
Computer Games You Can Program Yourself (1978) - jaybol
http://www.visualnews.com/2010/11/13/computer-games-you-can-program-yourself/
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thought_alarm
I found something much better than this when I bought an old Apple //c off of
Craigslist a while ago. This Apple //c came with a single software package
that included two disks and a book. It looked pretty lame at first.

The first disk contains a typical BASIC programming tutorial.

The second disk contained 15-or-so of games written in BASIC. Some graphics
games, some text games.

The book contained a high-level design document for each of the games on the
second disk, along with a low-level, line-by-line explanation of each line of
code. It's amazing.

I would have killed for something like that as a kid.

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kaib
I've been working on a simple voxel based game as a hobby project on the iPad.
It feels reinvigorating how a single person can quickly hack together
something really nice when you only need to do 16x16 pixel textures. I think
people underrate how exponentially increasing production costs are a drag on
game developer creativity. The human ability to suspend disbelief is
monumental and I think these new constrained voxel games and platforms like
the iPad will see more experimental gameplay emerge much like it did in the
early eighties.

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chipsy
I've been on the trail of this thought for over a year now. The game-making
process at this time is so constrained by the fidelity of content that the
only ways to really cut costs(or improve accessibility for amateur-level
projects) is to rely on low-fi and generative techniques, and to skimp on
diversity of content - all of which come at a price.

Crowdsourcing techniques might help at some point in the future, but we still
aren't connected enough to make professional-level creative collaborations as
simple as joining a game of Quake.

I just tossed some other projects aside and started working on something this
evening that puts my thoughts on simplifying the design process into code.
It'll be able to make something roughly akin to a single-player hypertext-game
or visual novel. Once it hits that goal, gradually I'll expand it and make it
more ambitious.

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MortenK
That was back when it was considered good coding practice to code on line 10,
20, 30 etc, so that you wouldn't have to rename all line numbers in case of
extra unexpected code lines.

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gommm
I loved those as a kid, there was also a magazine that would come every month
with program listing that I would type up and then try to modify... It was a
lot of fun and a great way to learn!

Sometimes I wonder how kids can learn programing by themselves now, there's no
environment directly available and if their parents don't introduce it to
them, I don't think they'll stumble that easily into it...

What was great at the time, is that any kid who had a computer or access to a
computer would sooner or later play a bit with basic and try their hand at
programming a bit

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Natsu
> there was also a magazine that would come every month with program listing
> that I would type up and then try to modify

That wasn't 3-2-1 Contact magazine by any chance, was it? Because I remember
typing the BASIC games they published into our computer.

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timinman
I used to LOVE that mag, but I don't remember it having programs. Wow, it was
cooler than I knew!

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Natsu
I think they had about one program a month or something? But you're right that
most of the magazine was about other things.

I'm pretty sure that the programs they published were submitted by readers,
but it's been a long time since I last saw that magazine, so my memory is
fuzzy.

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timinman
I remember reading this when I was 11 or 12-years old (about 25 years ago). I
had to ask my mom what 'Russian Roulette' was, which made her a little nervous
about what I was reading.

My favorite line is from that game: 32 PRINT " CHICKEN!!!"

The charm of a Jr. High kid armed with BASIC programming skills!

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iuguy
For a full archive of the book: <http://www.atariarchives.org/basicgames/>

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Tycho
I used to type in the code from books/magazines to create games on my ZX
Spectrum. Unfortunately I was never interested in the programming aspect, just
in getting the game they showed in the picture to work. I think I grasped some
of the basic principles like GoTo though. I recall an amusing-in-retrospect my
8 year old self had with a classmate:

"I have loads of games for my Amiga."

"Yeah, well I program games myself on my Spectrum."

"So do I! I know how to write in programming language." /bluffing

"Me too. I know _BASIC_." /massive bluff, expecting opponent to fold

"Yeah, BASIC is quite easy." /poker face

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ThomPete
Are there any blogs online mags etc or something like that who does this?

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timinman
Here's one with a handful of scans:
<http://www.zzap64.co.uk/c64/CommUser.html>

~~~
ThomPete
Thnx I was also thinking for something like Flash or HTML5

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duck
This was discussed two weeks ago as well:
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1866103>

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D_Alex
Wow... I remember this! Particularly for a) discovering that BASIC in the book
was not the same as BASIC on my C64 - figuring out the needed changes was a
major learning stimulus; and b) the amazing ELIZA program which wasa huge
influence on my entire philosophy...

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jon_hendry
_b) the amazing ELIZA program which wasa huge influence on my entire
philosophy..._

Why do you say your entire philosophy?

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D_Alex
It got me thinking along the lines of "what is thought/intelligence/free
will/nature of consciousness" etc.

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wccrawford
Would be nice to see something like this made for languages that are currently
popular (and 'easy'), like Ruby or Python.

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rbanffy
I think the dialect of BASIC these programs use is in a kind of a sweet spot
that teaches just enough high-level stuff while limiting you to low-level
IF/GOTO and GOSUB statements that are close to what processors actually
behave.

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urbanjunkie
I just remember the endless minutes spent looking for something I'd mistyped.
Happy days with my Video Genie!

~~~
cuppster
The checksum at the end of each line saved my *ss. I don't know how I could
have typed in the machine code to the C-64 Red Baron game without that!

