Attention Tolkien fans: User Icky has ported the classic adventure game The Hobbit by Melbourne House to the ST.
Icky describes the port as an experiment to see how a 44-year-old game can be faithfully ported to the ST using AI and even expanded. This is not an emulation, but a reimplementation of the engine. Decisions regarding the architecture and the implementation of the tasks were made by Icky.
The project was carried out in two phases: first, the engine with the simple graphics of the original Spectrum version, followed by the enhanced ST mode with improved visuals. The latter were not hand-pixelated: an AI (Claude) generated prompts for a second AI (OpenAI) based on the room descriptions.
The original was released in 1982 for the ZX Spectrum and was ported in subsequent years to many 8-bit computers (Oric, C64, Apple II, MSX) and finally to the Macintosh in 1987. Developer Beam Software subsequently programmed three adventure games that follow the plot of The Lord of the Rings. None of the games were released for an Atari system. In 1988, however, the Atari ST finally made its way to Middle-earth with War in Middle Earth.
