BassGuitari Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 While doing some digging on the similarities and differences between Level II BASIC and Model II BASIC (I'm bringing my Tandy 2 to Midwest Gaming Classic and thought it would be cool to convert a Model I game to the Model II), I came upon this .pdf of the summer '81 Adventure International catalog, which features the Scott Adams Adventure games available for Apple, TRS-80 Model I/III, Atari 400/800 and--listed almost as an afterthought, but sure enough--the TRS-80 Model II. Adventures #1-9 on one disk (8-inch, of course!) for $99.Later on, there's even a series of "interactive fiction" games available for, among other things, the Model II.So this confirms it: there were in fact commercially released games available for our favorite business system. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 Ohh how cool! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassGuitari Posted April 6, 2016 Author Share Posted April 6, 2016 Ohh how cool! Indeed! Makes me want to check out some Infocom catalogs and see if any of their games were released specifically for the Model II. I know Infocom supported CP/M, which of course is available on the Model II, but disk format can present problems. What's not cool is that Model II BASIC doesn't have PEEK or POKE commands (strange but true), which really throws a wrench in the whole porting-Model I-BASIC-games thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 The Model II was a sexy beast. I had a chance to pick one up a long time ago for next to nothing, but it's size to usefulness ratio made it a pass. If I ever got one, you can be sure the 8" gyroscope would come out and be replaced with a Lotharek HxC Rev. F. I would probably investigate replacing the CRT with and LED or LCD display. It's nice to see that there are still some games still floating around out there for it. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JamesD Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 Indeed! Makes me want to check out some Infocom catalogs and see if any of their games were released specifically for the Model II. I know Infocom supported CP/M, which of course is available on the Model II, but disk format can present problems. What's not cool is that Model II BASIC doesn't have PEEK or POKE commands (strange but true), which really throws a wrench in the whole porting-Model I-BASIC-games thing. Most of the POKEs were for the screen or assembly language subroutines. Those wouldn't be the same on the Model II anyway. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 Yeh that motor is constantly spinning and makes a racket!! Don't I ever know!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassGuitari Posted April 6, 2016 Author Share Posted April 6, 2016 (edited) Most of the POKEs were for the screen or assembly language subroutines. Those wouldn't be the same on the Model II anyway. Boooo. Guess that explains why nobody ever converted any Model I games to the II. Yeh that motor is constantly spinning and makes a racket!! Don't I ever know!! Yeah, the TRS-80 Model II must have been Steve Jobs' idea of hell. It definitely isn't quiet. That was actually one thing that struck me about it when I got my Tandy 2, just how loud the fan and everything was. Definitely an industrial quality about it. I don't think I ever even tried to hook up that big ole' bastard of a disk expansion I have for it. The combined cacophony of the Tandy 2 and the noise I can only imagine the disk expansion creates would be unbelievable. Edited April 6, 2016 by BassGuitari Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JamesD Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 (edited) Boooo. Guess that explains why nobody every converted any Model I games to the II. ... The Model I/III use a 64 column text screen and the Model II is 80 columns. The I/III support graphics characters and II supports more text characters. You would basically have to rewrite the games. Don't think of the Model II as a TRS-80. It's a CP/M business machine. It doesn't look like an Altair, but that's sort of what it is in a corporate friendly package. Edited April 6, 2016 by JamesD 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted April 6, 2016 Share Posted April 6, 2016 I'd say like those Northstar CP/M machines. A lot of the early computers' personalities were defined by their physical layout and boisterous storage options. Yeh? 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassGuitari Posted April 6, 2016 Author Share Posted April 6, 2016 I only would have attempted something very simple and purely text-based, since programming is mostly a pretty bewildering area for me. Like a little something out of one of the Dave Ahl books. I'm sure there's a rudimentary blackjack game I could whip up.My thought was that it might be relatively simple to adapt a TRS-80 version of such code to the Model II since their BASICs are mostly very similar, give or take a few commands (Model II has no cassette commands or peek/poke but adds a couple others that Level II doesn't have). I guess I can just play around with it and see what happens. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jhd Posted April 7, 2016 Share Posted April 7, 2016 If memory serves, there was a listing for a flight simulator in Model II BASIC published in Byte magazine, probably in the early 1980s. I saw this issue at my local library -- not online -- so I have no idea if it has been scanned. A complete run of the official Radio Shack computer magazine, TRS-80 Microcomputer News, is available online. Most of the Model II articles were about application software, but there may have been some game listings too. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pski Posted April 8, 2016 Share Posted April 8, 2016 We've got a whole bunch of Model II games at the model2archive, including most of the Scott Adams adventures. https://github.com/pski/model2archive/tree/master/Software/Games 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted April 8, 2016 Share Posted April 8, 2016 The wife is gonna love this! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassGuitari Posted April 8, 2016 Author Share Posted April 8, 2016 Now to find a way to get them onto a Model II formatted 8" disk... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted April 8, 2016 Share Posted April 8, 2016 How did they get them into a disk image? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pski Posted April 9, 2016 Share Posted April 9, 2016 (edited) All you need to create the 8"disk is an old DOS PC, ImageDisk, an FDADAP, an 8" floppy drive and some 8" disks. http://www.classiccmp.org/dunfield/img/index.htm http://www.dbit.com/fdadap.html Or, you can just hook up an HxC floppy emulator to your Model II and use the images directly from there. For the HxC you just need a 50 pin to 34 pin adapter. http://lotharek.pl/product.php?pid=18 https://github.com/NF6X/fd50to34 Edited April 9, 2016 by pski 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassGuitari Posted May 16, 2017 Author Share Posted May 16, 2017 (edited) Necrobump for another Model II game "sighting," this one in the July 20, 1981 issue of InfoWorld.Seems Avalon Hill's "Empire of The Overmind" was available for Apple II, Atari 800, and TRS-80 Model II! EDIT: And apparently also "Lords of Karma." This site claims the Model II versions are included on the same cassette tape as all the other versions, but that doesn't make sense since the Model II obviously doesn't have a cassette interface, or even cassette commands in BASIC or DOS. It also doesn't list the Scott Adams Adventure games as being available for the Model II (which they were, as established earlier), so this information may be specious. Edited May 16, 2017 by BassGuitari 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Loguidice Posted May 16, 2017 Share Posted May 16, 2017 I have the boxed blue and red versions of Empire of the Over-Mind, and both are just for "TRS-80 Level II, Apple II, Atari 8-bit". The boxed Lords of Karma I have lists "TRS-80 I/III, Apple II, Atari 8-bit". I have a pretty complete boxed vintage Avalon Hill collection and the only systems they supported (in my collection) were: C-64, Heath/Zenith Z-90 H/Z-100, PET, TRS-80 Level II (and TRS-80 I/III), Apple II, Atari 8-bit, CoCo/TDP-S100, TI-99/4a, VIC-20, Macintosh, Atari ST, and PC DOS. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Phillips Posted May 16, 2017 Share Posted May 16, 2017 The TRS-80 Model I came with two different configurations: Level I BASIC and Level II BASIC. Level I was a 4K "tiny" BASIC and used a different tape format that Level II which was a full Microsoft Basic. The Model III also had a Level I version but that was rare. Nonetheless it was important to state whether a game required Level I or Level II, even for machine language games because of the different tape format (and loading instructions). I suspect the blurb writer confused Level II and Model II which is pretty understandable. Not quite up to the level of "Don't do what Donny Don't does" but ambiguous enough. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassGuitari Posted May 16, 2017 Author Share Posted May 16, 2017 Most publications seem to have been generally clear on the distinction between "Level II" and "Model II."And here I was, getting all excited about "new" games for the Model II. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Loguidice Posted May 16, 2017 Share Posted May 16, 2017 I don't consider the lack of games all that surprising. It was an expensive business-class system that I doubt got into the hands of very many users who would necessarily be into games. It's probably most telling that Infocom didn't support it, as they supported nearly everything with sufficient memory and disk storage, even some quite obscure platforms. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassGuitari Posted May 16, 2017 Author Share Posted May 16, 2017 I don't consider the lack of games all that surprising. It was an expensive business-class system that I doubt got into the hands of very many users who would necessarily be into games. That's exactly the point, though. "Games for the Model II? What?!" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted June 6, 2018 Share Posted June 6, 2018 I wonder how good that Lunar Lander game is? ..in the github package.. It will be several days before I can get around to trying it out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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