About the Game
History
How to Play
Geneology
Imitations
Links

Original Release
Arcade

Other Releases
Apple II
Apple IIGS
Apple Macintosh
Atari 8-Bits
Atari ST
Commodore 64
Famicom / NES
PC (DOS/Windows)
Sega Master System

Picture Galleries
Coming Soon

Screenshot Galleries
Title
Level 1
Later On
Treasure Room
Extra

Audio Clip Galleries
Title
Treasure Room

Before Everquest, There Was Gauntlet, but before Gauntlet, There Was Dandy

The next time you are in a virtual dungeon, striking an alliance with other warriors and possibly an elf or two, all ready to do battle with evil ghosts and sorcerers, take a moment to remember the video game that brought the genre to life: Gauntlet.

True, things like adventure quests and multiplayer action did not start with Gauntlet. Competitive game play existed as far back as Pong, and players had already had a taste of cooperative and competitive play thanks to games like Joust. As for exploring dungeons, or caves or castles, while battling mythological beasts and finding hidden treasure, home computers and game systems had plenty of titles to offer, from the Atari 2600's Adventure to the famous Zork series (one such game allegedly even led directly to the creation of Gauntlet; see below). But it was Gauntlet that combined these elements with visually stunning graphics, atmospheric music and sound effects, and, perhaps most importantly, a snarky narrator who spouted helpful comments like "Elf needs food badly!" and "The wizard is about to die!" The result was a bona-fide success, with machines raking in heaps of quarters as players attempted to conquer as many dungeons as possible.

While Gauntlet's legacy is indisputable, its origins are a source of controversy. In 1983, John Palevich, freshly hired by Atari after graduating from MIT, released a game he had been working on since his college days. This game, inspired by Dungeons and Dragons, invited players to fight their way through dungeons crawling with monsters. Amusingly named Dandy (think "D and D"), the game boasted features like four-player simultaneous play, monsters that required multiple hits to kill, and monster generators to make things even more challenging. Two years and one company split later, Atari Games released Gauntlet to the arcades. Gauntlet looked very familiar to Palevich. By then he was no longer with Atari, and he threatened to sue the company if they did not give him proper credit. Atari Games never did officially attach Palevich's name to Gauntlet, but no lawsuit was ever filed, and reportedly Palevich was happy enough to get his own Gauntlet arcade cabinet.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the split, Atari Corp. also published a game similar to Dandy for its home computers and game systems, called Dark Chambers. Unlike Atari Games, however, Atari Corp. saw fit to give Palevich a credit for the game's design.