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I doubt Nolan will come back here and read this thread, but here's my question anyway: :)

 

Steve Wozniak claims in his book that he basically offered the Apple II design to Atari via Al Alcorn but was told that Atari was too busy with the video game market to do it. Is that true and do you remember Al or anyone else ever mentioning it?

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I doubt Nolan will come back here and read this thread, but here's my question anyway: :)

 

Steve Wozniak claims in his book that he basically offered the Apple II design to Atari via Al Alcorn but was told that Atari was too busy with the video game market to do it. Is that true and do you remember Al or anyone else ever mentioning it?

That would have been the Apple I kit design, not the later Apple II computer.

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It wasn't that the company was too busy.

 

It was that Atari was in the middle of Home Pong which was a tremendous amount of cost and resources to do. Also home computers were a very iffy thing still and would've required a tremendous amount more of capital and resources to get started and maintain and it was a new market to enter. Atari was an entertainment company - games were a proven profittable path to pursue. Home computers were a big gamble to jump into at that time.

 

Nolan put the "Steve's" in touch with several VC's to help them get going, and get going they certainly did.

 

 

Curt

 

 

 

I doubt Nolan will come back here and read this thread, but here's my question anyway: :)

 

Steve Wozniak claims in his book that he basically offered the Apple II design to Atari via Al Alcorn but was told that Atari was too busy with the video game market to do it. Is that true and do you remember Al or anyone else ever mentioning it?

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Did you program a game in college called Fox and Geese? Could you tell us about the game and the experiance of programming the game?

 

I programmed several games but the one that played the best and was sent around the country was Fox and geese. In the game the fox could move in any direction at twice the speed of the geese there was only one fox. The geese could move up to the right or the left. If a goose was alone the fox could eat it. If there were two geese adjacent he could not. The object was for the fox to either eat all the geese or escape past them. The geese won if they trapped the fox against the upper part of the screen. The number of geese was variable. 3 geese almost always lost 7 geese always won,

 

Nolan

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I doubt Nolan will come back here and read this thread, but here's my question anyway: :)

 

Steve Wozniak claims in his book that he basically offered the Apple II design to Atari via Al Alcorn but was told that Atari was too busy with the video game market to do it. Is that true and do you remember Al or anyone else ever mentioning it?

 

It is true. Remember that Atari at the time did not have the cash to fully exploit the 2600. We ended up selling to Warner so we could finance the inventory. We were growing very quickly and were always short on cash. (am I sorry for that mistake ---you bet.)

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Did you program a game in college called Fox and Geese? Could you tell us about the game and the experiance of programming the game?

 

I programmed several games but the one that played the best and was sent around the country was Fox and geese. In the game the fox could move in any direction at twice the speed of the geese there was only one fox. The geese could move up to the right or the left. If a goose was alone the fox could eat it. If there were two geese adjacent he could not. The object was for the fox to either eat all the geese or escape past them. The geese won if they trapped the fox against the upper part of the screen. The number of geese was variable. 3 geese almost always lost 7 geese always won,

 

Nolan

Wow, thanks for the reply! I would like to program a version of this game for the 2600. I'm not much of a programmer though so I don't even know if I can do it, but I can try. It's going to be a while though because I have a college course to finish first.

 

From your reply I get the impression that the geese can only move forward and diagonally. Is this correct? Also, what shape is the board and how many squares are there?

 

I wonder if the original game you wrote has been preserved somewhere. That would be cool if it has.

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It wasn't that the company was too busy.

 

It was that Atari was in the middle of Home Pong which was a tremendous amount of cost and resources to do. Also home computers were a very iffy thing still and would've required a tremendous amount more of capital and resources to get started and maintain and it was a new market to enter. Atari was an entertainment company - games were a proven profittable path to pursue. Home computers were a big gamble to jump into at that time.

 

Nolan put the "Steve's" in touch with several VC's to help them get going, and get going they certainly did.

And it was the Apple I design, right? (the kit)

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