Anyone know/remember Trade Wars or Warlords?

[Quasqueton]

Back in the early 1990s my gaming group (and other friends) discovered what now might probably be considered the earliest multi-player online computer role playing games. Logging on to local computer bulletin boards, we played "Trade Wars" and what I think was called "Warlords".

Trade Wars was a simple space-based text game where the universe consisted of 1,000 sectors. The players, logging in at different times and taking their (~100) turns each day, played the part of space merchants or space pirates. Buying, selling, stealing, fighting other players and the wandering Ferrangi were the standard actions. You could form guilds, use genesis torpedoes to create new planets, transfer colonists from "Terra", and so on. I never played in a game that had more than maybe a dozen players, but it was way (simple) fun.

The players didn't have to, but they often did take on certain personalities and characters in the game. These personalities came through not only in how you took your actions and played the game, but in how you presented yourself on the message boards dedicated to the particular game on that bulletin board.


Warlords was a (very simple) graphic game where the players picked out a spot on the randomly generated world to start their main castle. From the castle, the player sent out infantry, cavalry, and scouts to take nearby villages, harvest timber, and challenge your neighbor's territory. This game too let you play up a personality with the other players.


Playing either of these games took maybe 30-60 minutes a day. Nothing compared to the hours and hours possible with the likes of EverQuest and Ultima Online. But that was part of the fun. You could play a full game and still have a life outside.

I'm curious. How wide spread were these games? Did any of you ever play them in your local areas?

Quasqueton

 

[Wippit Guud]

I miss Trade Wars, I rocked that game.
I also miss Barron Realms Elite, because it was inter-BBS games, and liked to pummel other BBSs

Never did get to play VGA planets, wish I did, looked cool.

 

[KDLadage]

I used to play Trade Wars 2002 and Solar Realms Elite back when I was in San Diego. I would love to find an internet version of Solar Realms Elite -- that was a blast!

 

[Joshua Randall]

Back in the late '80s / early '90s, I played a BBS game called Spacer Quest (not to be confused with the Sierra adventure game Space Quest). It was similar to many other games: you had a spacecraft, you bought enhancements for it, you delivered cargo and fought other ships.

My favorite memory from that game was when, through many, many hours of gaming (plus some skullduggery), I achieved a monopoly on the fuel depots. I then jacked up the prices and forced every other player in the game to pay exorbitant fees if they wanted to be able to fly anywhere. Ah, good times.

 

[Dagger75]

Trade Wars ROCKED!!!! I remeber on one of the BBS's I found a sector the hod only one quadrant to it. I then Mined the hell out of it and and made a couple of planets full of people. I remember being able to join the Pirates or the federation. Each had a special ship. It was cool as hell.

Don't remember warlor.

What was the gladiator game, Arena I think?? Remember that one

 

[Endur]

ISS's ROCK

The ISS's you got from the Federation were pretty cool.

As was the underground (typing U in the spaceport).

And Mobile Planets were awesome for warfare.

Remember the H planets ... 1 million fuel for your Quasar Cannons.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

I remember mapping out quadrants for days trying to locate those all important sectors of space that you could "close off" to the rest of the universe... fun times.

My favorite online game of that time period, though, was Esterian Conquest, which was a space conquest game in which you'd build ships, defend planets and take over other players empires. Generally around 125 planets in a game. I remember one memorable game in which an enemy was trotting around the galaxy, mopping up planets with his 500 ship fleet. I gambled that he had to be throwing his entire production into that one flee, and built a series of small 10 ship fleets - one for each of his planets. I then parked them a sector or two off planet, and in one turn, took over his entire 33 planet empire. Ah, the glory of victory.

 

[LazarusLong42]

I probably wasted a six months of time playing TW2002 and BRE/SRE in the early nineties. Excellent, excellent games.

If you do a search... you can still find places to play them online. TW at least has continued to develop... you can now have more than one person playing at a time, for instance, and there are clients that will set up auto-trade routes and so forth for you.

Fun game.

 

[The Sigil]

Yah, I remember Tradewars.

In fact, I am a registered, paying customer. Too bad I don't run a BBS, eh?

TW was a lot of fun.

Other BBS doors I remember fondly...

Crunch League Football
King of the Hill Trivia
Foodfite

Oh, the wasted hours of youth - those were the days when a 2400 baud modem was fast and 9600 baud meant you were a rich ubernerd.

--The Sigil

 

[Zaruthustran]

Trade Wars was cool. I had notebooks full of star maps and trade routes.

But my favorite door was... uh.. the Wasteland game, whatever the name was. The combat was partly based on player skill; the game counted down from 8 to 1 and you had to hit the space bar when the timer reached a target number.

Pretty fun.

I'm surprised there are so few door-type games for the web.

-z