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I have classic Mac OS running in emulators (BasiliskII and SheepShaver) because: a) I enjoy the nostalgia (I grew up with Macs as a kid and didn't get a PC unt

by amyjess 10y ago

I have classic Mac OS running in emulators (BasiliskII and SheepShaver) because: a) I enjoy the nostalgia (I grew up with Macs as a kid and didn't get a PC until I was 12-13) b) I find the underlying technology extremely fascinating (resource forks especially) c) there are a lot of old Mac-only games that are a lot of fun (Power Pete! Spin Doctor! Slick Willie... though my emulator doesn't like that one. Plus a bunch of random games from the sampler CDs I used to collect as a kid.) I'd never, ever use classic Mac OS as a daily driver again, but it's a lot of fun for me to play with it every once in a while.

ashark 10y ago
I miss After Dark. A handful of the screensavers (four, I think?) are available for OSX, but only through some Japanese site with a distribution and payment system that's not immediately confidence-building compared to other solutions on the modern web. It's reminiscent of shareware, which I guess is kind of appropriate but doesn't make me more likely to hand them my CC number.
- zachberger 10y ago
  I miss the flying toasters.
- rodgerd 10y ago
  xscreensaver will always be there for you.
- pavel_lishin 10y ago
  Ditto, I loved that screensaver. jwz at least made a Flying Toasters module for xscreensaver, but there were so many great ones. I especially miss Starry Night, which seems like it ought to be trivial to recreate.
macandcheese 10y ago
The things I'd do for a Power Pete remake... iOS seems like a pretty good platform for it all told. I tried the emulator and managed to get it to run but everything was sped up 4x or so...
astrange 10y ago
It's unfortunate that Ambrosia, who released Mac games like Cythera, Escape Velocity, Asteroid, Harry the Handsome Executive, etc. apparently can never port them because they didn't negotiate remake or source code rights from the original developers. And they're still around, just enough to keep selling the old MacOS games at the original prices…
- MeetTheCryo 10y ago
  I might still have somewhere an archive of issues of "The Ambrosia Times"; before my family had a connection to the Internet, reading and rereading the Bitwise Operator column of The Ambrosia Times was my window into programming which went beyond what was taught in Dave Mark's "Learn C on the Mac" (although most of the content in those columns went way over my head, and I never programmed a game for the classic Mac OS which wasn't programmed either in Klik & Play or, later, in METAL BASIC). > Escape Velocity A game I recently described as "Poor Man's Sky" ; ) "Escape Velocity Override" is the only game in its series that I never completed, because of the registration "incentive" – "register or Captain Hector will steal X% of your credits (even before the thirty day trial period has elapsed)" was a surprise that left a nasty taste in my mouth, and I never went back to the game after that. I still have a pilot file from an early (I think the first) version of "Escape Velocity Nova" which featured a "bug" which enabled me to play multiple contradictory plot lines to completion... > Asteroid Don't you mean "Maelstrom"? And don't forget "Barrack"! Or "Apeiron"!
  - astrange 10y ago
    > "Escape Velocity Override" is the only game in its series that I never completed, because of the registration "incentive" Really? You should try it if you can, it's great. There were also a lot of great mods, like one total conversion called Frozen Heart. Of course they'd make the game crash all the time. Now, the third one had problems. They added all this… story… but the story lines liked to start with you getting kidnapped and drafted into a space army, so you pretty much couldn't do anything fun for most of the game. It's still available for Windows though. > A game I recently described as "Poor Man's Sky" ; ) Elite Dangerous is pretty much exactly EV but with modern graphics and VR, so that's nice. > Don't you mean "Maelstrom"? Yeah, that one! Also want to mention Realmz which some people are trying to clone, and TaskMaker which nobody is.

by amyjess 10y ago

ashark 10y ago

I miss After Dark. A handful of the screensavers (four, I think?) are available for OSX, but only through some Japanese site with a distribution and payment system that's not immediately confidence-building compared to other solutions on the modern web. It's reminiscent of shareware, which I guess is kind of appropriate but doesn't make me more likely to hand them my CC number.

zachberger 10y ago
I miss the flying toasters.
rodgerd 10y ago
xscreensaver will always be there for you.
pavel_lishin 10y ago
Ditto, I loved that screensaver. jwz at least made a Flying Toasters module for xscreensaver, but there were so many great ones. I especially miss Starry Night, which seems like it ought to be trivial to recreate.

macandcheese 10y ago

The things I'd do for a Power Pete remake... iOS seems like a pretty good platform for it all told. I tried the emulator and managed to get it to run but everything was sped up 4x or so...

astrange 10y ago

It's unfortunate that Ambrosia, who released Mac games like Cythera, Escape Velocity, Asteroid, Harry the Handsome Executive, etc. apparently can never port them because they didn't negotiate remake or source code rights from the original developers. And they're still around, just enough to keep selling the old MacOS games at the original prices…

MeetTheCryo 10y ago
I might still have somewhere an archive of issues of "The Ambrosia Times"; before my family had a connection to the Internet, reading and rereading the Bitwise Operator column of The Ambrosia Times was my window into programming which went beyond what was taught in Dave Mark's "Learn C on the Mac" (although most of the content in those columns went way over my head, and I never programmed a game for the classic Mac OS which wasn't programmed either in Klik & Play or, later, in METAL BASIC). > Escape Velocity A game I recently described as "Poor Man's Sky" ; ) "Escape Velocity Override" is the only game in its series that I never completed, because of the registration "incentive" – "register or Captain Hector will steal X% of your credits (even before the thirty day trial period has elapsed)" was a surprise that left a nasty taste in my mouth, and I never went back to the game after that. I still have a pilot file from an early (I think the first) version of "Escape Velocity Nova" which featured a "bug" which enabled me to play multiple contradictory plot lines to completion... > Asteroid Don't you mean "Maelstrom"? And don't forget "Barrack"! Or "Apeiron"!
- astrange 10y ago
  > "Escape Velocity Override" is the only game in its series that I never completed, because of the registration "incentive" Really? You should try it if you can, it's great. There were also a lot of great mods, like one total conversion called Frozen Heart. Of course they'd make the game crash all the time. Now, the third one had problems. They added all this… story… but the story lines liked to start with you getting kidnapped and drafted into a space army, so you pretty much couldn't do anything fun for most of the game. It's still available for Windows though. > A game I recently described as "Poor Man's Sky" ; ) Elite Dangerous is pretty much exactly EV but with modern graphics and VR, so that's nice. > Don't you mean "Maelstrom"? Yeah, that one! Also want to mention Realmz which some people are trying to clone, and TaskMaker which nobody is.