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Here's an excellent long read for those who need the background. Well worth your time to read even if you didn't grow up playing Elite: https://www.theguardian

Here's an excellent long read for those who need the background. Well worth your time to read even if you didn't grow up playing Elite: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/oct/18/features.weekend https://www.theguardian.com/books/2003/oct/18/features.weeke...

oska 6y ago
> Braben was studying natural sciences, Bell was on the maths course. Neither went anywhere near the computer science department, which they had arrogantly but accurately decided offered them nothing useful. They're talking about Cambridge in 1982. Was the computer science dept. really useless at that time? I doubt it. Obviously, I respect their DIY ethos and their genius for invention but they might have picked up some ideas for further invention if they had done some CS courses.
- frabcus 6y ago
  Certainly ten years later it was too abstract. Lots about compiler theory. Computer science is sometimes useful for software engineering, but only occasionally.
  - neilwilson 6y ago
    Avoiding going to Cambridge for that reason. The Poly's offered far better Computer Science courses at that time and we got an upgrade to a university degree anyway.
  - collyw 6y ago
    Before then computer science was the only course really offered. Around that time some universities seemed to start offering other related courses such as "Information Technology" (I remember they had slightly lower entry requirements as "computer science" was a relatively hard course to get onto in a decent University in the UK as it was popular.)
082349872349872 6y ago
> There were only 150,000 or so BBC Micros in the world at that point, so the ratio was almost 1:1, one copy of Elite for every computer that could run it. Now I'm curious. How many players who made it to Elite Elite are currently members of the anorak elite?
- jacquesm 6y ago
  I probably would have been but after a 6 month long binge on Elite I one day woke up, realized there is a lot more to life than playing computer games and deleted my copy by cutting up the distribution disks. Elite was pretty addictive, and I have a weak spot for that kind of mechanism that apparently has only one way to resolve it.

oska 6y ago

> Braben was studying natural sciences, Bell was on the maths course. Neither went anywhere near the computer science department, which they had arrogantly but accurately decided offered them nothing useful. They're talking about Cambridge in 1982. Was the computer science dept. really useless at that time? I doubt it. Obviously, I respect their DIY ethos and their genius for invention but they might have picked up some ideas for further invention if they had done some CS courses.

frabcus 6y ago
Certainly ten years later it was too abstract. Lots about compiler theory. Computer science is sometimes useful for software engineering, but only occasionally.
- neilwilson 6y ago
  Avoiding going to Cambridge for that reason. The Poly's offered far better Computer Science courses at that time and we got an upgrade to a university degree anyway.
- collyw 6y ago
  Before then computer science was the only course really offered. Around that time some universities seemed to start offering other related courses such as "Information Technology" (I remember they had slightly lower entry requirements as "computer science" was a relatively hard course to get onto in a decent University in the UK as it was popular.)

082349872349872 6y ago

> There were only 150,000 or so BBC Micros in the world at that point, so the ratio was almost 1:1, one copy of Elite for every computer that could run it. Now I'm curious. How many players who made it to Elite Elite are currently members of the anorak elite?

jacquesm 6y ago
I probably would have been but after a 6 month long binge on Elite I one day woke up, realized there is a lot more to life than playing computer games and deleted my copy by cutting up the distribution disks. Elite was pretty addictive, and I have a weak spot for that kind of mechanism that apparently has only one way to resolve it.