Contents

- Title Page

- Editorial

- NEWS

- New Products Available at amigakit.com

- Commodore 16 Mega Games Collection

- Paku Paku - C64

- Commodore 64 Introductory Audio Tape

- MEM64 Released

- Hollywood 5.2 Released - 10th Anniversary Edition

- Amiga Puzzle Game: G.E.M.Z

- iGame Front End Application for Windows

- Nerd Book

- SID Wizard Creation Guides

- AROS Vision 1.5.5 Uploaded

- Could Elite Make A Comeback?

- New Version of SysInfo Available

- MorphOS News: SteamDraw 2.1 Released

- JiffyDOS & uIEC Cheat Sheet

- “The Amiga Works” Kickstarter Project

- New Articles on Obligement

- Revival Studios News

- AmigaOS 4 News: A Frog Game

- V.A.M.P. Player 0.86 Available

- FastATA 4000 MK-VI CF/SATA: new BootROM ver. 7.0

- RGCD News

- Sketchblock Version 1.7 Relased For Amiga OS

- AmigaOS: GadToolsBox 3 Has Been Open Sourced

- Home Taping Is Killing Gaming

- Computers For The Masses Not Just The Classes

- Review: Mayhem

- Review: Dream — For The Unexpanded VIC20

- Retro Derby (G & G) — 17 - 18 November, 2012. Derby.

- Review: Alien Bash 2 — Flimsoft’s Premier Relase

- Review: Space Lords

Editor

Nigel Parker

Spell Checking

Peter Badrick

Text, HTML & eBook Conversion

Paul Davis

D64 Disk Image

Al Jackson

PDF Design

Nigel Parker

Website

www.commodorefree.com

Email Address

commodorefree@commodorefree.com

Submissions

Articles are always wanted for the magazine. Contact us for details. We can’t pay you for your efforts but you are safe in the knowledge that you have passed on details that will interest other Commodore enthusiasts.

Notices

All materials in this magazine are the property of Commodore Free unless otherwise stated. All copyrights, trademarks, trade names, internet domain names or other similar rights are acknowledged. No part of this magazine may be reproduced without permission.

The appearance of an advert in the magazine does not necessarily mean that the goods/services advertised are associated with or endorsed by Commodore Free Magazine.

Copyright

Copyright © 2012 Commodore Free Magazine
All Rights Reserved.

Issue 66

http://www.commodorefree.com/
Free to download magazine dedicated to Commodore computers

Available as PDF, ePUB, MOBI, HTML,
TXT, SEQ and D64 disk image

Editorial

Hi readers

This will be the last issue before the Christmas holidays, so A very Merry and Happy Christmas and a prosperous new year to you all, I hope you have been good little boys and girls and get whatever you want Santa Claus to bring you.

I would like to thank the various people who have emailed news items to the Commodore Free team over the years and of course the people who after some persuasion agreed to be interviewed. I would also like to thank the Commodore Free Team for all the work they do in helping to produce the magazine. and on a final note I would also like to thank all the readers of Commodore free and of course the demo coders and games creators and just people who keep the machine alive.

Ok you can all stop bowing over now and patting yourselves on the back we have another issue to fill so let’s get going should we?!

In this issue

Flimsoft’s premier product is launched, packaged and ready for download and we have a review in this issue of the game “Alien Bash 2”. Will the game live up to the expectations and has the development on the preview created a more fuller game? Well you need to read the review to find out. I would say that the download is £1.99 so its won’t break the bank and supporting a new developer must be applauded and encouraged.

We also have a review of the game Space Lords, I was lucky enough to obtain a cartridge version of the game and you can read more about the game in this issue, it’s a 4 player pongtastic challenge!

We also have a review of the Retro Derby bash complete with some pictures. This event was co created by Chris Snowden of www.commodore16.com and in the news section you can see someone filmed his almost complete Commodore 264 games, literally hundreds of titles were released for the machines and Chris has almost every title and variant.

The good old Vic 20 gets a look-in with 2 reviews one called Mayhem and another review from the denial website, both games run on the unexpanded machine!

Commodore free looks into the murky depths of tape pirates and also ponders on what the Commodore 64 can teach the youth of today, is the machine and indeed any 8 bit machine still a useful teaching aid for children?

Finally I would like to close this section with a famous quote

I would like to but can’t think of a suitable one

People keep asking what is the point and I think I have finally found it.

There you go!

I will just like to wish you all a merry Christmas (again)

Regards

Nigel

www.commodorefree.com

NEWS

New Products Available at amigakit.com

Amiga kit now have a wide range of new Individual Computers products available.

Here is news from the website

ACA 1232 33Mhz accelerator with 128MB SDRAM : 68030 CPU equipped accelerator for the Amiga 1200

ACA 1220 16Mhz accelerator with 128MB SDRAM
ACA 1220 25Mhz accelerator with 128MB SDRAM

These are both 68020 CPU equipped accelerator for the Amiga 1200 with lots of Fast memory at a great price.

We have the Real Time Clock upgrade for these accelerators, which is also compatible with selected A1200 clockports.

Apart from our own ZorRAM product, we also have the BigRAMPlus 256MB Zorro III memory expansion.

US Webstore: www.amigakit.us

UK Webstore: www.amigakit.co.uk

Europe Webstore: www.amigakit.eu

Commodore 16 Mega Games Collection

The Complete Commodore 16/Plus4 Collection

When it comes to the games, www.commodore16.com Admin Chris Snowdon has just about every single release. All that is missing is the big-boxed edition of Cuthbert Enters The Tombs Of Doom by Microdeal.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=dejpQcxJnq4

Notes from YouTube

Thanks to Chris Snowdon for showing us his bountiful unmatchable collection.

Although he has the normal version of Cuthbert In The Tombs Of Doom. Let's hope that he eventually acquires that last rare fabled big plastic boxed edition again someday for total completion :)

Paku Paku - C64

Jason M. Knight has created a game for the Commodore C64. The game is based on the classic game Pac Man. The game can be played with the keyboard or a joystick. Paku Paku is "Cardware", this means that if you like the game you can send a postcard to Jason.

Notes from Jason

Here it is, my 'port' of Paku Paku to the Commodore 64. This is released to the public as Cardware -- if you enjoy the game, please just send me a postcard as payment, preferably one that has a local photograph of where you are from. Apart from that consider all enclosed code to be released to the public domain -- that's just how I roll.

Features

- Based on original Pac Man map reduced to use 3x3 tiles instead of 8x8. This preserves the aspect ratio, map and scoring of the original game.

- Familiar WASD keyboard mapping for those used to modern games, and the old IJKM mapping for those more comfortable with a 'classic' C64 arrow layout.

- Support for either joystick port, though to use port A you must start the game with its button.

- No cross-talk between active joystick and keyboard. (a common issue with C64 games)

Improvements over DOS Version

- 160x200 colour graphics for text and background -- double the vertical resolution.

- 12x12 player sprite, double the resolution of the PC version

- 6x14 ghost sprites, double the vertical resolution

- Slightly smoother gameplay due to higher resolution, particularly when ghosts are 'slowed' due to power pellet or tunnel.

Lost Functionality

Due to the complexity and unpredictability of C64 disk systems, and the possibility that this could be run from TAPE if so desired, I did not implement a multiple high score system with auto-saving. I don't consider this a deal breaker given the number of C64 games that bother with it. As such this version only tracks the high score and last score

http://www.deathshadow.com/pakuPakuC64

Commodore 64 Introductory Audio Tape

What can your Commodore 64 do?

Well listening to this tape quite a lot, the tape was packaged with a number of Commodore 64 systems and its quite nostalgic listening to it back here on YouTube, takes you back doesn’t it.

SIDEA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGvpfYEF-RQ

SIDEB

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5LVAcyOpLQ

Retro Gaming | An Introductory Audio Tape of the Classic Commodore 64. I thought I would share this little piece of nostalgia. Introductory by Jonathan Kidd.

MEM64 Released

A Memory type game for the Commodore 64 released, match the tiles to win the game.

Instructions:

Your goal is to find all pieces which belong together by using as less turns as possible. Start with the SMALL FIELD game and then go to the BIG FIELD for a BIG challenge.

Credits:

Code

Dr. Science of Atlantis

Music

Agemixer of Atlantis,
Skalaria

Graphics

Dr. Who of Atlantis,
Rebel of Atlantis

Idea

Dr. Science of Atlantis

Charset

Dr. Who of Atlantis

Concept

Dr. Science of Atlantis

Loader

Dr. Zoom of Atlantis

http://csdb.dk/getinternalfile.php/109571/mem64%21_ATLANTIS.d64

Hollywood 5.2 Released - 10th Anniversary Edition

News from Amiga.org

Exactly ten years ago today, Hollywood 1.0 was shipped to the first customers. Since then the software has grown to one of the largest Amiga programs and is now available for all major systems including the mobile platform Android. To celebrate the success story of Hollywood, version 5.2 has been released today for all existing customers of Hollywood. Hollywood 5.2 is a major update which includes several new features among the usual bug fixes. Here is a brief overview of new features in 5.2:

- video system is now completely platform-independent which means that Hollywood video plugins will work now on every system incl. Windows, Mac OS X, Linux and Android

- support for commodity hotkeys (Amiga)

- support for tray icons (Windows)

- extensions in the plugin interface

- own error handler can be defined

- support for multiple screens (Amiga)

- improved support for Android

- better support for animations using alpha channels

A complete list of changes can be found in the history section of the documentation.

Hollywood 5.2 is the first joint release of Hollywood for both desktop and mobile platforms. Users of the Android version can conveniently update to 5.2 via Google Play while users of the Amiga and Windows versions can download update archives (35 to 45 MB in size) free of charge from the official Hollywood portal. http://www.hollywood-mal.com/

Please note that Hollywood 5.2 is currently only available for existing customers and cannot be purchased at this time.

Amiga Puzzle Game: G.E.M.Z

Press Release

Fabio Falcucci and Pascal Papara are proud to announce the immediate availability of G.E.M.Z. for all major operating systems.

G.E.M.Z. is a puzzle game with an original and addictive gameplay, an original story behind and a massive 43 minutes of original soundtrack.

It's available in four languages: English, German, French and Italian.

Extract of the story:

"You are Rubin, the bravest knight of the GemLand kingdom, and you have to save the princess Esmeralda kidnapped by her evil sister Zirconia, unfortunately Zirconia has casted on you an evil spell and now you have to escape from the G.E.M.Z. dimension in order to free Esmeralda or Zirconia will transform her sister into a diamond statue to claim the GemLand throne owned by Esmeralda."

You have to solve a number of puzzles to escape from the G.E.M.Z. dimension and free Esmeralda.

The game comes with five difficulty levels:

- Easy : 16 levels

- Normal : 36 levels

- Hard : 49 levels

- Insane : 81 levels

- Madness : 169 levels

Features

- Original Gameplay

- Original soundtrack (about 43 minutes)

- Hundreds of randomly generated levels for hours of pure fun

- Scalable graphics to run smoothly on slow CPUs or old computers

- Can run windowed or full screen

- Addictive Gameplay

A demo version is available at the game site with a limited play time of five minutes.

Supported Systems

- Windows (7, Vista, XP)

- Mac OSX PPC and Intel (OSX 10.4 or greater)

- MorphOS

- AROS i386

- WarpOS

- Linux (i386 and PPC)

- AmigaOS4.x

- AmigaOS3.x

Contacts

- Fabio Falcucci : info@a-mc.biz

- Pascal Papara : www.ares-shop.dewww.indiego-gaming.comwww.aeros-os.org

- G.E.M.Z. Site : http://gemz.a-mc.biz/

Please try the demo. AmigaOS 4.x user will need at least a SAM733/800 class Amiga.

Intel ATOM users need to edit the file "details.txt". It is self explaining.

See it live in this YouTube video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0U-K...ture=autoshare

iGame Front End Application for Windows

What is it?

iGame is a front end application for Windows, allowing you to manage your Amiga games collection. You can scan for your games, add them in a library, search for them, view their screenshots, listen to their music and of course, launch them in WinUAE so you can play them!

Download

Currently iGame is available as a beta version, although the basic functionality is there. You can download it and give it a try here. http://www.blitterstudio.com/files/publish.htm

Recommended downloads also include the Screenshots and Music packs from GameBase Amiga. Please make sure you read the notes at the end of this page about the prerequisites!

iGame started out as an Amiga application by MrZammler, if you’re looking for that version click here. http://winterland.no-ip.org/igame/

Features

Features currently include the following:

- Recursive folder scanning for your games.

- Storage of all game titles found in a local database.

- Use screenshots, music and extras from GameBase Amiga, if found. They are displayed on the right hand side for each game.

- Launch the selected game in WinUAE (with the selected UAE configuration) with a simple double-click.

- Music playback using the bundled XMPlay player, or alternatively DeliPlayer2 if it’s found installed.

- Search for selected game in well-known related websites (LemonAmiga, HOL).

- Live filtering of games from the list, depending on your search text.

- Multi-disk game handling (utilizing the DiskSwapper feature of WinUAE).

- Option to show only unique game Titles (default) or all files found.

Meanwhile, the following features are planned to be included later on:

- Support WHDLoad games (scanning, launching, metadata), besides just ADF/ADZ/ZIP/IPF.

- Fetch game metadata from various websites and store them locally for each game.

- Edit game metadata like screenshots, music, selected UAE config, information etc.

Installation notes

iGame requires the following Windows components, which the Setup file will try to download automatically for you if they’re missing in your system. However due to a current known issue in Visual Studio 2012, the Setup.exe doesn’t run on Windows XP operating systems. If you’re using Windows XP, please install these prerequisites manually and then just click on the “Launch” link:

- .NET Framework 4.0

- SQL Compact Edition 4 runtime

- Windows Installer 4.5

Nerd Book

From: Kevin Savetz
To: commodorefree@commodorefree.com
Sent: Wednesday, 14 November 2012, 19:15
Subject: Terrible Nerd, my new book

My new book is out.

Hello Commodore Free I would like to introduce my book!

Terrible Nerd is my memoir about growing up nerdy: being part of the first generation of kids with computers on our desks. Pirating games on floppy disk, coding on the Atari 800, crashing the Internet for all of Europe, helping clueless newbies as AOL's Internet AnswerMan, and many more true stories.

Paper: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1939169003/

Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/Terrible-Nerd-ebook/dp/B00A6I85BC/

Kevin Savetz ~ www.Savetz.com ~ www.SavetzPublishing.com

SID Wizard Creation Guides

E-Book: Creating Chip Tunes with SID-Wizard

If you have ever wanted to created music on the Commodore 64 commonly known as Sid music or chip music, then these e-books will of help. It’s an expanded manual for the music tracker program called SID-Wizard (version 1.2) by Mihaly Horvath.

The e-book expands on the manual provided with the program to help beginners understand the program and to help them start using the software and creating music The second PDF has charts and tables only (and is termed a “cheat sheet” or quick lookup guide).

http://www.witchmastercreations.com/e-book-creating-chip-tunes-with-sid-wizard/

The program Source code for Sid Wizard and examples can be downloaded from here

http://sourceforge.net/projects/sid-wizard/files/release/SID-Wizard-1.2-full-pack.zip/download

AROS Vision 1.5.5 Uploaded

A new version of AROS vision has been uploaded version 1.5.5. of AROS Vision. Highlights are full working versions of Real3D and SoundFX. Amigaguides are now shown (no crash) and there are two versions now.

Details on:

http://www.natami-news.de/html/aros_vision.html

on the download-page are now 2 versions:

http://www.natami-news.de/html/distr..._download.html

There is the full version and the "Classic" (=Light version)

The light version is the same as the full version (same libraries, MUI-Classes, Virus checker, packer) but many of the applications removed (less than half of the size of the full version). All versions include Wanderer, Scalos and Magellan. On the download-page are instructions and tips to add i.e. ARexx or change to Scalos.

There are basically 3 options:

- Use Wanderer and Zune (preconfig)

- Use Scalos and Zune replacing Wanderer (different startup-sequence)

- Use Scalos and MUI replacing Zune and Wanderer (instructions on download-page)

Details on "Download-Page"

I would also recommend to replace Input, Locale and PSI by original files from 3.1. because there seems to be a bugs in these programs

I have uploaded these short movies:

New Features:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV9km7A-jIQ&feature=plcp

Scalos and Zune:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2uXY4d08EYU&feature=plcp

Scalos and MUI:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dn5C8G3aDXU&feature=plcp

Demonstration of some software:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7RKCS_-ZiE&feature=plcp

Could Elite Make A Comeback?

Elite classic video games remake seeking backers

In this BBC news story (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-20165344) Rory Cellan-Jones talks to Elite co-creator David Braben

David Braben, one of the creators of the original, is seeking £1.25m ($2m) via Kickstarter to fund the updated version. http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1461411552/elite-dangerous?ref=live

Called Elite: Dangerous it will involve the same mix of interstellar travel, trading, piracy and spaceships as the original 8-bit game.

Those who pledge cash to the project will also get a chance to shape the development of the updated version.

"Elite is a game that I've wanted to come back to for a very, very long time," Mr Braben told the BBC. "It's the sort of game that I would very much like to play today."

“Elite” has gone down in history as one of the most successful games of the 1980s. It was the first ‘open world’ game in which the player can freely roam a vast space. It was the first true 3D game too, and set many other benchmarks. Ian Bell and I set out to make a game for ourselves rather than for some imagined market. We were sick of games with three lives then a new life every 10,000 score; we wanted something new.

New Version of SysInfo Available

Taken from http://sysinfo.d0.se/

Introduction

Exactly 19 years after version 3.24 of SysInfo it is time for an update! The original author Nic Wilson has kindly given me permission to continue the maintenance of this old classic.

Please report any bugs and feature requests to sysinfo@d0.se.

Do you want to be a beta tester? Contact sysinfo@d0.se, please include your system specs.

Known problems

The benchmark results provided by SysInfo is currently not verified on M68060 Amigas and useless in emulators set up to emulate faster than early classic Amigas!

I want more bug reports! Mail it to sysinfo@d0.se

You can download it here: http://sysinfo.d0.se/downloads/SysInfo.lha

History

SysInfo 4.0 (07-Nov-12)

- 19 years later, a new maintainer, a new release. (tnx Nic Wilson)

- Crash due to assumed accessible memory at $2000 changed to $4000. (tnx Piru)

- Updated memory size calculation in Memory Info to handle 64MB+ sizes correctly.

- Updated board size calculation to handle 64MB+ correctly, added MB suffix for sizes greater than 2MB.

- Several small corrections in the code.

- Added some support for 68060, more to do. Doesn't yet handle the difference between LC/EC versions.

- Added identification of UAE Autoconfig™ boards.

- Added identification of Individual Computers GmbH German (www.icomp.de)

- Autoconfig™ boards. (tnx Jens Schönfeld)

- New contact information: http://sysinfo.d0.se SysInfo@d0.se.

MorphOS News: SteamDraw 2.1 Released

News from Kronos via MorphZone

SteamDraw the vector-oriented GFX-program for MorphOS is now available in version 2.1. The following (and more) changes have been made over version 2.0:

- use of cairo as shared library instead of linklib

- removal of fill-option "Gradient", cairo seems to have some issues with keeping track of used memory here

- fill-option "Picture" is now rotated when it's object is

- removed some serious bugs,

- SteamDraw runs now again in only 1 task but extra measures to minimize CPU-load and lagging are still included.

Available via Grunch, or directly at:

http://www.steamdraw.homepage.t-online.de/SteamDraw.lha

JiffyDOS & uIEC Cheat Sheet

http://c64.berrydejager.com/jiffydos-uiec-cheat-sheet/

JiffyDOS & uIEC Cheat Sheet

by Berry

Reading several website and PDF files on JiffyDOS and uIEC I made the conclusion that a cheat sheet for the combined solutions may come handy.

Command Summary

Standard DOS 5.1 Wedge Commands

@

Read the disk drive error channel

@C:newfile=file

Copy a file on the same diskette

@I

Initialize the disk drive

@N:diskname,ID

Format (NEW) a diskette

@N:diskname

Short NEW

@Q

Disable the JiffyDOS commands

@R:newname=oldname

Rename a file

@S:file1{,file2}…

Scratch a file (or files)

@UJ

Reset the disk drive

@V

Validate a disk

@$

Display the disk directory

@#device

Set the default device number

/filename

Load a BASIC program

^filename

Load and run a BASIC program

%filename

Load an ML program

<-filename

Save a BASIC program

Additional JiffyDOS Commands

@B

Disable the 1541 head rattle

@D:filename

List a BASIC program from disk

@F

Disable the function keys

@G

Set interleave gapsize

@L:filename

Lock/Unlock a file

@O

Un-NEW a BASIC program

@P

Toggle printer output

@T:filename

List an ASCII file from disk

@X

Set Destination device number

@XW

Writes correct drive as default (i.e. set uIEC as 8 instead of defaulted drive 10)

*"filename" type

Copy a file

£filename

Load and run an ML file

'filename

Verify a file

CTRL+A

Toggle all files for copy

CTRL+D

Default drive toggle

CTRL+P

Screen dump

CTRL+W

Toggle single file for copy

SHIFT+RUN/STOP

Load & run first program on disk

SYS 58451

Re-enable the JiffyDOS commands (64 mode)

SYS 58551

Re-enable the JiffyDOS function keys and commands (64 mode)

SYS 65137

Re-enable the JiffyDOS commands (128 mode)

“The Amiga Works” Kickstarter Project

Allister Brimble has just launched a Kickstarter project for his new double album "The Amiga Works". He will create up to date CD quality versions and remixes of his best musical works from the Commodore. The album artwork and an A2 poster will be designed by Rico Holmes who was the inspiration and artist behind the original Alien Breed series and other Team 17 games. Visit Allister's Kickstarter page.

Quote:

"I have received many requests to create new versions of my tracks in the past, but I never felt I could improve on them.. until now. The technology exists to inspire me to create new versions of my tunes for these much loved games from the Commodore Amiga."

- Allister Brimble

As a big fan of his work I am very excited about this project. Recommend you get over to the project page now and make a pledge! :)

Link: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2059538678/the-amiga-works

Source: http://www.exotica.org.uk

New Articles on Obligement

The following articles have been added to the website of the French Amiga/MorphOS magazine Obligement (http://obligement.free.fr) during the last two months :

- September/October 2012 news.

- News: insights about the Amiga in 2012.

- Old articles from A-News 13 to 16: Review of KindWords 2, File: voice synthesis, Report: World Of Commodore Show 1989, Review of Kick Off, File : video titler, Hardware: A590, Hardware: LUCAS 68020, Review of Sculpt-Animate 4Dn etc.

- Report: Amigâteries 2011.

- Interview with Yannick Buchy (webmaster of Meta-MorphOS.org).

- Interview with Aaron Digulla (coordinator of AROS, from December 2006).

- Point of view: hardware projects on Amiga.

- Review of Amiga Forever 2012.

- Review of Hurrican.

- Review of Wild Streets.

- Review of Thundercats.

- Review of Curse Of Enchantia.

- Review of The Colonel's Bequest.

- Hardware: reflash of graphic cards in order to use it on Mac/MorphOS (update).

- File: Amiga history, year 1999 (update).

- File: Amiga shoot'em ups (1991).

- File: Amiga shoot'em ups (1992).

- Tutorial: Imagine 3D - creation of a simple asteroid.

- Tutorial: utilisation of GMail with SimpleMail and YAM (update).

- Tutorial: presentation and utilisation of Amiga911 Maker (update).

Article in English:

- Tutorial: utilization and configuration of Amiga911 Maker 1.54.

Rendezvous on http://obligement.free.fr for this nice reading.

All translations are welcome. Please contact David "Daff" Brunet for more info.

Revival Studios News

It’s time again for an my monthly update regarding my retro/homebrew efforts.

With the release of no less than 3 new games, divided over multiple platforms, I’ve been so busy that I didn't have time to write this newsletter, which is why you receive it at the very end of the month.

With more platforms and games in the pipeline, the next few months will be excited for you retro-enthusiasts.

[Videopac/O2] New Game Release - Cavity

After the success of Mage: The Enchanted Crystals it is always a challenge to tackle the next game.

I want to bring something fresh to the system with each release. While European gamers with a G7400/videopac+ usually have an edge in terms of graphics-quality, I decided to create an game experience that will be similar (and still look great) on both the stock Odyssey2, G7000 and G7400.

The game uses an advanced version of the colour routines I first used in Mage, I have been able to create in game graphics that don't even need a videopac+ background to look pretty!

In cavity, Your goal is to navigate your way through the cave while collecting various power-ups for points. As the game gradually increases in both speed and difficulty, you can collect a yellow power-up which temporarily stops the speed from increasing.

If you get the special item by picking up the blinking power-up at the right moment, you will be rewarded with a massive boost to your score as well as an instant speed-down!

You can watch the trailer for the game here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAVZnIU7gS8

Game features:

- Playable on Videopac and Odyssey2 consoles

- High resolution title screen on Videopac+ consoles

- Multicolour background and cave.

- Digitized speech using The voice add-on

- Internet high score uploading

- Online rewards system

The game is available now on cartridge for 39 euros + 5 euro S&H. An additional plastic Videopac box is available for 5 euros. Note that loyal-fans that own my other videopac games will receive a 4 euro discount! (see below)

You can email me at: sales@revival-studios.com to order this game.

For more information about the game, including screenshots, packaging shot and more, check out the game's page at: http://www.revival-studios.com/?page=136

[Videopac/O2] Mage: The Enchanted Crystals scores a 90% review and Retro-sizzler award

Positive reviews and feedback regarding my game Mage: The Enchanted Crystals for the Odyssey2 and Videopac consoles keep rolling in.

I am pleased to let you know the game scored a nice 90% , and a retrogamer-sizzler award, in this month's Retro Gamer Magazine, issue 108. You can view a scan of the review here: http://www.revival-studios.com/media/videopac/mage/mage_review_retrogamer.jpg

For those that unaware about this magazine. Retro Gamer magazine is a print-magazine by Imagine Publishing with a very large circulation of nearly 100.000 readers. In a time where print-publications are struggling, this magazine has a growing subscriber-base and won many awards for their magazine.

For more information about the game, visit the game's website at: http://www.revival-studios.com/?page=131

You can still order your copy of this game, or any of my other videopac/odyssey2 games, by replying/emailing to: sales@revival-studios.com

[Commodore VIC-20] New Game Release - Avalanche

Revival Studios has started development and publishing for the unexpanded Commodore VIC-20 home computer.

The first release for the VIC-20 is a game Avalanche.

Avalanche is a fun action game people can just pickup and play.

The player has to shoot the various gems that are falling down from the top of the screen.

The gems are marked with symbols and the player has to match up the symbol of his ship with the symbol on the gems. The game will automatically increase in speed, but by strategically shooting gems you can align up to 5 gems in a row to gain points as well as slowing down the game for prolonged gameplay.

Game Features:

- Fast, flicker free, arcade gameplay

- Gorgeous Multicoloured graphics

- Works on the unexpanded VIC-20

You can check out the trailer for the game at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnGaxCwaeuU

The game is available on Cassette tape and as digital download.

- Cassette Tape+Digital download = 7,99 euros

- Digital Download = 3,99 euros

You can email me at: sales@revival-studios.com to order this game.

For more information about the game, including screenshots and packaging photos, visit: http://www.revival-studios.com/?page=139

[ZX81] New Game Release - Down!

As you might remember, I released my first two ZX81 games a little while ago.

Since then I have received a lot of positive feedback. ZX81 fans were thrilled to see fast arcade games being released on this system(due to the nature of the system, ZX81 games are traditionally quite slow and flickery, unlike my games).

Well... Now I am proud to present my new game release for the Sinclair ZX-81, called Down!

In Down, the player needs to escape a burning village by manoeuvring downwards into the caverns beneath the village. Fall down from platform to platform while picking up items to gain points.

The game features, include:

- Fast and addictive arcade gameplay

- Running animated character in just a few tiny monochrome pixels

- Internet High score uploading

- Online rewards

- Support for AY-sound boards

- ZXpand joystick interface support

The game runs on a standard ZX-81 with 16KB ram and is available on:

- cassette tape+digital download (7,99 euros)

- digital download (3,99 euros).

You can email me at: sales@revival-studios.com to order this game.

For more information about the game, visit: http://www.revival-studios.com/?page=135

[Videopac/O2] - Revival Studios 2012 rewards competition

The videopac/o2 rewards competition is still ongoing. Please get your rewards in before the year ends! Join the Revival Studios 2012 Rewards Competition with more than 120 euros worth of prizes!

The Rules:

Each of my videopac games has a number of rewards (or achievements/trophies if you will) that can be unlocked by performing certain tasks in the game. Once you met the criteria for a specific reward, you can upload you high score code (even if you didn't get a high score an) these rewards will synchronise when using the same nickname.

The person with the most unlocked rewards on January 1st, 2013 will be the winner.

Scoring:

Rewards can be found in the following 6 games: AstroDodge (2011), Mayhem (2011), Colorclash (2012) , Mage: The Enchanted Crystals (2012) and the soon to be released Cavity (Q3-2012) and Stairrunner (Q4-2012). These games consist of bronze, silver and gold rewards. You can view all the rewards and their descriptions for each videopac/o2 game here: http://www.revival-studios.com/highscores/?consoleid=4&gameid=1

The following points are given to each reward:

- bronze: 1 point

- silver: 2 points

- gold: 6 points

On average, each game will contain 1 or 2 bronze, 1 silver and 1 gold reward. This means that even if you don't own all games, you could still win if you get a few of the more difficult 6-point gold rewards (like for example getting 1000 points in big-ship mode).

In an event of a tie, the fastest time/highest score in Mage will be decisive.

The prizes:

The are 2 prizes to be given away:

First Prize: A Collector’s Edition of Mage: The Enchanted Crystals

- Runner-up: A free copy of my Q1-2013 game

Closing date:

January 1st, 2013

A tip to get you started: To unlock the easter eggs in AstroDodge and Mayhem: You have to hold a specific key during the splashscreen until the titlescreen pops up.

GOOD LUCK!

[Videopac/Odyssey 2] - The Videopac/Odyssey2 Loyalty Program

Since the release of my videopac/odyssey2 stuff and more recently my home computer efforts, I have received lots a good feedback and support by retro-enthusiasts like yourself. By buying my games, you are allowing me to create new games for classic game systems (both popular and niche systems).

To give something back to the most loyal supporters, I am starting something called the loyalty program for the Videopac/Odyssey2 system, starting with the release of Cavity. The loyalty program will apply to anyone who owns all my previous videopac games (at the time of writing: astrododge, mayhem, colorclash and mage: the enchanted crystals), and will give you the following benefits:

- Discounts on upcoming videopac/odyssey2 games (starting with cavity)

- Free goodies and/or Exclusive items

The loyalty program only applies to my videopac/odyssey2 work, but I might extend it to other platforms as well in the future.

[8-Bit Home Computers] - Commodore and more...

With the first VIC-20 game released, and my second VIC-20 game coming out in November, I am currently looking into the other Commodore machines like the Commodore PET, Commodore 16 and Commodore 64. I will definitely have more Commodore news for you guys in the following months.

Additionally I am also looking into the Apple-II and Amstrad CPC, although I won't expect a release on these systems before 2013.

[Sega SG-1000 / MSX / Colecovision] - Next month...

Still in progress, I hope to set up a few webpages for the first game on these platforms soon, so we will have something to talk about in next month’s newsletter.

[Social media] Revival Studios on Twitter

For those that haven't checked it out yet: You can join me on Twitter (@revival_studios) for more day-to-day updates and previews of upcoming stuff. You can also join my Facebook, although I don't use Facebook actively (it just redirects to my twitter feed).

Here are the links:

- Twitter (@revival_studios) - https://twitter.com/#!/revival_studios

- YouTube channel - http://www.youtube.com/user/revivalstudios

- Pinterest - http://pinterest.com/revivalstudios/

In Closing

That's it for now! Thanks to everyone who has supported my efforts and provided feedback.

If you have any suggestions or remarks (positive or negative), don't hesitate to email me.

Kind regards,

Martijn / Revival Studios

AmigaOS 4 News: A Frog Game

News from imagodespira

Our next little game, A Frog Game, is ready for download!

Features:

- hardware accelerated graphics up to 1920x1080 Pixels, 32Bit (Sam440/733 + Radeon 9250 -> ca. 150FPS at1280x1024)

- 1 player mode vs. computer

- 2 player mode

- Online High score (http://www.amiboing.de)

- Online Awards

- self made Soundtrack :)

- hand drawn graphics

You can find the full Version for 5,- Euros and a free Trial Version here:

http://www.amiboing.de/gameDetail.php?id=4

V.A.M.P. Player 0.86 Available

The V.A.M.P. player is available for download for AmigaOS4, MorphOS and Windows in its site: www.vamp.es This multimedia player is programmed with Hollywood and it is with part of source code from Andreas Falkenhahn examples to VideoPlayer and AnimPlayer, I make this little tool to demonstrate the multimedia options of this programming language it isn't a substitute of other best video players but almost.

Also this a little tool to test the video formats supported for Hollywood.

V.A.M.P. display the next multimedia formats currently:

- Amiga Anim formats: anim, anim5, ham6, ham8 (Not Available for x64).

- MovieSetter movies format. (Not Available for x64).

- Gif anims.

- Show pictures: jpg, png, gif, lbm, bmp, svg.

- Video formats: cdxl, ogg, avi, mov, mpeg, mpg, wmv, flv, mp4, DivX, mkv.

- Play music & sound files: mp3, mod, 8svx, 16sv, iff, wav, wave, riff, ogg.

FastATA 4000 MK-VI CF/SATA: new BootROM ver. 7.0

ELBOX COMPUTER is pleased to announce that the FastATA 4000 MK-VI CF/SATA controllers are now shipped with the new BootROM (ver.7.0). New BootROM was developed in order to ensure full compatibility with AmigaOS 4.1.

About FastATA 4000 MK-VI CF/SATA

With the FastATA 4000 MK-VI CF/SATA controller you can now take advantage of the latest low-cost, high-capacity and fast SATA/ATA/EIDE devices like hard drives, Solid State drives (SSD), Compact Flash cards, DVD drives, CD-RW drives, CD-ROM drives, ZIP drives, etc.

The FastATA 4000 MK-VI CF/SATA is designed to simultaneously use up to four devices: one Compact Flash card, one SATA drive and two to four PATA devices. The number of simultaneously used Compact Flash cards or SATA drives may be increased with additional adapters up to the total number of all connected devices of four.

Features:

- Fast transfer rate of up to 16.6MB/s

- Supports PIO-0, PIO-3, PIO-4 and PIO-5 modes

- Compatible with ATA 33/66/100/133 and SATA devices

- Adds two buffered and terminated ports for 4 devices

- LBA 48 support in the on-board BootROM (support of drives over 128GB)

- Automatically configured devices

- Compatibility with OS3.x and OS4.x

- Boots from any attached HDD, SSD, CompactFlash, ZIP or LS-120

Package contents:

- Fast ATA 4000 MK-VI CF/SATA Zorro III card with SATA and CompactFlash adapters

- Floppy disk with AllegroCDFS, FastATA software pack and User's Manual

- 46-cm 80-wire ATA-66/100/133 cable

For more info, see:

FastATA 4000 MK-VI CF/SATA page http://eu-shop.elbox.com/cgibin/shop?info=410F4

for customers from the European Union,

FastATA 4000 MK-VI CF/SATA page http://shop.elbox.com/cgibin/shop?info=410F4

for customers from other countries.

RGCD News

Should have been in last months issue realy but missed dropping it in!

RGCD Newsletter October 2012

With just a few days left before the end of the month, retro-gaming chaos at RGCD Towers has meant that October's Newsletter nearly didn't happen! But here we are at last with a brief update on the months three new C64 cartridge releases, announcements and even some exclusive trivia for our subscribers!

Get 'Em DX Available! (C64)

A tribute to Nyarlu Labs' Forget Me Not, Georg Rottensteiner's Get 'Em DX is a procedurally generated maze shmup that plays like Pac Man with guns (and optionally with two players). The goal of each procedurally generated level is to eat all the crosses/dots, grab the key and head for the exit whilst collecting power-ups and merrily blasting away anything that gets in your way.

Originally released as Get 'Em back at the end of 2011 as an entry in RGCD's C64 16KB Cartridge Competition, everyone who played this great little game saw the promise behind the crude presentation. With a little encouragement and extra help from Sean and Ilija, Georg took the game back to the studio. Now, almost a year later, the final 'DX' version has finally arrived!

Featuring graphics/box design by iLKke and music by Sean Connolly, Get 'Em DX is both NTSC and PAL compatible, and its joystick-only control means that it is even playable on the Commodore 64 GS console. The cartridge version of the game comes in a purple cartridge shell complete with a printed manual and seven bonus stickers!

The cartridge version is available in two packaging types, a standard card carton and a more expensive 'deluxe version' that comes in a plastic case (a Universal Game Case with a specially cut foam insert to hold the cartridge as shown below). The standard version is priced at £20 inclusive of UK/Europe shipping, and £21 for the rest of the world, whereas the deluxe version costs £25 (UK/Europe) and £27 (rest of world). Psytronik Software are also selling the game on disk and tape for £3.99/£6.99 respectively (plus shipping).

Oh, and if that doesn't satisfy your Get 'Em DX fix, you can even play it as a free download for Manomio's C64 iPhone/iPad app!

The limited single-player version of Get 'Em DX is available for FREE download, or you can buy the full two-player game on cartridge from our shop (or the tape/disk version from Psytronik Software.

Fortress of Narzod Cartridge Available! (C64)

Originally released at Breakpoint 2009, TRSI's C64 conversion of this Vectrex exclusive title remains one of the highest scoring games on the Commodore Scene Database - and for good reason too. Fortress of Narzod is an amazing little vector-based shmup that is quite unlike anything else on the C64, with its bizarre array of enemies, bullet-ricocheting blast 'em up action and unique visual style.

Fortress of Narzod utilises the border areas of the screen to maximise the play area and the excellent 8580 soundtrack by Linus really takes this production to the next level. The game requires no keyboard input (even the high score table is controlled via the joystick) so it will work on the C64GS, but unfortunately the full-screen action comes at a cost of not running on NTSC machines (sorry!).

Through negotiating with Jay Smith of Smith Engineering/Western Technologies (via his son Spencer), RGCD finally have permission to sell the Commodore conversion of this classic game from our shop on physical C64 cartridge.

The snow-white cartridge is packaged in a box designed by Kay Failla of BitFellas and comes complete with a printed manual. Fortress of Narzod is priced at £20 inclusive of UK/Europe shipping, and £21 for the rest of the world.

Fortress of Narzod is available for FREE download, or to buy on cartridge from our shop at £20/£21 including shipping (Europe/Rest of World).

Space Lords "Centaurus" Available (C64)

It's taken almost a whole year since their first appearance, but the Space Lords have finally returned in this exclusive C64 remix of the classic Atari 2600/Coin-Op Warlords game! Initially released as one of the higher scoring entries in 2011's C64 16KB Cartridge Competition, ALeX, Retrofan and Taxim from P1X3L.net are proud to present the 'Centaurus' version of the game on a 16KB cartridge courtesy of RGCD.

Complete with a space-freighter load of aesthetic and gameplay improvements since the release of the free Andromeda and Andromeda II builds, Space Lords is a single-to-four-player space-station smashing battle-game that supports a huge variety of controllers (joysticks, mice, paddles, keyboard and the Protovision 4-Player adapter) and includes several game modes for either tournaments or single play sessions.

NTSC and PAL compatible, the cartridge version of the game comes in a classic black cartridge shell complete with a printed manual and a vinyl Space Lords sticker. The cartridge version is available in two packaging types, a standard card carton and a more expensive 'deluxe version' that comes in a plastic case (a Universal Game Case with a specially cut foam insert to hold the cartridge as shown below). The standard version is priced at £20 inclusive of UK/Europe shipping, and £21 for the rest of the world, whereas the deluxe version costs £25 (UK/Europe) and £27 (rest of world).

There is also the option of buying a download of the game in *.PRG and *.CRT format (complete with English and German manual texts) for the considerably lower price of £2. This will also be sent out to any customers who buy either cartridge version.

Space Lords 'Centaurus' is available for to buy as a download for £2, or on cartridge from our shop at £20/£21 (standard) / £25/£27 (deluxe) including shipping (Europe/Rest of World).

RGCD & Vlambeer to Release C64 Conversion of Super Crate Box!

Since the initial announcement of Paul Koller's official C64 port of Vlambeer's Super Crate Box a couple of weeks ago there's been a whole lot of questions and confusion on the internet regarding the project. This short preview piece will hopefully address at least some of the more bizarre questions that have been thrown our way over the past few days. A proper website will follow soon over at www.superbreadbox.com as we approach the first release date.

Secret Game Hidden on the Greenrunner/Redrunner/Retroskoi+ Cartridge!

Did you know that here at RGCD we like to occasionally include little hidden extras on our game cartridges? There was the undocumented cartridge-exclusive 'PETSCII' mode in Blok Copy mentioned on our Facebook page a few months back, but Aleksi Eeben surpassed this recently by secretly stashing a whole extra game on the Greenrunner/Redrunner/Retroskoi+ cartridge! To load Venus Express (PAL only) from the main menu, hold down and left on the joystick and press fire.

There will be more little surprises hidden on future cartridges - see if you can find them before they're announced! :)

Calling All Bloggers/Reviewers!

So, you've got a blog, YouTube channel, or maybe write for a magazine? Would you like us to mail you FREE review copies of our game cartridges prior to release? You would? Well, it just so happens that we are currently looking to expand the number of 'press' cartridges we send out, so if you'd like to get involved drop us a line introducing yourself, your site/channel/mag and give an indication of your current readership. Obviously we can't give cartridges away to everyone, but we will take every request into careful consideration.

Forthcoming Releases!

Finally, you might be interested to hear about these forthcoming releases from RGCD:

- Sub Hunter (64KB C64 Cartridge) (Mid November 2012)

- Trance Sector (64KB C64 Cartridge) (December 2012)

- Woolly Jumper / Sheepoid DX (64KB C64 Cartridge) (TBA)

- Spike / Minestorm (64KB C64 Cartridge) (TBA)

More game release dates will be confirmed soon!

Thanks for reading!

James Monkman / Heavy Stylus

Sketchblock Version 1.7 Relased For Amiga OS

This the seventh release of the maturing paint package for AmigaOS called SketchBlock.

SketchBlock supports layered images with variable opacity, and supports graphics tablets.

Thanks to "TommySammy" for the icon set and Martin "Mason" Merz for the fantastic AISS toolbar image package

Requirements

- AmigaOS4.1 Update 4

- AISS 4.12

- PROACTION 1.4 - for script GUIs

- PIL 1.17 - for export script

Download

http://os4depot.net/?function=showfile&file=graphics/edit/sketchblock.lha

AmigaOS: GadToolsBox 3 Has Been Open Sourced

https://github.com/thom-ek/GadToolsBox

GadToolsBox v3 is a powerful GUI generator for AmigaOS. It uses gadtools.library and some other external gadgets. With GTB v3 You can highly expand your GUI with a lot of features like toolbars, tree list views, page gadgets, clipboards. GTB v3 is something like resource editor, You can create here almost everything using all of OS features. You can draw pictures, mouse pointers, edit locale strings, create menus, windows, toolbars, version strings and much more, everything with one program.

Generated source code is similar to very well-known source code generated by old GadToolsBox by Jaba Development. So, turning to new GTB is very easy, but programs need to be reworked (there are a new functions and there is other naming convention). Of course GTB v3 can load old resources from GadToolsBox v2 (all #?.gui files), but you cannot load GTB v1 resources.

Home Taping Is Killing Gaming

When hope taping was prevalent back in the day, many ways evolved for getting a copy of the game from a friend onto a cassette so you could have a version for free; this process was commonly known as a “pirate” copy. Completely against the law but somehow; as kids this didn’t seem to matter and what harm was it really doing to the industry especially as they were making a mint from these games?

Well many companies suffered as a result of loosing sales to these “pirate copies”, and even closed their doors due to software pirates, how could you educate children to what they were doing especially as parents were turning a blind eye (mainly due to the fact they didn’t have to buy yet another game) Some people suggested “the games are to expansive” however even Mastertronic £1.99 games were copied so this opinion wasn’t valid as surely everyone could afford a good game priced so reasonably.

Some people went further copying the games from tapes to put on disk with menu systems allowing the player to select a game. As Games developed and multi loading tape system became the norm (mainly to dissuade copiers) this sort of defeated the art to some extent, especially when they were “dumps of memory” like from Action replay cartridges that could “freeze” the game a produced a menu for what you could do like copy the memory content to tape or disk. Some coders even managed to squeeze the multi load systems into a single file (commonly known as just that single file version) obviously the skill involved wasn’t without question, just the ethics of such an act.

People copied games for fun as well! with Disk versions of many games being “cracked” where the copy protection would be removed so the game could be freely copied to another device, in fact I have some of these versions even though I purchased the full priced disk, the reason was the copy protection played havoc with the disk heads bouncing them all over the place. Some of these “cracked” versions also fixed bugs and even added enhancements to games.

So when you could buy a full priced version of a game; or just obtain a free copy, what would the potential purchaser do, sadly I think most opted for the free version! Publishers realised they needed to produce something that was touchable, they tried with adding things like posters and art and fancy cases to the games hoping buyers would purchase the game for the art, although it worked to a certain degree it never stamped out the piracy. Indeed various hardware devices were released for what the creators termed “making backup copies” of your games just in case the originals failed (of course most were used to copy games for friends),or another wordy way of saying “making pirate copies” you plugged the hardware in and could copy a new game to a blank tape

Tape Copying Device

I know a local club I populated always asked users to bring in a game and submit it to the club; then the “hackers” would work on the game for as long as the club session ran, usually about 1 to 2 hours at the end they would have “broken” or removed the copy protection and have a version of the game to hand out to all members Free of charge!

This was ok in a way as you could try the game before you bought it, although I suspect most just used this as a way to obtain free games. If anything was any good I personally would buy it; and of course if a game wasn’t any good then I would format the disk and just return it for the next game. In a way this was a good thing for me; as it meant I bought more games because I could “try before I buy” to find the titles I really wanted. The idea was later used for cover tapes where a “demo” version with limited functionality like 1 level or a time limited version was released so people could try the game for themselves. At the time I did wonder how the reviewers in the magazines came to the conclusions about the games; as some were scored very high but the games were poor. It was later in life and after talking to one said reviewer who claimed “sometimes we are so pushed for the magazine deadline; we just ring up the publisher and ask them “what’s it’s like” and for some screen shots, then write the review having never even loading the game” ! so it confirms some of my suspicions on dubious scoring. If the game was buy a large publisher who had a number of adverts of course pressure was on as that publisher could pull the lucrative adverts from the magazine.

Did copying kill gaming then?

Personally I don’t think so, as a lot of people who bragged about the amount of games they had never played them and I would think would have never bought them anyway! Personally I always bought the games I wanted or thought were good as I wanted the instructions and everything that went with the game; incentives like stickers and posters of course were a must if the game was any good. I do respect that crackers liked to add extra lives and although I was never a fan of crack intros (sorry) I did appreciate the cracks to fix bugs and glitches; but really they should have been resolved before the game was issued and released for sale.

Relevant to today?

In a way the article is still relevant today and especially to commodore users. We know have what’s known as homebrew publishers, or bedroom publishers trying to sell new titles, of course you can find a cracked version of it somewhere online! although I think people have now realised that little money is to be made from selling a game this way and the publishers hope to just break even. I think the Commodore community as a whole respects the effort put in. (at least I hope so) so these cracks are few and far between and do seem to be frowned on by the community as a whole! Indeed some publishers after a couple of years will offer the games as a free download anyway.

I do appreciate the testers or trial versions of the game and think this was a good way forward so people can try before they buy. I liked the Shareware model of publishing.

To be honest who really want to insist “copyright” on a game that’s over 20 years old, and if you can’t buy the game legally anymore as in the case with Commodore titles from years ago what options do you have but to download a copy or pray for eBay or a car boot sale to turn one up; and hope it still loads!

Of course the people selling compilations of cracked software even to this day are not the most loved of people in the world, yes they are still being sold on eBay etc. ...

How many sales were lost to pirates, who knows! (none were lost to me though)

Computers For The Masses Not Just The Classes

Recent forums have been looking into the possibilities of using the Commodore 64 as a teaching aid for children; indeed many users are saying they do now use their old computers to teach children the basics. Many people in the computing industry today are where they are because of the home computing boom of the 80`s.

Although it’s fair to say that any of the 8 bit systems will have been a building block for many web designers and programmers or even hardware designers, and this text will be looking at them all as a whole! Although you have to bear in mind this is a Commodore magazine so some bias may be formed as I am completely commodore bent (hmm that doesn’t sound right does it... well you know what I mean )

Too much internet

Look at some of the children today growing up with the Tablets and mobile phones that in the 80`s many would have thought science fiction, most children have some form of computer at home and for my child using the internet seems to be a must these days just to do homework. Personally I think we need a good mix of imaginative play, building towers, logic, computers, playing with figures (man dolls and girl dolls) and of course chasing people around in some loose sporting activity, like tag or off ground tig, and working as a team (teachers don’t quote me)

The teachings of old

So how can an old 8 bit system teach children anything because; don’t you need internet access and the latest processor and 8gb of memory to actually do anything worthwhile. Well no! not really, it seems kids today are more users than anything else, most have little knowledge about how a computer works or even that they need software loading. I know at work we have been told “this system is to old because it doesn’t have xyz software on it and will need replacing”, (of course xyz software just needs installing) but for some reason they seem to think the machines are supplied with all the software ready to run.

I know many web designer who are professionals i.e. earn a living from web design; and they don’t know the first thing about html code, true you can point, click to create websites but you surely need some understanding of what is happening in the background to make you sites better ;and just to obtain general knowledge about what goes on “under the hood” or to make your page compatible with as many browsers as possible.

Enter then the 8 bit system

Children should be taught about memory and how to program, the very basics like printing your name on screen, having the computer prompt for input; and then output the results, changing the screen colours and of course on the commodore Poking a value then Peeking at the result. Many would say basic is dead but I disagree with that statement, especially for primary children, more it’s the logic that goes into the formation of an application than the programming language.

Wont children get board

No!

How long did you play around with your 8 bit machine? After school in the holidays and at weekend ,and being dragged down for tea and supper then being forced off the machine to go to bed. Its endless fun seeing your name scroll down the screen; how do you make it move diagonally what about making it go left to the screen edge then go back to the right how do you make it scroll down then up! How do you make it flash in different colours or make the screen change when the text hits the screen edge?

Of course even the actual art of loading a program into memory and starting it can be a challenge to a young mind, but it does get the concepts across about memory and locations especially when the program needs to be run by a SYS command, connecting the various parts together, monitor, printer and disk drive and making text appear on a printer and not on the screen can also be fun. I do think all this is lost with children just dumped in front of a tablet or computer and shown how to click on things; they don’t seem to know where to look when things don’t work.

I remember playing games as a child that were little more than commodore graphics cobbled together with BASIC; the thing is this doesn’t matter; and a good idea or concept can overcome crude graphics and sounds, children also don’t seem to be bothered about “realistic graphics” but more the excitement of the game, remember at Christmas when your child spent more time playing with the box`s than the actual presents, heck a box can be anything; a secret lab, a space ship, an office block, a bank or even a cardboard box!

Work

What I do find interesting is the number of people we have had at work for “work experience” who actually haven’t heard of MS-DOS or DOS and have only seen GUI or graphical user interfaces; some are aware of Linux and Unix but this isn’t the general knowledge of the students we have received.

I even spoke to one teacher of Information Technology (although he didn’t call it that) who said they were told to drop dos from the curriculum because it’s not relevant to today’s society and needs. Well I work for a large manufacturing company and we have a number of Dos machines that are needed for the business to run, sometimes it’s actually quicker to drop to a dos box on a windows system and issue commands via the command line interface (dos) or run a created Batch file than to hunt for icons and click on things.

We have even had potential web developers on work experience that didn’t know that Html is a programming language! and that without the editor they used at school couldn’t even create a basic webpage! One thing about programming on an 8bit system is Memory and resources; as they are fixed you need to be more efficient and creative in your programming, not just suggest more memory and a faster processor, programming for 8 bit systems is a real art form, some of the demos and games that were and are still created are amazing, and of course this teaches you about being proficient and to utilise resources to the full.

Back to today

So is learning on an 8bit system relevant today,

Yes of course as this will teach children the basics of computing in a world where people use computer programs I think we are losing potential talent; as we don’t teach the basics anymore. Linux is still relevant and picking up the pace more and more, true it has a GUI now but to get the most from the system you need to use the command shell.

If nothing else 8 bit systems offer immense fun

Heck I still have great enjoyment trying to figure things out, and when you actually get a program to work Man you can really bore the pants of someone talking about how you did it!

Some ideas for inspiration to feed a young mind

The user guide is a must

http://www.lemon64.com/manual/

as could be the programmers reference guide

http://www.devili.iki.fi/Computers/Commodore/C64/Programmers_Reference/front_cover.html

Kids and the Commodore 64

http://www.commodore128.org/Library/Commodore%2064%20Books/Kids_and_the_Commodore_64.rar

Gortek and the Microchips

http://www.bombjack.org/commodore/books.htm

Some of note for good starters are

Commodore 64 Introduction to BASIC Part 1

and

Commodore 64 Introduction to BASIC Part 2

Of course Gortek was available for both the C64 and the Vic and teaches children in a “child friendly way”

http://www.gamebase64.com/game...18&h=0

the VIC manual is available from here

http://www.replacementdocs.com/download.php?view.4513

and of course the Step by step range of programming books

You may also like this

Apple I BASIC as a Mac OS X Scripting Language

http://www.pagetable.com/?p=35

Commodore BASIC as a Scripting Language for UNIX and Windows – now Open Source

http://www.pagetable.com/?p=48

And some Commodore programming languages with details and downloads

http://commodore64.wikispaces.com/Programming+languages

Amongst the many others you can find!

Review: Mayhem

By Commodore Free

Another revival studio release for the unexpanded Vic 20 and I can hardly wait to get the thing loaded after the other game review Avalanche (see commodore free issue 65) I was expecting something of the same quality. Did I find it....?

Loading the game we are presented with a basic title screen

Not many options just to press Fire

While it may not look like much! The game does have some plus point

Your job is to run around and collect the gold coins the other objects you must avoid as they will kill you

As you collect coins the game becomes harder as more and more blobs appear to kill you; the aim of the game is to collect as many gold coins as possible, you can move your man with the aid of the joystick in any direction. That’s about it in a nutshell

The game however is very fluid and amazingly fast; as more things appear the game wasn’t slowing down, one thing missing though is a high score screen, when you die you are presented with your score and then it goes back to the title screen. So you don’t get to see a High score xxx or a list of high scorers.

No music plays again on this it’s just spot effects from the coins although the sounds are well created I would have liked some Vic music

Scores

Graphics

6/10

Sound

6/10

Gameplay

7/10

Overall

6 /10

Review: Dream

For The Unexpanded VIC20

By Commodore Free

Jeff from Denial creates some great game written entirely in BASIC

Here is a comment from him

“Everything I make is entirely in BASIC. I have an affinity for the type-in game one might see in 80s magazines, so all of my games can be typed in.

With Dream, the struggle is for money (diamonds) and love (hearts). It's sort of a heavy-handed "message." That's why there are two scores and a "finale". Get it? Sometimes I try to have a point to my games. haha “

Jeff

Ok the download is available from the denial website here is the link

http://www.sleepingelephant.com/denial/Dream.zip

A discussion about the game is available here

http://sleepingelephant.com/ipw-web/bulletin/bb/viewtopic.php?p=64317

Loading the game we see a title screen

Doesn’t look much but the little man who looks like a cassette is snoring zzzzzzzz's and these are animated, remember this game is written in BASIC !

With only one option to “PRESS START” I hit the fire button

The idea is to collect as many diamonds and hearts as you can before the game ends; you can move multidirectional using the joystick, what I couldn’t believe is the speed at which the game plays, and the responsiveness of the controls, ok it’s got some of basics jerkiness and not fluidly smooth as a machine code program would be; but the game doesn’t really suffer from this, it actually adds to the quirkiness of the game. The graphics are functional but the little man is animated well for the block he is; or cassette (if you like)

The game could do with a high score and in my personal opinion I would have had the hearts to extend the timer in the game not just add to the players points but it’s a great effort. I need to see out more of these games it really took me back to the type in listings I fought with when I first received my original Vic (all those years ago) I think it just needs a couple of enhancements as mentioned above.

Scores

Graphics

5/10
Nice Animation On The Main Character

Sound

5/10

Gameplay

5/10

Overall

5/10

Impressive for a game written in Basic on an unexpanded Vic

Retro Derby (G & G)

17 - 18 November, 2012. Derby.

By Peter Badrick

This event was organised by Chris Snowden and Shaun Bebbington with machines and support provided by guys from The Retro Computer Museum (retrocomputermuseum.co.uk/index.php), Andy Spencer, Steve Allsopp, Stuart Shaw, Simon Hardy, Richard Gellman, James Neil Rawlins, Karl Pantling-James & Lee Hearne.

I arrived on the Saturday with my Son, Stephen. This was his first event of this nature and we’d both been looking forward to it for some time.

On arrival we met with Chris and Shaun and were introduced to other people who were there. I finally got to meet with friends in person that I’d been in touch with on Facebook for some months. Greetings to Max Hall, Jackie Mason and Barry Lendrum. After concluding some business with Max and Jackie (namely a VC-20 for Jackie and a lovely retro rotary dial phone for Max) we had a look around.

The first items that caught my eye was the little Astro Wars unit that was also making the most noise. I had one of these as a kid, along with a Galaxy Invader 100 (the white version. I now have a Galaxy Invader 1000, the yellow machine).

That certainly brought back some memories. Alongside this was the Grandstand Scramble.

I never had this unit but I did have the Pocket Scramble.

On the same table I was pleased to see the Nintendo Virtual Boy, their first stab at 3D gaming. Also headache inducing after a while and left a few people with a stiff neck lol.

Next to this was the mini MAME cabinet using an iPad. A superb little unit that faithfully reproduced the classic arcades of yesteryear. Very impressive.

There were also a few old faithful machines available, NES, SNES, Atari Jaguar, Xbox 360 (playing multiplayer Doom on this was great fun. I have a PS3 at home but have to say that the Xbox Live Arcade has far more retro goodness for you to download than the PSN. Come on Sony, get with the programme!).

Also available were the following machines:

Sinclair ZX81, Sinclair Spectrum +3, Commodore VIC-20 (I played Avenger on this, I believe this to be the best home version of Space Invaders. Ever. On any system. So there!), Commodore 64 (with Gideon’s 1541U2 of course), Commodore Amiga, Commodore Plus/4 (well, when an event is run by Chris Snowden, this is to be expected :-) ), Commodore Amiga 1200, Nintendo 64, Nintendo GameCube, Sega Master System, Sega Mega Drive, Sega Dreamcast, Atari 2600, Atari 800XL, Sony PS2, PC Engine, MB Vectrex, Dragon 32, Nintendo Wii, BBC Master and PC Engine.

Sorry if I’ve missed any systems, there really was a lot to take in and I’m glad I was able to attend both days.

However, the system that captured most of my attention was the MB Vectrex. I’d read about this machine and seen a few videos on YouTube, so was interested to see one in action. I have recently been playing a lot of Fortress of Narzod on the C64, and port of the Vectrex title and have been very impressed. However, to see it running on the Vectrex blew me away. The display is like nothing I’ve seen before. Bright, glowing lines, extremely smooth graphics and great sounds. Even without the colour overlays, this system impresses. And yes, I was on it a lot. And yes, I want one for my collection. And yes, Xmas is just around the corner... hmmm....

The way the graphics are drawn still amazes me. On the C64 version of Narzod when you move your ship forwards, the graphic is replaced by smaller and smaller versions to mimic the look of it moving away from you. On the Vectrex, it actually shrinks as it moves away, extremely smoothly with no flicker or redraw. And when your ship explodes, instead of changing to an explosion graphic, your ship actually blows into 3 pieces that are then moving and rotating independently of each other. Sounds simple, but it really does make all the difference.

A lot of the machines on display had modern devices attached to them to enable loading of games from SD or CF cards. I have one of these for my C64 (1541U+) and Spectrums (DivIDE) but was surprised to see they were also available for cartridge based systems from the Atari 2600 and the Nintendo 64!

Needless to say, I’m now on the lookout for these devices for the machines I have in my own collection! Did I mention Xmas is round the corner?

On the Sunday, due to popular request, Shaun dragged in his Commodore 128D with the SuperCPU, FD4000 drive and a copy of Metal Dust. This setup stole the show with a small crowd gathered around ooohing and ahhhing in all the right places. Sorry Nigel, but Metal Dust is a bloody good game ;-)

A big shout out must go to the guys from the Retro Computer Museum for supplying the machines and support for the whole event, it’s all the behind the scenes work that made this such a great event. Also their policy of “hands on” makes a big difference. What’s the use of showing these machines if people aren’t allowed to “experience” them? None really, I’m sure you’ll all agree. For more information, please visit retrocomputermuseum.co.uk/index.php where you can learn about their great work. Go on and donate funds or equipment while you’re there. Everyone will appreciate it ;-)

Again, thanks to Chris Snowden and Shaun Bebbington for organising the event and to all the great people I met over the weekend, Hiya! To those that didn’t come, shame on you all, you missed a great weekend.

Pete Badrick.

Review: Alien Bash 2

Flimsoft’s Premier Relase

By Commodore Free

This is the long awaited version of Flimsoft’s initial release finally arrived for me to review, after playing the preview many times available here http://csdb.dk/getinternalfile.php/107986/alien_bash_2_prw.prg

I was so keen to get this application up and running, how would it fare to the preview now it was a finalised finished version.

You are under attack from aliens, they mean to kill you! Can you help defend your planet; you must work hard to save yourself and your planet from the relentless attack waves.

Loading up then

I was sent the Tap file and a PRG, the tape version just has a scrolling message as the border flashes and a loading screen a small LOADING progress bar shows how long you need to wait but as you can see it's some time before the screen appears!

Then the game loads, the PRG once copied to a real machine just ran the game, of course the final releases will be professionally packaged and released on Tape and disk and as a digital download.

You eventually see the title screen

Without more options I pressed the fire button and was then launched straight into the game.

The game play is varied on different levels with different attacking waves, on level 1 for example you see aliens advancing towards the bottom of the screen; if they hit the screen or you then you lose a life! The aliens seem to advance at random some slowly; some are quicker and there lies a problem if you have 2 moving at the same speed on opposite sides of the screen you can only hit on and the other will then kill you. Hitting an alien reduces the alien counter in the bottom of the screen this shows how many aliens are left, if you die you are regenerated back to life and the counter continues from where you exited the game.

After loading the game I was initially disappointed as the preview had what I thought was a really good music track; the final release has changed it for what I feel is an inferior piece of Sid music, each level has a different track though. However the graphics have been much improved from the preview and on level 1 the aliens have more detail, and the animation of them have also been improved quite dramatically.

The background is quite sparse and is completely static a sort of colour bar landscape(although it does slightly vary between levels)the ship at the bottom moves only left and right and of course fires all controlled by the joystick.

On each screen you can see the number of lives left, the remaining aliens left to kill and the level number. The game is very difficult! and I can just about get to level 2 before dying, when you move to level 2 your ship is placed in the screen centre and you need to move quickly or at this location you will last seconds before you die.

As a first release from Flimsoft the game is certainly showing potential and looks and indeed feels very polished, personally I would have liked the game to be given an easy, medium and hard option or even a more sedate start. No doubt someone will finish the game without losing a life, but personally I found it far too hard.

Level 2 sees different aliens this time they are some form of ships and they move side to side these actually shoot down to you as well

So each level has different music track and attack waves to vary the game play

This is definitely one for the lads night in, I am told the more you play the easier it gets; however I didn’t find this, and had to resort to cheating to get the screen shots. After level 4 you have a guardian to kill out

Scores

Graphics

7/10

Sound

5/10

Gameplay

6/10
just to hard strangely it does have a hook

Overall

7/10

Not a bad start from Flimsoft’s launching career into publishing, I am sat here criticizing it but I keep going back over and over again! It is addictive even though it is to hard

The digital download is £1:99 so it won’t break the bank and you will be supporting another new developer for the Commodore scene, Flimsoft have other productions in the pipeline and if they match or better this quality then the excitement will be uncontainable

Flimsoft website

http://www.flimsoft.co.uk/home.html

Flimsoft demo on YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOYMzXrcLQ4

Review: Space Lords

By Commodore Free

(c) 2012 P1X3L.net

An action-packed party game in space for up to 4 players.

Code

ALeX

Graphics

Retrofan

Music

Taxim

Four Space Lords battle for supremacy in their galaxy. Everyone has a space station on the edge of the great spiral nebula. In order to protect their own stations the lords try to move their shields to reflect the glowing plasma balls which they hurl against each other. If the station is hit despite resistance individual segments will burn until it eventually provides no protection for the Lord. If a Space Lord is then hit by a plasma ball which got through the station he loses a life. The game runs until single lord remains, who thus receives the golden crown of the galaxy.

Released by Retro Gamer CD (RGCD) http://www.rgcd.co.uk/2012/10/space-lords-centaurus-available-c64.html

From the press release

remix of the classic Atari 2600/Coin-Op Warlords game! Initially released as one of the higher scoring entries in 2011's C64 16KB Cartridge Competition, ALeX, Retrofan and Taxim from P1X3L.net are proud to present the 'Centaurus' version of the game on a 16KB cartridge courtesy of RGCD.

Complete with a space-freighter load of aesthetic and gameplay improvements since the release of the free Andromeda and Andromeda II builds, Space Lords is a single-to-four-player space-station smashing battle-game that supports a huge variety of controllers (joysticks, mice, paddles, keyboard and the Protovision 4-Player adapter) and includes several game modes for either tournaments or single play sessions.

There is also the option of buying a download of the game in *.PRG and *.CRT format (complete with English and German manual texts) for the considerably lower price of £2. This will also be sent out to any customers who buy either cartridge version.

NTSC and PAL compatible, the cartridge version of the game comes in a classic black cartridge shell complete with a printed manual and a vinyl Space Lords sticker. The cartridge version is available in two packaging types, a standard card carton and a more expensive 'deluxe version' that comes in a plastic case (a Universal Game Case with a specially cut foam insert to hold the cartridge as shown below). The standard version is priced at £20 inclusive of UK/Europe shipping, and £21 for the rest of the world, whereas the deluxe version costs £25 (UK/Europe) and £27 (rest of world).

Commodore Free

This is a very classy game release!

Think of this as a progression of breakout with 4 players and you have some sort of idea how this works, you have different variations of the game

SCORE HIGH: 3 game rounds. After each completed round, a bronze, a silver and a gold crown will be distributed. Finally, the crown and the survived time are evaluated and awarded an overall winner on the podium. The round display is in the form of 3 rings on the left side. Only in this variant, points are scored and the high score is stored.

LIVE LONG: Each player has 3 lives (which are shown near the border as hearts). If a Space Lord lost a life it's taken off and his space station rebuilt, while the other players continue to play without interruption. If you have used up all 3 lives, you're ruled out. Until all players have lost (except the last) their lives, the game is over. The place on the podium shows how long a player has survived, compared to its rivals.

PLAY ONCE: Only one round with the subsequent ceremony (no points). Optimal for quick games or a competition for many players by knockout system.

Game playfield is split into 4 distant sections each section is the players ship and base this is a sort of four player version of Breakout; but you must defend your base from the onslaught of 'pong' attacks. Careful movements of your ship and deflections will slowly break down enemy bases, leaving their vital hot spot open, but be careful not to trap the “pong” ball behind your ship as you will soon destroy your base.

As seems to be the norm with current RGCD releases you have a quality package with stickers and a full instruction book, if you have some sort of obscure input controller I bet the game supports it with some of the control methods listed are keyboard, mouse, joystick ,paddles and Protovision 4 player adaptor. I am sure you can soon get 4 payers connected somehow.

Easy to pickup but yet completely difficult to master you have to deflect a ball that’s launched from the mother ship in the centre of the screen, the ball will then bounce to an opponent based on some complexities in physics of angles and velocity (gee I wish I had stayed awake now in class), the opponent must then deflect it elsewhere, like to one of the other players to stop his base being bashed, once an opponent’s base is completely bashed he is out of the game, the game then continues until only 1 person survives. With a single player the other players are by computer control, and they seem to be very good players but not overly good giving a convincing amount of gameplay, as the game progresses further mother ships appear with more balls adding to the games complexity

One of the nice features is the way the players ship moves in an arc round the base

Scores

Sound

8/10
Great Title Music But Just In Game Spot Effects

Graphics

8/10

Gameplay

9/10

Overall

8.5/10

You really need a lads night with 4 friend in and this game then begins to shine another RGCD gem for the already growing collections of great games