It may look primitive now, but way back when, Lode Runner was an advanced action game. Though the game started out as a late-night university side project, the commercial version of Lode Runner was developed on an Apple II+ and was originally named Miner. A leaked prototype version of Miner reveals significantly cruder motion and graphics than what was produced after Doug E. Smith signed a contact with Broderbund to release the game commercially. The most recent console release of Lode Runner is Lode Runner 3-D, which was released on the Nintendo 64 in 1999. Clearly, Lode Runner's level-building holds up even today.

For those of you too young to remember 1983, games were a lot simpler back then. With only a few exceptions, most computer games were devoid of even the simplest scrolling, giving you one screen to play with. This led to games having multiple levels. Over time, we'd see games with numbers of levels that reached into the hundreds. But even a game with 150 levels can be mastered. What happens then? Douglas E. Smith's Lode Runner left that up to you.

Lode Runner's objective was simple: You, as a little white stick figure, had to get all the gold and get to the exit. Standing in your way was an army of infinitely respawning robots (called "mad monks" in later updates of the game) and layers upon layers of brick. The key to Lode Runner's gameplay was not only the ability to expertly navigate the paths, ladders, and hand-over-hand rungs of the levels, but also the ability to think fast with your laser shovel. Digging holes was your main form of offense in Lode Runner, as you could trap the enemies in the pits you dug, hoping that the pits automatically filled in before the robots could struggle out to safety and continue the chase.

Many of the game's puzzles forced you to do some very precise digging as well. You'd often find yourself digging several layers deep to get at the last remaining piece of gold. Since the holes filled in automatically, digging eventually becomes a race against time, as you'd have to dig your way into and out of danger before the holes filled in, burying you alive.

The 150 levels that came with Lode Runner were fine on their own, but what really set Lode Runner apart from the pack back then was its full-featured level editor. You could create levels just as devious--if not more so--than the ones that shipped with the game, and the game was very good about letting you save those levels to a floppy disk. Just like the real game, a user-created level disk could hold up to 150 levels, leading players to devote months to creating their own personal masterpiece.

After its original release on the Apple II, Lode Runner spread quickly to many other platforms, including the Commodore 64, the Atari 400/800/1200XL family of home computers, and other popular home computers of the day. It eventually went on to spawn an arcade release and a wide collection of sequels and spin-offs that took the series in many different directions, including competitive multiplayer and online play. While those may be fine and good, the original game is, without a doubt, one of the greatest games of all time.

I was 8 years old when Lode Runner was released in 1983, but it didn't enter my life until the following summer. Lode Runner is, without a doubt, the first truly amazing game I came into contact with. It was also one of the first games to really show off the power of playing computer games. Sure, Donkey Kong may have looked better at the arcade, but it only had four levels! Lode Runner started with 150, and before too long, I had designed 300 more. To sum it all up, I spent the summer of 1984 locked away in my bedroom, designing Lode Runner levels on my Atari 800 and listening to Van Halen at full volume. My love of Van Halen soon subsided, but my love of games never has.