No, I don’t mean the old "Gold Box Games", though now that you mention it, I miss those too. I am talking about the old 1st Edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons single player modules. These modules were designed in such a way as to only need 1 person in attendance; that person was the Dungeon Master and the only adventurer.
I only have module MV1, the first in the series, titled "Midnight on Dagger Alley"
To avoid giving things away too early, or making the game too easy by allowing the player to see the entire map at once, the map had squiggly red lines all over it and came with a red lens to filter them out (similar to how Transformers each cam with a red filter so that their statistics could be read). This was not fool-proof of course, but at least it made it difficult to accidentally see what was in the adjacent room out of the corner of your eye.
Each pre-generated character had a different mission and different sets of skills. While the rooms weren’t random, this still allowed for a lot of replayability. If you managed to complete the first character’s mission, you probably had ran into a lot of the items that the other two characters needed to complete their missions, but would not have remembered where they were as they were not important at the time. Also, the maps were so large, that it would be impossible to memorize each room and it’s contents unless you were a savant. In which case you probably weren’t playing AD&D in the first place.
This particular module has enough of the information printed in it that even those without the first edition core rule books should probably be able to play. I can attest to this as I started playing after 2nd edition had already been released, and I didn’t actually have to look anything up in order to play. However, it does rely on the player knowing how to use THAC0 (not calculate it, just what to do with it) and the saving throws might throw off players who have no experience with AD&D. For those with experience with D&D’s 3rd or 4th edition, the saving throw could be substituted for one of the newer ones (death magic for reflex for instance) with little difficulty.
I am not sure why the concept of the single player role-playing game did not catch on more, and why there are none on the market – at least to my knowledge – at present time. This is a great way to play when all of your friends are busy. It is also a great way to introduce new players to the game as an experienced player can DM this module for a newer player to explain the rules. If you ever see this module – or another single player module for that matter – in the bargain bin of your local gaming store, I would highly recommend buying it before someone else does.
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