and Eastern microcomputers, including the IBM 5150.

[←75]

Ahl, David. (1984) Creative Computing, November 1984 issue.

[←76]

Ibid.

[←77]

Ibid.

[←78]

These were small games in which the entertainment aspect was secondary to the educational purpose, which was of primary importance. From the introduction of the 1980 RamWare edition manual: “Until they go to school, children think that learning is fun, not work. Is this the reason that they learn so much faster in the early years? And learning is great play. With these games children teach each other the alphabet, addition and subtraction, recognition of letters and words, even art as they play with patterns on the screen.”

[←79]

Curiously, after achieving moderate success with his first games, Blank would end up collaborating with David Ahl for Creative Computing magazine.

[←80]

Later renamed The Software Exchange due to a legal dispute with Tandy over the use of the TRS-80 trademark.

[←81]

May 1979

[←82]

Monochrome video, 128 x 192 blocks.

[←83]

Blank's game made its public debut in the October 1978 issue of SoftSide, where a lengthy section detailed the gameplay and included carefully commented code. The article bore the title of Santa Paravia en Fiumaccio. The Software Exchange catalog listed the game under the same name, with a price of $7.95. However, the game's code spelled the name as Santa Paravia and Fiumaccio. In later editions by Instant Software and Keypunch, the name finally settled as Santa Paravia and Fiumaccio.

[←84]

The text printed in green was added to Sum9rx.

[←85]

Input text was printed in red by the teletype. Output text was printed in black.

[←86]

There’s no surviving explanation for this game mechanic.

[←87]

Patent Trader, Computer-Age ‘Monopoly Game’ Teaches Basic Economics To Sixth Graders, Jill Nagy

[←88]

LIFE Magazine September 1, 1967

[←89]

Moncreiff, Bruse (1965). The 'Sumerian Game': Teaching Economics with a Computerized P.I. Program.

[←90]

Introduction to the game, non-interactive. Starting scenario.

[←91]

Input for resource usage in the first turn: stored grain, grain used for planting, and grain for food. The sum of these three must equal the total harvest.

[←92]

User Input.

[←93]

Verification and validation feedback: data confirmed as accurate.

[←94]

Next turn.

[←95]

Initial report.

[←96]

Input for resource usage in subsequent turns: grain taken from storage divided by year, stored grain, grain used for planting, and grain for food. The sum of the harvest and extracted grain must equal the total of stored and used grain.

[←97]

Warning to the user: the oldest grain is about to spoil.

[←98]

User feedback.

[←99]

Validation failed. User feedback.

[←100]

The game ends after just 6 turns with the death of the ruler and the succession of the next ruler. Richard Wing's notes indicate that the game's duration could be shortened if the player demonstrated an understanding of the game mechanics. In this particular game, the player was performing well: they had increased the population to 519 people and had the grain stores full.

[←101]

Note: The printout was produced on September 18, 1964, under the supervision of E. McDonnell.

[←102]

Program booting up.

[←103]

Indication of the screen projection of the first slide. There are no further signals in the listing.

[←104]

Introduction to the game, more complex and with a degree of interactivity compared to the Sum9rx version.

[←105]

Initial report: note the different inventories by harvest season.

[←106]

Input for resource usage.

[←107]

Confirmation. Note that if (grain used as seed + grain used for food) > harvest, the steward informs of the need to withdraw the necessary grain from the warehouses for the operation. Otherwise, it calculates the grain that will be stored.

[←108]

Residual inventory = Previous inventory + newly harvested and unused grain.

[←109]

New season, new turn.

[←110]

If the ratio of food to population is less than 9, but there is food in the warehouses, the steward asks to add food to prevent part of the population from dying. This warning does not occur every turn but skips a turn.

[←111]

Start-of-turn report. Note the inventory differs from the initial game report.

[←112]

The population in the previous turn had a sharp decline. The harvest depends on the number of available workers, equal to 0.15 of the sum of the workers present in the previous season and the workers present in the current season. If there are few workers, it is more convenient to abandon part of the fields to obtain the same harvest using less grain as seed. Conversely, in case of an increase in population, it is necessary to increase the fields to also increase the harvest.

[←113]

Player feedback for incorrect input.

[←114]

Question to the student to verify the understanding of fundamental concepts in the economic simulation.

[←115]

Feedback to the player.

[←116]

Backer’s edits are outlined in green.

[←117]

The method is used to make estimates through simulations. It relies on an algorithm that generates a series of uncorrelated numbers, following the probability distribution that the phenomenon under investigation is assumed to have.

[←118]

Sic

[←119]

Sic

[←120]

It is interesting to note that Storer used the variable N5 to store the number of game turns, initially set at 8. This choice might have been driven by the need to quickly change the number of turns during the playtesting phase or to allow players an easier way to modify the game, enabling them to customize the program to suit their preferences.

[←121]

Pollution game, lines 1616-1990

[←122]

Hamurabi, lines 565-567

[←123]

Pollution game, lines 1710-1720

[←124]

Hamurabi, lines 945-950

Table of Contents

- Preface

- Part I: The Sumerian Game

- Part II: The Digital Resurrection

- Studying the games

- The name of the Versions
- Launching the game
- Starting Parameters
- Inventory Mechanics
- Grain Spoilage
- Disasters
- Text and Questions
- User Feedback
- Farmed land
- Ending

- Analysis

- Introduction
- Which Version to Rebuild
- Sum9rx - The McDonnell Listing
- Analyzing The McDonnell Listing
- McDonnell Listing Algorithm
- Suilxr - The McLaughlin Listing
- Analyzing The McLaughlin Listing
- McLaughlin Listing Algorithm
- Random Numbers
- What is Missing
- Critical Issues and Observations

- Part III: Legacy

- King of Sumeria

- FOCAL source code for the DEC-1968 version

- Observations

- FOCAL source code for the Backer-1969 version

- Observations
- FOCAL source code for the DEC-1970 version
- Observations
- Algorithm of DEC-1970 version
- Analysis

- The Pollution Game

- BASIC Source code

- Analysis

- Hamurabi

- BASIC Source Code

- Analysis

- Acknowledgments

- Appendix

- The slides

- Gallery

- Analysis

- Peoples

- Andrew Edward Rudolph Jass
- Audrey Bratman
- Bruse Moncreiff
- Christine Hartz
- David H. Ahl
- Donald Joseph Nuccio
- Douglas Dyment
- Frank Cassetta
- George Blank
- Gerard Mergardt
- Harriet Greenberg Forsythe
- Herbert James Hallworth
- Jimmer Leonard
- Kenneth Roswell Tice Sr
- Mabel Addis Mergardt
- Mary Grace Pethick Robinson
- Milo Guisti
- Nathan Jaspen
- Noble Gividen
- Otto Schmidt
- Richard Wing
- Stanley Kellerhouse
- Walter Goodman
- Walter Koetke
- William McKay
- Wolfgang Erasmus Kuhn

- Bibliography