musicForProgramming();

OZApps · December 2012

@techdojo, no particular game, I meant the screenshots were all that were present to look at the difference and at times drool on the colours that the humble speccy lacked or at times feel so good about the best graphic sprites on the speccy.

techdojo · December 2012

Yeah, it was often a shock to see the reality of the game when presented with some glorious mockups / coverart.

I remember Christmas 1981 when I got my Vic-20 and a couple of game cartridges to go with it - Jelly Monsters (the BEST home Pacman version ever) and Scott Adams Adventure land, I was really excited when I opened the packaging and saw this lovely airbrushed picture of a sleeping dragon in a wood, then when I booted the game it was just text, I hadn't got a clue at the time about "interactive fiction" and I doubt my parents had either, I think they were a little disappointed to, but ironically I now spend more time reading and playing games and I love interactive stories - who knew?

As an aside - I doubt any youngster these days will be able to remember the first iOS game they played in thirty years time!

ar2rsawseen · December 2012

The ZX Spectrum was what an iPod is today and there were amazing apps/games that were created for this platform.

Thank you for explanation, that actually clarifies a lot.
@Scouser pardon me for such, probably personal question, but if you achieved something with ZX Spectrum, why weren't you the first on other era's, as apple apps etc?
Definitely you had a headstart (creating games for IOS comparing to ZX should probably be a breathe), you had the experience (which is needed a lot and cannot be substituted by plain knowledge alone), and there must have been an undying motivation to achieve more.
So what was missing?

gorkem · December 2012

//off-ish-topic// Sizin Amstrad (Your Amstrad) was the single mag I was dying to read over and over and over again. This is a feeling I cannot explain. Once I went to the shop at 06:00 to wait for the mag to arrive. Thrilling!

Covers: http://www.cpcwiki.eu/index.php/Sizin_Amstrad

OZApps · December 2012

@arturs, while your question is very valid, it is comparing apples and oranges. There is another developer that worked on the very successful LucasArts franchise, he is not known as the pioneer or the foremost authority, but he still makes decent apps.

The technology, the graphics etc is entirely different. To give you an example, the Hunchback example that @techdojo provided, the game sucked, had the worst gameplay and graphics. Still it was the turning point for many companies and had people queued up to buy it.

If you really want to see some amazing things, see the games from Raffaele Cecco or Costa Panayi, the graphics and effects that they achieved are still unrivaled even today. However these guys are not known for their games with the newer generation. Raffael is now into web than games and also the Author for a book on Javascript graphics, http://shop.oreilly.com/product/0636920013044.do Costa Panayi was last known working for Fisher Price.

Look at the game Revolution and the physics engine and the game written in less than 48K, now that is what is amazing. I will allow @scouser to state his side of things. It will be difficult for anyone that did not grow up on the 8-bit era to understand what that meant. The standards and expectations are very different, kids that look forward to a PS3/Xbox release will never understand what it was drooling over a screenshot of 256x192 pixels waiting for a game on a cassette tape that took like 10-15 minutes to load up.

Scouser · December 2012

@Arturs: I got very disillusioned with the games industry as a whole and was not really into 3D and the whole 1st Person / 3rd person shoot em ups so I bowed out of writing games and went back to doing the type of technical coding I had learned back in the latter end of the 70s & early 80s, before I started in games.

The type of coding where you had direct access to the hardware and could make it do what you wanted it to do rather than what the API writers wanted you to do.

By the time Smart phones came out, nobody really expected them to become a gaming platform and so were ignored by all but the niche programmers (hence hundreds of fart apps) and casual gamers.

At that time nobody knew how big they would become and I couldn't justify spending nearly £2000 on a mac, iDevice & developer license in the hope that they would succeed.

I later purchased an Android device and dipped my toes in the water as the $25 developer license was something I could justify as I already had the PC and phone.

moopf · December 2012

This thread is better than people telling you their age directly

I was never an assembler nut, although dabbled a lot, (went through owning a ZX80 and Spectrum but was always more of a Commodore person truth be told - the joy at getting a VIC-20 has never been matched since by any piece of tech for me) and by 15 I was writing business systems for a company who were moving from a mainframe to desktops (lovely big 286s) so never really had a need to become psychotic through opcodes.

petec · December 2012

... the joy at getting a VIC-20 has never been matched since by any piece of tech for me....

Same for me, except it was my 16k Spectrum that is the most exciting memory - I can still remember the drive home with it. No other piece of tech has really come close to that since - it's all very clever but not so magical.

techdojo · December 2012

It must be really confusing for any newcomers to this forum to actually find anything useful as every thread regardless of it's title, just seems to turn into a bunch of old men prattling on about the "good ole days" like a group a pensioners sitting in a barbers shop.

@ar2rsawseen to be fair, it was a massive leap in time from the end of the 8bit / start of the 16bit era till mobile devices once more took up the mantle of "casual" games. I'm sure @scouser like me and many others always harboured a secret desire for the "glory days" of back bedroom coders to once more rise up, but with the advent of the 32bit systems it looked like those days were pretty much gone for good and so with rent to pay and good paying jobs a lot of programmers just "settled in" for the rest of their career.

I "dabbled" in PalmOS development and casual games on the PC throughout the 90's early 00's but it was always more of a "hobby" than anything commerical, now mobile has advanced to the point where the back bedroom coders can once more shine, your seeing a lot of people looking for one last hurrah. The only danger I can foresee is that the AAA approach that overtook the console market might become so prevalent on mobile as to once more push the hobbyist's away.

ar2rsawseen · December 2012

I can completely understand it, but I just don't get it!

Maybe I am too much of a dreamer, but even with everyday job I would spend some free time in trying, struggling and dying to achieve more. But maybe it's just the youth spirit in me and will all fade away by the mid thirties

moopf · December 2012

I can completely understand it, but I just don't get it!

Maybe I am too much of a dreamer, but even with everyday job I would spend some free time in trying, struggling and dying to achieve more. But maybe it's just the youth spirit in me and will all fade away by the mid thirties

That depends on your outlook. I'm just touching 40 now and I haven't lost any of the dreamer in me - I'm always interested in the cutting edge or trying new things and have always filled my spare time with the other things to see where they go. Despite most of them failing over the years, or getting disgruntled for one reason or another, I've never been able to kick that dreamer trait I have. I also like a puzzle, working out something I know nothing about, which probably also accounts for it.

ar2rsawseen · December 2012

@moopf thats really nice to hear.

And also shocking to hear it from you. :O I'd say that moopfing and dreaming can't be combined, but here you go and prove me wrong

moopf · December 2012

@moopf thats really nice to hear. And also shocking to hear it from you. :O I'd say that moopfing and dreaming can't be combined, but here you go and prove me wrong

haha, the two aren't mutually exclusive

Although I can't deny I've certainly got grumpier over the years, I've always managed to keep it in check. The thing is the grumpiness often comes from trying and failing at something, or rather not failing but it not leading to where you want it to. And each time that happens it can be a little tougher than the last time but I always find a way over it, or rather the dreamer just kicks in again whether I want it to or not.

So the two pretty much go hand in hand for me

Scouser · December 2012

@moopf: Much to learn, you still have.

Only get you so far, dreaming can, then to actually try to achieve your dream, you have.

When that fails, just like the rest of us you will be.

)

techdojo · December 2012

Actually I'm 100% in agreement with @moopf, I still dream, I still try, it's just that "real" life tends to end up being a higher priority, I will admit a good job and a decent paypacket has taken some of the "hunger" away, but I was just talking about this very thing with another colleague, at the end of the day, who are you doing this for?

If your just doing this for yourself, then arguably it doesn't matter if you finish something providing your having fun and getting the enjoyment you seek out of it. To gain any degree of commercial success I think you need that "hunger" to drive you on.

@moopf: Only get you so far, dreaming can...

Yeah THEN you have to do some work!

techdojo · December 2012

Gideros - where all the old curmudgeons come to play!

Although probably NOT the kind of image @Deniz, @Atilim and @Gorkem envisaged when they wanted to create a new development environment

)

moopf · December 2012

Removed

moopf · December 2012

Removed, was obviously off-target. Joy of internet discourse and language differences.

ar2rsawseen · December 2012

I really wish I could have read what @moopf had written.

But @moopf I can assure you that @gorkem didn't mean any disrespect to you, just making a joke (maybe an awkward one

)

Unless you are simply moopfing again and this was simply a troll post

gorkem · December 2012

Come on Moopf, I'm not denigrating you and I'm not planning to go anywhere with it. If I didn't like your attitude here, I simply wouldn't joke. You are an important person in this forum and I have a respect for you, just like I feel the same for everybody. I'm so sorry to have hurt you.

moopf · December 2012

OK @gorkem, no problem, just a misunderstanding (probably not helped by language differences I guess). Have deleted my post. Thanks.

gorkem · December 2012

I've deleted mine too. It doesn't show my potential joke talent. :-q

Dikkesnoek · December 2012

You can also try my radio station: Radio Progressive, www.radioprogressive.com

I alway listen to this music when I need to concentrate. There is also a free
radio app, not build with Lua but Objective-C.

Regards,

Marc

Mells · December 2012

I didn't understand most of what you were all talking about but I've read all of it, went to check websites about it, and it was kind of fascinating

Like listening to my old uncles on a christmas dinner

(joke joke)

@Dikkesnoek
it almost felt like *you* were off topic

thanks for the link

OZApps · December 2012

Gideros - where all the old curmudgeons come to play!

Although probably NOT the kind of image @Deniz, @Atilim and @Gorkem envisaged when they wanted to create a new development environment )

@Techdojo, BTW @Gorkem and @Atilim also rant about their Amstrad as we do about our Speccy's. Though they might have wanted kids playing in their frontyard, they ended up with oldies drinking their beer

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