Alphaman

Overall, though, Alphaman doesn't offer enough complex gameplay to keep Roguelike fans satisfied. Recommended if you are new to Roguelike games in general, or want to try Rogue in a futuristic setting. Overall, a worthy attempt with discongruous parts that didn't quite gel together into an engrossing game. Worth a look, definitely, and fun for a while… but don't expect it to be the next NetHack.—Home of the Underdogs

Alphaman features a futuristic, or rather, post-apocalyptic, setting. It was created in 1995 by Jeffrey R. Olson, who in the same year also wrote Ricochet. It was released as shareware, but based entirely on good will. There is no registered version with enhanced features, there are no nag screens.

The game gives you a choice of difficulty levels at the beginning, a nice touch lacking in other roguelike games. You get a short introduction and the option to print out the commands list. Then you are cast into the abovementioned ruins of Central New York. The game was developed for DOS from the beginning and makes good use of colors and the IBM character set, compare the screenshots.

It is a bit confusing in the beginning that every step takes you to a new map. But character-based games don't like to work with maps that are larger than the screen, so each character of the world map represents one screen. The landscape is detailed, you soon learn that some symbols delay your progress, they represent shrubbery and might take two or three turns to pass.

The ultimate goal of the game is to locate the Grinch's stronghold and beat this powerful and psychotic enemy. To do so, you must first enter five other castles and beat the respective bosses there, each time gaining an indispensable item. The name of these bosses and castles shows a strong humoristic element (Gilligan in the castaways' fortress; Buzz Aldrin, cult leader of These Who Came In Second) that reminds me of Escape from Hell.

Unlike most roguelike games, you can save and keep on playing. The savegame is named after your character, you continue playing by typing alphaman [name] at the command line (where [name] is the name of your character), so you can have multiple characters parallely.

A fun little cheat: If you name your character Jeffrey Olson, you start with excellent stats and equipment.