

Prince of Persia source code documentation [1989] [pdf] - labria
http://jordanmechner.com/wp-content/uploads/1989/10/popsource009.pdf

======
heed
Mechner has also taken the liberty to share his old journal entries from the
Prince of Persia era. A lengthy, inspiring read, and highly relevant to people
trying to build something.

Check them out on his website:

<http://jordanmechner.com/old-journals/>

~~~
whatusername
Can I just second that these are an engrossing read.

See the HN discussion here - <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=952029>

~~~
wallflower
Thanks!!! Plowing through it, enjoying the read, sad it will soon be done.
It's like reading Coders at Work in autobiographical form. One of the best
non-book books I've read in months.

> We chatted for an hour about peripherally related topics. Broderbund,
> corporate America, the rat race, capitalism, freedom. I was seducing him. At
> the critical psychological moment, I remarked:

“You know, all my clipping is done on the byte boundaries.”

There was a pause

April 3, 1989

> The other thing is, I liked them. Lately I’d been starting to feel jaded
> about this whole enterprise – “Oh well, it’s just a computer game” – but
> watching Chris and Stu, I realized: These guys love games. They love games
> the way I loved movies in college. Even more, because they’re not interested
> in girls yet. Computer games are like the air they breathe. If I can make
> one that they can get excited about, that’s a real accomplishment. That’s
> something I can be proud of.

So I worked till ten with renewed enthusiasm.

May 6, 1989

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wallflower
I am really intrigued what the redacted ##magic marker'd##-out line could
be...

    
    
      PRINCE OF PERSIA--Cheat Key Version
      August 27, 1989
    
      ???         Enable cheat keys
    
      With cheat keys enabled:
      [Return]    Disable cheat keys
      SKIP        Skip to next level (up to Level 12)
     ################################## (Redacted!)
      TINA        Go the end of level 12
      R           Restore full strength
      BOOST       Boost max strength (origstrength) by 1
      Z           Reduce guard to 1 unit of strength
      ZAP         Zap guard (he drops dead)

~~~
mkelly
When I saw the same page in the development journal he posted, I assumed that
code got removed from the game after he printed out that page -- not something
that was redacted, per se. :)

[edit: attempting to use something resembling English grammar this time]

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swannodette
Lovely

Total RAM: 127.75K

Total Diskspace: 252.5k

~~~
teuobk
Another way to think about it is that the game used almost all of the
available RAM and drive space. That would be like a game today needing 3.5 GB
of RAM and 0.90 TB of disk space. :)

~~~
gaius
You've played Crysis then ;-)

