Philosopher's Quest
Topologika 
1979
- Aka:
- Brand X
- Language:
- English
- Authors:
- Jonathan Mestel, Peter D. Killworth
- Systems:
- T/SAL
- Platforms:
- Amstrad CPC , Amstrad PCW , Archimedes , BBC/Electron , PC , Spectrum
- Genres:
- Fantasy, misc.
- Entered by:
- dave, Gunness, leenew, Starscream, Strident
- Added:
- 10-05-2010
- Edited:
- 03-07-2020
Synopsis
Plot
Welcome to the adventure Philosopher's Quest, an "intelligent" adventure where the player explores a strange land full of weird and unlikely things, some dangerous, some even magical.In this new and authentic game the concept of the adventure is exploited to the full, and extended to include abstract thought as a means to progress and survival. However, wild speculation will get you nowhere, you have to use your wits! The objective is to find all the treasures and bring them back to where you began, but in the meantime you have to sift clues, weigh up risks, spot magic words and remember which way you came!
Notes
Originally written as Brand X and placed on the Phoenix mainframe at Cambridge University in 1979.Commercially released years later, as Philosopher's Quest by Topologika.
Acornsoft released the game for the BBC, but due to memory limitations, quite a lot of the game was removed.
It has been claimed that some of this material was used for Castle of Riddles instead, but this has been disputed: "The two originals were Castle of Riddles and Countdown to Doom. The former feels very much like Philosopher’s Quest II, although it is a completely original effort and not, as is sometimes reported, derived à la Zork II and III from yet-unused sections of Philosopher’s Quest‘s mainframe source, Brand X."
Resources (Upload file)
- Solution
- by terri
- Solution (Mainframe)
- by Richard Bos
- Solution (PC)
- by Richard Bos
- Map (Mainframe)
- by Canalboy
- Map (Mainframe)
- by Canalboy (trizbort)
- Clue sheet (BBC/Electron)
- by ?
- Review
- by Canalboy
- Further Info:
- Search at Complete BBC Games Archive
- Search at CPC-Power
- Search at Museum of Computer Adventure Game History
- Search at Spectrum Computing
- Search at The Tipshop
- Search at World of Spectrum
[+] Users who have solved this game
[+] Users currently playing this game
- —
As with the other recent comments... This was also released for the BBC.
Image here: http://stardot.org.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=7919
Thank you.
Hi,
as it says in the description, the BBC version has its own entry as it differed quite a lot from this version. Same with the other Beeb titles.
Hi Gunness,
Acornsoft released cut down versions of this, and the Doom Trilogy, but the full Topologika versions were also released for the beeb. The link above will take you to the images of all the full Topologika versions we have archived :-)
Lee.
Jeez, the history of these games is really headache-inducing - I'll send you an email :)
Fascinating. And, on checking this, it seems that my walkthroughs do work for all these disc versions, both for Doom and for PQ. Now I'll have to change them and re-upload... oh, life is though!
Well found. I wonder if we'll ever find the complete set of them. You don't happen to have a BBC version of Xerb lying about somewhere, do you? Or the source code for Hezarin?
Hi Richard,
No, I can't help you out with either Xerb or Hezarin.
I don't think Xerb made it to the beeb (although with these you never can be sure!).
Hezarin was released, and I am on the look-out for it.
I may have more news very soon regarding a couple more Topologika titles :-)
As for the source code, a promising contact we have been corresponding with seems to have gone quiet recently... :-( my fingers are always crossed though!
Lee.