As you can see, I’m sort of a retro junky. But this is a fun one for all of computer gaming geeks. No networks here… just early 90s computer gaming mayhem.
My good friend Ben and I used to spend hours in his parent’s basement playing a few games in particular:
-Star Control (The original!)
-Space Quest (For the official record… Roger Wilco was, is and ever shall be a character in my book–not voice software.)
-and Dr. Spaitso a Voice Synth response system.
We’d eat frozen pizzas and drink sugar pop. And although I can’t eat as much pizza and we’ve switched to diet pop, being able to play these games again would be fabulous. And now you can! A little program called DOS Box located at sourceforge brings your dreams of playing your old DOS games back to life.
Interestingly enough, the Space Quest series had a final release in which all 6 versions of the games were included in a single box-set. Unfortunately, when I tried to install the early versions Space Quest 1, 2 and 3 on my Windows machine they didn’t run so well. DOS Box has solved that problem. First I installed DOS Box. It’s a free download but the reason I found out about it is because I recently picked up the latest issue of Retro Gamer magazine and the free disc included DOS Box and a copy of the adventure game Arena. I then decided I would like to play the VGA version of Space Quest 1–the upgrade to the original version. So I copied the files to the hard drive–oof… a whole 6MB!
Then I ran the following command:
The great thing about DOS Box is that it creates a 486-based environment in which your DOS programs can run. So even the load times for the games are simulated. After a short wait I saw this for the first time:
Woot! And then the fabulous midi soundtrack began followed by…
I bought a SlikStik controller for playing mainly arcade games. I didn’t enclose it into a cabinet, but I still have a good set up. Here is a picture of that set up. Can you name the game? The game represented is my all-time favorite.
Welcome the following to the grid:
RigorMortis
POI
Xsyntrex
T Dog
2J
Glyph
Xenolith
Back in the late 70s and the early 80s, Coleco was one of the big names in handheld electronics. Besides Coleco there was really only one competitor that I can remember and that is Mattel. Mattel had its own line of electronic LED based handhelds that were fun, portable and relatively cheap. As LCD screens became less expensive to produce and the graphics could be displayed in higher resolutions, the LED games that were once popular faded into non-existence.
However, there is a new audience for all these games–adults. So the audience isn’t really new–we just love our old games. Remember the games that didn’t take you 8 days to finish? Or how about the games that you didn’t have to have an online subscription to? This retro craze is bringing back all kinds of these games… and Coleco has been given a second chance. A company called Techno Source has acquired the rights to produce and sell original Coleco games as well as brand new ones. I don’t know if the new Electronic Quarterback handheld will look like the one I had in 1979, but if it does– I may be one of the suckers that will buy one.
Sadly, I already have an dreary update to my terribly optimistic post. The new “Electronic Quarterback” pales in comparison to the original. It’s an lcd version and doesn’t even have the same controls. *Le sigh*. It should legally have to carry a number 2 on the end of it’s name… and maybe that says something.
