Boulder Dash by Mapa Soft?

[RockfordDash]

Hi,

 

I was wondering if someone knows this Boulder Dash version. Is this the official release or hacked BD? What's Mapa Soft? I couldn't find any references. It looks to me like some enthusiast's work.

 

 

Thanks,

RD

[ivop]

Perhaps designed by http://atariage.com/forums/user/3960-mapa/ ?

[+Stephen]

Haven't seen that, but it's almost certainly one of the 50,000 or so edited levels floating around out there.

[MaPa]

Perhaps designed by http://atariage.com/forums/user/3960-mapa/ ?

Surely not

[TheMontezuma]

Hi,

 

I was wondering if someone knows this Boulder Dash version. Is this the official release or hacked BD? What's Mapa Soft? I couldn't find any references. It looks to me like some enthusiast's work.

 

bd2a.png

 

Thanks,

RD

 

In Cracow (Poland) in the 80-ties there was a company "Mapasoft".

They offered games for ATARI on tapes, since the most of ATARI owners in Poland had XC12 devices.

Later they also introduced "Turbo" modifications for XC12 with TOS (Tape Operating System), so I assume they had knowledge to hack Boulder Dash.

[RockfordDash]

Thanks for sharing. It seems likely that it was done by them. Whoever did it, did a great job. With Poland being a Wild West (East?) in the 80-ties as far as copyright is concerned, they could get away with it.

[TheMontezuma]

Yes, game piracy was legal in Poland until 1994.

Anyway Mapasoft didn't officialy sell games, but they had a "game copying service", so you could come to Mapasoft with your own tape and they would copy games to it for you

 

https://translate.google.de/translate?hl=de&tab=wT&sl=pl&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fretrospekcja.net.pl%2F2015%2F11%2F05%2Fsklep-z-pirackimi-grami%2F

Edited June 3, 2019 by TheMontezuma

[RockfordDash]

OK, I found more references to Mapasoft:

 

https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fc64power.com%2Fforumng%2Findex.php%3Ftopic%3D6335.0

 

And this is what their offer looked like:

 

Games came in packs.

 

[+Nezgar]

Yes, game piracy was legal in Poland until 1994.

Anyway Mapasoft didn't officialy sell games, but they had a "game copying service", so you could come to Mapasoft with your own tape and they would copy games to it for you

Interesting. How did they make money? Would they still charge you for the copy even though you had to bring your own tape? (And wait around for them to record it? Or was it a drop off/pickup type arrangement?)

[+ZuluGula]

They were selling sets, like you can see in the post above, with a few good games and rest not so good. This way they could sell more tapes. You could also make your own set. In this case they charged you per title. It was more expensive than buying a set, but you got what you wanted. You choose your titles from the list and you could pick up your tape later. They could sell you a new tape, but back then even tapes and floppies were expensive, so many people reuse their own old media when they get bored with the games.