24k #21 — Pyramid of Doom
Today’s 24k installment in our 24 x 24k for 2024 series is not a machine but a software title for a series of machines. “Pyramid of Doom” was the eighth release from early video game company Adventure International. Scott Adams, the co-proprietor (and no relation to the Dilbert guy), was an early purveyor of Adventure-style games for home computers.
The Strong / National Museum of Play includes a copy of ”Pyramid” in their collection — tape and diskette for 24k Atari machines. I’m aware of no Atari machines that shipped with 24k standard, but the Atari 400 and 800 could be upgraded to that amount or (modestly) beyond.
It was tempting to think of the Atari 8-bit machines as just fuller versions of the popular Atari 2600 / VCS but they were much more sophisticated machines that shared little in common beyond the 6502-family CPU shared with so many other period machines. Though the 400 and 800 were marketed for years, and succeeded by a series of semi-compatible machines, only the early machines shipped with less than 24k and likely very few were upgraded to exactly the 24k mark.
Pyramid of Doom was released in 1979 — the same year that the first Atari 8-bit home computers were released.