Computing History of Mazes
From Maze
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| − | In addition to ''Pac-Man'', ''Adventure'', and ''Zork'', other mazes abound ([[http://weizenbaum.mit.edu/mediawiki/index.php/Talk:Maze_walking%2C_solvability%2C_generate-and-test]]) in the early days of video arcades and home computers, but these are the most prominent examples. It would simply be impossible to use the word "maze" within the semiotic domain of computers and not create some association with these games. Therefore, there's some cultural capital at work whenever 10 Print's design was called a maze in the early eighties. It is reasonable to conclude that the various sources from the early eighties that called the 10 Print design a "maze" were explicitly (though perhaps not consciously) tapping into a cultural history of mazes that home programmers and game players would be aware of. | + | In addition to ''Pac-Man'', ''Adventure'', and ''Zork'', other mazes abound [http://weizenbaum.mit.edu/mediawiki/index.php/Talk:Maze_walking%2C_solvability%2C_generate-and-test] in the early days of video arcades and home computers, but these are the most prominent examples. It would simply be impossible to use the word "maze" within the semiotic domain of computers and not create some association with these games. Therefore, there's some cultural capital at work whenever 10 Print's design was called a maze in the early eighties. It is reasonable to conclude that the various sources from the early eighties that called the 10 Print design a "maze" were explicitly (though perhaps not consciously) tapping into a cultural history of mazes that home programmers and game players would be aware of. |
Finally, though there’s no evidence to prove this, one wonders whether the program would have the program have had the same viral-like persistence if its description had made no mention of mazes? | Finally, though there’s no evidence to prove this, one wonders whether the program would have the program have had the same viral-like persistence if its description had made no mention of mazes? | ||
