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/vr/ - Retro Games

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File: 34 KB, 500x287, atari 800XL system.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
6377221 No.6377221 [Reply] [Original]

What can /vr/ tell me about this? Game essentials? Seems to not be discussed much at all compared with other home computers (even the Apple II has had more threads).

>> No.6377234

I found one of these in the trash of my school one day in the mid 1990s. It worked but I never had any games or programs for it. And by worked I mean I could plug it into the tv and type words, had no disc drives or anything for it, just the keyboard itself.

>> No.6377249 [DELETED] 

Had a brief reign in 1981-83 when it was hot but the C64 soon overtook it and Atari fucked themselves with a giant vibrator during the video game crash.

>> No.6377256

I can tell you that you'll find a bunch of games for it in random 2600 lots almost as often as you find coleco carts.

>> No.6377258

Had a brief reign in 1981-83 when it was hot but the C64 soon overtook it and Atari fucked themselves with a giant vibrator during the video game crash. It's pretty much of an early 80s machine and couldn't keep up with NES-era gaming. It has a bunch of really great features missed on the C64 but is a lot worse in sprite capabilities or being able to display multicolor graphics.

>> No.6377284

I like the Atari 8-bit but it essentially died in 1985 and was a zombie machine for the remainer of its life and never got a lot of big computer games like Pirates!, Maniac Mansion, and Ultima V.

>> No.6377402

>>6377258
Well, Broderbund always developed their games around the Apple II first because they claimed it had the most primitive hardware yet a disassembly of Drol finds that the Apple, C64, and Atari versions have practically nothing in common, about 90-90% of the code is completely different despite all three machines having a common CPU.

>> No.6377429

>>6377402
Game development wasn't the mechanised industry back then that it is today, it's not EA and Ubisoft and their sweatshop game factories. It was a lot more loose in those days and programmers usually worked alone and not part of a team. Also programmers tended to discuss their techniques a lot more openly in those days, in magazines they'd tell you eg. their technique for smooth ZX Spectrum scrolling (today they'd get sued by EA for divulging the company's proprietary scrolling routines).

>> No.6377446

>>6377429
yeah that's true. the gaming industry today is so remote and far removed from the community, it's not like in the 8-bit era when programmers were just neckbeards making games for other neckbeards and there was a real sense of community.

>> No.6377504

Star Raiders is pretty great

>> No.6377506

I grew up with an Atari 800
Spent a lot of time playing Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves with my brothers

>> No.6377531

>>6377284
After 85 it was a budget machine aimed primarily at the European market, but it had a huge handicap in the cassette interface being locked to 600 bps while Commodore and Sinclair used software-driven cassette interfaces that you could write fastloaders for and "turbocharge" them.

>> No.6377559

the C64 was an easier machine to code for

>> No.6377573

>>6377559
Maybe, but then again the C64 has its own set of quirks and "gotchas" you need to master and very little programming wisdom from it translates onto the A8 and vice versa.

>> No.6377595

Atari had an OC donut steal BASIC, they didn't use Microsoft BASIC and they also copied the HP BASIC string handling system rather than the DEC BASIC string handling Microsoft used which means converting programs that use a lot of strings is a real PITA.

>> No.6377618

>>6377284
From a North American standpoint, the Apple II and C64 were the two 8-bit titans and everything else was an also-ran.

>> No.6377862

Boulder Dash

>> No.6377898

Play a Willyvania

>> No.6378073

/vr/ is very bad at discussing computer games desu.

>> No.6378105

>>6378073
Americonsoleplebs who cant fathom why computers are better

>> No.6378109

>>6378105
Since when was the Atari 8-bit ever relevant in Europe? It was one of those also-ran computers like the Dragon 32 or MSX.

>> No.6378158

>>6377221
There are several models:

>400
16k memory, can be expanded to 32k. Horrible membrane keyboard.
>800
48k, generally the de-facto machine for 80% of software. Only machine with two cartridge slots.
>1200XL
Short-lived 64k model, garbage. Avoid.
>600XL/800XL
The same machine but with 16k and 64k of memory respectively. BASIC and a diagnostic test are built in and there's no longer a separate BASIC cartridge. Newer OS ROM.
>65XE/130XE
Post-Tramiel takeover machines. Cheap, flimsy garbage built on a $20 budget. 64k and 128k RAM respectively.

The two standard disk formats were the 90k 810 format and the 130k 1050 format but the former is much more supported. The 400/800 had a separate BASIC cartridge and four joystick ports, all later machines have onboard BASIC and two joystick ports.

>> No.6378208

>>6378109
Don't exactly know how relevant it was, but I know it was somewhat popular in Spain

>> No.6378305

The A8 enjoyed a last Indian summer in the early 90s when Eastern Europe was opened up as a market--there are lots of Polish and Czech A8 games from that period.

>> No.6378890
File: 165 KB, 402x401, icancounttopotato.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
6378890

>>6378158
>there were several models of the 800XL
>400
>800
>1200XL
>600XL/800XL
>65XE/130XE

>> No.6380071

Sup assembly language LARPer guy.

>> No.6380271

>>6377506
>Spent a lot of time playing Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves
>inb4 JPCfaggots and the weeb versions of that game

>> No.6380573

>>6380071
Sup old enough to post here LARPer guy.