Altair 8800 BASIC - TARGET (1977)

# Trying to find a truly ancient computer game from vague memory **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Tags:** video-games-e-games\ **Created:** [October 27, 2026, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-find-a-truly-ancient-computer-game-from-vague-memory/1034192 "2026-10-27T14:26:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2

**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2026, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-find-a-truly-ancient-computer-game-from-vague-memory/1034192/21 "2026-10-30T16:51:51Z")

Yeah, seems to be. The OP could take my prompt and modify it as necessary to make it closer. The OP describes it as more like an Asteroids game where you’re controlling the bullet in flight. ---

**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2026, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-find-a-truly-ancient-computer-game-from-vague-memory/1034192/22 "2026-10-30T19:52:37Z")

Is this version any closer? > **Summary** > > ```auto > > > > > > Altair 8800 BASIC - TARGET (1977) > > > > > > >

> > >

MITS ALTAIR 8800 / TELETYPE Model 33

ALTAIR BASIC v4.1 (8K)

SOUND: [ON]

> > >

> W/A/S/D / Arrows: Move > B: Step Budget > T: Target Quota > X: Symbol >

> C: Color Phosphor > M: Sound > P: Pause > R: Restart/Reset >

> > >

> > > > > > > > > > >

> > > > > > ``` ---

**Author:** ![DigitalC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DigitalC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DigitalC)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2026, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-find-a-truly-ancient-computer-game-from-vague-memory/1034192/23 "2026-10-30T23:41:23Z")

> [@Jasmine](#): > > If you found the game, I seriously doubt you could find a machine to run it. He said he still has it in the attic! Now, whether it works or not is a different question… ---

**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-find-a-truly-ancient-computer-game-from-vague-memory/1034192/24 "2026-11-02T13:15:13Z")

> [@DigitalC](#): > > He said he still has it in the attic! I’m impressed! 💯 ---

**Author:** ![StarvingButStrong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/starvingbutstrong/32/335_2.png) [@StarvingButStrong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StarvingButStrong)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-find-a-truly-ancient-computer-game-from-vague-memory/1034192/25 "2026-11-02T16:12:33Z")

I’m sorry about vanishing for a few days. I was truly overwhelmed by how much effort so many of you put into my question, though in truth most of it went totally over my head. What I probably needed was a link to some hobbyist who had a web page of replicas you could simply play what looked like the game with a browser. I know there’s at least one for old Zork type games, so just maybe? I was never into the hands-on side of things. My brother did all the tech stuff: he’d boot the computer, load the game, laugh at my frequent ineptitude at playing whatever it was. After I posted that message, I finally realized what was going on with me. My Eldest Brother and I were part of a large family … and we were the two outsiders. All the other boys (and a couple of the girls!) were stereotypical jocks through and through. It was sports. sports, sports plus later on lots of booze and in some cases drugs, and in one bad case a career of crime to support it. With the sort of aftermath you might expect. We two simply didn’t fit, and I think our overburdened parents just had no idea what to do with us. We were both excellent students – I think we fled to school – and we were polite and followed the rules so I guess they figured they could just concentrate on the needs of the noisier mob. I actually got more involved with the computers after he’d moved on to CP/M and later some CP/M-DOS hybrid and so on. A friend of his had invented a game creation system that would turn out text games like Zork and its ilk. It was not at all demanding of true programming skills, what it took was creative writing to come up with your scenarios and puzzles and descriptions. Those I was good at, while Brother would loyally always expand the matrixe(?maybe?) so I could have more and more verb and objects as my games grew. We’d spend hours, me creating the game, him engineering it, and finally being my first player. Wow. More detail than you need, sorry. Anyway, time passed, and that phase of things passed. I moved basically into writing stories that didn’t have to define down to verb-object phrases. Brother was, no surprise, a software engineer. He had a bad heart attack, but seemed to recover well. He lost extra weight and started an exercise program under medical supervision and things seemed to be going well. Then it was October, which here in New England means falling leaves. And he got the idea that he was feeling great so why not rake up leaves and haul them away… His backyard had a lot of trees, and was sort of secluded. The autopsy said he’d been dead for several hours before a neighbor happened to spot him lying there. And it’s now October again, and every year I get sort of melancholy when the leaves start to fall. Which is a long lead up to saying, I didn’t realize at first I wasn’t missing a computer game I was suddenly remembering. Thank you all for your kind attempts to help, sorry for the waste of your time. ---

**Author:** ![Baal\_Houtham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baal_houtham/32/13604_2.png) [@Baal\_Houtham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baal_Houtham)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-find-a-truly-ancient-computer-game-from-vague-memory/1034192/26 "2026-11-02T16:36:46Z")

Sad story, but also lovely ---

**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-find-a-truly-ancient-computer-game-from-vague-memory/1034192/27 "2026-11-02T18:39:11Z")

FWIW I tried loading and running a bunch of game disks I found on the Internet under CP/M 2.2 in the SIMH emulator, and they worked fine. Zork and what not; none of them had the Target described in the OP, only the Basic Computer Game of that name. If you can _find_ the disk, running the game was never going to be a problem. There are also various web-based simulators where everything runs in a web page. ---

**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-find-a-truly-ancient-computer-game-from-vague-memory/1034192/28 "2026-11-02T20:16:29Z")

> [@StarvingButStrong](#): > > Which is a long lead up to saying, I didn’t realize at first I wasn’t missing a computer game I was suddenly remembering. > > Thank you all for your kind attempts to help, sorry for the waste of your time. Thanks for sharing that story. Sorry about your brother. Those are nice memories to have had. There’s no waste of time here. We were all just curious too. ---

**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-find-a-truly-ancient-computer-game-from-vague-memory/1034192/29 "2026-11-02T23:00:49Z")

Have you seen the thread on nostalgia for text-adventure games? > [@A hollow voice says 'Fool.'](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-hollow-voice-says-fool/1034313/): > > Who loved and maybe still loves those old school interactive fiction games? I actually downloaded an emulator that plays the games on my phone which has way more juice than a Radio Shack Tandy ever did, I love those games so much. Who else recalls reading the New Zork Times? Who remembers typing 'XYZZY" to see that happened? Any of you deviants finish “Leather Goddesses of Phobos?” Fess up! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trying-to-find-a-truly-ancient-computer-game-from-vague-memory/1034192.md?page=1)