Back in the day, people learned programming by typing in BASIC programs from books and magazines. Besides the books that came with my TSR-80, if there was one book that got my programming bug off the ground, it had to be this one: Basic Fun with Adventure Games. A book I bought for $0.75 at an school book sale when I was around 5th grade.

What made this book so amazing is that it not only contains a full text adventure game you can type in, but it also teaches you how to write your own adventure game – from concept to implementation. I remember being blown away at how good this book was. Even today it holds up to teach the requirements and skills needed to program your first game. It certainly worked well enough for me as a 10-12 year old to completely write my own game about finding the deed to a castle after your rich uncle died. Highly recommend checking it out.

It was the most amazing 75 cents I spent in my entire childhood and still holds a special place in my heart. My copy still sits on my bookshelf next to the college programming textbooks.

Resources:

• Complete PDF version of Basic Fun with Adventure Games
  • Authors: Margaret A. Zuanich; Susan D. Lipscomb
  • Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers, Avon Books
  • Date: 1984
  • ISBN 10: 0380874865
  • ISBN 13: 9780380874866
  • Alternate download location: https://spectrumcomputing.co.uk/entry/2000849/Book/BASIC_Fun_with_Adventure_Games
• Apple II version from RetroProgrammez: cia.bas (note: has a few typos and at least one syntax error mid-game that need to be fixed)
• Basic Fun with Graphics The IBM/PC Way – downloadable PDF
  • Internet Archive copy you can borrow for 1 hour at a time
  • Authors: Margaret A. Zuanich; Susan D. Lipscomb
  • Date: 1983
  • Publisher: Avon Books
  • ISBN 10: 0380850680
  • ISBN 13: 9780380850686

Links:

• Another page from RetroProgrammez that covers this book.
• Online copies of other programming books by Susan Drake Lipscomb
• Online copies of other programming books by Margaret Ann Zuanich
• Compute! magazine archive – type in your own programs from the era