Retro-Computing
A hodgepodge of posts that are all about old computers and technology like Apple ][ and Atari and vintage gaming platforms.
Old Ironsides on Apple ][
Old Ironsides (Optimum Resource, Inc., 1982) is a two-player game for the Apple II that simulates Nineteenth Century naval combat. Having read all twenty Aubry/Maturin seafaring novels, I have been craving some sort of naval battle game. The problem is, when you get down to it, ninety percent of the action in these wonderful novels is comprised of the days-long chase of an enemy ship. Not the stuff of an action packed game. Old Ironsides strips most of the technical (and realistic) aspects of sea battles away to reveal an arcade-like multi-player game much in the same vein as the classic Atari Combat.
The result is a very fun game that has just enough tweaks to it to make it feel like you are really battling it out on the open sea rather than just playing Combat with boats. The wind is a factor, as is the aiming of your broadsides. A direct hit to the bow of an opponent will ignite his magazine, thereby ending the battle rather quickly. Also, your ship can sail off the screen. Stay of the screen for too long and you are “lost in the fog,” and lose. A good navigator can use the fog as cover and sneak up behind an enemy.
The Apple ][ has many limitations when it comes to action games and this game would benefit from smoother controls and maybe a few graphical enhancements (like actual fog and weather). But, all-in-all, a very good game for the time it was created, and one of the few Apple ][ games that still holds up to this day.
eBay Auction: PC Transporter for the Apple IIgs
This is the Applied Engineering PC Transporter. It allows you to run MS-DOS applications on your Apple IIgs! It can also be used as a ~800K RAM disk. Click the following image for a closer view:
This auction includes all the items pictured above, including the following:
- PC Transporter card, includes original box and manual
- II GS Installation kit, includes original box and the cards an cables need to connect the PC Transporter to your Apple II GS
- A 2 Bay “Transdrive” Floppy Drive for MS-DOS disks and its leaflet manual (with instructions on setting jumpers, etc.)
- Original PC Transporter System disks (both the 3.5″ & 5.25″ versions)
- An original IBM MS-DOS 2.0 disk and accompaning system tools disk, both are 5.25″ floppies.
Note: The MS-DOS drive spins quietly the entire time that it recognizes that there is a disk inside. This has no apparent effect on its operation, and I assume this is the correct behavior for the drive. But it’s been more than a decade since I used this with any regularity, so I don’t know for sure.
At the time of this posting, this has been completely tested and is working. Here is a video demonstration of the actual item I am selling that I recorded just before removing the parts from my GS and packing them up for this auction (or watch the annotated version with dorky stock music on YouTube):
Even though the card is leaving here in working form, I can make no guarantees as to if it will work in your machine. Therefore, I am selling this item AS IS. Please buy shipping insurance if you have any concerns. I will ship to the US only. The entire package is going to weigh somewhere between 8-10 lbs. Contact me if you have any questions. Here the link to the eBay Auction… bid early… bid often!
UPDATE: The package eventually sold for around $155! Woo hoo!
“Dippy Golf” – Another Apple ][ Game I Wrote as a Kid
![“Dippy Golf” – Another Apple ][ Game I Wrote as a Kid](https://robertgomez.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/Dippy-Golf-Splash.png)
After posting Malfunction, my text adventure game for the Apple ][, I have been spending a whole bunch of time tinkering with my old Apple ][ software creations. Another one of my better creations was a golf game that I titled, Dippy Golf. This game featured nine holes which were loaded in from external graphics files and, even more impressive, was the use of audio samples of my voice! The game worked but still felt somewhat unfinished, so I decided to complete the game and post it here on the Pages of Fun!
One of the first major additions that you will see is the snazzy splash page and loading message:
This was actually the last thing I added to the new version of the game, but I wanted to use my other upgraded piece of software, Lo-Paint 2. More about that later. The game takes several seconds to load the audio samples. Creating samples on the Apple ][ was incredibly difficult. I used a piece of software called The Voice by Muse. This application was developed in part by Silas Warner, the creator of the Castle Wolfenstein series of games.
The process of getting audio into the computer required taping myself on a cassette recorder, than plugging the recorder into the never-really-used tape data jack on the back of the Apple ][. The sound quality is awful, but this was about the best you could do on an Apple ][. You should note, that this is a golf game, so one of the samples is a naughty word. I stole the idea from an early Mac golf game which my neighbor owned.
Anyhow, on to the introduction/instructions screen:
I love that old, uppercase Apple ][ font. One of my improvements here was to center the text on the page and use a nicer prompt for a key press. After this page you proceed to the first hole:
As you can see, the graphics are in Apple 2 lo-res mode graphics. In this mode you are allowed 40×40 pixels, 16 colors and four lines of text. As crude as this image is, I believe it’s actually higher resolution than Atari 2600 golf.
The game mechanics are simple. You point in a direction then specify how hard you want to hit the ball. This was fine as a proof of concept, but didn’t provide much challenge once you memorized the best angles and swing percentages for each hole. The major 2009 update to game play was the addition of the random element of the wind. This makes the ball behavior somewhat unpredictable (like real golf for me) and can push the player into taking riskier shots in hopes of catching that breeze for a few extra pixels of distance. On some holes, like the one pictured next, it really adds to the challenge.
Without the wind, you could reliably hit to the micro-islands off the right of the screen.
All of these holes where drawn using an art tool which I programmed called Lo-Paint. In addition to my Dippy Golf updates, I also updated Lo-Paint and included it on the disk. This was a major upgrade to the tool so I consider this version 2 of the software. The interface has been completely revamped and now you can save and load lo-res images! Check out this screen shot of Lo-Paint 2 in action!
If you want to try out Lo-Paint 2 or Dippy Golf download the disk image which is attached to this post and open it up in AppleWin or your favorite Apple ][ emulator.
My Apple ][ Masterpiece, “Malfunction”
![My Apple ][ Masterpiece, “Malfunction”](https://robertgomez.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/malfunction-splash.png)
(Okay, Masterpiece should probably be in quotes too!) I have been on a bit of a retro computing kick this evening. I have been playing around with AppleWin, which is the best Apple ][ emulator for Windows that I know of. I played a little bit of the original Castle Wolfenstein and then decided to fire up my trusty Apple ][gs and port some of my old Applesoft programs to PC.
The process of transforming a 5.25″ floppy to a disk image is somewhat complicated, but not too bad if you have the right tools. First, I turned on my ][gs and booted the System 6 disk. I then ran the awesome program Asimov (by Ninjaforce) which can create and “burn” Apple ][ disk images. I was able to save six 5.25″ disk images onto a single 3.5″ ProDos floppy. The next step is taking this 3.5″ floppy down to my System 9 Mac which I keep stowed away in my basement. The old Mac system could read ProDos disks so I am able to pull the files off the floppy and then save them to a PC formatted 3.5″ floppy (or send them over a network, but I am not connected in my basement). I have a USB floppy drive on my PC specifically for this purpose. Once the disk images are on my PC’s hard drive (with a .dsk extension) I can boot them in AppleWin.
I spent a few hours running my old programs. Most of them are pretty stupid, but I can’t believe I wrote them as a 10 or 11 year-old. I will post some screenshots in the near future. However, sometime in my sophomore or junior year of high school I took the time to create a full text adventure called, “Malfunction.” My code was based on the code in the book Write Your Own Adventure Programs For Your Microcomputer by Usborne Computer Books. The book guided you through the creation of a haunted house game. I was taken step-by-step through the process of game design–from creating maps and puzzles to programming a text parser. This was a great book, and I’d love to see an updated, perhaps Flash actionscript oriented, version.
Now, more than 20 years later, I have decided to publish my game!
In order to play the game you will need to install an Apple 2 emulator. For windows, I use AppleWin. It’s really simple and runs near-perfectly. As for other platforms like Mac, I’m not-so-sure. Look to Google for your answers.
The game is mediocre at best, but I am pretty proud of it. I learned a ton about programming when I created this. I hope you enjoy it. Please feel free to leave me some comments about what you think.
Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards on MS-DOS
Leisure Suit Larry is one of my favorite adventure games of all time. Certainly the best of the Sierra 3-D games in my opinion. It may not the most challenging game or have the deepest storyline, but what it lacks in depth, it makes up for in humor. Leisure Suit Larry is essentially an 80s PG-13 sex comedy in pixelated form.
The graphics, crude as they may be, are completely appropriate for the mood of the game. By keeping the imagery minimal, Larry’s dirtiness attains a level of cuteness that never comes across as anything but good-natured fun. My favorite moment is the disco dance scene which borrows heavily from the movie, Airplane!
This is one of the few Sierra games that I actually completed as a youngster, back before the days of the Internet. When I inevitably got stuck, I needed to use a hint book. I remember the hint book also included the setup to the dirty jokes’ punchlines that the barfly at Lefty’s keeps muttering (always followed by a “Har, har, har…”). Now that I do have access to walkthroughs and such, I may try to tackle the sequels. I got about halfway through Larry 2 before giving up.
Oh, and one last thing. The Lesuire Suit Larry theme song—what a great, catchy tune. You’ll be whistling it for days. I believe it was written by Al Lowe himself. I was very disappointed when, as a teenager, I saw Al Lowe on Name That Tune and there was no mention of his dirty-old-man video game designer career, just his musical background. Yawza, yawza, indeed.
A Homebrew Atari 2600 Cartridge Design
Recently, I took the time to enter an art contest. It was sponsored by AtariAge.com—a Web site devoted to the the preservation of the Atari 2600 and other ancient Atari computers and consoles. They also are one of the few places that sell new(!) games for the Atari 2600.
It was one of these new, so-called homebrew games that was the object of the contest. The game is called Elevators Amiss and it involves running a tiny pixelized chambermaid up the floors of a hotel, trying to avoid the elevators that move up and down across your path. Think of it as a less complicated version of Frogger. The winner of the contest was to receive a copy of the game and a credit from the AtariAge store. That was enough to get me to give it a go (I’ve been eying the Joystick to USB converter for awhile now).
My approach to the design was to create an image that was dynamic and made you think you were buying a 3-D video action extravaganza… pretty much like every Atari game box tricked me into thinking when I was a kid. Looking back on past winners, I noticed that there were many entries that used some of the same design and layout of the classic games that Atari put out in the early eighties. In my opinion, such designs go against the spirit of homebrew Atari games. These games are not really about nostalgia, they more are about taking a near-dead platform and breathing new life into the system.
The hardest part about illustrating this game it that the theme of killer elevators doesn’t work well outside of the constraints of the 2-D pixelated screen. My idea was to have the elevators flying through the walls and ceilings, completely dislodged from their elevator shafts smashing everything in their paths. In the image, the chambermaid is sprinting down the hall, just avoiding a crashing elevator car. Originally, I was going to give her a rainbow colored tracing of her movements trailing behind her (ala the Keystone Kapers box) but I liked my elevator painting too much to cover it up with action lines. Anyhow, here’s the final product for your viewing pleasure.
Unfortunately, I did not win the contest. The winner was Nathan Strumm #1. It was one of the better ideas, but to me it doesn’t capture the essence of the actual game play. My personal favorite was Patricio Cuello #1—simple idea, well executed with lots of colors. It seemed very appropriate to me. Check out the contest page to see all the entries.
Ultima 7: The Back Gate & Serpent Isle on MS-DOS
Considered by many to be the best games of the Ultima series, Ultima 7 is one of the most detailed and time-consuming RPGs I have ever attempted to tackle. You can pick up and interact with just about every object in the game and there are tons of dialog trees to navigate through. The story is intriguing and branches all over the place, with some of the main plot lines spanning both games. My biggest complaints with the game is the awful MIDI based sound effects, major Windows compatibility issues, and the fighting system lacks any strategy. The game makes up for these flaws in its depth. The game is less about building a character as it is about unraveling the mystery of a strange religion known as the Fellowship.
King’s Quest III – To Heir is Human on MS-DOS
Onward on my journey through the King’s Quest saga I go. Part III was the first in the series to really try to present a narrative. There are many more non-player characters to contend with, most notably Manannan the wizard, who has enslaved you to a life of household chores. These characters don’t just run on to the screen and steal your possessions (although there still is that in this game). There’s a genuine attempt to give them personality.
With all the new found attention to story telling, the designers seemed to not be paying much attention to game play. There are stretches of the game where you have to wait forever for a timed trigger event to occur. In the meantime you are stuck doing virtual dusting for fifteen minutes. Very boring.
Also, like most of these Sierra 3-D adventures, this game is really cruel when it comes to killing you off without a hint of advanced warning. These frustrating game play elements had me seeking out hints very early in the game. I found a website that was invaluable in getting me through the game. Universal Hint System guides you very gently through a invisiclues style hint system that does its best to avoid revealing to many spoilers.
Oh, and one more thing. The game requires you to have the manual to get anything important done. There is a section of the game when your mixing recipes for spells, following the manual, and, if you have one small typo during the tedious, drawn-out process, you die. As some consolation, they do take the time to show you a goofy animation of the spells going horribly wrong.
This was the last of the classic, mouse-free King’s Quest games. I think I am going to take a break from the series before attempting to tackle King’s Quest IV (which I got 75% through on my Apple ][gs back in the day).
King’s Quest II – Romancing the Throne on MS-DOS
I’m continuing to play the King’s Quest games in DosBox these days. Tonight I just completed King’s Quest II: Romancing the Throne with 175 points out of 185.
To me, the art of these games is, in many ways, vastly more impressive than your modern 3D modeled game. The fact that every pixel on the screen was hand drawn and not rendered with some world generating algorithm just astounds me. Furthermore, even more so than King’s Quest I, the artists get tons of animation mileage out of so few pixels. They are not going for realism, rather they were trying to communicate a narrative, ideas and emotions. Yeah, that’s right. Video game romanticism.
In these first two installments, storytelling hasn’t been as much of the focus. They seem to be more geared towards exploration and object hunting. Although I had to look for hints twice (one of those times I had the right idea, I just forgot to re trigger an event during my many restores and saves), the adventuring is not so much about complex puzzle solving. That’s not such a bad thing since these days I don’t have the time to scratch my head for hours (I couldn’t get more than 2 or 3 rooms into Graham Nelson’s Curses, although in theory I liked that game). Perhaps as I play through these games I will get better at thinking through puzzles and then I can go back and attempt to take on an Infocom classic.
King’s Quest on MS-DOS
I am currently reveling in Sierra 3-D adventure games like the King’s Quest series and Leisure Suit Larry. As a kid, these were the only PC games that could draw me away from our family’s Apple ][. The economy of pixel usage in the art and animation is truly brilliant and the game play still holds up pretty well. I just finished King’s Quest I this evening for the first time. I finished with 136 points of a total 158. Made in 1984, this was the first of the Sierra 3-D adventures. It doesn’t quite hold up to some of the later entries in the series in terms of story and puzzle complexity. Without warning, the game can also be rendered un-winnable if you eat/use certain items at the wrong time. This is a big adventure game no-no in my opinion. But aside from these gripes, it was still fun twenty years after its release.