Late last year I found this classic (for me, anyway) picture lurking in my files and scanned it. It’s a Polaroid photograph of one corner of my then “computer room” taken by myself somewhere around late 1994 or early 1995 (yes, my family was lucky enough to have the space for another room dedicated mainly to my BBS computer, but filled with my other junk as well). I was 13 or 14 at the time. As you can see on the picture, I’ve labeled certain items in the room with numbers. Each number is associated with an item that I talk about below. With that out of the way, click on the image to open up the bigger version and let’s start the tour!

1. DEC VT-125 Terminal – A true classic in the terminal world, pulled from a dumpster. The neighbor of my father’s company serviced minicomputers and was always throwing neat stuff out. I got about 3-4 of these, took a few apart, eventually throwing them away for space concerns. But I think I still have one or two left.

2. Micromint Z8 Board – Part of the Micromint Z8 Basic Computer/Controller set. Inherited from my father’s old workplace. The Micromint Z8 system was a BASIC language-programmable microcontroller, essentially for early “embedded computer” applications. I have a bunch of cool expansion boards too, including one that lets you save/load your program to cassette tape, and another that lets you burn EPROMs of your BASIC programs! Cool stuff — I should play with it again.

3. NES Games – Back in 1994, my NES game collection could actually fit in one cubic foot of space. Crazy. A NES Game Genie code book can be seen here, awkwardly sticking out of the top of the plastic basket. Eventually my collection would spill out of the pictured basket and beyond…

4. Commodore CBM 2001-32 – This was had at a hamfest for $10, including the separate companion disk unit. It’s tucked away in the far back corner of the room, so I guess I didn’t use it very much.

5. Zoom 2400 BPS Modem – My first modem, given to my family by a friend. The top cover is off because I was playing around with hooking the speaker audio output to headphones — both for kicks, and for late-night modem sessions without waking the parents (I did this before I figured out the Hayes AT command to turn off the internal speaker) . This very modem is responsible for introducing me to the world of BBSes sometime in 1991. Of course, this being 1994-95, my main workhorse at the time is an Intel external 14400 modem across the room (not pictured).

6. Apple II+ – My dad bought this for me around 1990-91 (from a hamfest, big surprise) so I could learn BASIC on it. And I did, having loads of fun with it over the years. At the time of this picture I had the luxury of a color composite video monitor (#11). Up until then, I was stuck with a monochrome green-screen. But somehow it almost didn’t feel like an Apple II any more once it was in color.

7. Odyssey2 Games – Yes, this black blob is actually fifteen Odyssey2 games in interlockable cartridge racks, purchased for $10 along with an Odyssey2 console at a hamfest in the early 90s.

8. Nintendo Entertainment System – Back then, I took everything I owned apart, and the former “family NES” was not spared this treatment. Thinking myself clever, I switched the one and two player ports around, along with the “power” and “reset” buttons. How delightfully obnoxious. This unit, 11 years later, went on to become the NES DVD Player hack I did recently.

9. EPROM Eraser – It’s the gray rectangular box on top of the Apple II+ (#6). Never really used it very much. It was inherited along with the Micromint Z8 controller board stuff (#2) and was used to erase EPROMs programmed by the unit. It works by shining UV light through a tiny quartz window on the EPROM.

10. Apple II Disks – Stacked here are two boxes of Apple II disks. The lower one is mine, the upper one was given to me by a friend (with all his Apple II disks in it!). In fact, it was the same friend who gave my family the 2400 BPS modem (#5). It’s nice to have good friends.

11. Composite Video Monitor – What a grand day it was when I acquired my first color composite video monitor at a local hamfest! In this picture, the monitor is performing triple duty between the Apple II+ (#6), NES (#8), and Atari Jaguar (#14). I simply switched the AV connectors at the back depending on which one I wanted to use.

12. Atari Lynx – I bought this under-utilized portable wonder in used condition from a guy who regularly called my BBS (“Raven,” if you must know) in 1993 or 94. The transaction was done entirely by mail and we never met in person (imagine that!).

13. Mystery Sticker – I’m not sure what this is. It looks like a random peel-off trading card-sized sticker just stuck on the wall at an odd angle. Weird. This picture have been taken after my dad made me take down the 100-odd posters and other crap I had tacked and taped all over the walls, believing they were a fire hazard.

14. Atari Jaguar – I was a total Atari nut in the very early 90’s, believing strongly that Atari was the greatest company ever. “What’s this Nintendo business?” I said. “Atari was first!” I heard rumors of their Panther, then Jaguar, consoles and waited anxiously for their release. My birthday in 1994 was one of the happiest days of my life: I received an Atari Jaguar System and Super Metroid for the SNES. Here, Doom can be seen in the cartridge slot, a version of the seminal 3D FPS rivaled on consoles only by the PlayStation version.

15. Apple III – The prize of my collection at the time. When I first heard about the Apple III years before, it was like some magical, mythical beast. Would I ever catch sight of one, much less possess it? Naturally, I was extremely excited when my father and I came across this one later at a hamfest (again, big surprise). $10-20 later, I had my first Apple III, complete with dust cover (pictured on the unit). I only had the Apple II emulation disk for it, though, and to this day have never run any native Apple III software. Shortly after my Apple III was obtained (turned out they were not as rare as I thought), the Apple Lisa quickly became the next mythical beast to be had — a beast I’m still chasing in the wild to this day.

16. Plug ‘N’ Play Mosaic Book – This book is how I got my first copy of Mosaic, the first graphical web browser (it came on a floppy disk in the back). Shortly after, I began to develop my first home page, and boy did it suck. It’s funny reading lists of “cool” web sites from back then because, well…there were only about ten web sites back then. Ergo, all of them were cool (and listed in this book).

17. Handheld Video Games Magazine – I just found this particular issue (Spring 1991) again recently while working on my “Game Ads A-Go-Go” column for GameSetWatch. Good issue. I apparently didn’t value it very much at the time because it’s sitting on the floor right next to the spot where our cats would leave all the dead birds they’d caught that week. Yum.

Well that’s the tour, hope you enjoyed it. Thanks for accompanying me on a nice walk down memory lane.

Simple but well-constructed, Shamus is one of my favorite games for the Atari 800. It’s an engaging experience…unless you see what I’m about to show you. That’s because the real enjoyment and challenge of Shamus as a game is mapping its unpauseable, implausible geometry.

Shamus is a natural extension of Atari’s old Berzerk. Touch the wrong thing, and you die: an enemy, a bullet, or a wall. There’s even an Evil Otto equivalent, the Shadow, who comes to get you if you’re on a screen too long. But a fixed map, keys, and keyholes bring in an adventure element that Berserk doesn’t have.

Now I could fill you in on all sorts of game details, but they won’t make much difference. Just blast your way through the maze, heading for room 127. The following tips, however, may help you choose your route: 1. the large, difficult rooms are the horizontal connectors (those with left and right exits). All of these, plus the start room, contain an item, while none of the other rooms do. 2. The blinking question mark, called a “Mystery,” will give you points and/or an extra life but may also summon the Shadow immediately, so it’s best to eliminate all enemies in the room before grabbing it. 3. Some of the keys change position from game to game. Check out my maps (below) to work out the best route through all the places they may be hiding.

Warning: Shamus spoilers ahead!

[ Continue reading The Mazes of Shamus » ]

After playing my new AV Famicom and the 18 games that came with it for a few days, I have a few things to report. The first of which is that yes, I still love it. But if that were all I had to say, then this would be a boring article. Luckily, the other things are more interesting. For example, I am quickly falling for the Nintendo “dogbone” controller. It’s strange really; I’ve had one for years but never really gave it a good chance. I was biased immediately by the slanted A-B button arrangement, which I definitely do not like for playing Super Mario Bros. games (because I constantly hold down B with the tip of my thumb and use the ball of it to hit A and jump — the upward-slanted button line makes this play style awkward). But for every other game, it’s really comfortable. I now highly recommend getting one and giving it a chance if you haven’t already. My old US dogbone needs a good scrubbing and some new conductive rubber pads (I might have some left from an old controller repair kit somewhere) before it will be completely up to par. But once it is, I think it just might become my new favorite NES controller. I noticed something funny when comparing the Japanese dogbone and the US dogbone side to side. The Japanese dogbones have three foot controller cords, which is a pathetically short length by US standards. But it’s no big surprise; after all (or so I hear repeatedly) Japanese people all live in tiny apartments the size of my kitchen, so they’re never more than three feet away from their TV — even when taking a shower. Anything longer than three feet and the annual choking and tripping deaths in Japan would skyrocket. But hey, that’s Japan. In the US, we’re proud of tripping over our cords; it’s a matter of national pride. So how’s this for comparison: the cord on the US dogbone controller is eight feet long. No, not your standard six feet. Eight. Because of the three foot Japanese cord length, I think Nintendo of America decided to tack on another couple feet just out of spite. Either that, or Nintendo has a death wish for Americans.

So what else is new? A few things. First of all, you must drop everything and play Tetris 2 + Bombliss. This cart contains my new official favorite version of Tetris, and it comes with a bonus Tetris-like game called Bombliss. This particular version of Tetris was never released in the US, so not many American gamers probably know of it (and no, it’s not Tengen’s Tetris). And for some reason, despite the number “2” in the title, it seems to be the same ‘ole Tetris that we know and love. This version was developed by Bulletproof Software, has great graphics, smooth gameplay and controls, and relatively relaxing music (instead of relentless, frantic Russian marches that typically make me want to jump off a bridge when under level-11 duress). Bombliss, also included, is a game played with Tetris-like pieces, except that some of the pieces contain — surprise — bombs. Every time you complete a horizontal line, all the bombs in the line explode. Your goal is to blow up everything on the play field (normal blocks included) by tactical bomb placement. Bombliss also has a puzzle mode, which is really addicting and worth playing. The game even lets you put in your initials and saves all your high scores to SRAM. All in all, I think Tetris 2 + Bombliss is a must-have for your Famicom collection. How do you get it? Well either track down an original copy of the cart (worth having), or perhaps find it through other means.

The last thing I have to report is a follow up on the couple Deadly Towers articles we had on here. It turns out that one of the 18 used games that came with my AV Famicom was none other than the Japanese version of Deadly Towers, known as Mashou (“Evil Bells”) over there. The only thing I really have to say is that I played it for a while, and it appears to be exactly the same as the US version, which is to say that it sucks just as bad. I’m exaggerating a bit, because I really like the charm of it, but of course, it’s no Zelda. Overall, the coolest thing about owning Mashou in cartridge form is that the cart has a nifty red LED built into it that lights up when you turn the system on (see white cart in picture above). For that reason alone, you must own it now. Run, don’t walk, to your nearest…Japan. Try not to trip on the way.

The Tetris part of the sublime Tetris 2 + Bombliss.

The Bombliss part of Tetris 2 + Bombliss.

This is sort of a follow up to my last feature on Deadly Towers. I stumbled upon this speed run video (78 mb, requires Xvid codec) of a guy beating said game in 18 minutes and 46 seconds on the site NES Videos (scroll down to Deadly Towers on that page). NES Videos is a cool archive of tool-assisted console game movies. What are tool-assisted game movies, you ask? Well, they are attempts to find the quickest possible way to complete a game, but they use emulator save states to achieve as perfect as possible a performance, and clever video editing to present a seamless viewing experience (making it appear that the entire run was done in one sitting). Ideally, I suppose the time-attack competitors that make these movies are looking for the theoretical “best” or “fastest” way to complete a given video game, sometimes with different constraints. They’re lots of fun to watch, so check out some more on the NES Videos site.

Anyway, as I mentioned before, all the dungeons that Ben Johnson mapped (presented in our last article) are completely superfluous to successful Deadly Towers completion. And as a great illustration of this fact, the player in the video doesn’t enter any one of them at all. This video makes it look like DT is way easier than it is. But give it a play yourself and get frustrated / mystified like the rest of us. 🙂