Hello!
I keep seeing your name pop up on various projects like Kingdom Crystal 2017 but I'm still waiting for a Bog Brother's reunion :-p
Hello!
I'm seeing CodenameV later today, we still discuss ideas but never seem to pin the time down...
Thomas QuillinEinar Saukas wrote: ↑Fri Dec 07, 2018 11:29 pm Nice story
Please tell us your full name, so we can add missing author information in the Mazeball entry at https://spectrumcomputing.co.uk/index.p ... 6&id=15606
My kind of guy!Turtle_Quality wrote: ↑Fri Dec 07, 2018 11:03 pm They had about 130 bytes spare when my code was about 200, and I spent a couple of weeks reducing the code when I should have been doing homework . . .
Its always interesting to have people that were in the industry in the 80s, and also interesting to hear the stories behind them!Turtle_Quality wrote: ↑Fri Dec 07, 2018 11:03 pm Hi,
I'm Thomas. I had been doing some simple games programming as a 15 year old on friends' ZX81s and Acorn Atoms (both 1k), and was hoping to get my own computer -maybe a VIC20. Then at a computer show in April 1982 , at a crowded Sinclair stand, Clive announced the ZX Spectrum. As the flashbulbs popped and reporters asked questions about it, a spotty 15 year old shouted "What's the keyboard like ?" Clive stretches over the tables around the stand, I stretch through the crowd, to prod those rubbery keys. Late that night I persuaded my dad to loan me a massive £175 and I phoned in an order on the Sinclair hotline.
I don't remember how long it took to arrive, 6 or 8 weeks maybe, but I still got it before many of the major software houses had one. I remember being at a show in August asking ... maybe it was Quicksilver... if they would bring out Centipede because I was struggling to write my own version in basic, but they just wanted to buy my precious Spectrum from me - no way !
I got the PSS compiler by hacking it out of Light Cycles, and liked writing noisy games with nested for next loops and out commands. Sent some in for a PSS Compiler competition including a nice lunar lander (with a sprite routine written in assembly with the Spectrum manual and poke commands) and a crappy but extremely noisy game called Mazeball, that got picked up by PSS related company Wildest Dreams. You can still find Mazeball in the archives but sadly my lunar lander is lost to time. Earlier this year I tracked down my first cassette copy of Mazeball
I'd also written a short compress / decompress routine in assembly, and when I went to buy a Multiface from Romantic Robot in Kilburn, I asked if they compressed data before they dumped it all to tape. Apparently they hadn't thought of that. I offered my code for a free Multiface. They had about 130 bytes spare when my code was about 200, and I spent a couple of weeks reducing the code when I should have been doing homework, and got my free Multiface worth £40. Which went on to sell countless numbers on Spectrum then Amstrad, but I had geek cred.
So now I'm trying to push the grey cells, try to recreate that sprite code, and squeeze out an excessively noisy puzzle game - I was so taken with Sega Columns in 1990 I went home and wrote one on my Sam Coupe. Then maybe back to lunar lander.
Thanks Ivan ZXIvanzx wrote: ↑Sat Dec 08, 2018 9:02 pm
Its always interesting to have people that were in the industry in the 80s, and also interesting to hear the stories behind them!
By the way, have you thought about remaking Mazeball in the Spectrum? There is now a compo that may interest you !
http://zx-dev-mia-remakes.proboards.com/
Welcome here too, Oblo! Looking forward to seeing your new game!oblo wrote: ↑Mon Dec 10, 2018 9:35 pm Greetings from Spain!
Long-time ZX Spectrum user, I started borrowing/using 48ks from friends/school and learning from programming books that were on the public library, until I could afford a +2A. Since then, I like to "mess" with anything about our speccys (gaming, harware and software) but after all this time I still considered myself a "seasoned amateur", mainly because I barely can read assembler
I discovered yesterday this forum so I decide to register to share what I can and to ask what I (still) don't know. Anyway, here are a few links with some of the games I developed until now:
O-trix
O-cman
2x1 Depthcharge/Escape
O-Puzz Attack!
... and in a few days I hope to release a new one
Later!
Hey, [mention]oblo[/mention]! Fancy seeing you here. Welcome!
Of course, no problem at all and thanks for the link.PeterJ wrote: ↑Tue Dec 11, 2018 7:19 pm Welcome @@oblo
Just to let you know that the first two games are available on the main Spectrum Computing website without the need to go elsewhere:
https://spectrumcomputing.co.uk/index.p ... l_id=15743
I'm sure @R-Tape will add the other two, if that is OK with you?
Have you made a Speccy game before? If not, make 2019 the year!