Seven Cities of Gold (The)

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Comments (15)
dtm-artist - 16/03/2024
Another masterpiece from Ozark Softscape that perfectly follows MULE with a richly rewarding and endlessly enjoyable experience. I am so happy that Seven Cities of Gold is included on the 400 Mini and that a new generation can experience this great game, where hopefully it will spark their imaginations and inspire them to dream and explore.
Punkydudester - 21/12/2014
It looks awesome and I can't wait to try it.
Flyerdommo - 05/10/2013
One of the first home computer games that totally captivated me. The element of surprise combined with a huge unknown playing field, an unheard of number of possible moves and the outstanding New World Editor made this into a singular gaming experience in the early 80s. Plus, it even has an air of historical accuracy about it. One of the few lasting masterpieces. I still play it for fun on my old Atari 8 bitter on occasions. Absolutely brilliant!
Shatter - 09/08/2013
I played this games for months if not years it was always one of my favs - I would def buy it again if they gave it an update to current systems. I remember trying to keep natives happy but that never really seemed to go well for me... much easier to kill them off... Though as others have said it never made the king happy.
Keith - 19/02/2012
After I download the images, how do i play this on my Win XP or Win 7 system. I Found my parents old Atari 400/800 systems, but they no longer have the game?
Keith - 19/02/2012
After I download the images, how do i play this on my Win XP or Win 7 system. I Found my parents old Atari 400/800 systems, but they no longer have the game?
Gwobby - 11/04/2011
Excellent game, my friend used to take great delight in killing off all the natives and the King was never best pleased with us on our return to port!

p.s. pul - why not play it on an atari emulator?!

www.gwobby.webs.com
Pul - 11/04/2011
I loved the game: if it was available for later systems I would certainly play it.
glf - 30/08/2010
my first flopy disc game its a classic, still have manual and some disc of maps
eppy2000 - 06/10/2007
A terrific game, disguised by the fact you might be learning history while you're at it. The opening title sequence is great, too. I was always only average at the game. I would discover a lot of the Americas, bring home the gold, and all I got was fair/poor rating. And the kingdom commended me for being good to the natives. It also didn't help much if the crew died off at established forts and missions!
Enrique Gánem - 01/06/2007
It was very simple (a little too simple for my comfort). If you use the atari800 emulator from sourceforge (linux and windows versions freely available), all you have to do is press F1, go to the Disk Management menu and select the creation of a blank atr file. The load the game, and when you are asked to create a new world, just press F1 again, go to the same menu, and select the empty disk as D2, then switch the disks, press ESC to return to the emulator, and press START (F4 in this emulator, I believe). I am travelling again. Thanks!
Jim Kuchera - 31/12/2006
This was the most beautiful game ever written for the Atari 8-Bit. Bunten presented to the user a wonderful real time challenge in discovering the new world. You knew this was going to be a fine game from the opening screen with fine music. It is nothing like M.U.L.E., the author's other great title, but for a single player game, this one fascinated both me, and my children, back in the early 80's. Again, like M.U.L.E., this game had the most elaborate packaging of any game I've ever seen. It is much more rare than the 'rarity scale' suggests. Like all of these Atari games, yes, they play with an emulator, but it just isn't the same as playing through the original game console. I love this one!!!
Enrique Gánem - 14/12/2006
This is one of my favorite games.

However, I have problems with my emulator. I start the first image, then load the second image. but I cannot make the system go beyond the start of the map generation stage (by the way, I am using the emulator on SOURCEFORGE.NET - I am a Linux user).

I would appreciate your help.

Rod Lauder - 15/08/2005
I "rediscovered" this game after 20 years - I still love it.It was great to read Dan Bunten's comments! I couldn't find my manual, so having it here helped to remind me how to make the historical world (vs only random worlds). Thanks!
Pratik Patel - 08/08/2004
Ha! I'll show this to Jim Rushing (he's one of the managers at EA HQ now). I'm sure he'll be proud that people still remember one of his early efforts!

Information

GenreStrategy - MiscellaneousYear
LanguageMachine LanguagePublisherAriolasoft (Germany)
ControlsJoystickDeveloperOzark Softscape
Players1CountryGermany
Programmer(s)

Bunten, Dan / Rushing, Jim
Watson, Alan

LicenseCommercial
Graphic Artist(s)

Watson, Alan / Glover, Roy

Medium Disk
Sound

Glover, Roy

Rarity
Cover Artist(s)Chang, WarrenSerial
Dumpdownload atari Seven Cities of Gold (The) Download

Additional Comments

Other versions with the same title:


Electronic Arts, Ariolasoft UK.

Many thanks to Bernhard for the scans of this rare game.

Comments by Dani Bunten (found here):

'This was my best selling game. It garnered a SPA Gold Disk and a number of minor awards. It was also my first game that didn't allow for more than one player. It was planned to be multi-player but during during development it lost that aspect, along with colonists and development. To keep it's focus (and allow for a really large world) it ended up just covering the early exploration and conquest of the new world. It was published in '84 by Electronic Arts and it was the game Trip Hawkins (founder of EA) coined the term "edu-tainment" to describe on the press tour introducing it. (Back then the term wasn't the kiss of death it is now).

There are several things I'm proud of about that game. Unlike most strategy-adventure games then (and now as well) which load the player with numerous economic and logistical decisions, it only used four commodities to model the constraints and opportunities facing the Conquistadors (men, food, [trade] goods and gold). I also like the way I was able to reflect the unique interactions between natives and Conquistadors when they shared neither a language nor cultural values in common. I came up with a simple arcade element which also included a number of subtle "secret" opportunities that I was quite gratified to learn that folks found on their own. Finally, the fact that our "New World" was randomly generated (and so large it required disk caching and overlays) made exploring a challenge fraught with peril and surprises. It sufficiently captured the sense of panic that comes from being lost in the wilderness and running out of supplies as well as the joy of rescue (which was something I experienced once backpacking and wanted to make a touchstone of this design).

Our biggest frustration with this product was that it was developed in the days when you had to write a number of different versions since no platform was pre-eminent. There were Atari 800, C64, Apple, Mac and IBM PC versions of the game put out but the only "full" version was on the Atari. On the others we did the best we could with wha t we had.'

Disk

Seven Cities of Gold (The) Atari disk scan Seven Cities of Gold (The) Atari disk scan

Book / Magazine Reviews

 Electronic Games · October, 1984


Sail the unknown seas in the hope of fame and fortune in a solitaire action-strategy game brilliantly crafted by the same design team that produced the 1984 Arcade Award winner M.U.L.E. Ozark is obviously a unit on the rise, because the fluid play-action, exceptional animated graphics and painstaking attention to detail and nuance of Seven Cities are significantly improved over the group's... [more]


 Computer Games · November, 1984


The New World is waiting to be discovered, and it's all yours to explore, plunder, discover lost cities, kill and return to Spain to the acclaim of your countrymen. Of course, it's not all fun. You can get completely lost, your men can panic or mutiny, and you can starve to death. Nobody ever said discovering America was going to be easy.

Before you set sail, stop off at the outfitters... [more]


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