The world's very first computer game MOD...? Thread

Hello. This is David H Schroeder, author of several 8-bit home computer games "back in the day," including CRISIS MOUNTAIN (1982) and DINO EGGS (1983).

I'm going to make a claim. You tell me if I'm wrong. I think that my Apple II game DINO EGGS was the world's first computer game to be modded.

By that, I don't mean someone just doing some personal hacking in their garage. I mean creating a mod with a purpose, distributing it, and getting significant numbers of people playing and enjoying it.

DINO SMURF was a hack/parody of DINO EGGS done by Andrew Johnson and Preston Nevins. Here is the webpage that documents the parody trilogy of which DINO SMURF was the first part. In the 32 years since DINO EGGS (and DINO SMURF) came out, I've heard from many fans of the game from all over the world. Probably 10% of them knew the game as DINO SMURF -- and some of them didn't even know that it was a parody game -- they hadn't encountered the original DINO EGGS, only the parody.

So, I think DINO EGGS was the subject of the world's first computer game mod. Does anyone have evidence otherwise?

And, by the way, I'm releasing a labor of love this summer -- a revival and expansion of DINO EGGS called DINO EGGS: REBIRTH. I hope you'll check it out. Thanks!

-- David H Schroeder

Wow that is really interesting!

But I couldn't find any sources on what is the first one, so I'll say it is probably Dino Smurf.