''Alto Trek'' is a

computer game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device to gener ...

, developed by

Gene Ball Gene Ball is a computer science researcher and computer programmer. Ball obtained a bachelor's degree from the University of Oklahoma, and attended graduate school at the University of Rochester, completing a master's degree and finishing his doct ...

and

Rick Rashid Richard Farris Rashid is the founder of Microsoft Research, which he created in 1991. Between 1991 and 2013, as its chief research officer and director, he oversaw the worldwide operations for Microsoft Research which grew to encompass more than ...

for the Xerox Alto while they were graduate students at the University of Rochester during the late 1970s. It is one of the first networked

multiplayer game A game is a structured form of play (activity), play, usually undertaken for enjoyment, entertainment or fun, and sometimes used as an educational tool. Many games are also considered to be work (such as professional players of spectator s ...

Gameplay

''Alto Trek'' is a multiplayer game where each player uses their own Alto workstation to control a starship. The objective of the game is to destroy the enemy without being destroyed. A player can choose between being a

Klingon The Klingons ( ; Klingon: ''tlhIngan'' ) are a fictional species in the science fiction franchise ''Star Trek''. Developed by screenwriter Gene L. Coon in 1967 for the original ''Star Trek'' (''TOS'') series, Klingons were swarthy humanoids c ...

, Romulan, or

Terran Terran or Terrans may also refer to: Fictional entities Literature * Terran Federation (''Starship Troopers'') * Terran Trade Authority universe of Stewart Cowley * Terran Empire in the books of Poul Anderson Television * Terran Federa ...

. The game can be played by one player, but there will be no enemy to destroy. There is no central server that maintains the game state. Each Alto " multicasts" its game information on the shared Ethernet that all players must be on. The "multicast" address on which to rendezvous is a function of the number of stellar systems in the game.

Development

The manual for version 2.1 is dated August 1979 and authored by Allen Wells, Bob Baldwin, and Steve Quarterman. It confirms that the game was authored primarily by Ball. Around 1997, while a vice president at Microsoft, Rashid began to re-implement the game as a way to teach himself to use the

DirectX Microsoft DirectX is a collection of application programming interfaces (APIs) for handling tasks related to multimedia, especially game programming and video, on Microsoft platforms. Originally, the names of these APIs all began with "Direct", ...

programming API. This resulted in the development of ''

Microsoft Allegiance ''Allegiance'' is a multiplayer online game initially developed by Microsoft Research. It is notable for providing a mix of real-time strategy and player piloted space combat gameplay. Although the game was well received upon release, its sale ...

''.

References

{{reflist

External links

Internet Archive - ''Alto Trek'' 2.1 manual
1978 video games Video games based on Star Trek Xerox Alto games Video games developed in the United States