Sorting out a few cupboards this afternoon I found some of my vintage Kenner Starwars figures. Looking out of the window at the snow gave me an idea and it sort of spiraled on from there 
‘Oh nuts!’
Gwaarrrr – Translation ‘Now, where is the pesky bogger’
‘These aren’t the droids you’re looking for!’
‘Aw crap, they said they’d fixed it!’
‘Does this one bite too?’
After much deliberation, reading various reviews and hitting the stores, I’ve decided that the tablet netbook for me is the Acer Aspire 1825ptz. Can’t wait to unwrap this one come Christmas day morn.
Hoping I can resist the temptation to take a peek
Throughout the mid eighties Epyx Computer software released some of the very best multi-sport games and I recall endless hours with friends picking various events from each Epyx title and creating our very own massive Olympic style game’a'thon. Throw in a few events from other multi sport games such as Skate or Die, Run the Gauntlet, Combat School & Daley Thompsons Decathlon and with eight players, hours can turn into days
Even though most of the Epyx games are pushing 25 years old now, they’ll still very playable and lots of laughs. Some can also be found on the Nintendo Wii -Commodore 64 channel.
Taken from the C64 versions, here’s my fav top 10 events.
#10 Javelin – Summer Games II (1985)
A nice and easy one to get things started, coupled with a silky smooth animated runner and scrolling. Simply hammer away at the fire button to build up speed and tap left to angle the Javelin before the fault line.
StiGGy’s best score – 93.1 meters
# 9 Cliff Diving – World Games (1986)
Lots of fun hugging the cliff for as long as possible before making the perfect dive. Press fire to launch, and use up/down to control your drive. As you enter the water, press left or you’ll hit the bottom of the pool!
StiGGy’s best score – 90 points
# 8 Ski Jump – Winter Games (1985)
Quite a tricky one is this and is often sheer luck that you can land safely. Press fire to begin you decent down and press fire again at the end of the ramp. Control your ski’s with the joystick/keys directions making sure you don’t over compensate and crash land.
StiGGy’s best score 196.6 points
# 7 High Jump – Summer Games II (1985)
Back to the track for this one as you try to beat your mates with the highest jump. Gather speed with left/right combination, slow at first and then progressively faster. Press fire to make your jump (don’t press fire too late) and as you reach the bar, press up so that your legs don’t catch the bar.
StiGGy’s best score 2.05 meters
#6 Platform diving – Summer Games (1984)
This diving event offers a greater challenge than cliff diving and allows you to compete across different dive types. Easy to mess up but rewarding if you can time it right enabling you to climb up the overall leaderboard.
StiGGy’s best scores
Forward – 126.10 points
Back – 140.00 points
Reverse – 175.75 points
Inwards – 172.75 points
#5 Foot Bag – California Games (1987)
A great event to really show off your skills. If all goes well, smug grins abound but it’s very easy to mess things up! Hit the bird of extra points.
StiGGy’s best score – 26,750 points
#4 Pole Vault – Summer Games (1984)
Select the bar height and pole grip (low, med & high), press space to start running and press down to plant your pole as close to the bar as possible (I find lowering the pole just after the 4th flag). Press right to whip yourself up, not forgetting to press fire to release your jumper up and over the bar. It’s one tough event that i’ve never managed to crack.
StiGGy’s best score – 5.5 meters
# Weight Lifting – World Games (1986)
I love this event, as you try to see who can lift the most. Timing is critical, from various moves to how long to stay in each position. I love the subtle animation on the character sprite when he checks his grip. It’s what’s so great about these series.
StiGGy’s best scores
Snatch – 195kg
Clean and jerk – 160kg
#2 Surfing – California Games (1987)
Surf’s up! Build up speed by making small jumps before trying out a 180 jump and spend a little time in the tube. My favorite event from California Games.
StiGGy’s best score – 6.3 points
#1 Barrel Jumping – World Games (1986)
They should make Barrel Jumping part of the Winter Olympics, it would be so cool to watch Build up speed slowly with left/right combination gradually getting faster and faster. At the jump line (or just after if you can time it right) hit the fire button and soar over the barrels not forgetting to press down just before landing.
StiGGy’s best score – 14 Barrels
If you haven’t tried any of the Epyx sporting games, you need to…right now
Summer Games
Winter Games
World Games
Summer Games II
The Games: Summer Edition
The Games: Winter Edition
Califonia Games
California Games II
Can’t stop laughing at this!
Actually it started the other week but today was the first of our Christmas shopping trips into the city. Arriving very early, I think we’d managed to pick up most of the gifts we wanted to pick up within the first few hours and by lunchtime everywhere was beginning to get very crowded and long lines of queues were forming at the tills. Shuffling a few bags around, I managed to drop one, smashing the contents therefore had to queue up again to pick up another
Sadly at the store I was hoping to take a look at the Netbook Tablet I’m interested in didn’t have a demo model on display. Hopefully I can track one down at another store as I really want to see/try one out before I buy.
With just a few more items to pick up online that’s about our shopping done for friends and family. We usually leave our own gift shopping until closer to Christmas when the city is full of festive cheer…or grumpy folk bouncing of each other
With Christmas rapidly approaching, thoughts wonder to what the jolly fella might stuff down our chimney this year and here’s hoping he’s reading this post, finds that I’m on his ‘been good this year’ list and takes note.
Ever since my HP TX1000 tablet laptop gave up and refused function despite marginal success with the old ‘penny’ trick – See blog post http://stiggyblog.wordpress.com/2009/08/08/hp-tx1000-repair-part-1-the-problem/ I’ve been on the lo0k out for a suitable replacement.
Originally, I was thinking about going down the route of the Apple iPad after a work colleague had let me test drive his own during lunch breaks. It certainly is a fine piece of kit with a touch screen that’s simply outstanding. Pricewise, the base model is within budget but with only 16gb storage and no 3G it seems a bit pointless to be honest. Bump up another £70 for the 32gb mode or another £170 for the 64gb model, add another £100 for the 3G, then ££ for the case, ££ for the dock and keyboard and more ££ for the camera kit it starts to get a little silly really.
…and to be honest, with a cheaper Linux or Windows based netbook I won’t have any storage issues, won’t need an external keyboard (yes the iPad has a very good on screen keyboard but nothing beats proper keys) and the scope to do/run pretty much whatever I like on it and in some cases won’t have to re purchase stuff I already own from the app store. For example, I can run VM DOS and X- Wing on a netbook
So, with a tick list of requirements, I’ve found these two jazzy looking netbooks with rotating touch screens for those times when I want to read in portrait mode.
First up is the Acer’s 11.5 Tablet Netbook, the Acer Aspire 1825 PT
I really like the look of this one, has all the right connection ports, wireless, HDMI and bluetooth as well as plenty of Ram to throw at Windows 7 (would prefer XP) so hopefully it doesn’t chug along.
The alternative to the Acer, is this very dapper looking Packard Bell Butterfly Touch (also available in Red).
This has similar specs to the Acer base model and is priced slightly under the iPad base model at £400.
O.k, so both netbooks are heavier than the iPad, probably have less battery life, no doubt weight a damn sight more, not have the same touch screen experience and viewing angles but I’m certainly intrigued to take closer look at them. I’ve managed to locate a store that has both models stocked therefore some time before now and mid December, will no doubt go and visit to check them out in person.
You still reading this Santa?
Yesterday, myself and a couple of the RCM chaps got together to move some of the retro computer hardware and software from one storage to another. Although back breaking work, it was laugh a minute all day and thanks to Stuart and his van, various cars and Curstie’s MPV, we managed to get about 70-80% of it moved so far.
All the chaps, figuring out what is going to go where. Me behind the camera already wondering when the first cuppa would come.
Couple of shelve units for the hardware storage. Lots more of these to erect.
The first van load gets unloaded. Kudos to Mike nursing an injured wrist and still able to lug various TV and monitors about.
The first of the arcade machines arrives and a heavy bogger it was too!
..and so were some of the TV sets.
Back at the old storage unit, room 1 is slowly getting emptied.
..but still lots more to pack in the main room with endless three deep rows of cassettes, carts and disks.
With the first few loads moved, time to catch a quick lunch. Pinkies raised!
More stuff to be moved into the lift, through the corridors and into the back of my car.
Starting to get somewhere now although lots to sort through.
This room, empty this morning is now almost full. By now, all of us were starting to creak a little.
A mountain of retro computer goodies
..and with the light fading and sore everything, time to catch ones breath and congratulate each other for how much stuff we got moved.
It hurts to even smile
Mike, Stuart, Jim’bob, Andy, Richard and myself.
p.s One last thing, Richard has kindly given me a home built light pen for my MB Vectrex. Can’t wait to try it. Need sleep first!
For my next PC based project I intend to build an old PC capable of running DOS and/or Windows 95 coupled together with a very early 3DFX graphics accelerator card (or early Nvidia TNT card). This is so I can ‘re’run some of my floppy based DOS games such as Doom,Tie-Fighter and Duke Nukem as well as early 3D accelerated games such Interstate ’76, 3d Snooker and Quake (with 3d patch).
DOSbox running under a modern O/S does a damn fine job with most older DOS games but I really want the best compatibility and to run them on native hardware - especially as DOSbox or Virtual PC images can’t take advantage of 3D graphics cards yet.
All of this is for a later post but whilst I’ve got a little bit of free time, I thought I’d play around and create a DOS based Virtual PC.
My first snag – Sadly, Microsoft’s Virtual PC 2007 doesn’t support MS DOS 6.22 therefore rather than tracking down an older version I thought I’d try out the popular DOS replacement FreeDOS which is something I’ve been meaning to look at for some time now.
First, I downloaded and installed a copy of Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 – http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtual-pc/
..and created a Virtual PC by selecting ‘other’ from the list of O/S environments. For my Virtual PC, I’ve allocated 32mb of ram and created a 50mb virtual harddisk.
After downloading the FreeDOS .iso file from – http://www.freedos.org/ I started the Virtual PC with the freeDOS installation .iso image mounted in a Virtual CD drive. You can either do this from within MS Virtual PC 2007 or use something like Daemon Tools to mount the image.
Here’s the FreeDOS main screen providing options to run live from the CD which then provides further options to install to the harddrive (or in my case Virtual harddisk I created earlier).
Installation of FreeDOS is pretty straight forward and reminiscent of my days prepping DOS PC many many moons ago. Simply run the installer, format the (virtual) Harddrive and install FreeDOS.
FreeDOS installed and booted in MS Virtual PC 2007.
One thing is for sure, FreeDOS contains many useful programs! - I wish they were around in the early days!
Time for some fun. Digging around my software cupboard, I found my Star Wars Dark Forces big box from 1994.
‘Behind a veil of secrecy the evil Empire is creating a doomsday army – one that, if finished, will become the final cog in the Empire’s arsenal of terror and domination’ – ‘Your Mission? Join the Rebel Alliance’s covert operations division, infiltrate the Empire, then battle every man and machine the Imperial Forces can muster. Search a vast galaxy for clues, attack enemy bases all in a desperate attempt to stop the activation of this fearsome new weapon‘.
Forget Kyle Katarn, agent StiGGY is on the case
Loving the blocky SVGA graphics and Midi renditions of the Star wars tunes . The first time I saw it, it was barely running on my 486 66mhz but even so I was totally blown away. It still plays brilliantly after all these years!
Plenty more DOS games to follow and I’m hoping my Doom II floppy disks still work. If you’ve got half an hour spare, I highly recommend you give FreeDOS a try. If you want to get cracking with DOS games without the hassle of Virtual PC’s, you might like to try DOSbox – http://www.dosbox.com/ and pick up a few freeware games from http://www.abandonia.com/
More video, this time from the Retro Gaming Museums gaming day I attended last weekend. There’s me at the 20 sec mark limbering up on Defence Force for the Oric Atmos
Found an excellent walkaround video at the R3play classic gaming expo on YouTube. As you can see, massive event!
http://www.youtube.com/user/electriclifeform#p/a/u/0/UiNAgN-YsGU
Arriving the day before at Blackpool and after terrible driving conditions throughout the whole trip up north, we settled into the hotel, had a gorgeous supper and headed out to take in the sights of this popular coastal town.
Incredibly cold, wet and windy but a fun to stroll around the illuminated streets.
Stopping by one of the many arcades to warm up and I spotted a four-up Sega Rally & Sega Daytona. Perfect to kick start our retro gaming weekend!
The following day I headed up to Norbeck Castle were R3play was being hosted. Judging by the long line of eager gamers, this was going to be one hellava busy event. Thankfully, Norbeck Castle is huge, so plenty of room for everyone.
After grabbing a coffee and saying hello to a few folk I headed into the main room but wasn’t prepared for the sheer amount of computers, consoles and arcade machines on display. There was so much stuff, it was difficult to know where to start! Looking at the lines of impressive arcade cabinets, I made this my first port of call. They has everything from Defender, to Frogger and Outrun to Pheonix. Nestled between a classic Star Wars cab and a more modern Star Wars Trilogy arcade cabinet was one of my all time favorites – Atari’s Return of the Jedi. It’s not actually a great game but there’s something about it that I love and played this for hours way back in the mid eighties.
The marquee had also been signed by Dave Prowse (Darth Vader), Jeremy Bullock (Boba Fett) and Warrick Davies (Wicket). I shall be making enquiries..i want to own it:-)
Plenty of pinball machines available too.
Starting to get busy now. This is one half of the main room.
Gary and the chaps from Amibay had put on a great selection of Commodore Amiga’s. Whilst watching Mark & Duncan playing Team 17′s Project X, forgot how good this game is, must hunt it out again and give it another blast.
Escaping the relentless noise of the music being pumped out of the PA (something I’d have to admit was a a little enoying at times) I sought shelter in the ‘Ocean’ room and chatted with fellow ‘RCM-er’s’ and met Jim Bagley one of the brilliant coders who worked on coin-op conversions for the Sinclair Spectrum such as Cabal and Midnight Resistance.
I also got chatting to the head of one of the best publishers during the 80′s/90′s - Gary Bracey of Ocean software. A really nice chap who seemed a little shell shocked by that Retro Gaming was so popular and the many fans of Ocean games after all these years.
Browsing various classic game artwork by Bob Wakelin in various guises from mugs to mouse mats.
The second day was much like the first, albeit slightly less people. Aiming for the Commodore’s, I sat down with Duncan for a Stunt Car Racer linkup
These were great, old PC’s networked together for plenty of old school Lan deathmatches with Doom II, Heretic, Hexen, Dark Forces and Quake = Happy days!!
The first of the days Q&A sessions was hosted by Retro Gamer magazine Paul Drury and his guest, father of Llamasoft, the legend that is Jeff ‘Yak’ Minter!
Jeff talked about all of his work at Llamasoft from Deflex, Gridhunter, Attack of the Mutant Camels through to Tempest 2000 (the latter being the only reason why I brought a Atari Jaguar), and other projects he worked on including ill fated Konix Multisystem through to the Xbox and beyond. A really nice chap and was full of anecdotes during the golden age of computer gaming . Later on, I spoke to him outside and almost wet myself when I saw what brand of cigarettes he was smoking – Camel – what else
After lunch the second round of Q&A sessions was with another legend, Jon Hare of Sensible Software. Unlike most, Sensible Soccer isn’t my cup of tea but Wizball and Cannon Fodder are. Another great session full of tales from the days when he and Chris Yates started out including the ups and downs and on to more rescent developments with the iPhone and iPad.
Cannon Fodder..the main reason why I skipped so many classes at college
With the last few hours of R3play winding down, time to get that last game in.
Collection of racer cabs including Outrun and Chase HQ.
Pimped Amiga 1200 from Amibay.
Apart from the loud music and terrible lighting for photo’s, a pretty good retro gaming event.
One last look out of the hotel window before heading home.
As always, I had a superb day yesterday at the Retro Computer Museum’s gaming day.
RCM team always put on a great show and yesterday was by far their best. So much so that I was totally engrossed with computers and consoles on offer and chatting to friends alike, for the first time at a retro gaming event I didn’t actually take many photos. A small selection can be found below as well as the rest on Flickr
Early in the morning as systems were checked over one last time in the main hall. It wasn’t long before each room was jam packed full of eager retro gaming fans.
RCM team put together a great collection of vintage systems like the Commodore SX64, Camputers Lynx and this very nice M5 Sord.
…and some more obscure hobbyist hardware like the ‘Everdrive’ flash cart for the Genesis allowing images (including 32x) to load from SD card.
Every retro gaming taste accommodated for like this vintage Acetronic home console-
-to the more rescent with the Sega Dreamcast with twin arcade sticks. I spent quite a lot of time with this one and round after round of Soul Calibre.
My own C64 ITX PC drew a bit of interested and lots of folk dropping by to ask me questions and advise on their own similar projects.
Both Oric -1 and Oric Atmos were primed and ready to spend some quality time with. The Atmos was playing a conversion of the C64 classic Impossible Mission which was released only a few days ago, proof that this little machine is still loved by many.
..but first, I had a score to beat on Defense Force. My best at 650,000 and with a glug of coffee, I settled in for the task at hand. After little over an hour and with very sore wrists, I’d done it
More competition with the every popular Bomberman tournament. This time around, 4-up was replaced by and epic 10-up battlefest.
More retro goodies on offer and I managed to pick up a few bits for my collection.
Roll on next weekend and R3play!
