Alternate Reality: The City

Title	Alternate Reality: The City
Image
Developer	Paradise Programming
Publisher	Datasoft
Designer	Philip Price
Composer	Gary Gilbertson
Released	1985
Genre	Role-playing
Modes	Single-player
Platforms	Atari 8-bit, Commodore 64, Apple II, Mac, Atari ST, Amiga, MS-DOS, TRS-80 Color Computer

Technology

The game requires a blank, formatted disk to use as a "Character Disk" in order to save the game.

Reception

Scorpia gave Alternate Reality: The City a mixed review in Computer Gaming World. The graphics were praised for its attention to detail, as was the expansive city to explore. She criticized the game, however, for having no goal; once the city is painfully mapped out, the only thing left to do is monotonously battle enemies in preparation for The Dungeon. The 8-bit versions omitted certain features such as joining guilds, and Scorpia criticized the Apple version's poor graphics. In 1993 Scorpia called The City "a fascinating premise that turned out rather poorly ... a game for those with great persistence and patience".

Alternate Reality: The City received a mini-review in 1988 in Dragon #131 by Hartley, Patricia, and Kirk Lesser in "The Role of Computers" column. The reviewers gave the Macintosh version of the game 3 out of 5 stars, and the Atari ST version 3 stars. Alternate Reality: The City and Alternate Reality: The Dungeon were both the subject of the feature review Dragon #135. The reviewers gave Alternate Reality: The City 3 stars, and Alternate Reality: The Dungeon stars.

References

• Alternate Reality: The City, 12 March 2024
• The History of Computer Role-Playing Games Part 2: The Golden Age (1985-1993), Barton, Matt, Gamasutra, 23 February 2007, 3 January 2017
• The Original Alternate Reality Homepage, 2024-03-19, www.eobet.com
• November 1986, Scorpia, Computer Gaming World, Alternate Reality: The City, 22–23
• Scorpia's Magic Scroll Of Games, Computer Gaming World, October 1993, 25 March 2016, Scorpia, 34–50
• Lesser, Hartley, Lesser, Patricia, Lesser, Kirk, The Role of Computers, Dragon, 131, March 1988, 78–86
• Lesser, Hartley, Lesser, Patricia, Lesser, Kirk, The Role of Computers, Dragon, 135, July 1988, 82–89

External links