In 1980, a young Bill Gates successfully convinced IBM to choose Microsoft to provide the operating system for its new PC, despite the fact that Microsoft did not actually have an operating system at that time. To fulfill this commitment, Gates acquired an operating system called 86-DOS from a startup, rebranding it as PC DOS and selling it to IBM for $430,000. As part of the deal, IBM requested that Microsoft also provide a version of BASIC and some simple games. In response, Microsoft developed “DONKEY.BAS,” a game about a car avoiding donkeys on the road, which also happens to be the first PC game ever developed. This anecdote has since become a legendary story in Silicon Valley.

Gates and Neil Konzen developed the game “DONKEY.BAS” late at night in a small room with a prototype IBM PC, despite the challenging conditions. The game was seen as unimpressive by early Apple employee Andy Hertzfeld, who criticized its concept and graphics. It was surprising to discover that the game was co-authored by Bill Gates himself. In 2001, Microsoft created a 3D version of “DONKEY.BAS” called “DONKEY.NET” to showcase the company’s progress. There are versions of the original game available for play, such as a browser-based version hosted by MIT and an iPhone and Apple Watch version developed by an individual. Gates was known to be a fan of Minesweeper, another classic Microsoft game, to the point where he had to delete it from his computer to maintain productivity.

Andy Hertzfeld, a former Apple employee, clearly recalls reacting to the IBM PC for the first time, particularly noting the poor game choices. He pointed out “DONKEY.BAS” as the most disappointing, criticizing both its simplistic concept and poor graphics.

Regarding the surprising discovery that Bill Gates had a hand in creating this game, Hertzfeld noted:

“We noticed that the game’s comments proudly named Bill Gates and Neil Konzen as the authors. I recognized Neil as a talented young programmer from his work on Apple II (and later as the lead on the Mac project for Microsoft), but we couldn’t believe that Microsoft’s cofounder helped make such a terrible game and even admitted to it in the game’s code