NetHack History file for release 3.4

Behold, mortal, the origins of NetHack...

Jay Fenlason wrote the original Hack with help from Kenny Woodland,
Mike Thome, and Jon Payne.

Andries Brouwer did a major re-write, transforming Hack into a very different
game, and published (at least) three versions (1.0.1, 1.0.2, and 1.0.3) for
UNIX(tm) machines to the Usenet.

Don G. Kneller ported Hack 1.0.3 to Microsoft(tm) C and MS-DOS(tm), producing
PC HACK 1.01e, added support for DEC Rainbow graphics in version 1.03g, and
went on to produce at least four more versions (3.0, 3.2, 3.51, and 3.6).

R. Black ported PC HACK 3.51 to Lattice(tm) C and the Atari 520/1040ST,
producing ST Hack 1.03.

Mike Stephenson merged these various versions back together, incorporating
many of the added features, and produced NetHack version 1.4.  He then
coordinated a cast of thousands in enhancing and debugging NetHack 1.4 and
released NetHack versions 2.2 and 2.3.
 
Later, Mike coordinated a major rewrite of the game, heading a team which
included Ken Arromdee, Jean-Christophe Collet, Steve Creps, Eric Hendrickson,
Izchak Miller, Eric S. Raymond, John Rupley, Mike Threepoint, and Janet Walz,
to produce NetHack 3.0c.  The same group subsequently released ten patch-
level revisions and updates of 3.0.

NetHack 3.0 was ported to the Atari by Eric R. Smith, to OS/2 by Timo
Hakulinen, and to VMS by David Gentzel.  The three of them and Kevin Darcy
later joined the main development team to produce subsequent revisions of
3.0.

Olaf Seibert ported NetHack 2.3 and 3.0 to the Amiga.  Norm Meluch, Stephen
Spackman and Pierre Martineau designed overlay code for PC NetHack 3.0.
Johnny Lee ported NetHack 3.0 to the Macintosh.  Along with various other
Dungeoneers, they continued to enhance the PC, Macintosh, and Amiga ports
through the later revisions of 3.0.
 
Headed by Mike Stephenson and coordinated by Izchak Miller and Janet Walz,
the development team which now included Ken Arromdee, David Cohrs,
Jean-Christophe Collet, Kevin Darcy, Matt Day, Timo Hakulinen, Steve Linhart,
Dean Luick, Pat Rankin, Eric Raymond, and Eric Smith undertook a radical
revision of 3.0.  They re-structured the game's design, and re-wrote major
parts of the code.  They added multiple dungeons, a new display, special
individual character quests, a new endgame and many other new features, and
produced NetHack 3.1.

Ken Lorber, Gregg Wonderly and Greg Olson, with help from Richard Addison,
Mike Passaretti, and Olaf Seibert, developed NetHack 3.1 for the Amiga.

Norm Meluch and Kevin Smolkowski, with help from Carl Schelin, Stephen
Spackman, Steve VanDevender, and Paul Winner, ported NetHack 3.1 to the PC.

Jon W{tte and Hao-yang Wang, with help from Ross Brown, Mike Engber, David
Hairston, Michael Hamel, Jonathan Handler, Johnny Lee, Tim Lennan, Rob Menke,
and Andy Swanson developed NetHack 3.1 for the Macintosh, porting it for
MPW.  Building on their development, Barton House added a Think C port.  

Timo Hakulinen ported NetHack 3.1 to OS/2.  Eric Smith ported NetHack 3.1
to the Atari.  Pat Rankin, with help from Joshua Delahunty, is responsible
for the VMS version of NetHack 3.1.  Michael Allison ported NetHack 3.1 to
Windows NT.

Dean Luick, with help from David Cohrs, developed NetHack 3.1 for X11.
Warwick Allison wrote a tiled version of NetHack for the Atari;
he later contributed the tiles to the DevTeam and tile support was
then added to other platforms.

The 3.2 development team, comprised of Michael Allison, Ken Arromdee, David
Cohrs, Jessie Collet, Steve Creps, Kevin Darcy, Timo Hakulinen, Steve
Linhart, Dean Luick, Pat Rankin, Eric Smith, Mike Stephenson, Janet Walz, and
Paul Winner, released version 3.2 in April of 1996.

Version 3.2 marked the tenth anniversary of the formation of the development
team.  In a testament to their dedication to the game, all thirteen members
of the original development team remained on the team at the start of work
on that release.  During the interval between the release of 3.1.3 and 3.2,
one of the founding members of the development team, Dr. Izchak Miller,
passed away.  That release of the game was dedicated to him by the
development and porting teams.

Version 3.2 proved to be more stable than previous versions.  Many bugs
were fixed, abuses eliminated, and game features tuned for better game
play.

During the lifespan of NetHack 3.1 and 3.2, several enthusiasts of the game
added their own modifications to the game and made these "variants" publicly
available:

Tom Proudfoot and Yuval Oren created NetHack++, which was quickly renamed
NetHack--.  Working independently, Stephen White wrote NetHack Plus.
Tom Proudfoot later merged NetHack Plus and his own NetHack-- to produce
SLASH.  Larry Stewart-Zerba and Warwick Allison improved the spellcasting
system with the Wizard Patch.  Warwick Allison also ported NetHack to use
the Qt interface.

Warren Cheung combined SLASH with the Wizard Patch to produce Slash'em, and
with the help of Kevin Hugo, added more features.  Kevin later joined the
DevTeam and incorporated the best of these ideas in NetHack 3.3.

The final update to 3.2 was the bug fix release 3.2.3, which was released
simultaneously with 3.3.0 in December 1999 just in time for the Year 2000.

The 3.3 development team, consisting of Michael Allison, Ken Arromdee, 
David Cohrs, Jessie Collet, Steve Creps, Kevin Darcy, Timo Hakulinen, 
Kevin Hugo, Steve Linhart, Ken Lorber, Dean Luick, Pat Rankin, Eric Smith, 
Mike Stephenson, Janet Walz, and Paul Winner, released 3.3.0 in 
December 1999 and 3.3.1 in August of 2000.

Version 3.3 offered many firsts. It was the first version to separate race 
and profession. The Elf class was removed in preference to an elf race, 
and the races of dwarves, gnomes, and orcs made their first appearance in 
the game alongside the familiar human race.  Monk and Ranger roles joined 
Archeologists, Barbarians, Cavemen, Healers, Knights, Priests, Rogues, 
Samurai, Tourists, Valkyries and of course, Wizards.  It was also the first
version to allow you to ride a steed, and was the first version to have a
publicly available web-site listing all the bugs that had been discovered.
Despite that constantly growing bug list, 3.3 proved stable enough to last
for more than a year and a half.


The 3.4 development team initially consisted of Michael Allison, Ken Arromdee,
David Cohrs, Jessie Collet, Kevin Hugo, Ken Lorber, Dean Luick, Pat Rankin,
Mike Stephenson, Janet Walz, and Paul Winner, with Warwick Allison joining
just before the release of NetHack 3.4.0 in March 2002.

As with version 3.3, various people contributed to the game as a whole as
well as supporting ports on the different platforms that NetHack runs on:

Pat Rankin maintained 3.4 for VMS.

Michael Allison maintained NetHack 3.4 for the MS-DOS platform.  
Paul Winner and Yitzhak Sapir provided encouragement.

Dean Luick, Mark Modrall, and Kevin Hugo maintained and enhanced the
Macintosh port of 3.4.

Michael Allison, David Cohrs, Alex Kompel, Dion Nicolaas, and Yitzhak Sapir 
maintained and enhanced 3.4 for the Microsoft Windows platform. Alex Kompel 
contributed a new graphical interface for the Windows port. Alex Kompel also
contributed a Windows CE port for 3.4.1.

Ron Van Iwaarden maintained 3.4 for OS/2.

Janne Salmijarvi and Teemu Suikki maintained and enhanced the 
Amiga port of 3.4 after Janne Salmijarvi resurrected it for 3.3.1.

Christian `Marvin' Bressler maintained 3.4 for the Atari after he
resurrected it for 3.3.1.

There is a NetHack web site maintained by Ken Lorber at http://www.nethack.org/.

			   - - - - - - - - - -

From time to time, some depraved individual out there in netland sends a
particularly intriguing modification to help out with the game.  The Gods of
the Dungeon sometimes make note of the names of the worst of these miscreants
in this, the list of Dungeoneers:

    Adam Aronow               Irina Rempt-Drijfhout     Mike Gallop
    Alex Kompel               Izchak Miller             Mike Passaretti
    Andreas Dorn              J. Ali Harlow             Mike Stephenson
    Andy Church               Janet Walz                Norm Meluch
    Andy Swanson              Janne Salmijarvi          Olaf Seibert
    Ari Huttunen              Jean-Christophe Collet    Pasi Kallinen
    Barton House              Jochen Erwied             Pat Rankin
    Benson I. Margulies       John Kallen               Paul Winner
    Bill Dyer                 John Rupley               Pierre Martineau
    Boudewijn Waijers         John S. Bien              Ralf Brown
    Bruce Cox                 Johnny Lee                Richard Addison
    Bruce Holloway            Jon W{tte                 Richard Beigel
    Bruce Mewborne            Jonathan Handler          Richard P. Hughey
    Carl Schelin              Joshua Delahunty          Rob Menke
    Chris Russo               Keizo Yamamoto            Robin Johnson
    David Cohrs               Ken Arnold                Roderick Schertler
    David Damerell            Ken Arromdee              Roland McGrath
    David Gentzel             Ken Lorber                Ron Van Iwaarden
    David Hairston            Ken Washikita             Ronnen Miller
    Dean Luick                Kevin Darcy               Ross Brown
    Del Lamb                  Kevin Hugo                Sascha Wostmann
    Deron Meranda             Kevin Sitze               Scott Bigham
    Dion Nicolaas             Kevin Smolkowski          Scott R. Turner
    Dylan O'Donnell           Kevin Sweet               Stephen Spackman
    Eric Backus               Lars Huttar               Stephen White
    Eric Hendrickson          Malcolm Ryan              Steve Creps
    Eric R. Smith             Mark Gooderum             Steve Linhart
    Eric S. Raymond           Mark Modrall              Steve VanDevender
    Erik Andersen             Marvin Bressler           Teemu Suikki
    Frederick Roeber          Matthew Day               Tim Lennan
    Gil Neiger                Merlyn LeRoy              Timo Hakulinen
    Greg Laskin               Michael Allison           Tom Almy
    Greg Olson                Michael Feir              Tom West
    Gregg Wonderly            Michael Hamel             Warren Cheung
    Hao-yang Wang             Michael Sokolov           Warwick Allison
    Helge Hafting             Mike Engber               Yitzhak Sapir

