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Coders from the 80's

Sabnock

Member
We are looking for any bedroom code warriors from the 1980's / 90's who played around on any of the old classic machines like the spectrum, C64, BBC, Amiga etc who have now come to GMS to realise their long lost but never forgotten ambitions.

We have formed a small group of like minded wanna be coders and are looking to strengthen our numbers with the intention of bouncing ideas, helping each other and generally chatting about how much better things were way back when .

If you are interested let me know.
 

rIKmAN

Member
I'm from that era, but I have a couple of questions:

(a) Who's 'we' and how many of you are there?
(b) Describing your group as 'wannabe coders' would imply you are all beginners who don't know how to code yet and want to learn?
 
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PhenomenalDev

Guest
I'm not from that era but can I come anyway just because I can?
 

Sabnock

Member
I'm from that era, but I have a couple of questions:

(a) Who's 'we' and how many of you are there?
(b) Describing your group as 'wannabe coders' would imply you are all beginners who don't know how to code yet and want to learn?
We are 4 people so far. varying levels of code experience. 1 is fairly new and 3 are fairly experienced.
 

Sabnock

Member
How are you gauging experienced? I might scrape in, if I'm lucky.
Hobbyist would best describe my level of code. have written a few clones etc. Paul and Marc are similar. Steve is relatively new to it but has produced and released a great game already. some are stronger some are weaker but we chat and help each other out.

a few of mine for instance

https://forum.yoyogames.com/index.php?threads/close-to-the-original-pac-man.18339/#post-120176
https://forum.yoyogames.com/index.php?threads/galaga-clone.18357/
https://forum.yoyogames.com/index.php?threads/asteroids-1979-edition.5939/

Mmmm, need to finish Galaga
 
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Guest User

Guest
I highly recommend these guys! very helpful and very friendly they are.
 

HayManMarc

Member
I call us "Old Farts from the Old School", but I sense the others don't like that so well. :p

Our conversations are nothing special and far from advanced -- our group is more like a 'skype cafe' where we can chat about our projects and what we might be stuck on (and sometimes movies, AAA games, food). No drama, no braggadocio, just chat.
 
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ChristopherD

Guest
Greetings to the group. Lifelong gamer here, starting with the TRS-80 Model 1 (biorhythm carts, anyone?) and Model 3 (Infocom, represent), but really got hardcore into gaming with the Amiga. I mostly did pixel art in Deluxe Paint. Did graphic arts professionally for a decade before teaching myself Objective-C on OS X. That became a career in iOS development because I got damn lucky that the iPhone was invented. Been programming for over a decade now, and recently ditched Apple (at home) for a serious gaming system and realized I also have a damn good game development system as a natural side effect.

Tried Fusion and disliked it greatly. Tried Unreal and found it too imposing. Tried Unity and while I like C#, found the project structure obtuse.
Been studying GameMaker Studio 2 for about a week now, and it seems straightforward and has been quite easy to get started.
Looking forward to getting my first game under my belt.

(well, 4th game; did 3 at a mobile game company using Unity; 2 never were never distributed, 1 was quickly cancelled due to low consumer interest)
 

HayManMarc

Member
Hi ChristopherD. Nice to meet you.

I started with a TRS-80 Color Computer II, but didn't do much with it. Then learned some Apple Basic in school. That was it for me, until I found GameMaker and GML several years ago. I'm still using the old GM:Studio 1.4 - haven't quite jumped the hurdle to GMS2 yet, but will soon.
 

Sabnock

Member
Hi ChristopherD,

I'm fully over to GMS2 now and really liking it. myt only concern and the only 1 reason i might go back to GMS1 is for the licenses i have as part of a humble bundle deal. I am working on a project now that i actually think might be a viable release. hopefully :D
 
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ChristopherD

Guest
Hi ChristopherD,

**1 reason i might go back to GMS1 is for the licenses i have as part of a humble bundle deal**
Yes, same here. In fact, I had completely forgotten I had purchased that bundle, but checked on a whim.
Now, I have trouble going back to the GMS1, so I guess they're going to win the "paid upgrade" battle with me. :p
 

Carnivius

Member
Not looking to join a group or anything but just wanted to say it's cool to see more 80's home computer game folk. I'm an Amstrad CPC and Amiga guy myself and most of my projects are generally accurate to CPC graphic limitations just cos I really enjoy it. And helps me focus. 16 million colours is just too much for my OCD I realised when I found myself tweaking colour values of minute amounts of hoooours... :p
 
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GM029

Guest
I started out with an Atari 800 programming in Atari Basic. Good times. I later moved on to an Atari ST and eventually a 386. I've been using PCs since.
 

Paul Green

Member
I started out with an Atari 800 programming in Atari Basic. Good times. I later moved on to an Atari ST and eventually a 386. I've been using PCs since.
Commodore Fan Boy Here... :) but I loved the ST, even just the simple comparison of games that were out on both machines. :)

You thinking of joining up/us, or just reminiscing and sharing, as nostalgia is always a good thing... it takes us back to a happy place?
 
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GM029

Guest
That brings back memories! I played the crap out of Starglider on the ST. But Starglider 2- what an improvement. You had a whole solar system to explore, planets with day/night and actually revolving around the sun. Pretty amazing for its day actually.

I wasn't really an Atari fanboy too much. I was probably 8 years old or so when we got our Atari 800 so it wasn't initially my choice to buy it. Same with the ST- it was a 'hand me down' from my dad.

My friend had a C64 so I played that a lot too. We used to get those Mastertronic discs with both the Atari and C64 versions. Since they didn't copy protect the disks I would copy the Atari version and my friend would keep the original disk for his C64.

I actually briefly owned an Amiga 1000 too before I switched to a 386. I got the Amiga used and really inexpensive so I decided to try it out. I mostly used the Amiga to play Zany Golf, Marble Madness and Unreal (the UBISoft side scroller). I was amazed at stereo sound! I used RCA cables to plug it into my 80s boom box lol.
 
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GM029

Guest
Commodore Fan Boy Here... :) but I loved the ST, even just the simple comparison of games that were out on both machines. :)

You thinking of joining up/us, or just reminiscing and sharing, as nostalgia is always a good thing... it takes us back to a happy place?
Sure, I'll check out the group.
 

Sabnock

Member
Not looking to join a group or anything but just wanted to say it's cool to see more 80's home computer game folk. I'm an Amstrad CPC and Amiga guy myself and most of my projects are generally accurate to CPC graphic limitations just cos I really enjoy it. And helps me focus. 16 million colours is just too much for my OCD I realised when I found myself tweaking colour values of minute amounts of hoooours... :p
Come join us, you know you want too

Really want to see your CPC stuff.
 

Sabnock

Member
I miss peeking and poking

Fancy joining other former pokers although at least one is still a peeker
 
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Paul Green

Member
@Storyteller

Code:
10 POKE63280,0:POKE53281,0
20 A$ = CHR$(87)+CHR$(65)+CHR$(78)+CHR$(84)+CHR$(32)+CHR$(84)+CHR$(79)+CHR$(32)+CHR$(74)+CHR$(79)
30 A$ = A$+CHR$(73)+CHR$(78)+CHR$(32)+CHR$(85)+CHR$(83)+CHR$(63)
40 PRINT A$+CHRS$(13)
50 GOTO 40
 
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Mr Ed

Guest
Hello! Count me in!

I've got a similar story to ChristopherD; Started gaming on the Speccy when my folks bought me one for Christmas in 1982. I still remember loading Atic Atac for the first time on a 12" black'n'white TV on that cold December morning three-and-a-half decades ago. Ahh, the memories! I was always more interested in how the games actually worked, rather than playing them, so I taught myself BASIC, and spent countless hours designing and hand-encoding pixel-art on graph paper! Progressed on to STOS BASIC on a 1040STE. Then on to QuickC on PC.

Although I'm a professional coder (SQL, PL/SQL, Java, JavaScript, blah, blah. Boring!) I've always wanted to make games. I used to spend far too much of my time on the Retro Remakes and Ogre3D forums, but that's taken a back seat in recent years. Now my kids are demanding that I buy ever more powerful gaming machines I'm realising that (again, like ChristopherD) I have amazing development machines that are much more interesting than the Linux boxes I usually work with. I tried Unity, but couldn't get along with C#. Tried Unreal but it's huge complexity and potential far outweighed my (lack of) talent and available time. I tried out a bunch of other "simpler" frameworks (Stencyl, Godot, Construct2) before something with GMS2 just kind of clicked. I put together my first "game" in just a few days and I'm looking forward to seeing where I can go next.

Geez, I can ramble on when I get going!
 
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Mancopter

Guest
Count me in please! C64 games were the best! I've remade a few c64 games (in other languages), been playing with GM for a little while now and am enjoying it!
 

Changgi

Member
Fan of 80s video games and home computers here, though not much of a coder for them... yet anyway. Bit curious as to what you guys chat about.
 

Paul Green

Member
Fan of 80s video games and home computers here, though not much of a coder for them... yet anyway. Bit curious as to what you guys chat about.
Anything and everything, from coding, to movies, work stresses to how 'murrggghh' we are feeling if we have a cold.. :)

Sometimes we have quiet days, others are very active, from the 8 of us, there are various time zones, so there is usually some movement (even if it's only a couple of sentences)
 
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zendraw

Guest
can i buttin? i have experience in gml and am willing to helpout if i can.
 

Changgi

Member
I'm unable to locate that anywhere online or in Skype forums, do you happen to have a link?
It was released as a one-time demo which I tried out. There were some Asks relating to it but the new version isn't officially out yet, so there's only hoping they'd keep it. You could still start a group chat, but existing groups weren't saved.

On a related note, I also started my own Atari Discord server and am hoping for more people to join too. Discord is a lot like Skype but instead of just one IRC "channel" like Skype does, it allows you to set up many so that you could keep things more organized and it's easier for you to find what you're looking for instead of one big chunk of chat. Like I have channels for the respective Atari systems/computers. It also offers multiple voice chat channels that you may enter or leave at will and some other fun stuff like small games and music from bots.
 

Paul Green

Member
Well, I think we'll stick with Skype for now, as it's still working.

On an un-realated, but related note, curious for both @Changgi and @blacklemon what was your favorite game of the 80's and to which 8 or 16 bit machine did you play it on?
 
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zendraw

Guest
dont know if these games were from the 80`s. but i love Solbrain, TMNT Tournament, Shadow of the Ninja, Gremlins 2, and proly more, but these are like unforgetable. espetially solbrain.
 

Changgi

Member
I wasn't technuCally born in the 80s. Is this why i didn't get an invite despite expressing interest? :/

Either way, I grew up playing lots of Atari 2600 and NES games. I'm less acquainted with the home computers, but the Atari 800 and the Apple IIe are my favourites. Some of my favourite games are Millipede, Beamrider, 1943, Missile Command, Wavy Navy and Warlords.
 
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David Berkompas

Guest
Hi, Dave here. The first computer I owned was a TI99-4/A, with an extended basic cartridge. I remember the first time I tried writing some sprite testing, and for a few days couldn't understand why my sprite wasn't appearing. It turned out to be I was moving it across the screen so fast that I had to put in a delay loop. Crazy stuff.

Moved on to the C64, and had a couple floppy drives. Never did make it up to the Amiga, but a couple friends had the A500.

I've written a few things for the Gameboy Color and N64, but those were either scene demos or hacktros.

Thanks for the invite HayManMarc.


Dave
 

Mick

Member
Cool group, I'm interested! I started out on a Commodore 64, at that time I was mostly in to gaming, but did try some basic Basic from magazines. I loved the music on the C64 and still do, we actually write music for our current game on SID Wizard for the C64. Jeroen Tel is my favorite composer on the C64. :)

After the C64 I went on to the Amiga and when I found AMOS I was hooked, I did some prototypes in that, but never released anything. I have been coding ever since, but started doing games again a few years ago. The influence is mostly old games. :)

I'm a chiptune freak, I have written an ebook for using the SID Wizard tracker and have recently made a few extension for using chiptunes in GMS.

I'm also experimenting a bit with Blitz Basic 2 for the Amiga, would be really nice to do something on that platform. :)
 
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factnfiction101

Guest
I started with QBASIC back in the early 90s on a Windows 3.1 or 3.0 machine. My first game was the example in the QBASIC book, "Gorillas" I played around with the physics of the exploding bananas and the game for awhile. I think I also worked on a personality type program.

I didn't start using GM until I got a hold of a free Windows 98 machine, back when GM was 4.1 or 4.2

I use to mess around with hacks, but I haven't done much in the past few years.
 
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