Atari Keyboard Stickers

[ballyalley]

On May 6, 2014, I made an AtariAge posting called "Atari 8-Bit Sticker for Sale." I should have placed a link to the posting here, since it provides a very low cost stickers:

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/225142-atari-8-bit-sticker-for-sale/

 

I don't use these stickers for Atari 8-Bit programming. I just use them for ease of emulation use. You'll never have to recall which PC key is the Atari's "Start" key ever again. These stickers are highly recommended!

[gilsaluki]

I see. Emulation. Way above my head. I cannot understand how any of that works. I just use a real Atari.

[ballyalley]

I see. Emulation. Way above my head. I cannot understand how any of that works. I just use a real Atari.

 

I use my real Atari too-- and I still prefer it for gaming in many ways (for one thing, the picture just looks better on a real CRT TV/monitor). I have my Atari 130XE set-up on a desk behind me; I use it primarily with my five AtariMax carts that I've created to hold about 40-50 games of my choice. I have no idea how emulation works either, but I'm glad that it does. It has allowed me to do some really neat, fun stuff over the years. Like use a 320k Atari to see some of the latest homebrew games and make a map of many of the dungeons of "Temple of Apshai Trilogy." The best way to think of Atari 8-Bit emulation isn't as a better, alternate or only way to play games besides real hardware. Think of emulation as just another Atari computer, one that Atari would have released if they could have done it. With an emulator I can use four drives at once, a virtual printer and so many other gadgets-- and I make use of many of them while exploring utilities, applications and programming.

 

There's a really easy way to try emulating the Atari 8-Bit for the first time. Big Five Software wrote an emulator for Miner 2049'er and Bounty Bob Strikes Back! The emulator has no perks; there are absolutely no extras at all. I haven't tried it on recent versions of Windows, but it used to work great on Windows XP. What makes it great is that you download it and it just works. There's no configuration. It only supports the keyboard (the cursor keys are used as the joystick), but you can be off and playing Miner or Bounty Bob in moments... if you have Windows. Check this link:

 

http://www.bigfivesoftware.com/Emulator/emulator.htm

 

Maybe just a taste of emulation is all you'll need to give it a whirl. Or maybe you'll hate it and never use it again. Either way, you'll never know without trying out. My thought is that once you have an emulator configured (which isn't hard nowadays) you may never look back!