ZX Spectrum - Your memories

[Ferral]

I never knew that they incorporated mini games while loading on the spectrum. It will have probably been Mastertronic again as a rough uneducated guess.

Loading mini games was done towards the end of the lifespan of the 8bit era though. What really killed the C64 was the C64 C in my eyes, with just the cartridges and no interface to attach a disc drive or tape loader. Unfortunately it had no access to the huge catalogue of older 64 games so it wasn't really going to go anywhere.

At the same time the Amiga had just dropped in price also, so a lot of people just went for that. Even I started using the C64 less and less once I got the Amiga.

[Betty_Swallocks]

Argh! I just remembered the name of the game where you drove the 'dragster' type car around a map!

It was TransAm - another game by Ultimate. And it was 16k! I used to love that game

http://www.clive.nl/images/23489.jpg

That one's been remade too

http://retrospec.sgn.net/game/tranzam

[psj3809]

At the same time the Amiga had just dropped in price also, so a lot of people just went for that. Even I started using the C64 less and less once I got the Amiga.

Yeah once the Amiga/ST came down in price and became more popular i saw so many people jumping ship. Theres tons of great Speccy games i loved but in the late 90's i was getting fed up saving up for a 10 pound game and then getting it home and realising it was a very poorly designed game.

The originality of lots of the games in the mid 80's seemed to have gone, i always liked coin op conversions but some of the later games were just poor, the magic started fading for me and of course the Amiga arrived !

[DavidM]

<snip>

[Ferral]

Yeah, the 16 bit era had flair.

I definately agree that most of the later games were just churned out, bigger software houses jumped ship after a year or two of the Amigas life. We ended up seeing poor conversions on 8 bit as more work was being put into the 16 bit versions.

What was left was the budget houses like Mastertronic and Firebird who literally just released new title games but on budget for &#163;2 or &#163;3. Now Mastertronic do the Sold Out range for the PC so they are still about. Firebird on the other hand seemed to have just died like Thalamus and System 3. These houses did release fr 16 bit for a while if I remember rightly but he games didn't quite have the same feel as their 8 bit counterparts.

Unfortunately there was no way of the dedicated C64 and Speccy software houses staying alive as the industry was booming and had sarted moving forward, not forgetting that this move forward was gaining rapid pace.

[DavidM]

<snip>

[Ferral]

At times the C64 had some major slowdown, so did the amiga if to much was onscreen. Not forgetting on the 64 at times it had some major graphics corrution in games even when loaded properly.

[psj3809]

I'm a huge fan of emulators, amazing all the ones out there. I remember the first time i saw an advert in a PC mag in the mid 90's featuring a cd full of Speccy games and an emulator, had to get one of those ! My folks found it funny i was suddenly playing these old games on a PC back then.

Nowadays you get great emulators on a Pocket PC, a GP2X (great device) and PSP's etc. Its great retro is so popular again.

The first computer you got back in the 80's was a special time though, the Amiga to me was superb and there was still tons of excitement but as a kid the 8 bit era was great and so new.

Remember going into WhSmiths or Dixons and seeing all the old computers on display, tons of games being shown and in the magazine racks lots of different mags such as Crash, Zzap, Your Sinclair etc (Can get these on dvd all scanned in which are huge trips down memory lane).

Very special times !

[DavidM]

<snip>

[Unique]

i loved the spectrum when i was a kid. spy hunter was one of my favorite games, and jet set willly, and the 3d games by ocean. i'd love a speccy emulator for my iphone, they'd probably look great on the small screen

[manwithnoname]

I'm a huge fan of emulators, amazing all the ones out there. I remember the first time i saw an advert in a PC mag in the mid 90's featuring a cd full of Speccy games and an emulator, had to get one of those ! My folks found it funny i was suddenly playing these old games on a PC back then.

Nowadays you get great emulators on a Pocket PC, a GP2X (great device) and PSP's etc. Its great retro is so popular again.

The first computer you got back in the 80's was a special time though, the Amiga to me was superb and there was still tons of excitement but as a kid the 8 bit era was great and so new.

Remember going into WhSmiths or Dixons and seeing all the old computers on display, tons of games being shown and in the magazine racks lots of different mags such as Crash, Zzap, Your Sinclair etc (Can get these on dvd all scanned in which are huge trips down memory lane).

Very special times !

I remember going into WhSmiths (and John Menzies I think), surely back then they had all the new computers on Display

[Dareos]

its a lot further on in this thread, and i am kinda drunk but did anyone mention Wheelie?

hell, did i mention it?

trashman too, or Chaos and Lords of Chaos and... prolly i did, but damn they were good

kinda predecessors of EQ and WOW really i spose

BMX simulator, Indy Heat

Super Lawnmower Simulator (press M to mow)


may well be repeating myself, but then they deserve it!!

[Dareos]

reading back

INPUT, that was before Your Spectrum (later Your Sinclair)


Horace Goes Skiing (also Horace and the Spiders)

but i think Ferral mentioned Bionic Commando, quality again!!!

but the c64 just never ever had the same quality as the speccy

the Speccy lasted almost 10 years, which is a marvel unto itself, and although the colour and sound were never as good as the later C64 efforts. the speccy was easier to write for (i'm told) and thats why there was 14000 ( yep, 14000) games rather than the paltry 8000 that there were for the C64.

and on that note, how many games do nintendo, sony and microsoft have for their latest consoles?


and how long will they last?

[Kumagoro]

Two great spectrum games which are still great now

Chaos - you can play in the link
http://chaos.ffnet.org/

Kickstart 2 - Link has the C64 version i cant work out how to speed up in the game
though or pull a wheely.

http://c64s.com/game/1470/kick_start_ii/

[psj3809]

Just come back from a retro event in the Midlands, was a great gathering, lots of fellow retro gamers from forums. Sandy White (Ant Attack writer) was there, interesting to hear him talk about games back in the day.

Oli Frey also had a book out a while back with lots of his famous covers over the years, he did some great artwork.

Its amazing how popular many of the retro games still are, tons of retro sites, even lots of the latest machines have retro compilations nowadays.

[psj3809]

its a lot further on in this thread, and i am kinda drunk but did anyone mention Wheelie?

hell, did i mention it?

trashman too, or Chaos and Lords of Chaos and... prolly i did, but damn they were good

Chaos was great, i always played Rebelstar a ton as well. Remember that great strategy game ?

Wheelie I always found quite difficult when you got to the end to find the 'ghost rider' and then had to do the reverse and get all the way back ! Tricky game. The complete opposite was Bruce Lee, remember that classic ? So easy but a great game