Ancient Domains of Mystery

"GET YOUR JUNK OFF MY ALTAR!"
 * – one possible result of dropping items on an altar in ADOM

Much has been said about ADOM, the roguelike game.

Roguebasin classifies both ADOM and NetHack as Hacklikes, as opposed to Angband and similar games which are Band. So a contrast of ADOM and NetHack is fundamentally different from a contrast of NetHack and Angband.

ADOM and NetHack both have persistent levels. They both have a BUC system (but in Angband, curses as such apply only to worn items). They both have gods and alignments (but Angband does not). You pray when in trouble. Both ADOM and NetHack shops are rooms with items on the floor (but Angband shops are menus).

But ADOM is much larger and more difficult than NetHack, while NetHack has some nice features that ADOM lacks. Eva Myer's Nethack vs ADOM page has two sections, each listing why one game is better than the other. Nethack vs. ADOM@Everything2.com has three (and potentially more) attempts at contrasting the two games.

Attempting to play ADOM?
NetHack players attempting to install ADOM on their computer (even if they already run Angband) might not expect certain problems that can happen.

ADOM's source code is not public. You cannot compile ADOM for whatever Unix that you are running or port it to whatever operating system you have. If you go to Thomas Biskup's official site, http://www.adom.de, but cannot find a binary for your platform, then you could still rig a DOS emulator to play the DOS version of ADOM. You could investigate DOSbox, or you could even try to install FreeDOS in QEMU.

ADOM is "postcodeware", so if you play it enough then you must also tackle the Postcard Quest of sending a postcard to the game's author, Thomas Biskup in Germany.