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TOOT BOOT posted:Dumb story: When the original Quake came out I was stuck with a 486SX so I downloaded a program that emulated a math coprocessor. 
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Apr 23, 2014 02:33
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I have been remiss in my retro computing posting as of late. I have new acquisitions to talk about soon though. Every now and then I go hunting for Atari 8 bit computer titles. Sometimes I find them in retro stores, normally just find a seller with a lot of loot and I bid low and hope for the best. (Normally this means I lose 1/2-4/5ths of my bids but I am only mostly silly.) So what have I gotten over the last few months?  And now that I have a set of paddles? I can kick some good rear end in Kaboom!
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Apr 25, 2014 10:54
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Captain Rufus posted:
Whoa, Adventure Creator! That brings back memories. No ACS, but it was lots of fun. Can't remember whether or not I had the C64 or Apple version though. Spinnaker made some good stuff--the Snooper Troops games were pretty cool too. Also, my most recent acquisition:  Always wanted one of these as a kid, but never got the chance to have one. Any goon recommendations as to what I might want to get for this thing?
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Apr 26, 2014 01:53
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Genpei Turtle posted:Whoa, Adventure Creator! That brings back memories. No ACS, but it was lots of fun. Can't remember whether or not I had the C64 or Apple version though. Spinnaker made some good stuff--the Snooper Troops games were pretty cool too. 
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Apr 26, 2014 02:12
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Genpei Turtle posted:Also, my most recent acquisition: Holy poo poo man that is an awesome setup. I had a IIGS Woz for a while but one day I turned it on and something exploded inside and then I didn't have a IIGS EDIT: We're joystick buddies! I hate that thing though, it would be nice if button 0 was one of the face buttons instead of 0 being on the stick and both face buttons being 1. EDIT2: pinballin'  Somehow this manages to be better than the awful Spidersoft Pinball Mania on the Amiga, and has an excuse for not having flipper noises. I got this in a Broderbund double pack with Choplifter and both are super fun.  I've been reliving school memories with Car Builder and Print Shop, I have Dazzle Draw and Carmen Sandiego on the way. Still on the lookout for Oregon Trail and Lode Runner among other things. I'd like to get a mouse card and Super Serial card/ImageWriter II for printing out Print Shop stuff. Also still on the lookout for Wilderness, which seems to be impossible to find  d0s fucked around with this message at 04:08 on Apr 26, 2014 |
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Apr 26, 2014 03:30
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d0s posted:Holy poo poo man that is an awesome setup. I had a IIGS Woz for a while but one day I turned it on and something exploded inside and then I didn't have a IIGS I don't think we're joystick buddies since apparently my joystick buttons are in reverse to yours. Also the left face button is broken. It works, but sometimes the button just dives into the body of the joystick and doesn't want to come back out. quote:I've been reliving school memories with Car Builder and Print Shop, I have Dazzle Draw and Carmen Sandiego on the way. Still on the lookout for Oregon Trail and Lode Runner among other things. I'd like to get a mouse card and Super Serial card/ImageWriter II for printing out Print Shop stuff. Also still on the lookout for Wilderness, which seems to be impossible to find Early Broderbund stuff was really awesome. Lode Runner and Drol were my favorites. I wouldn't kill yourself looking for Wilderness, and if worse comes to worse I think it's on Underdogs in the DOS version. (though the CGA version looks worse since the trees are purple instead of green) It's also a very cerebral game; I don't really think it's for everyone. Being one of those education games, it's pretty rare.
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Apr 26, 2014 04:27
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If you have a IIGS you need Zany Golf. Fantastically fun game with great music and graphics for the IIGS. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNISV7uLLc8
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Apr 26, 2014 08:36
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Genpei Turtle posted:I don't think we're joystick buddies since apparently my joystick buttons are in reverse to yours. Weird, is yours a Suncom TAC-1? Genpei Turtle posted:It's also a very cerebral game; I don't really think it's for everyone. Being one of those education games, it's pretty rare. I normally don't really like slow CRPG/adventure stuff but that's because I just can't stand Dungeons & Dragons/generic fantasy or the specific brand of humor in the most popular (LucasArts) adventure games (I'M SORRY), so spending a lot of time and effort in those worlds is totally unappealing to me. Something like Wilderness is right up my alley though, ever since you posted about it I've been dying to try it! I also want to play some of the less fantasyish text adventures like A Mind Forever Voyaging, etc.
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Apr 26, 2014 09:01
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Genpei Turtle posted:Whoa, Adventure Creator! That brings back memories. No ACS, but it was lots of fun. Can't remember whether or not I had the C64 or Apple version though. Spinnaker made some good stuff--the Snooper Troops games were pretty cool too. I am on the iPad till Monday so I can't give a pro link. But like that other dude I too am irritated about best version of Ultima 1. I even have Burger Becky H. On my Facebook friends list. Even with the odd friendly pestering she doesn't seem to want to help us peeps out in getting it. (She just talks about food and trans issues. And new version of Battle Chess. Blah.) But Arkanoid is tight on it, and Thexder sounds like heaven. And has a continue mode. Doesn't look as good as Tandy 1000 version but sounds better and you might almost complete it. Both Bard's Tale ports are sweet though honestly Silversword on iOS is to old Bts what Tale of the Forsaken Land on the Ps2 is to the original 5 Wizardries. The dream PERFECTED. Almost. A IIGS isn't really a must get system unless you are an Apple 2 fan honestly. But if you are it or a IIC+ are probably your best system choices. Also the Amiga has the best version of Adventure Construction Set. It enrages me nobody has made an RPG maker even remotely as versatile yet still easy to make adventures for to match it.
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Apr 26, 2014 09:55
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Captain Rufus posted:So what have I gotten over the last few months? Any chance you could write some of your thoughts about Field of Fire?
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Apr 26, 2014 10:11
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An IIGS! I loved that computer and miss mine. I'd recommend Roadwar 2000 if you are into strategy games. I also recommend Tetris because well, it's Tetris. The Bard's Tale games get the best ports on IIGS, though the third game lacks an IIGS version and you'll have to settle for IIc version. I used my IIGS up until high school, where it had to be thrown out due to the monitor getting too burned in. I got an old Packard Bell, the one with the Navigator shell package, and used that sucker until college, when I started to become much interested in PC gaming and playing more modern games. I used to play a lot of old DOS and Win9x games before finally having an up to date PC. Stonekeep and World of Xeen were good, as well as the old Fallouts.
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Apr 26, 2014 13:37
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Hob_Gadling posted:Any chance you could write some of your thoughts about Field of Fire? Once I get around to playing it. So many projects, so little time. I have a couple more A8 bit titles on the way here too. Been buying so much lately I think I need to slow down a bit, get some more organizer items, and pay a little home improvement things. Sure I am paying bills like a goddamned boss and all but I need to try to properly enjoy what I already have in my various nerdy interests. Problem is every time I go to Atarimania or whatnot I just see more STUFF I want. But I'll try to check the game out ASAP . Looks a bit like a Squad Leader styled game and I likes me some Squad Leader. Edit: gonna do some laundry before work. Seems like a good time to read the manual even if I should be reading the Warmachine rule book instead. Might even have some time to test it out. Also I would love to hear more about those Roadwar games. Always wanted then as a teenager but never got around to it. Be nice to know if I should hunt them down even if I just play em in an emulator. Captain Rufus fucked around with this message at 22:13 on Apr 26, 2014 |
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Apr 26, 2014 21:21
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d0s posted:Weird, is yours a Suncom TAC-1? It's a Suncom something. On further inspection there's a little switch on the bottom that lets you swap which buttons are 0 and 1 so maybe it is the same? Check yours, is that there? Also, for less fantasyish text adventures, Deadline, a mystery, is one of my favorites. Planetfall and Starcross are really good Sci-fi titles, and the aforementioned Suspended as well. I also have a fondness for Infidel, which is sort of an "archaeologist exploring buried pyramid" game. Captain Rufus posted:Both Bard's Tale ports are sweet though honestly Silversword on iOS is to old Bts what Tale of the Forsaken Land on the Ps2 is to the original 5 Wizardries. The dream PERFECTED. Almost. Heresy! Comparing that bastardized crossbreed of JRPG and Wizardry to the originals! I kid, sort of. Wizardry Busin and its prequel, Busin 0 (which is possibly my favorite PS2 RPG ever) are fantastic games but they're really different in formula from the classics. Also for some reason I just can't get into Silversword the same way I did with Bard's Tale. I dunno why though, since the only real complaints I have is that the gameplay is sluggish and the art is hilariously bad. Starhawk64 posted:An IIGS! I loved that computer and miss mine. I'd recommend Roadwar 2000 if you are into strategy games. I also recommend Tetris because well, it's Tetris. The Bard's Tale games get the best ports on IIGS, though the third game lacks an IIGS version and you'll have to settle for IIc version. I consider that a plus, since Bard's Tale 3 was a terrible game. I'll definitely look into Roadwar 2000 though.
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Apr 27, 2014 00:13
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Seeing as we have a few people familiar with Apple IIs here, I'm wondering if anyone recognises a game from my dusty memory: It was a single screen with a border around it, and you were a spider that could surround things with web and then eat them. If you didn't get to them in time they would change into flying things that were harder to kill. One thing that I definitely recall was when you cleared a screen a bug (you? A fly?) would zip around the screen and spell a word cursively congratulating you. The one I recall is "Spiffy", because that's the only time I've seen that word used in a game. I've looked through lists of Apple II games looking at all the bug-sounding ones and nothing comes close. A friend in high-school back in the 80s had the original, and that was strange enough for us little pirates, and we could never defeat the copy protection. Or he never let us try, I'm a little hazy on that.
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Apr 27, 2014 01:48
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Genpei Turtle posted:It's a Suncom something. On further inspection there's a little switch on the bottom that lets you swap which buttons are 0 and 1 so maybe it is the same? Check yours, is that there? Naw, mine only has a switch for Apple/IBM. Oh well! EDIT: I do love the coiled cord of these things and wish this was done in more computer joysticks. The boxy shape of the stick itself is weird at first but ends up kinda cool because lots of A// stuff lets you use the stick as a mouse since not everyone had a mouse card and this is my situation now, the shape makes it easier to use like that. Aside from the inability to change the button placement and the bad default (on mine) it's a high quality professional feeling peripheral that's very suited to the Apple II. EDIT2: Did some research, mine is a TAC-1, Yours is a TAC-1+. I just found a nice example of a 1+ one eBay for $17, so now we really are joystick buddies. Gonna put my TAC-1 up for sale once I get the 1+ if anyone here wants to call dibs I'm, looking for $15 shipped which is very cheap for a perfectly working A// stick (as long as you can get past the main fire button being on the stick itself, I can't because  but it's really not some horrible thing).
d0s fucked around with this message at 04:50 on Apr 27, 2014 |
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Apr 27, 2014 04:22
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TOOT BOOT posted:Dumb story: When the original Quake came out I was stuck with a 486SX so I downloaded a program that emulated a math coprocessor. My first PC-compatible computer was an 8088 (not 86) with a Hercules graphics card that was longer than my forearm. Upgrading to VGA would have cost probably a grand (though Dad did do it after a while), so I made do with roguelikes and games that would play relatively nicely with this 'simCGA' TSR program. And by 'relatively' I mean crazy amounts of horizontal tearing on anything that was animated. But it worked, and I'm impressed by that to this day.
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Apr 27, 2014 04:43
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K-Razy Shoot Out was, along with K-Razy Antiks, why I thought K-Byte Software was the COOLEST COMPANY when I was like 5 or whatever. Of course then I eventually realized those games were just basically copies of more famous titles but you know what, they were still fun. And what the hell is Adventure Creator?! TO THE INTERNET Also hell yes Genpei Turtle with Wasteland on original hardware. I mean, I play Wasteland on my P/166 with MS-DOS, but somehow taking a machine that once ran Windows 95 and downgrading it is only 1/10th as cool as what you are doing. Bieeardo posted:My first PC-compatible computer was an 8088 (not 86) with a Hercules graphics card that was longer than my forearm. Upgrading to VGA would have cost probably a grand (though Dad did do it after a while), so I made do with roguelikes and games that would play relatively nicely with this 'simCGA' TSR program. And by 'relatively' I mean crazy amounts of horizontal tearing on anything that was animated. But it worked, and I'm impressed by that to this day. 
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Apr 27, 2014 17:53
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Couple of things I suggest for your Apple IIGS. First get ADTPro from here http://adtpro.sourceforge.net/ You can build your own transfer cable if you have any experience with altering pin-outs Second, by hook or crook get yourself one of these http://www.reactivemicro.com/product_info.php?products_id=34 (I have 1 for my Rom1 and 1 for my Rom3 IIGS). You can use Ciderpress to move IIGS files from your PC to the Flash Card without any special drivers. With those 2 items you can easily transfer the myriad of resources that Apple II enthusiasts have put together. There are even images of entire hard drives full of IIGS software. As for IIGS specific software, for RPGs Dungeon Master was pretty drat good. If you decide to play Bards Tale for the IIGS, make sure you tell the Temple of the Mad Dog BURGER. Alien Mind was a pretty difficult top-down shooter, as was Xenocide. Neuromancer was fun as well, as long as you don't mind them being a bit liberal with the plot line. Pirates! is always a good classic for some swashbuckling action.
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Apr 28, 2014 15:13
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Dual wielding sound cards was a total success, when it's supported the GUS absolutely destroys the SB. I love this thing!
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Apr 29, 2014 02:25
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You sir are correct! Retro Computing: Why Bother? Atari 8 Bit Update 1 It has been a while since I last did some Atari 8 bit computer fun hasn't it? Well, in between seeing horrible things on https://www.somethingawful.com and working I have finally gotten around to getting a few more goodies over the last few months. (And losing a lot of bids because I both lowball things as a cheapskate with a sense of self loathing and an understanding I have too much stuff already and really need to lower my purchasing even if I am paying off bills well ahead of schedule like a boss. Oh yeah, and last 10 second snipers. Lots of sniping.) Over the next few weeks as I have time and desire I am gonna show my recent pickups and even take a few pictures describing them and my thoughts. Just for fun, you know? PLAY THE GAMES. Don't hoard. Don't get them graded. They are meant to be played and enjoyed. (Even if I still haven't taken Mail Order Monsters out of its wrapper. It just feels bad. I mean I will but I dunno.)  Most of my haul from the last few months. Necromancer is sealed so when I open it I am destroying yet more collectible collectibleness I got cheaper than loose copies go for anyhow. Adventure Creator is a game creation tool I had back on my C64 so I kind of wanted it again. I had played Jungle Hunt on my friend's C64 as a kid that was also then a cartridge. Mountain King I somehow had as a kid on the Atari 2600 but had no idea what I was doing. (Glad to have it with manual as it is.. complicated.) Kaboom! is something I am very happy to have as I have finally gotten my own set of Paddle controllers and now have it to play with them! K-Razy Shoot-Out is a nifty Berzerk clone. Field of Fire is both another SSI game which makes it a want, and its a Squad level strategy wargame which is kind of my jam. The most I paid for any of these was 15 bucks for Necromancer. It, Adventure Creator, Mountain King w Manual, and Kaboom! were from one seller. I bid on more stuff, some of which he relisted and I got sniped on most of it, though I WILL have two more loose but with manual cartridges to go with these titles.  First I plug in my untested paddles. For those not in the know, Atari paddle controllers were 2 controllers to a single DB9 socket. Which is why the old 2600 had some of the first 4 player games on a programmable game console. (And the Atari 8 bit computers originally came with 4 DB9 ports. I am unaware of any 8 player games sadly. Not that in this day and age I could get people to even try games on a computer from the late 70s.) Yes it is sitting on top of my NES Advantage joystick. Both could use a good cleaning. Its amazing the kind of mung a 12+ megapixel camera can pick up! Also the paddles still work after however long they were owned by whomever then ending up in a Connecticut retro games store. They do need a little refurbishing to deal with the "jitters" paddles sometimes get as the years go on. LET US KABOOM!  The game in motion which is the only way to get a shot as it has no pause function. In Kaboom you have to stop the Mad Bomber above from having his old timey bombs hit the ground. In between waves you get to rest until you press the fire button. Every 1000 points you get another bucket down at the bottom. To make your life harder, when you miss a bomb, the bottom most bucket is removed first. When you lose a bucket it slows back to the previous wave's speed. However you get points per bomb based on the wave. Yet you cannot store extra buckets at all. There are a lot of things neat about this version over the 2600 original. For one you see a simple city backdrop up top. The bombs themselves have slight differences with the lit wick being on the left or right. Plus as you catch bombs a simple version of The 1812 Overture's famous bit that happens around the 13:50 mark on the full arrangement happens, with it sounding more "correct" if you catch the bombs via your paddle controlled buckets in the right order. It is not exactly a MAJOR change from the 2600 version but.. its nice. I have never owned the 2600 one but on emulation packages but I can say controlling Kaboom with a paddle is so much better and playable than touchscreen, gyro, analog stick, or any other way. The symbol by the score up at the top shows me using a paddle with wide buckets. You can also have thin with paddle, and the same two options with joysticks. There are alternating two player modes, and a nice versus mode where one player controls the Mad Bomber and the other the buckets and you duel it out, switching sides if you miss.  The biggest high score I recall getting is around 2500 or so which is "Badge Score" with a joystick, but 3000 is paddle. These scores here are my normal so far. On other formats even with a mouse I can't get even HALF of this. The Epyx 500XJ is plugged back in and it's time for some CRAY-ZEE MONEY!  Actually no. Its K-Razy Shoot-Out. It is a Berzerk clone. Unlike that game this one has your enemies teleport in, sometimes right on top of your head. You can also hold the fire button and aim in any direction. One odd bit I have noticed is that you and the monster robots only are allowed a single bullet on screen at a time. Also you have a timer bar that counts down with the obvious timer bonuses.  It is a fun little game. Here are some robots roaming about the randomly generated maze while my latest death has a nice little animation of my man dying at the bottom.  It is fun but I need some more practice time with it. If you like Berzerk it is well worth trying though. Now it is time to go on a hunt. A Jungle Hunt. (As opposed to a hunt for my life. I have none regardless of my attempts otherwise. I do not game to escape life, but to have something to do that is enjoyable. And affordable.)  Based on the arcade game, in Jungle Hunt you have 4 stages with a countdown timer. In the first one you have to take your WHITE MAN'S BURDEN guy and jump from vine to vine with the one you are about to jump to mostly obscured till you jump. It is a mixture of timing both when the vine will be towards you enough to catch it. You have some leeway though if you jump too late you will end up lower and lower on the vine if not miss it outright.  Part two has you swimming a river, with nasty bubbles bringing you to the surface out of control in the middle, plus alligators and a nasty air bar if you spend too much time underwater. You have a VERY short ranged knife that can stab said crocs. Unlike the arcade version it seems pretty easy to hit them in this port.  The third part has you jumping and ducking boulders as they roll and bounce down the mountain.  Most obstacles you conquer give you points which they turn into. Here we see a big boulder coming our way. Do we wait till it lands and push up and fire for a big jump forwards? Stand still and duck and let it fly over us? Run under it? You have control.  And in a final stage these fine (old) cannibals are preparing the blonde chick for a tasty stew. You have to time jumps over both the offensive stereotypes while evading their movement, then jump up to catch the girl. I need more practice at that part. And finally, Mountain King!  This is a game you NEED the manual for otherwise it wont make a bit of sense. You have a man on a mountain. Pressing fire works his flashlight. Diagonally up makes you jump in that direction.  Collect 1000 points of gems to earn the special fire. Look for a tiny blinking light and you can find it. Use your flashlight (which when using doesn't allow you to collect gems) to find it. Press down to grab it. The chest on the far platform on the light either makes bats or gives you 260 points. Bats will steal your next goody. To help you, there is a tune that plays louder or quieter to let you know if you are getting closer. (In the Hall of the Mountain King.) On higher difficulties you have limited time to find the item. Jumping is VERY difficult in this game which can make things tricky.  Then you have to bring the flame down here, also avoiding the Spider that can web then kill you if you fail to escape (also like the bats will steal your two items based on difficulty level), then press down in the correct spot to raise the ladder. Climb up, align yourself properly with the crown, push up, then pull down with the crown on your head.  Now run and jump back up the mountain to the SACRED FLAAAME. I in my limited time have yet to do this part. Bats keep stealing my crown. The only real nicety is that the stages are wraparound. It is kind of hard and like I said, jumping is awkward at best! But it is pretty fun. I can totally understand why kid me with no manual couldn't make sense of the Atari 2600 version at all. So there we have it! The first three of my new pickups played and talked about. So far I have enjoyed and spent the most time with Kaboom! but I do want to spend more time playing all of them. I haven't gotten Adventure Creator to work yet, so I need to check it out and also see if it simply is not compatible with the XL/XE series of computers or if it requires the disk drive to be active merely to play even though that is just used to save games. So next time perhaps I shall be able to show that title. And defile a sealed Necromancer. And hope Field of Fire has working disks. (Bonus Forums version content not on my blog! What games did I lose out on from this seller? Super Cobra, Super Breakout, Submarine Commander, Frogger, Buck Rogers Planet of Zoom, River Rescue, Donkey Kong, K-Razy Antiks, and Popeye. To be fair most of them I lowball bid. But I probably shouldn't as most were at least cart and manual. Oh well. Common sense and fiscal responsibility were beaten out by snipers.) Oh yeah. That Pro IIGS link I mentioned. Right. http://www.whatisthe2gs.apple2.org.za/ Some of yall might be able to make use of this website.
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Apr 29, 2014 07:24
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That port of Jungle Hunt appears surprisingly well done. I shouldn't be surprised, I guess, because the arcade game isn't really that complex. But it's still pretty cool.
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Apr 29, 2014 23:10
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Figured I'd post my nearly complete computer gaming setup which has taken over like half of my spare room: Commodore/PC land PAL A500, NTSC A1200 (in a drawer, I just swap it with the A500 when I want to play AGA stuff), 1084 monitor NTSC C64: 1541-II disk drive, Aprospand port expander, Epyx Fastload PII 400 DOS/Win 3.11 PC: 256mb RAM, 4MB PCI Diamond Stealth3D S3 VirgeDX, SB AWE64/GUS Classic, 19" NEC Multisync monitor  Apple Ghetto Apple //e: DuoDisk, 80col/64k expansion, "Slinky" memory expansion, AppleColor Composite Monitor //e Mac Performa 631CD: SCSI ZIP/CD-R drives, Apple Multiscan 15" monitor (system isn't set up at the moment because I'm looking for a better place to put it) Some spare displays: Apple Monochrome Monitor //, extra 1084, extra Apple Multiscan 15, PVM  warez click for large Amiga games on first two shelves, then C64 games and C64/Amiga docs, then Apple stuff The X68K sits next to my main PC for now, as it's the old computer I use most. I'm almost totally out of space which kinda sucks because there are a few more systems I'd like to have, like a 386 class system for older DOS stuff, a IIGS and an Acorn Archimedes of some sort. I refuse to just pile poo poo up though so I'll wait until I have a bigger place to live. Looking at retro computer gear is fun as hell, please post your setups! d0s fucked around with this message at 06:27 on Apr 30, 2014 |
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Apr 30, 2014 06:09
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I can do this. My main retro area. Without any cleaning. This is where the MAGIC happens. And when NES carts on that super comfy chair keep hitting me in the rear end and falling over? It helps me in Kaboom!  (Most of my games are in drawers and plastic tubs. I need more of them.) Edit: Dang. Didn't notice that spot on the carpet without any carpet. I'll have to do something about that. Another thing to go up on the big list of HOME REPAIRS. :/ Captain Rufus fucked around with this message at 07:42 on Apr 30, 2014 |
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Apr 30, 2014 07:34
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I am really enjoying the Ultrasound https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ag-cPyXr4Z4 If you're in any way interested in the mid-late DOS era games or demoscene stuff it's indispensable. It's one of those things that you wonder how you ever got along without. Having one of these back in the day must have been mental! Please don't pay what people ask for them on eBay though, anything over $80-90 is way too much. Try to find some European people selling them on other boards and stuff, it was way more popular there.
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Apr 30, 2014 11:28
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d0s posted:I am really enjoying the Ultrasound I had Siege (the Magic Candle RTS thing) with a SB16 and due to a glitch on SB16s it'd use the PC speaker. Seriously the only time I wanted a gravis ultrasound instead.
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Apr 30, 2014 12:05
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chairface posted:I had Siege (the Magic Candle RTS thing) with a SB16 and due to a glitch on SB16s it'd use the PC speaker. Seriously the only time I wanted a gravis ultrasound instead. Yeah, it's kinda something you never realize you need until you use one with something that supports it natively and then it's like "holy poo poo I was missing out on this". The first time I loaded up Jazz Jackrabbit with it was pretty awesome, you go form the kinda glitchy/staticy SB to perfectly clear sampled music and its like someone put an Amiga in your PC. EDIT: Having only an Ultrasound is a bad idea though, it's good at one thing and that's tracker music. If you like that sort of thing it's a godsend, but using it to emulate a Sound Blaster is pointless. In stuff that supports the GUS natively it's usually the best choice, but a real Sound Blaster is always going to be the best choice for the widest support of DOS games. It happens that most of my favorite DOS games have native GUS support so it's a huge plus for me, but it is probably not something everyone needs. d0s fucked around with this message at 14:52 on Apr 30, 2014 |
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Apr 30, 2014 13:43
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I was using PCs in the GUS' heyday (in the UK), but I didn't know anyone that actually had one. If I remember rightly, they cost around £100 while SB16 compatible off-brand cards cost more like £15. At that point £100 would buy you an extra 4Mb RAM so understandably not many people would buy one. I seem to remember some titles didn't run well with the GUS too (almost certainly the fault of the developers, not the hardware). Shortly after, the AWE32 was released, which retained the SB16's wider compatibility and had better sound quality than the GUS at a similar price point.
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Apr 30, 2014 15:16
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d0s posted:If you're in any way interested in the mid-late DOS era games or demoscene stuff it's indispensable. It's one of those things that you wonder how you ever got along without. Having one of these back in the day must have been mental! Please don't pay what people ask for them on eBay though, anything over $80-90 is way too much. Try to find some European people selling them on other boards and stuff, it was way more popular there. Now, looking back, I can see I was obviously letting my bias run wild, as it was hard to even get me to acknowledge that the Ultrasound's MIDI output was superior, being all-in on the "bleep bloop cheesy MIDI sound is proper MIDI sound" camp that had basically no adherents at the time. But my Pro Audio Spectrum 16 actually did have fantastic .MOD playback, and it irritated me that people assumed if you did not have an Ultrasound you could not possibly be a TRUE DEMOSCENER because obviously I felt like my credentials in that regard should have spoken for themselves. I mean, let us not forget I am MENTIONED IN PASSING ON WIKIPEDIA  But yeah. Ultrasounds were amazing, I acknowledge that, even if not necessarily INFINITELY BETTER FOR ALL THINGS. Oh wait, as I see that you say that it is ONLY good for demoscene stuff when I would say its true calling is MIDI, huh. I remember hearing the Ultima VIII soundtrack on my buddy's Ultrasound and even my hyper-jaded-annoying-kid-self had to be like "OK, yeah, that sounds amazing"
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Apr 30, 2014 16:24
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..btt posted:I was using PCs in the GUS' heyday (in the UK), but I didn't know anyone that actually had one. If I remember rightly, they cost around £100 while SB16 compatible off-brand cards cost more like £15. At that point £100 would buy you an extra 4Mb RAM so understandably not many people would buy one. I seem to remember some titles didn't run well with the GUS too (almost certainly the fault of the developers, not the hardware). Here's a text file from 1994 that explains the sound card choices and pricing of the day, according to this a SB16 was $95 while a GUS was $100 and an AWE32 was $295 http://pastebin.com/j2yjPi5z I think the AWE and GUS cards are great with stuff that's designed to use their specific features, that's why I run and AWE64 and a GUS in the same machine. Amusingly neither of these options provides a very good SB16/Pro/etc experience, but I find that 90% of the games I like will support either the GUS or AWE natively, but rarely both (or if it's both one choice or the other is obviously better). I really dislike the sound of the SB/pro/16 FM synthesizer, be it a real Yamaha chip on a Creative board or some kind of emulation/simulation, maybe because I have no nostalgia for it but it just sounds really chintzy to me, and on games with the option to use native GUS over SB Pro/16 there's a clear improvement to my ears. I 100% agree that a native AWE game can sound just as good or better. Coming into this stuff fresh (my PC gaming back in the day consisted of a DOS 286 with a PC speaker followed by a Windows 95 Pentium, so I missed the era entirely) I can see why the GUS excited people, but also why it was kind of considered a luxury- in the case where a game supports it the results are beautiful, but it really did not have the widest support and it's emulation of other standards was pathetic and required memory hogging software to run. Even at the same price it would have definitely made sense to get an SB16, or even an AWE over a GUS if you were building a PC on a budget and could only have one card in those days because both guaranteed compatibility with the widest range of games. From the point of view of someone playing with old computer gear in 2014 though, the GUS is one of the coolest things I've come across. The demoscene absolutely loved this card and music is a huge part of demos, there's just something cool to me about hearing the very Amiga-like tracker music coming out of a DOS PC, I can totally see the appeal this thing would have had back in the day. It's specifically NOT a general purpose hassle free thing, its a weird and quirky specialty board for weirdos and that makes it fun  EDIT: Quarex posted:Oh wait, as I see that you say that it is ONLY good for demoscene stuff when I would say its true calling is MIDI, huh. I remember hearing the Ultima VIII soundtrack on my buddy's Ultrasound and even my hyper-jaded-annoying-kid-self had to be like "OK, yeah, that sounds amazing" I love it's MIDI especially with the Pro Patches pack, and I definitely don't think it's only good at scene tracker music, but stuff like the AWE does make it a little less relevant for today's usage, I just didn't want to be the dude claiming the GUS was some total soundcard solution when it's really more of a specialized thing. You don't NEED a GUS for great MIDI, although at the time it was one of the top solutions. Lots of scene demos only support the GUS, and lots of games only support either SB Pro/16 or GUS and that's more of what I was referring to. EDIT2: The GUS is bundled with a MIDI player and some samples, this is my favorite track from that pack: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WXF7vYaSKo It sounds even better with the Pro Patches but nobody's uploaded that version to Youtube d0s fucked around with this message at 17:37 on Apr 30, 2014 |
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Apr 30, 2014 16:40
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I did say "off brand", as in, not made by creative. Bear in mind I'm talking UK prices, and £100 would be very roughly equivalent to $200. I do remember the basic model AWE32s were around £150 when they first appeared over here. There were a lot of lovely, knock-off sound cards which were generally more trouble than they were worth to get working, but you could usually wrangle them into working with DOS games that had SB16 support. Sometimes you had to drop to standard SB mode. Weren't Macs more popular than PCs in the States at the time? Might account for some pricing disparity. E: wasn't the AWE64 actually a massively cut-back AWE32, just with 64 channels so they could put a bigger number on it? I seem to remember a bit of a backlash when it came out. ..btt fucked around with this message at 17:14 on Apr 30, 2014 |
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Apr 30, 2014 17:05
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..btt posted:Weren't Macs more popular than PCs in the States at the time? Might account for some pricing disparity. They were all over our public schools but as far as private ownership goes I think the Mac was a really regional thing, on the west coast it seems like it was neck and neck with the PC but it was definitely only a minor phenomenon where I live on the east coast while PCs were ubiquitous. I am using the very scientific method of comparing the Mac ephemera I find at thrift stores here vs. what my west coast friends find, and my memories from those days. I don't believe that Mac was ever more popular than the PC in the US at any time during it's entire history, aside from very specific applications where it was everywhere, like desktop publishing and education. I wasn't questioning your recollection about the card prices BTW, just wanted to show the US perspective of how stuff was, I know there were and are huge crazy price discrepancies between US and Europe and comparing them is pretty futile. d0s fucked around with this message at 17:20 on Apr 30, 2014 |
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Apr 30, 2014 17:15
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Good point about some demoscene things being GUS-only; I had totally forgotten about that, likely again due to my purposeless soundcard favoritism. Yes, clearly that is one thing I should add to my own MS-DOS gaming setup (which I would post but I am in Texas for two months rather than with my precious goods). Though I suppose fixing the CMOS battery should take priority. Also, in the Midwest, Macs served as "things you find in public schools but if any of your friends have one they are probably complaining about how there are no games for it" fodder just as on the East Coast, from my anecdotal experience, haha.
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Apr 30, 2014 18:26
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Well, after a bum first purchase, the second C64 I bought actually boots. It arrived today and sure enough, it works more or less right out of the box. Sadly the case and keyboard are in worse cosmetic shape than the first one I got, and I think it's a later model (not that that matters much). I'll be needing to clean the keys to free them of fossilized grime, and sometime later give it the retr0bright treatment, but for now I'm thrilled. The bonus with this one was that it came with an Epyx Fast Load cartridge. It's in similarly dingy shape, but still has the original label, though the adhesive has mostly dried out and it's only barely still sticking on a bit of the plastic. Works though! Now to find actual C64 floppies... Pictures forthcoming. Oh, the cleaning to be done...
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May 2, 2014 03:15
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minidracula posted:Well, after a bum first purchase, the second C64 I bought actually boots. It arrived today and sure enough, it works more or less right out of the box. Sadly the case and keyboard are in worse cosmetic shape than the first one I got, and I think it's a later model (not that that matters much). I'll be needing to clean the keys to free them of fossilized grime, and sometime later give it the retr0bright treatment, but for now I'm thrilled. I've said earlier in this thread, I think C64 has the best price:fun ratio of any of the old computers I'm into (I have not gotten into Atari 8bit systems but I hear they're also really great on that front). There is just so much cool stuff out there, and if you try to grab loose disks or compilations you can end up with an amazing collection of great games really quickly. If you're in the US and have an NTSC machine keep an eye out for budget publisher Thunder Mountain's Top Flight and Action Pack.  I seriously would like to have been the C64 owning kid who unwrapped that action pack for christmas or whatever. I wouldn't have left the house for moths! The really great games here (IMO) are: Paradroid Uridium Trailblazer Wizball Parallax Usagi Yojimbo The pretty good ones: Infiltrator Implosion Equinox Crap: Top Gun Slot Car Racer Uchi Mata Great Escape Parallax and Trailblazer repeat on both but Infiltrator and especially Uridium are fantastic and Top Gun's title music is a slightly sped up version of Comic Bakery (poo poo game though) so you should really try to get both. The Top Flight collection disk hates fastloaders though, like most V-Max! protected stuff so make sure to take it out before trying to play it or you'll get some interesting(terrifying) noises coming from your 1541! Of course if you're in the UK all this stuff is available even cheaper on cassettes and you have tons more stuff we never got int the US like Armalyte and Turrican. If you can get just one other disk I would make sure to get Tower Toppler(aka Nebulus). d0s fucked around with this message at 23:16 on May 7, 2014 |
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May 7, 2014 23:03
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d0s posted:Crap: Hey! This is a pretty nice adventure game where you have to figure a way to escape from stalag before the oppressive surroundings crush your spirit. Red Cross parcels rise morale for a while and you have several ways to plan your escape. You could tunnel out, you can try and sneak past the guards at night, and simply getting outside the camp is not enough. Don't get caught or it's the slammer for you. The game is relatively slow which may be a turn off. There's a lot of mandatory waiting, but on the other hand it builds tension.
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May 7, 2014 23:38
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Hob_Gadling posted:Hey! This is a pretty nice adventure game where you have to figure a way to escape from stalag before the oppressive surroundings crush your spirit. Red Cross parcels rise morale for a while and you have several ways to plan your escape. You could tunnel out, you can try and sneak past the guards at night, and simply getting outside the camp is not enough. Don't get caught or it's the slammer for you. Point taken, I should give it a second chance. I really didn't spend much time with it because it just seemed really slow, and had a "Spectrum port" look. I'll revisit it ASAP, sometimes I judge things too harshly based on like two minutes of play.
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May 8, 2014 04:09
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d0s posted:I seriously would like to have been the C64 owning kid who unwrapped that action pack for christmas or whatever. I wouldn't have left the house for moths! The really great games here (IMO) are: "Rabbit Bodyguard?"  Sounds like one of those many Ninja-turtle knockoffs from the late 80s.
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May 8, 2014 19:28
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Genpei Turtle posted:"Rabbit Bodyguard?" I always thought it was a mascot ripoff but that makes sense considering it's date. It's a pretty impressive sidescrolling hack and slash featuring a ninja
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May 8, 2014 20:06
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Usagi Yojimbo is about the same age as the Turtles, and started off under the same comics publisher. They've had a number of crossovers over the years, but the Turtles have always enjoyed greater popularity.
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May 8, 2014 20:19
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Bieeardo posted:Usagi Yojimbo is about the same age as the Turtles, and started off under the same comics publisher. They've had a number of crossovers over the years, but the Turtles have always enjoyed greater popularity. Yeah this, he's not a ripoff; he's another character in the same continuity who never made it as big. IIRC Usagi even had an action figure in the TMNT line, same as Rat King or a host of other minor characters.
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May 8, 2014 20:21
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