Quest was written by a school teacher by the name of Roger Chaffee. The code can be found in the July 1978 issue of Byte Magazine which you can find in the Internet Archive here. Chaffee’s school received a pair of Commodore PETs and he wrote the game in only two weeks!
Surprise surprise! We’re going spelunking in search of treasure. In the game you explore the cave complex using compass directions of North, South, East, West, Up and Down using only the first letter of each word.
It took me probably 45 minutes to map the entire game out AND find the treasure. The problem? Now that I had the treasure in hand I found I could not leave the cave complex. The obvious exit is now blocked by the treacherous Gnome-King. The other exit is too narrow for me to fit through now that I have the treasure.
I methodically began to more carefully explore my locations. There are a couple of instances where new locations open themselves up to you. I was not clear if this happened after multiple explorations and was in the code that way or if it was because I was in possession of the treasure. Once I found the Crystal Palace it then led me to a new labyrinth which I was able to work my way through to escape with the treasure.
Colossal Cave continues to influence the interactive fiction in 1978. There is a maze within the cavern complex here AND a labyrinth that you have to work through. I also had my treasure stolen by a pirate in the game but I was able to find it in a dead end to the maze. Once I recovered the treasure the pirate never bothered me again.
The game is small but the locations within the cave complex are interesting enough. I believe I spent a total of 90 minutes playing Quest and I enjoyed the experience. I thought it was very impressive for a teacher to produce this in only two weeks for his students to play. It must have been the talk of the school and thrilling to go into Mr. Chaffee’s computer class in 1978 and play Quest in class.