Source:GEnie Apple II RoundTable Bulletin Board, Eamon topic 12

This page is a verbatim reproduction of original source material and should not be edited except for maintenance.
Description	An archive of the 16 messages posted to the GEnie Apple II RoundTable Bulletin Board, category #16 ("Eamon"), topic #12 ("SwordThrust").
Source	Content was retrieved from the text file eamon.03.txt made available by GEnie.
Date	February 1994–April 1995
Author	Various
License	It is believed that the use of this copyrighted item in Eamon Wiki qualifies as fair use under the copyright law of the United States.
Previous item	Topic 11: Help with Eamon Scenarios

Topic 12: SwordThrust (the commercial Eamons)

Message 1
J.SCHONBLOM [J.ERIC] — Mon Feb 28, 1994 at 21:42 EST

Swordthrust (one word when you run the program) or Sword Thrust (two words on the disk label) was Don Brown's commercial version of the Eamon series. It is my understanding that there were six adventurers in all. I have five of them, all written by Brown and copyrighted in 1981. My copies were sold by Main Street Publishing for $5 a copy in 1985. Some were sold singly and some with two adventures, one on each side of the disk.

I'll pay $5 for an original copy of any of these. I'm keeping my own, but I'd like to buy Tom a set of originals for the archives. Please don't upload this copyrighted material!

Does anyone know who acquired the distribution rights when Main Street Publishing went under? Tom talked to Donald Brown, who has no idea.

The next post, a long one, lists the five adventures I own and a little about each. Does anyone know anything about the sixth?

Eric ( o= =o === =ooo oo oo= == )

Message 2
J.SCHONBLOM [J.ERIC] — Mon Feb 28, 1994 at 21:47 EST

Fair warning: This is a long post!

Sword Thrust 1: Main Cave & The King's Testing Ground

The Main Cave has the principal features of the Eamon Hall, although weapons, spells, and training must all be bargained for, with the vendor stating an asking price, and the hero making counter offers. One gimmick: you can buy a poor club for 0 gold pieces and sell it back for 2; however, it takes a long time to make much money that way.

The King's Testing Ground offers one outstanding weapon and several puzzles, but no quest other than loot. There's a gold statue, but you must be clever to get it home.

Sword Thrust 2: Vampyre Caves

The hero is bitten by the vampyre on entry and cannot walk from the cave into the daylight until he is rid of his curse. This is the quest. There's plenty of treasure and several puzzles. I've been playing this for ten years and still don't know why there is an old woman lying dead on the floor of the deepest room in the cave. You tell me!

Sword Thrust 3: The Kidnapper's Cove

You are on a rescue mission, which is easy enough if you drop all your weapons and are content to pay the ransom; otherwise, you'll be filled with arrows long before you can use your weapons or magic. If there's a clever way to beat this game and clean out all the treasure without using a superhero, I don't know what it is. You'll better be able to parry!

Sword Thrust 4: The Case of the Sultan's Pearl

You are to solve a murder mystery. Be warned: if you kill anyone who isn't a villain, an army appears and kills you. It's not much fun once you know the killer. Watch the assassins, who attack without warning with very sharp knives.

Sword Thrust 5: The Green Plague

Evidently created for a contest, you can solve this in one sitting with a beginning character wielding ordinary weapons... if you are careful. There's a quest, but not much treasure. It's a good adventure to re-enter to build parrying ability.

Eric ( o= =o === =ooo oo oo= == )

Message 3
T.ZUCHOWSKI [TomZ] — Tue Mar 01, 1994 at 07:45 EST

In case anyone is wondering why Eric started this here instead of in Lost Classics, SwordThrust was a superset of the Eamon system. I've been told that the program code and database were =very= similar, though I've never been able to get my hands on a set of my own to play with.

Yeah, I talked to Don Brown about a year ago. He's programming in the Des Moines area. I found him by doing a search on CIS. He has no problem with this stuff going public-domain, but was quite clear that he doesn't own it and doesn't know where the owners are. Alas.

TomZ

Message 4
GCOURTER [Grinner] — Sat Mar 05, 1994 at 10:32 EST

FWIW,

I only have Sword Thrust 1 through 3. I rarely sell my old stuff but will consider it. I also have copies of some of the real old (i.e. dos 3.3) Eamons. If there's any interest, I'll check which ones, but I assume they're all uploaded here somewhere.

:)er

Message 5
T.ZUCHOWSKI [TomZ] — Sat Mar 05, 1994 at 15:17 EST

>>>Grinner

Sure, I'm definitely interested in picking up those SwordThrusts, if your price is reasonable.

As for the Eamons, I'm very interested in finding any new ones that aren't in the present listing of 224 titles. Just because it's old doesn't mean that it ever saw wide distribution. If you got them from a P-D house, then I'm sure that I've already got them.

We don't actually have DOS 3.3 Eamons here on GEnie. I tried putting a few particular titles up, and it was not good. There are an astonishing number of Apple II users who genuinely don't understand the difference between DOS 3.3 and ProDOS, I learned. And so to eliminate the confusion, the DOS 3.3 Eamon stuff was pretty much all nuked.

TomZ

Message 6
GCOURTER [Grinner] — Sun Mar 06, 1994 at 16:22 EST

TomZ,

Old Eamons - Death Star, Hogarth Castle and The Abductors.

Just ran across (again) some of my other old stuff. Like Akalabeth (pre- Ultima Lord British), Soft Porn Adventure, Temple of Apshai, pretty interesting.

:)er

Message 7
T.ZUCHOWSKI [TomZ] — Mon Mar 07, 1994 at 08:05 EST

>>>Grinner

I don't have any Eamon adventure named "The Abductors". Do you mean "The Abductor's Quarters" by Jim Jacobson? If it is indeed "The Abductors", then I would be VERY interested in getting a copy.

I dunno how up to date you are on Eamon stuff, but those three Eamons that you have are 10 years old, =very= primitive by modern Eamon standards, and low-rated as well. There are about 180 Eamons with higher ratings in the Eamon list. *8-) If you haven't ever played a modern high-rated ProDOS Eamon, then you may not know what you're missing.

TomZ

Message 8
GCOURTER [Grinner] — Thu Mar 10, 1994 at 18:21 EST

TomZ,

I dunno how up to date you are on Eamon stuff...

I know this stuff is real old. It's in a book that I have to dust twice before I open it ;). The label on the one says Eamon Adventure # 8: The Abductors. I believe I bought it from Micro Co-op between 8 and 11 years ago. As stated before, it's a DOS 3.3 16 track disk (yes I've got some 13 track games as well). It could be the Jim Jacobson game, but I've not fired it up to check. Let me know if you want me to.

Also, I know this stuff is old. The death star really stinks. But it is very aged.

:)er

Message 9
T.ZUCHOWSKI [TomZ] — Thu Mar 10, 1994 at 20:25 EST

>>>Grinner

Yep, that "Abductor" Eamon that you have is in fact Eamon #8, nothing new there. Thanks for checking.

The death star really stinks

I was always rather amazed by the fact that a couple of professional programmers like Don Brown and John Nelson would tend to turn out such poor Applesoft code. They never quite did seem to get a good hold on what makes Applesoft go. The present incarnation of The Death Star isn't nearly as bad as your old one, as the code cleaned up really well for faster execution.

Still, I imagine that plenty of newbies were attracted to The Death Star because of its title and never ever played another Eamon. *8-)

TomZ

Message 10
GCOURTER [Grinner] — Sat Mar 12, 1994 at 10:35 EST

TomZ,

I figured that these Eamons were around. Just thought I'd check. It's kinda fun to find this old stuff every now and then. It's even more amazing to run it. Like the old 13 track 'Monty Plays Monopoly' that I've got. A low res monopoly game (and the dude's pretty good too).

I'm waiting on the PowerPC personality that will allow me to use a dos 3.2 disk.

:)er

Message 11
H.HISLOP [Harold] — Sat Mar 12, 1994 at 14:39 EST

Hmmmm....

Gents, thats 13 or 16 _sector_ not track.

All Apple 5.25" drives were 35 track. (35 usable tracks that is)

-Harold
Resident solder slinger.

Message 12
GCOURTER [Grinner] — Sun Mar 13, 1994 at 12:32 EST

Oops - sorry Harold. You are of course correct. Didn't even think about what I was typing - tracks came to mind directly. Sectors come later.

Tnx,
:)er

Message 13
D.CHEEVER — Mon Jun 06, 1994 at 22:49 EDT

Just a little further information os Swordthrusts.... In the August 1982 edition of Softtalk "The Eternal Curse may cause you great consternation until you grasp its message. A little familiarity with Oscar Wilde doesn't hurt." and "Episode number 7, The Hall of Alchemie, is the first one not written by CE founder and owner Donald Brown; its author is Peter Wityk. The difference is evident, but none of the saga's hallmarks have been besmirched." By the way the CS Software price was $29.95 a disk.....

Dave Cheever

Message 14
J.SCHONBLOM [J.ERIC] — Fri Jun 10, 1994 at 22:41 EDT

...$29.95 a disk

I bought my Sword Thrusts in a book store at $5 each. They were a bargain.

Eric ( o= =o === =ooo oo oo= == )

Message 15
M.THEODORAKI [peggyTheo] — Fri Apr 07, 1995 at 21:58 EDT

Hi, all..I have played Sword Thrust Vampire Cave and after quite a while I won. I'll admit I cheated a bit, I went into the master and gave myself more gold so I could get more training. I NEVER found a dead woman that I could /can remember. I have never gotten through Kidnappers Cove but I would love a copy of another adventure. I know it's a DOS 3.3 version. Swordthrust was my first real text adventure and I was hooked. I later moved on to Infocom but I still dust off SwordThrust every now and then. At the moment I run on a IIE and/or a GS but I am having to upgrade to IBM compatible because of my job. My Apple will move up to my room and that "thing" will be in the dining room. I don't get on often but I will try to get on next week. Peggy Theo

Message 16
T.ZUCHOWSKI [TomZ] — Sat Apr 08, 1995 at 07:41 EDT

>>>M.THEODORAKI [peggyTheo]

Peggy, have you ever tried Eamon adventuring? If you like SwordThrust, you more than likely will like Eamon. Donald Brown invented both, and SwordThrust is nothing more than a mildly souped-up version of Eamon.

We have over 100 ProDOS Eamons here in A2. You might want to especially check out Eamons by Sam Ruby and Pat Hurst, to name just two superior authors. Also note that the Eamon descriptions include a 1-10 rating.

If I may be so bold as to recommend one of my own Eamons, you might want to try this one for starters:

15698 EAMON.124.BXY            X T.ZUCHOWSKI  910522   52736     56  36
  Desc: 80-col. P8 'Assault on Dolni Keep'

And here is the ProDOS Eamon Master:

16219 EAMON.001.BXY            X T.ZUCHOWSKI  910729   72320    268  36
  Desc: ProDOS Eamon Master/Main Hall

TomZ