lord_mike

In the early 80's I became a proud owner of an Atari 1200XL that I got on clearance for $99. I was so happy to finally get a REAL computer after my joke Timex Sinclair 1000 machine. My folks were never too keen on me having an expensive computer, so it took a LOT of begging even to get this special deal. In time, I got a tape recorder, disk drive, a printer, etc... I spent many a summer programming that thing, and (of course) playing games. I had a lot of good memories of the Atari... Sadly, about 15 years ago, my Atari 1050 drive failed.... It would spin up with a disk, then just spin and spin and spin with the red light on... but never read anything. I always meant to get another one, or repair this one, but as time went on, the prices went way up, and the availability went way down... Lately, I've been really pining for the old programs that I wrote as a teen.. Maybe it's a midlife crisis, I don't know... better that than chasing women and buying expensive cars, eh? I had my disks still, but no way to access them. This weekend, though, I made a fateful purchase at the Cleveland Classic Computer and Gaming show... I bought another 1050 drive for $20... probably too much money, but I figured that I needed it to recover part of my personal history... and it was A LOT cheaper than eBay.... So, today, I finally got the chance to hook it up.. I dragged my old, dusty 1200XL out and plugged it in... who knows if that still worked.. it has been years since I used that machine... it powered up! Now, the moment of truth... I plugged in the 1050, and grabbed my Hard Hat Mac disk.. nervous and trembling a bit (who knew this would be so emotional!), I put in inside the disk.. it spun and stopped, just like it was supposed to!... I rebooted, and the EA logo came up!!! then, after a couple of minutes.. the game itself! The drive works! And so do my disks (hopefully... only had time to test one)! I can't even begin to describe the feeling that came over me at that very moment as I stared at my 25" color display. It was like I had just been transported back in time... and, yet it was different, since my Atari was relegated to a B&W TV in my youth.... so many memories came flooding back... there was a sense of joy and excitement that I cannot even begin to describe.... It was just... awesome!! what an incredible and unique feeling! Who knew!!! So, now, I am one of you... I hope to post some of my old programs here, and maybe you can help me to figure out how to connect my APE-FACE parallel printer adapter so I can print them out... so much to do... lets hope my other disks have held out as well as Hard Hat Mac. Thanks for letting me share my story and I look forward to lots more conversations in the future! Thanks, Mike

The ZX spectrum had some amazing games for it... which is rather amazing since it's predecessor, the ZX81 was such a crappy (although cleverly designed) machine. The TS2000, as it was called in the states, never made it big here... I think partly, because people had such a foul taste in their mouths from the TS1000. But, definitely a very cool machine and worthy of its place in history. Thanks, Mike

I think the problem is fixed now.. I went over 30 pit stops without it happening. The problem was that the cars remained grey while the screen lightened and they became invisible. The tunnel is WAAAAY cool!! Thanks, Mike

Mikey likes! The only problem is if you play long enough the one level the opposing cars become invisible... that does add to the difficulty. The rain is cool. The colors are great, IMO. The daytime reminds me of the bright, humid haze during a hot summer. I like that the game isn't too hard, but maybe it's too easy.... one thought I had would be that instead of lowering the damage limit (which might ruin the "fun" aspect of the game by dying to quickly or easily).... have some gas stations that wouldn't have repairs available.. just gas... or maybe as the game goes on, have the gas stations become less and less frequent. I guess increasing the amount of damage per bump later in the game would also work. I know you've mentioned these thoughts in the past. Just some random thoughts. This game is fantastic and lots of fun to play! You should consider asking Albert about getting it sold on cartridge here at AA. Thanks, Mike

Oh, Jbs, I'm sorry.... I scrolled up too high, and accidentally referenced the post above you instead... Please don't take offense... I didn't mean to dis' you in any way.... I'm REALLY REALLY friggin' tired with all this wedding stuff going on! My bad... a typo form lack of sleep... I'd still like to do the music for you, if you are still interested.... I apologize again! I knew that didn't seem right when I said it... Thanks, Mike

Hang on there, Dan.. I've got more music comin'... I'm getting married in a couple of weeks, so I'm a bit distracted... But, I'll get more music out to you as fast as I can... Thanks, mike

Whoops.. you're right... my bad!!! also ignore the paddle thing... no kernel options of any sort in the multisprite kernel Thanks, Mike

Oh, and one more suggestion... use the pfcolors command to differentiate between the color of the buildings and the road. In fact, the code could be significantly trimmed if pfcolors were used to "hide" portions of the roadway part of the playfield instead of having 3 different playfields stored in memory. Thanks, Mike

This game is great!!! Lots of fun to play! Some not too difficult to do suggestions: Change the background screen color slowly from bright blue to black and back again to mimic the progression from day and night and night into day. Insert some weather changes like fog (easy--just change colors to be more difficult to see), snow (shades of white and more difficult to steer), rain (???). Allow for paddle controls as well as joystick (don't eliminate the joystick control... just allow paddles as well). BBasic 1.0 does support paddles to the best of my knowledge. Thanks, Mike

Simple... start losing points and keep losing points for as long as you are in the garage.... This game is becoming way cool! Thanks, Mike

Why not have the TURBO title text be vertical instead of horizontal. That way, no flicker! Thanks, Mike

Well, my code was a modification of the code listed here in this Atari music tutorial: http://alienbill.com/2600/basic/music/ Then I got some Tron music midi's: http://www.geocities.com/megalithmusic/tronmidi.html And I opened them in a free sequencer that converts to musical score called Anvil Studio to find the notes and lengths: http://www.anvilstudio.com/ I got the frequencies and distortions for the notes I needed using WebTune2600: http://alienbill.com/2600/basic/music/tune2600.html Then just plugged the values into the data statements! Oh, as for the supercharger, people were telling you to get.... It only can handle 4-6K roms, ato the best of my knowledge, and the 6k use special bankswitching... not a great option for you, I'm afraid. Thanks, Mike

Don't finish it up, just yet. I've got more music stuff for you coming soon! Thanks, Mike

Wow!!!! Great job, man! Can't wait to try out the finished product! I wonder if Batari would have ever thought that BBasic would inspire such creative and advanced projects! Thanks, Mike

Here's code for the intro theme. I'll work on the other music, too. I've kept is as short and simple as possible, 'cos memory is still somewhat limited. the high pitch is necessary to keep it in tune using the same distortion register. Let me know what you think. tron_music_intro.bas tron_music_intro.bas.bin Thanks, Mike

Your first Atari game may the most ambitious and advanced BatariBasic game yet! Great stuff!!! If you need help with music (if you can fit it in), let me know... Thanks, Mike

My next door neighbor had the Colecovision. I really liked it! It was quite cool... of course, not having any gaming system of my own at the time, anything video was cool. My favorite game was Venture, by far... The controller was rather... well.. unusual... but, I was just happy to have relatively easy access to a game console. Prior to my neighbor's Coleco acquisition, I had to visit friends miles away to be able to play home video games. Having access right next door was very exciting! Thanks, Mike

Don't be crazy, RandomTerrain... that would make sense!!! We can't have something as crazy as making sense in our intellectual property laws! Thanks, Mike

Oh, I forgot to mention that the long complicated procedure for transferring files only applies to programs "stuffed" with a recent (post 1999) version of stuffit. Some programs out there are stuffed with the old version, in which case the transfer is easy. Some places to go for games and software: Macintosh garden: http://mac.the-underdogs.info/ System 6 heaven: http://www.euronet.nl/users/mvdk/compatible.html Thanks, Mike

2. A youtube commenter on the second part of the video claimed that the system looked like an HP9000 minicomputer. If he's correct, that Hp would be brand new... and probably pretty powerful. 3. The Atari 800 did have a sprite editor just like the one shown on the video. Mostly, only developers had any access to it. Thanks, Mike

Well, the Classic II can read and write PC HD floppies... sortof... you need PC commander on the mac... there is a file out there that will write a mac disk with pc commander and stuffit expander on it. Stuffit is the compression format for macs, and almost all programs out there are in .sit files. You can then load that disk on your mac: http://www.macgeek.org/downloads/PC_Mac.zip The problem is that Stuffit changed their format in later releases, and it's not backwards compatible, so you have to get Alladin Expander for the PC, make sure that it expands all files in macintosh format (which will be macbin files), Zip up the .MacBin files that are created into a zip file, transfer those files to a floppy, load the floppy onto the mac (have to zip them 'cos PC commander doens't recognize long filenames and the Mac won't recognize the files), unzip the files on the mac (using the DropStuff extensions or a Mac compatible zip program that you can hopefully unstuff and install on the mac), then unstuff the MacBin files (which are portable mac format files) with the old stuffit expander... then... possibly... you've got something you can run! More info here: http://www.jagshouse.com/stuffit.html It's a major pain in the arse! If you can get the mac networked, that would help a lot! I've done this for a Mac Classic I and it took days to get anything running... So, you have to decide whether or not it's worth it. Another good site with lots of tips and tricks: http://home.earthlink.net/%7Egamba2/ Thanks, Mike

I gave my 10 year old nephew his belated Christmas gift, yesterday... an Atari flashback II... he loved it! AS his father said, we lost him for the evening. He played all night... he especially liked advenure. A kid who was born 20 years after the atari 2600 was released... a kid from the nintendo, 3-D, first person shooter, multi-polygon generation, and he'd rather play atari the whole night than his brand new Nintendo. That says something. Thanks, Mike

I completely and totally disagree with the naysayers.... Case in point, my nephew... when he comes over my house, he absolutely LOVES playing Atari... this kid has gamecube and nintendo DS and every modern convenience, but still loves combat... I gave him a jakks pacific 10-in-1 joystick a few years ago, adn he loved it. Last year, I got him one of those Coleco TV head-to-head games which were on clearance at Walgreens, and I understand why--it was seriously AWFUL, and yet he played it.. as engrossed with it as he'd be with Mario Baseball. I asked his mom why woudl he be so interested in such obviously inferior technology. "Because it's different," she said. The simple things in life can still excite even after all these years. Give a kid a 40 year old Lionel train set, and he'll still think it's cool. Could you resell it like the old days, with single game cartridges? Hell, no! but can old Atari's still sell, yep! The flashback II is a testament to that. Everyone assumes that only middle-aged adults care about the flashback 2. Tell that to my nephew, who is getting one this Christmas. Thanks, Mike

I remember Pac Man bweing $60 when it first came out--quite an outrage for such a crappy game, yet they sold! Thanks, Mike

My Atari christmas memories were always the same... No Atari under the Christmas tree... <sigh> I would have given my left arm for an Atari 2600, but there was no way my folks were going to pay $200+ for a toy.... no mattter how much it would have meant to me... I finally got my atari 20 years later when a coworker gave me his... That was a good Christmas!!! Thanks, Mike