SeaWar
Seawar was a fast paced, real-time, interactive war game, offered by the CompuServe Information Service (CIS). First published in 1983, it remained on the service until 1989.[1][2]
Development
Seawar was developed in FORTRAN IV by Scott W. Killen between 1981 and 1982 for the Prime 750 minicomputer.[3] In 1983, Killen ported the title to the DEC-10 platform, where it was published in December 1983 on CIS by Bill Louden.[1]
Because online access was expensive and players needed to begin matches simultaneously, the game operated within a specialized social context known as the “War Room” that streamlined coordination and introduced features that were unusual for the time.[4][1]
Online expense aside, the technical requirements to play Seawar were minimal and compatible with large numbers of personal computer systems of the time.[5][6] Players needed a CompuServe subscription, a telephone connection operating at 300 or 1200 baud, an RS-232 compatible serial port, a modem, and a character-based computer terminal or terminal emulator.[4]
Gameplay
Seawar was played on a 10 × 10 grid representing the ocean. Two to four players were each assigned a quadrant of the grid along with a port (P) in that corner. Within that quadrant, aircraft carriers (A), cruisers (C), battleships (B), and submarines (S) were placed. Each player began with three to five submarines, while other ships were awarded one to three. Both the number and placement of ships were determined randomly.
Ports contained a large supply of ammunition that could fire on enemy ships within two sectors. Also, adjacent ships could dock with the port and receive ammo and repair damage. Heavily damaged ships might require up to three docking commands to reach full battle readiness. Ports could be destroyed by enemy ships; however, an enemy ship hit by a port was likely to be heavily damaged or sunk.
All ships shared a common set of controls and basic capabilities, including visibility, single-sector movement and firing in any direction, and a standard level of offensive damage. Each ship class also possessed a unique advantage that was lost once the ship became sufficiently damaged. Aircraft carriers could fire two sectors away to simulate air attacks, cruisers could move two sectors in any direction, battleships inflicted more damage than other ships, and submarines were invisible to the enemy. Immediately before sinking, a ship was immobilized.
The game required a synchronized start, with all players moving and firing simultaneously in real time. Moving and firing required players to enter grid coordinates. To equalize the effort associated with this task, the ocean was rotated so that all players viewed themselves in the upper-left quadrant, with their port at 00. The game used a simple command structure that could be played effectively with four single-character, case-insensitive commands and an understanding of the coordinate system. Examples include “D,” which docked ships at the port; “25M26,” which moved the ship in sector 25 to sector 26; and “25F26,” which fired at the ship in sector 26. The final command, “W,” refreshed the screen when players chose wait.
The game ended when only one player remained. It tracked the number of player wins and the total enemy ships sunk and allocated ranks of Swabbie, Ensign, Captain, or Admiral based on the number of ships sunk.
Context and legacy
By early 1984, CompuServe had established itself as the premier commercial gateway for large-scale online multiplayer games.[7][8][9] While other major commercial systems such as The Source and Delphi had no known multiplayer war games; the PLATO network hosted several.[8][10] However, PLATO was not a commercial network; it was restricted primarily to educational institutions, government agencies and, significantly, usually required a specialized 1200-baud PLATO IV or V graphics terminal.[11][12] [13]
As 1984 began, CompuServe offered three real-time multiplayer games in addition to Seawar: Space War, Decwar, and MegaWars.[1] MegaWars was an enhanced version of Decwars and contrary to the 1983 games catalog, MegaWars II was never released.[7] Whether Space War shared some of the same code base as PLATO's 1962 Spacewar! is unknown, however, it, Decwars and MegaWars shared the same conceptual framework. Unlike these space-themed multiplayer games, Seawar featured naval combat and was independently conceived by Killen.
At the time, off-peak hours at CompuServe were $6/hour, a sizable sum for someone waiting online for a game that required all players to start simultaneously.[4] Seawar addressed this economic pressure through several creative design choices that made paid online play more practical: rapid games, a centralized War Room, spectator access, and solo play.
Rapid Games: Seawar matches typically lasted about fifteen minutes while Megawars might take two to three hours to complete, making Seawar significantly more affordable for the average user.[10]
The War Room: While CompuServe’s Megawars game started when the first player joined, it required an external 'CB simulator' and forums for players to coordinate mutual starts.[14][15] Seawar integrated game coordination into a public chat environment called the 'War Room.' This solved the synchronization problem by creating value during the wait; players could socialize, build relationships, and configure match settings before being seamlessly drawn into live combat once everyone was ready. Seawar was likely the first publicly accessible network game to feature such an integrated matchmaking environment.
Spectator Access: War Room visitors could choose to observe games already in progress. Game spectators were given an omniscient view of all ships, including submarines, as the game unfolded. If the conditions for a synchronized start were met, the spectator was automatically transitioned into a live game against real players. None of the other CompuServe war games are known to have had an observation mode leaving Seawar as possibly the first publicly accessible network game to offer this capability.
Solo Play: If no live opponents were available, players could initiate a game against the computer. This provided entertainment and warm-up time while waiting for a real match. As with observing a game, a player engaged in solo play would be immediately transferred into a triggered live game. At the beginning of 1984, playing a game against a computer was not unusual, but doing so to have fun while incurring online charges while waiting for a live multiplayer game was.
In an era when every second online carried a fee and players joined pre‑existing multiplayer games, the War Room’s ability to turn “waiting time” into valuable social interaction, game watching, and solo play was apparently unique. Its capacity to transition players seamlessly from those fun activities into a newly created live match was the first known instance of this capability in commercial online game design.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 CompuServe Games Highlights. CompuServe. 1983. pp. 6–7, 13. Search this book on
- ↑ Peterson, Cheryl (July 1989). "Online: Island of Fantasy". Compute!'s Gazette. 7 (7): 21 – via Archive.org.
- ↑ Krislov, Alex (February 1986). "Online After Five". Online Today. 5 (2): 13 – via Archive.org.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 CompuServe IntroPak (PDF). CompuServe. 1984. p. 6, 9, 18. Search this book on Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; name ":1" defined multiple times with different content - ↑ Miller, Mark (March 21, 2025). "What did the computing world look like in circa 1984?". Quora.
- ↑ Reimer, Jeremy (December 14, 2005). "Total share: 30 years of personal computer market share figures". arsTECHNICA.
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 Maher, Jimmy (December 8, 2017). "Games on the Net Before the Web, Part 1: Strategy and Simulation". The Digital Antiquarian.
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 Fitzgibbons, Patricia (June–July 1986). "Island of Kesmai" (PDF). Computer Gaming World (29): 30 – via Computer Gaming World Museum.
- ↑ Mace, Scott (October 15, 1984). "Computer Games Get Social". InfoWorld. pp. 30–31.
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 Sullivan, Nick (June 1986). "Telecomputing - Multi-Player Games On CompuServe". Family Computing. 4 (6): 20–22 – via Archive.org.
- ↑ "PLATO". The Grainger College of Engineering University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Fall 2020.
- ↑ Stifle, Jack (March 1974). The PLATO IV Terminal: Description of Operation. Urbana Illinois: University of Illinois. pp. 1–90. Search this book on
- ↑ Stifle, Jack (1978). PLATO V Programmable Plasma Touch Terminal. Champaign, Illinois: Carroll Manufacturing. pp. 1–100. Search this book on
- ↑ MegaWars. Columbus, Ohio: CompuServe. 1984. p. 3. Search this book on
- ↑ "Last night, 39 musicians had a COMPUSERVE conference, so did 31 M.D.s 49 Sports fans and 640 apple polishers, and no one had to leave home". Compute!. 6 (11): 15. November 1984 – via Archive.org.
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