Xyphus was written by Robert Waller and Dave Albert and published by Penguin software for the Apple II in 1984. Versions for the Commodore 64 and Macintosh would be released in 1985. My time spent playing the game clocks in at 15 hours and still growing.
Gamers are extremely passionate about their table-top role-playing games. The way in which the games are handled and/or played can vary greatly. Players and gamemasters tend to be divided over how they want to experience the game. Those who belong in the first camp like a long campaign or story arc that consists of episodic adventures. These adventures are deftly interwoven together to form a cohesive story or mythology. Examples of this kind of play could be any of the Pathfinder Adventure Paths that exist today or any of the larger 5E campaigns such as Tyranny of Dragons. Some players are quick to criticize this style of play explaining that they feel railroaded or pressed to go in a certain direction dictated by the gamemaster. The players in the other camp prefer a sandbox style of play. Meaning they prefer a campaign that does not have a specific storyline but one where the GM sets up a world or at least a small section of one and the player characters are free to wander where they will and find adventure. It is all about freedom of player choice. Players in this camp like to consider themselves “old-school”. This style of play is also often referred to as a hex crawl. The GM uses a special kind of graph paper that consists of hexes which is a map of the geographic area. In this sandbox style of play the GM has placed many different Points of Interest or POI’s on the map. These may consist of dungeons, towns, and/or special encounter areas. The entire world is like a dungeon to explore. While they explore, the GM constantly rolls dice to see if random encounters are generated.
I am often fond of saying that the creators of computer role-playing games between 1978 and 1984 stumbled around in the dark. This is in reference to all of the different experiments that were tried in the translation of the table-top game to the home computer. Many of the early programmers were avid Dungeons & Dragons players. This was akin to a transcendent experience for many of them and they wanted to see if they could take that experience and translate it to a computer game that 100s or 1000s could enjoy. Some of these “experiments” were disastrous while on the other hand we also witnessed the birth of giants such as Wizardry and Ultima. These giants were starting to exert their influence into the industry resulting in games that both emulated their successful formula yet strove to be distinct.
This brings us to Xyphus. It is clear that the developers of this game were greatly influenced by the idea of a hex crawl.
The game is divided into six different scenarios which must be completed before you can move on to the next one. Each scenario gives you a specific task to perform and a new area of the overland map to explore. Movement is performed using a cluster of keys via the keyboard. You can press the TAB key to move the entire party at the same time or elect to move each character individually.
The game manual explains that each scenario can take between 3 to 12 hours to complete. This seems, in my experience thus far, fairly accurate. I am now through the third scenario and thus far the game takes place entirely outdoors. Outdoor exploration, as well as movement on a hex map, makes the game rather unique. It is reminiscent of Robert Clardy’s Wilderness Campaign or Randall D. Mastellar’s The Wylde. There are certainly games where traveling outdoors is a component but Xyphus might be the first game where all of the exploration and action takes place on the overland map.
The game manual that comes packaged with the game is well presented and contains information on the different types of spells you can cast as well as a list of monsters that you may encounter in your exploration of Arroya. I enjoyed the illustrated bestiary, a portion of which is shown below.
Your party consists of four characters however you can choose to play the game with only one character. The game does warn you during the creation process that you’ll need at least one elf and one dwarf in order to complete the game so you’ll at least need a party of two. When you create your characters you choose between dwarf, elf, and human races and you can elect to be either a fighter or spellcaster. You are not in control of any attributes or character options other than the naming of your characters. I often like to use literary inspiration when choosing my character names and decided there was no need to break convention. I chose the names Hanuvar and Antires from the incredibly excellent Lord of a Shattered Land (I highly recommend you support this author and read this one – you will NOT be disappointed) by Howard Anrew Jones for my two fighters and Mordred and Raistlin for the two spellcasters.
The party created, equipment in hand, I set out to explore the world of Arroya. In my next Xyphus installment, I’ll go over each of the scenarios I’ve completed and the trials and tribulations which ensued.
Until next time…