[game_preservation] National Game Registry Blog

[Martin Goldberg]

On Wed, Dec 16, 2009 at 11:12 PM, Devin Monnens <dmonnens at gmail.com> wrote:

>>

>> Here's another source as well -

>>

>> http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/mit/tx-0/TX-0_history_1984.txt

>>

>

> Thanks, I'll take a look through that one.

>

>>

>> I can ask over on the vintage computing mailing list.  May actually

>> find someone willing to scan full copies.

>

> Yeah, if someone had copies of those, those are the pages I really need!

> Incidentally, because these were distributed through DECUS, it should be

> possible to find all the software in the catalogue and get it running.

>


Ok, I'll post over there.


> Text adventures for example don't seem to have had a big impact

> on console games (their successors, the graphics adventures, did however).


I wouldn't exactly say that either.  Most of the D&D and similar
themed games have direct links to their text counterparts.  Look at
something like Adventure or the early D&D themed games.  Likewise, you
have a period of hybrid graphic/narrative console games starting in
the NES era.



>

>>

>

> I'd say the PDP-8 was purchased by at least a few private high schools. The

> DECUS software catalogs tell you where the software was made, too. Lunar

> Lander comes out of Lexington High School (MA), Apollo II from Wayland High

> School (MA), and then there's a game of NIM produced out of Highland Park

> High School in IL (and these are just a few games distributed through

> DECUS). These are all produced in FOCAL, which was another easy-to-use OS

> (comparatively with assembly, of course).


Yes, but software can still be made via a timeshare/dialup access to a
PDP-8 or other mainframe and mini.  Do the DECUS catalogs
differentiate between that?



>

> Hmm. Well, why are so many kids using Flash? There's a bunch of stuff on

> Newgrounds.


Because animations and visual interactions can be done by very
"turtle" like vector programming, via the movie like frame by frame
timeline interface.   All with very minimal actionscript attachments
to any graphical objects.



>I figured Actionscript was about as complex as learning BASIC,

> only it's a lot faster to get the visual output and jump into debugging.

>


Nope.  Actionscript is a regular object orientated scripting language,
based off of ECMAScript (also used for Javascript).



>>

>>

>> Everything he's taken credit for was actually designed and built by

>> someone else, including other engineers at Atari.  The only game I'm

>> aware of that he had any hands on with in the design process was

>> Computer Space, and even then that was just finishing up the layout on

>> circuitry that Ted Dabney designed.  Otherwise, everything at Atari

>> was done by Al Alcorn, Steve Bristow, the guys at Cyan, etc.

>

> Now didn't Bushnell design Gotcha? Or was that another designer? Out of all

> the games I saw at the time, that looked like the only one he'd made outside

> of Computer Space. While it was a new type of game, I can't exactly say it

> looked like it was any good...


No, Gotcha was done by Al Alcorn as well.  Unless you're thinking of
Touch Me, but even that was done by Steve Meyer at Cyan (Grass
Valley).



> RE: Dabney - Baer and Steve Kent both seem to talk about Bushnell building

> Computer Space. So Baer was just going off of Bushnell's story in Kent's

> book?


I'd have to see what material of Ralph's you're referring to.  Ralph's
a friend of mine, and fully aware of Ted and his actual contributions.


> Also, regarding running a company, I think you'd have some doubts just from

> hearing the stories about Bushnell hiring bums off the street to assemble

> computer parts!


Well, that's when they started mass producing them.  The first lot of
them were hand built by Ted and Al.  Curt actually has one of them.


>This and the jacuzzi board meetings.


That wasn't a Nolan thing as much as a typical 70's thing.  Most of
the male management partook of that.  There's a reason why Gotcha's
original controllers looked lair a pair of boobs.



> The way Kent describes

> it, he kind of glorifies the story, when in reality it's just complete and

> total disaster (not to say it isn't possible to have successful jacuzzi

> board meetings, but these are really just a bunch of kids who suddenly have

> more money than they have ever seen before or know what to do with - and

> don't know a lick about business or money management).


I'm not sure that's the right context either for this.  They weren't
all kids, some were seasoned engineers and business veterans.  It was
more a sign of the time.  Don't forget, recreational activity, drugs,
alternative management techniques, and even the counter culture, all
have a longstanding tie in to the computing and video game fields and
industries.  One person's hot tub session is another's beanbag session
(PARC) and another's acid test.  Heck, Mitch Kapor personally stated
to me he conceived of Lotus while tripping on acid.  (Was visiting
with him at the EFF sponsored Summercon back in '91).  Have you read
the book "What the Dormouse Said" btw?  Great read.

And actually, Atari didn't have more money than they knew what to do
with.  They were constantly at odds with going bankrupt, an ever
crowded market, and research to keep ahead.  Within a month or so of
Pong's arcade release you had the first clones starting to appear.  In
fact the real money didn't start coming in until they hit the consumer
market - '75-'76 is when they first started hitting the large sales
and any sizable profits.

Marty