Devin

You have IE confused with AOL. But, seriously, as I tell students: "Some things don't exist: Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, Microsoft Security".

You should definitely use Firefox or Chrome - never touch IE. IE is the browser that gave birth to the spyware industry (that and ActiveX). I don't trust the application, period, given it *still* will download ActiveX. Firefox is an excellent choice since there are some exceptional plugins. NoScript allows you to control what sites can use scripting - and makes the Internet much safer. There is also a plugin called DownloadHelper that can rip videos from YouTube.

Besides what everyone else has added, don't forgot these: Four-Play - The artwork is top notch and the music is excellent Go Fish - The water effect is truly amazing. The music is also well done. Colony 7 - When you can't tell if it is an Atari or Commodore 64 screenshot, it is masterfully well done

Very, very impressive!

Fair enough. Needless to say, we all can agree that the Aquarius is - without a doubt - poor in the graphics department.... and the programming.... and the keyboard layout.... and...

Here's a picture of IBM PC Extended ASCII. It has much better lines - and scientific symbols. But, obviously, wasn't designed to be a console.

Extended-ASCII art. It is the same as the old, old DOS games that made use of the smiley face, lines segments, etc.... to get "sprites". So, the Aquarius has basically the same graphics and sound functionality as the 1981 CGA PC in text mode (which gave 16 color characters). the only difference is the Aquarius extended-ASCII characters were designed for games; PC was not. Still, the card symbols are much better done on PC than the Aquarius. The "club" never looked like a club to me. And, to make matters worse, the Aquarius doesn't have a spade. I guess they though developers could use the plane. The PCs extended ASCII art has much better lines. The PC's extended-ASCII version of Pac-Man is far superior than anything the Aquarius can pull off. But, the PC could hardly get as good TRON: Deadly Discs. But back on subject. Most people don't know computer tech at all - that I realize. They don't know a byte from a nibble - nor the use of "hacker" vs. "cracker".

[quote name='Jay Silverheels' date='Sat Feb 12, 2011 2:32 PM' timestamp='1297549951' post='2208453' It is no secret. This was no secret to me when I was a ten year old playing Aquarius AD&D. This just a semantics argument, but words mean what most people think they mean. When you say ASCII art, people think this: http://www.asciimation.co.nz/ I haven't seen that in eons. Truly epic!

It *is* ASCII art - its just a tad more picturesque than what the IBM could do. The "sprites" can only move 8 pixels at a time (since they are characters). It makes Aquarius games graphically poor and jerky. Here, enjoy the fear, and horror, of the demon! "Oh noes, I haz planes for feets!"

Sadly, I was being dead serious. The Aquarius has no customizable bitmap graphics. Basically, the designers put special "pictures" into the unused Extended ASCII characters. This includes the control characters 0..31 as well as the extended range of 128...255. This was not uncommon in the era - IBM, Commodore 64, etc... put special graphic in these areas - mainly for the purpose of enhancing the content on the screen. Most systems had lines segments for drawing boxes. But the Aquarius is designed to use Extended ASCII as the systems only graphics. I've attached an ASCII dump screenshot. You should recognize some of the pictures from Deadly Discs. If the graphic is not in this chart - Aquarius cannot draw it. That being said, look at Dungeons and Dragons for the Aquarius. The demon is hilarious - once you know what you are looking at. The person who coded the demon did a pretty good job.

Hmmm. The mystery continues.... Perhaps it is: Awesome Albert Atari Aardvarks (Texas reference) Academic Acid Or perhaps the beginning of Led Zeppelin Immigrant Song: Aaaaaaa-aaaaa-ah!

I agree. In many ways, you can consider it the computer form of "Plan 9 From Outer Space". That movie, in practically every aspect, was a dramatic and epic failure. However, for some reason, Plan 9 is a wondrous gem! The Aquarius is the same way, it is a disaster of computer science, but is just somehow an enjoyable system. Perhaps it is the design - the eloquent design of the cartridges or the subtle colors... The system is a conundrum - ineptitude wrapped in eloquence! Anyway, I don't want to anger any Aquarius fans. I think it a great little system *and* a terrible little system!

I bought one on eBay a while back - mainly so I could own the computer with "the worst reputation of all time". So, I hooked it up - sure it can't be that bad - and I was wrong - it was worst. But, anyway, it is still a fun little computer. I only have a few cartridges - and I never bought the expansion pack that turns it into an "80's computer". ASCII-art Deadly Discs anyone?!

Wow, no one mentioned the WORST home computer and WORST console ever... The Mattel Aquarius This computer was designed to take down the Atari 2600 as a true "gamer computer". Why did it fail? ASCII-only graphics. The system used 128...255 for the graphics - the only graphics. No joystick - unless you got an expansion Unprogrammable - 4k RAM and a limited BASIC It was produced for 3 months and canceled.

Unless, perhaps, the questions are randomly generated math problems.

dasm is a great assembler, but takes a little effort to get used to. The best approach (at least the one I use) is to create a batch file called "asm" that calls dasm with the correct parameters. The following is the batch file contents that I use: @echo off dasm ntsc.asm -f3 -o%1.bin start %1.bin The approach I used was for testing. I always name the root assembly ntsc.asm - mainly because I also plan to create PAL versions if necessary. The code above basically assembles the code, saves the binary to the specified name, and then opens it. I vary the output name depending on the build - to keep a binary history for myself. So, if I want to assemble build 1, and I am calling it "b1", I would type: asm b1 Of course, you might want a more flexible version. The batch file below takes two arguments - the source and destination. Notice that you don't have to specify the .asm or .bin - the batch adds those manually. @echo off dasm %1.asm -f3 -o%2.bin start %2.bin It would be used as: asm mycode b1 I've also attached a copy of the batch file. asm.zip

Oddly enough, the lunatic that wrote that game is from Sacramento too! ;P I guess that be you! Cool! I'm actually from Yuba City, but close enough. Just out of curiosity, there is a boxer that looks like a Texan. Is he listed as being from Austin by any chance? No, unfortunately. The one guy wearing overalls is from Topeka, Kansas. If I ever get around to creating a sequel, I will definitely put Austin, Texas into the mix!

Wow. I will definitely have to check this place out when I visit Dallas during the summer break! (Austin is a short drive south from Dallas). We don't have many great pinball arcades near where I live. I used to *love* playing the Adams Family back in the day. There was another one called Black Knight - or something like that from when I was kid. I thought it was epic back then.

What does it do?

I am really enjoying playing this game. I only have one request, though. For Blackjuko, can we also clear a card? Currently lets us iterate from 2 to 10. But, once we put down a value, a value is will always be displayed. It might be useful sometimes to just clear it - or mark it somehow - for those "ah, crap, that's not right" moments. So, iterate from 2 to 10 + blank.

Oddly enough, the lunatic that wrote that game is from Sacramento too! ;P

Could it also be Haunted House?

By far, it has to be the Xonox double ender - Chuck Norris Super Kicks / Artillery Duel. ... yes, yes, I know. It's two of the same thing.

And cats. Don't forget the cats! ..Al Perhaps gnomes riding cats into battle?

Get all four!