Pharaohs Tomb

Year 1990, and George Broussard still has no idea he'll spend decades promising Duke Nukem Forever to the world. Instead, he releases through Micro F/X Software a modest but functional action platformer that today is remembered mainly as proof that before Commander Keen arrived, there were other attempts on DOS at what Apogee would later perfect.

Pharaoh's Tomb is a platformer set in an Egyptian setting — hieroglyphics, tombs, traps, enemies that bore you. You play as an adventurer making your way through a series of levels, collecting items and trying to survive. No ambitious story, no deep lore. Egypt was a popular backdrop back then because it looked exotic and the artists could get by with repeating tiles.

The controls are simple to the point where everything else depends purely on level design. And that is... solid, if you enjoy methodical room exploration with the knowledge that around every corner could be either treasure or death. The game is divided into episodes following the shareware model popular at the time — you get the first one free, the rest you buy. The pace of play is slow, cautious, occasionally frustrating not because it's difficult, but because some traps show no mercy and checkpoints are as generous as a pharaoh during a drought.

What remains of it today? Mainly historical context. Pharaoh's Tomb shows where Broussard and his collaborators stood before Apogee found its true voice. It's a game that works, but invents nothing. Graphics on CGA or EGA are readable, the speaker music hurts, the Sound Blaster version is a step up, though still nothing groundbreaking. It has aged exactly as you'd expect from a shareware title at the turn of the decade — mechanically it endures, atmospherically it feels like a museum piece.

Who will enjoy it today? Mainly those collecting context — those who want to see where Apogee came from and where it was heading. As pure entertainment it's a tough sell, but as a half-hour trip back to 1990, when shareware filled diskettes at computer markets and terms like "episode 1 free" sounded like a revolutionary business model, Pharaoh's Tomb has its place. You can handle it in a browser via DOSBox emulation without installing anything, and that's its greatest advantage today.