4 ms·
Used to play this in the 80s. LAN parties before the LAN. Good times! :) Although the most amusing part is that if you wanted more than 4 colors (which was b
by a-dub 8y ago
Used to play this in the 80s. LAN parties before the LAN. Good times! :)
Although the most amusing part is that if you wanted more than 4 colors (which was basically any game) you had to use "Low" resolution mode which was only 320 by 200. MIDIMAZE took it a step further and only used about 1/4 of the screen leaving you with only about 160 by 100 of gameplay area. I guess networked multiplayer first person shooters over daisy chained serial lines were pretty heavy duty for machines designed in 1985. :)
Other fun ST facts:
They were huge in early electronic music because they were cheap and had those handy built in MIDI ports. I believe cubase was originally written for the ST.
They have 4 characters buried in their character set that you can assemble into a square and get a picture of "Bob" from Church of the Subgenius fame.
When they had a machine exception, they'd paint little bombs on the left side of the screen, where the number of them indicated the exception type (bus error, 0 divide, etc)
- bhauer 8y agoSome friends and I used to have gatherings to set up MIDI-rings and play MIDI-Maze for hours. I'm having difficulty remembering, but I think we sometimes had as many as eight players. The more players, the more likely the dreaded "MIDI-ring boo-boo" would interrupt a game. I wrote a map designer in GFA Basic, and I recall we had a bunch of custom maps as a result. Definitely a spiritual precursor to DOOM on a LAN.
- a-dub 8y agoThe first "network programming" I ever did was a GFA Basic program that talked over MIDI between two STs. Long before I ever saw a real networking protocol or a "null modem cable.". :)
- djaychela 8y ago>They were huge in early electronic music because they were cheap and had those handy built in MIDI ports. I believe cubase was originally written for the ST. Indeed - the reason I got into electronic music was because I had an ST (and that was part of the reason I got an ST, if you get my meaning). Tried Pro 24, and then got hold of Cubase. Used to spend hours improvising music using it, using muting via the F-keys. Rock solid setup, just worked and was dead easy and quick to use. Amazingly it translates to the version in use today - I used to show it to my pupils (via an ST emulator) to show them how what they were using had a history going back 20+ years. I wonder how different the musical landscape would have been without MIDI ports being built into the ST. Yes, of course, you can buy an interface, but if it's already there...
- chokma 8y ago> When they had a machine exception, they'd paint little bombs on the left side of the screen Earlier on, they used a mushroom cloud icon, but that was not well received apparently. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bomb_(icon)#Atari_ST_TOS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bomb_(icon)#Atari_ST_TOS
- alexisread 8y agoMIDIMAZE III was actually fullscreen! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xd6S7xAmfZc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xd6S7xAmfZc Speaking of networked games, there was a racing game called Hover Sprint which allowed 16 players over MIDI: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oy90R039b1g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oy90R039b1g Lastly (just for geek wow really) a guy called Douglas Little has written a POC of Doom for the STE (as well as Quake II for the Falcon): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCvx2O5M69E https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCvx2O5M69E