Eamon Dragon

Eamon Documentation

In the 45+ year history of Eamon, it has been well-documented in various ways, primarily through the Eamon newsletters, which ran for almost 20 years. Below is a list of documentation resources available to you.

Eamon Manuals

Eamon Manuals - From the very beginning, Eamon had two instruction manuals: one for players and another for dungeon designers. These documents helped users navigate the Eamon world, understand how to play the game, and learn how to program new adventures for others.

Printed Eamon newsletters were the primary method of documenting Eamon by communicating news, announcing new adventures, publishing bug fixes, reviewing Eamons, helping designers create new dungeons, and listing adventures.

13 issues of the Eamon Adventurer’s Log, published by the National Eamon User’s Club.
55 issues of the Eamon Adventurer’s Guild Newsletter, published by the Eamon Adventurer’s Guild.
4 issues of the Eamon Deluxe Newsletter, discussing Eamon Deluxe.

Each newsletter featured a series of regular columns, with some of the most popular being:

Bugs n’ Fixes

Surprisingly, this is the reason the newsletters were created. Here, the publishers would announce bugs found in various adventures and detailed how to fix them. As Eamon slowed down over the years, this column grew less and less frequent, and by the type the Eamon CD was published, Eamon was generally “set” in place. Because of this, most of these fixes are not available on the website as the difficulty of transcribing the columns is not worth the effort.

Designers Den / Dungeon Design Columns

Designers Den columns guided aspiring programmers in designing their own Eamon adventures. While most focused on building adventures for the Apple II, many articles were general and covered important features such as plot development and best practices for creating traps.

Eamon Reviews

Eamon Reviews played a vital role in the early days of Eamon when players relied on mail-order floppy disks for new adventures. With limited resources, people wanted to ensure they were investing in high-quality adventures. Reviews of almost every Eamon adventure are now available online.

Eamon Lore

Eamon Lore was a short series offered a broader discussion of trends and themes found in Eamon adventures, and featured a number of contests.

Eamon Walkthroughs

Walkthroughs became a popular way to revive interest in older, more challenging Eamon adventures. While some adventures included “hints” files on the disk, many did not, making these walkthroughs invaluable for navigating difficult Eamons.

Eamon Maps

Although Eamon Maps were not published in the newsletters, they became a valuable resource as Eamon moved online. Many players found these maps helpful for working through complex adventures.