
The Monster Truck Madness 2 site is unchanged from 1998 - shrikant
http://www.microsoft.com/games/monster/default.htm
======
Arubis
An HTML file virtually unchanged in fifteen years still renders cleanly in a
modern browser. Backwards compatibility across open standards is a wonderful
thing.

~~~
thetrb
I'm pretty sure a .doc file created fifteen years ago also still renders in
Word.

Same for a PDF file created 15 years ago or most other formats. So I don't
really see your point about open standards in this case.

~~~
Lagged2Death
_I 'm pretty sure a .doc file created fifteen years ago also still renders in
Word._

Check this out: [http://timtyson.us/archives/2008/01/theft-by-
taking/](http://timtyson.us/archives/2008/01/theft-by-taking/)

Old MS Office file formats were never engineered to be future proof in any
way, and they're a huge headache for Microsoft, and they do indeed behave
oddly in new software, and Microsoft cannot wait to get rid of them, and
nobody in their right mind can blame them, honestly.

Open standards _rock_.

~~~
klodolph
> Open standards _rock_.

I'd like to expand on this. The Microsoft Word team is the only group of
people that ever had any say over what goes in a Word document. In the old
days, a Word document was nothing more than the serialized version of what
Word had in memory. Photoshop files are the same way. As soon as you're not
the only one with a say over the file format, you turn it into a standard. And
you step up to make it a good standard because otherwise nobody's going to use
it.

My conclusion is that _any_ standards rock.

~~~
Justsignedup
To keep going. Any standard that is not open will not open itself for multiple
implementations (see old MS standards with word xml format). The problem of
course is that if I cannot implement your standard, you are still the only
consumer. So really:

Standards with producers/consumers from different independent teams from
different organizations with different goals are awesome.

------
mmcconnell1618
The System Requirements brought back memories:

* Multimedia PC with a Pentium 133 or higher processor

* Microsoft® Windows® 95 operating system or Windows NT® Workstation operating system version 4.0 with Service Pack 3

* 16 MB of RAM; 32MB recommended

* 30 MB of available hard-disk space; 110 MB recommended

* Quad-speed CD-ROM drive; 6x recommended

* Super VGA, 16-bit color monitor

* Microsoft Mouse or compatible pointing device; joystick or race car controller recommended

* Audio board with speakers or headphones

~~~
kombine
Now compare this with modern mobile devices which run slowly and can do a
fraction of what PCs were able to do 15 years ago having 10x lower clock
rates.

~~~
ebiester
So much wrong, I don't know where to start.

1\. Compare apples to apples. What could something the size of a phone do in
1998?

2\. The current resolution of the iPhone 5 is 1280 x 2272. The game ran on
800x600 with a fraction of the colors,

3\. That game sold for what... 35 bucks? Are you comparing what two developers
make in a month and a half, selling for 2 bucks with a AAA budget game? Yes,
an HTML5 game is going to be slower, but compare one of the top games for the
mobile systems and the mobile game today is more impressive. Perhaps 'Need For
Speed: Most Wanted'?

4\. Clock Rate Isn't Everything. It never has been. Further, the equivalent
Pentium 133 laptop is lasting 1.5 hours max with a battery the size of a half
dozen iphones. Power matters.

5\. Could a mobile-sized device, sans phone (FCC issues) be created that is
tuned for speed instead of battery, with a lower grade resolution (compromise
for battery and speed), that was faster? Sure. Would anyone buy it? Probably
not. Engineering is about compromises.

And yes, I'd like to be able to use my computer as a general purpose device,
but nobody has stepped up to the plate yet. I mean, we could start with a
Cyanogen mod and build up from there, but it's a bigger effort than it looks.

But I'll tell you what, let's put it on the backlog. ;)

~~~
zxcdw
Still doesn't change the fact that 15 years ago "we"(as in, programmers,
industry, whatever) were much, much more efficient with limited resources than
what we are now. Some people consider it a good thing, some of us consider it
a bad thing.

~~~
peterhunt
This is a meme. Everything high quality happening on mobile is crazy resource
constrained.

~~~
code_duck
1-2 gb of ram is insane luxury compared to say, the Amiga which typically had
1000 times less - 512k or 1mb of main ram and the same amount of 'chip' ram
(for video/audio processing).

I'm not a mobile device expert, but programmers don't have to think that much
about 512k on an iphone, do they? On an Amiga it was often all you had for the
entire system including the OS.

~~~
peterhunt
Yeah but the Amiga drove 640x256 at 16 colors (4 bits), so around 80kb.
Contrast that with the newest iPhone which drives 640x1136 at 24-bit color, so
around 2.08mb. This is 26x the number of pixels. Keep in mind you also have a
networking stack and lots of semi-realtime sensor data.

Not to mention that the demands on the system in terms of features and
performance are so much higher.

~~~
code_duck
26x the number of pixels, but you have over 200 times the ram available and
that's assuming your app only gets 100mb (and that AmigaOS takes up zero
resources). The default Amiga had an 8 MHz, 16 bit processor which again is
less than 100 times what's available now on an average device. I just can't
see modern devices being construed to be nearly as resource restrained as
personal computers from the 80s.

------
cocoflunchy
Motocross Madness 2 is also still up:
[http://www.microsoft.com/games/motocross2/](http://www.microsoft.com/games/motocross2/)

And this list wouldn't be complete without Midtown Madness (1?)
[http://www.microsoft.com/games/midtown/](http://www.microsoft.com/games/midtown/)

[edit] I'm sure you can find a bunch of others by browsing through the wayback
machine
([http://web.archive.org/web/19980214201021/http://microsoft.c...](http://web.archive.org/web/19980214201021/http://microsoft.com/games/)),
like
[http://www.microsoft.com/games/outwars/](http://www.microsoft.com/games/outwars/)

~~~
TallboyOne
Motocross Madness and Midtown Madness were both such fundamental pieces of my
childhood. I wish I could convey the amount of nostalgia I have. Motocross
Madness was the first time I actively tried to use a computer to 'do'
something. I had to program my own tracks, and it was insanely hard at the
time, but god were those the glory days.

~~~
nkassis
I'm with you that game was amazing. The track designer was such fun. Really
wish they would have continued the series. The track designer was really easy
to learn I feel compared to the current modding tools that come with games.
And it had enough stuff to keep me for a long while. Must have played that
game for a few years.

~~~
TallboyOne
no track designer, heh. Im talking a pirated copy of 3dsmax and a lot of
reading. In retrospect this might have been motocross madness #1

------
csomar
Try refreshing the page and you'll get a different sound-track. Made me
curious about the implementation.

Interestingly, they are using a custom random function

    
    
       today=new Date();
       jran=today.getTime();
       var number=5;
       var random_number=1;
       var bgsnd="/games/random/bgsnd.wav";
       var images="/games/random/intro.JPG";
       var sizes=" width=602 height=228";
       function randomizeNumber()
       {
       ia=9301;
       ic=49297;
       im=233280;
       jran = (jran*ia+ic) % im;
       random_number=Math.ceil( (jran/(im*1.0)) *number);
    
       if (random_number==1){
    	  bgsnd="audio/intro/yeeha.wav";}
       if (random_number==2){
    	  bgsnd="audio/intro/crash_10.wav";}
       if (random_number==3){
    	  bgsnd="audio/intro/heybuddy.wav";}
       if (random_number==4){
          bgsnd="audio/intro/lovethatmud.wav";}
       if (random_number==5){
     	  bgsnd="audio/intro/webintro.wav";}
     
       }
    
    

And then they run it when the page opens

    
    
    	          randomizeNumber();
    	          document.open();
    		  if (version == "n3" || version == "n4"){
    		  document.write("<embed src="+bgsnd+" autostart=true hidden=true></embed>");}
    		  if (version == "e3" || version == "e4"){
    		  document.write("<bgsound src="+bgsnd+">");}
    		  document.close();

------
aatish
I see your monster truck madness website, and I raise you the Space Jam
website, unchanged since 1996
[http://www2.warnerbros.com/spacejam/movie/jam.htm](http://www2.warnerbros.com/spacejam/movie/jam.htm)

~~~
orblivion
Another one I like to point out:
[http://www.heavensgate.com/](http://www.heavensgate.com/)

~~~
ChikkaChiChi
...who is paying to keep that online?

~~~
fuzzybassoon
Maybe the one person who (supposedly) left the cult to continue disseminating
their message?

From
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heaven's_Gate_(religious_group)...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heaven's_Gate_\(religious_group\)#Mass_suicide_and_aftermath)

Only one of the group's members, Rio DiAngelo/Richard Ford, did not kill
himself: weeks before the suicides, in December 1996, DiAngelo agreed with
Applewhite to leave the group so he could ensure future dissemination of
Heaven's Gate videos and literature. He videotaped the mansion in Rancho Santa
Fe; however, the tape was not shown to police until 2002, five years after the
event.

~~~
ChikkaChiChi
Wow. The more you know. Thanks!

------
Titanous

        $ curl -sI http://www.microsoft.com/games/monster/default.htm | grep Last-Modified
        Last-Modified: Tue, 23 May 2006 17:19:11 GMT

~~~
chrismonsanto
Might have been copied to a different server and someone forgot to copy the
metadata too.

------
DigitalSea
Nostalgia overload. I absolutely loved this game back in the day. Surprised to
see you can still even download the demo of the game even. I'm guessing this
was one of those sites Microsoft forgot about. Look at those system
requirements, back when PC power was still measured in megahertz and ram was
still referred to in megabytes, crazy.

~~~
BonoboBoner
I spent hours driving through the never ending nature around the actual track.
What a fantastic game.

------
everettForth
[http://www.dolekemp96.org/main.htm](http://www.dolekemp96.org/main.htm)

~~~
zschallz
When I read campaign stances on this site last year I was really surprised how
socially moderate their campaign was. I'm glad the site is still around.

~~~
Natsu
Just look at some of this:
[http://www.dolekemp96.org/agenda/issues/internet.htm](http://www.dolekemp96.org/agenda/issues/internet.htm)

    
    
        Bob Dole Will Protect the Constitutional Liberty of Internet Users
        Bob Dole is concerned about children accessing unsuitable material when using the Internet. But strict censorship of the Internet is not the answer. Bob Dole believes that parents should take responsibility for the material that their children view, and he wants to encourage technology which allows those decisions to be made within each home.
    
        Throughout his Senate career, Bob Dole has fought to protect the Constitutional liberty of Americans:
        Bob Dole is a supporter of the Pro-CODE bill that limits the federal government's control of encryption and user keys. It permits the export of software that includes encryption if the software is easily available in this country.
        Bob Dole strongly supports the observations made in the recent National Research Council report that widespread use of encryption to promote information security outweighs the difficulties encrypted communications place on law enforcement. Economic espionage from foreign countries and companies is a serious threat, and Bob Dole believes Americans should have the right to guard themselves using encryption.
        Bob Dole supported the Senate hearings on Internet copyright laws. The hearings provided suggestions from information creators, Internet and on-line service providers, librarians and Internet users on developing compromises that balance the rights and needs of all participants.
        Bob Dole fought for provisions in the Telecommunications Act of 1996 that encourage parents to take responsibility for the Internet material which their children view.
        Bob Dole helped pass the Bayh-Dole act of 1980 which helped create the biotechnology industry by allowing inventions from federal research dollars to be commercially developed.
    
        As President, Bob Dole will:
        Promote policies that ensure that the United States remains the world leader in technological innovation.
        Reject heavy-handed big-government regulations of cyberspace.
        Promote policies that preserve and advance the openness and decentralization of computer-based communications.
        Preserve and protect American citizens' right to privacy and the need for secure communications.

------
8ig8
I'm not sure why, but the '.htm' extension always felt dirty to me. Still
does.

~~~
lstamour
It feels DOSsy, to force the file extension to bend to your 3-character limit
rather than let it all hang out. Then again, it highlights how accustomed we
are now to hiding our filenames with folders and web apps.

~~~
shrikant
Ah yes, the days of dealing with directories named "PROGRA~1". Good riddance.

------
Blih
[http://www.microsoft.com/games/empires/features.htm](http://www.microsoft.com/games/empires/features.htm)

Age of empires

~~~
aroman
Yup, came here to post this link. I literally was just playing the trial
version hosted on this website YESTERDAY. It plays perfectly under WINE in Mac
OS 10.9 on my MacBook Air.

Such a fantastic game.

------
sunwooz
Why were we so fascinated by black backgrounds back in the 90's? I know I was
guilty of it.

~~~
verisimilitude
Black backgrounds definitely have a different look on CRTs; that may have been
a factor.

------
danso
AFAIK, the original homepage for "Black Hawk Down", which was a long-form
serial newspaper story before it became a book and a movie, still looks as I
remember it back in 1997:

[http://inquirer.philly.com/packages/somalia/sitemap.asp](http://inquirer.philly.com/packages/somalia/sitemap.asp)

Back then, it was one of the most sophisticated news and multimedia packages.
It still is today.

------
malkia
I worked on the port to pc of this game -
[http://web.archive.org/web/20020325194655/http://mgspc.com/](http://web.archive.org/web/20020325194655/http://mgspc.com/)
\- the mgspc.com still is owned by Microsoft, and at some point the
redirection worked... Sadly it's gone ;(

------
Splendor
[http://www.microsoft.com/games/monster/audio/boogievan.wav](http://www.microsoft.com/games/monster/audio/boogievan.wav)

~~~
codfrantic
Is that Steve Ballmer?!

------
phillc
I actually owe my programming career to MTM. When I was ~10-11 years old, I
held many tournaments. At some point, my tournament grew to the point where I
couldn't manage signups day of, and tried to make a website using frontpage +
some form of extensions (angelfire? tripod?) to have early signups. I
eventually learned javascript and a tiny bit of perl.

Looking back at that point in time, I did a horrible job of managing those
tournaments (Sometimes my pre-teen responsibilities took priority and made me
miss some tournaments. Oh and I seem to remember storing passwords in clear
text). However I look at myself today and am extremely happy to be a
successful developer, which may have never happened if it hadn't been for the
MTM1/MTM2 games and websites, which I am certain I probably copied a ton of
"codes" from back then.

------
TheTechBox
I used to love this game. Wonder why they keep these sites up? I mean looking
at the domain it's hardly buried deep within the MS site...

~~~
unreal37
A client of mine has a site with 4000+ individual pages, and no content
management system.

In the corporate world, you just don't touch stuff if you don't need to.
There's no time to go and find web pages that haven't changed in 10 years and
figure out what to do about them.

~~~
TheTechBox
4000 files(?) must be crazy to manage. Is there any kind of templating system
at all with them?

Now I come to think of it I guess there may also be a need to keep it in place
due to links from other parts of the site.

~~~
unreal37
It isn't so crazy. Imagine that 3900 of those 4000 files never change. Every
few years there is a redesign on a section of the site, but some sections
haven't changed in 7-8 years.

It's easy to manage a large site that only makes a few changes per week.

------
rocky1138
"Xbox unveiled at the 2001 Consumer Electronics Show."

------
jakestl
It installs if you set it to Windows 95 compatibility mode. The game runs too
if you tweak the graphics settings.

For being a 15 year old game I'm surprised at the amount of features it has
(instant replay, view from other trucks, etc.)

------
petersimones
I remember buying the steering wheel for Midtown Madness, which was larger
than many desktop monitors today and required a near-bolting to your desk, and
feeling like I was on the cutting edge of gaming.

~~~
mxfh
That wheel still works with basic built-in drivers under Windows 7 for me,
Microsoft SideWinder Force Feedback Wheel USB was built rock solid.

------
nnnnni
"HEY BUDDY, READY TO GET MUDDY?"

That reminded me why I generally always leave my sound muted unless I need it
for something specific. Ugh, remember the old days when every page had a midi
embedded in it?

------
dlinder
Hahaha, cpyright.htm

8 + 3 ftw!

~~~
ajasmin
After they got rid of that limitation Microsoft started using unwieldy path
names like "Program Files" and "My Documents".

~~~
prawn
Horrible to be reminded of PROGRA~1...

~~~
ygra
It's still needed from time to time. Sometimes even when there's poorly-ported
Unix software that hates being installed in a path with spaces.

------
jpswade
Check out all these old trials:

[http://www.microsoft.com/games/trial_versions.htm](http://www.microsoft.com/games/trial_versions.htm)

~~~
pbhjpbhj
None of those trials that I tried have the download available, eg AoE II
([http://download.microsoft.com/download/aoeaok/Trial/1.0/WIN9...](http://download.microsoft.com/download/aoeaok/Trial/1.0/WIN98/EN-
US/AoE2demo.exe)).

Very strange that they retain the page when the payload doesn't link anymore.
The pages must turn up in the link-checks and be specifically flagged to
remain unfixed?

------
pkboy
How about Space Jam?

[http://www2.warnerbros.com/spacejam/movie/jam.htm](http://www2.warnerbros.com/spacejam/movie/jam.htm)

------
Spone
Some other oldies at
[http://chiliconvalley.online.fr/gamesuk.htm](http://chiliconvalley.online.fr/gamesuk.htm)

[http://chiliconvalley.online.fr/games/keuk/start.htm](http://chiliconvalley.online.fr/games/keuk/start.htm)

------
anyfoo
"Simply put, these are the best web styles I've seen on a PC!" \-- anyfoo

------
rimo
Thanks for this, I forgot what the web once was.

------
Pinatubo
The website from my favorite late night show in college is still up. Last
updated 1999:

[http://www.etropolis.com/fishmasters/fishtop.htm](http://www.etropolis.com/fishmasters/fishtop.htm)

------
stevewillows
Another fantastic example of this is the site for Space Jam --
[http://www2.warnerbros.com/spacejam/movie/jam.htm](http://www2.warnerbros.com/spacejam/movie/jam.htm)

------
ericgoldberg
This is amazing. I have 3 new SMS tones now. (See:
[http://www.microsoft.com/games/monster/downloads.htm](http://www.microsoft.com/games/monster/downloads.htm)
)

------
novascorpio
One of my favorite throwback sites that's still up is
[https://www.kfc.com/](https://www.kfc.com/). 2006 isn't _that_ old, but it's
still hilarious.

~~~
dpcx
I worked at Yum Brands when that version of the site was first created. It's
_much_ older than 2006 though.

------
_pmf_
The original Monster Truck Madness, along with the original Motocross Madness
(with dedicated motion sensitive Microsoft Sidewinder controller), were
probably the games I played the most.

------
mikelbring
More responsive than most sites today.

------
mixmastamyk
... and I've been waiting for Monster Truck Madness 3 for almost as long. :D

Loved playing that game with my coworkers, and always raced as SnakeBite. Go
Army Armstrong.

------
guiomie
Is that Steve Ballmer talking when you load the site ?

------
bashinator
One of my favorite '90s-style sites:
[http://www.basscentral.com/](http://www.basscentral.com/)

~~~
bradleyy
Agreed, Beaver is a great guy, but that website. Oy gavolt.

Also kitschy, in same vein: [http://bassnw.com/](http://bassnw.com/) \-- a
couple hundred feet from my office. Great folks.

------
capex
The newsreel tries to complete the nostalgia, 'Xbox unveiled at the 2001
Consumer Electronics Show'.

------
kurtko
Here's another classic ... even 2006 looks so dated today:
[http://www.nature.com/news/2006/060703/multimedia/50_science...](http://www.nature.com/news/2006/060703/multimedia/50_science_blogs.html)

~~~
joering2
[http://www.heavensgate.com/](http://www.heavensgate.com/)

edit: okay just learnt someone already posted this one. needless to say, the
visit to this site still creeps me out!

------
uses
None of the linked reviews [0] are still up, and all but one of the review
sites themselves are gone.

[0][http://www.microsoft.com/games/monster/reviews.htm](http://www.microsoft.com/games/monster/reviews.htm)

------
jamescraft34
Wow am I a code nerd or what. Just viewed source and was excited and
overwhelmed with nostalgia. Look at all those <td>'s!

<blink>Post more old site links!</blink> Actually that would be a fun thread
to create...

~~~
mrspeaker
View source on HN. Still overwhelmed with nostalgia? ;)

------
stormbrew
Really a shame it didn't have an Under Construction[1] gif.

[1]
[http://www.animatedgif.net/underconstruction/caution1_e0.gif](http://www.animatedgif.net/underconstruction/caution1_e0.gif)

------
tomelders
If I knew then what I know now, I'd be rich. I sometimes wonder what it would
be like if I found myself transported back to the late 90's with a copy of
jQuery. I'd blow their tiny minds I would.

~~~
logicallee
nothing would run jQuery bro.

now get transported back with a copy of Firefox...

~~~
rtkwe
Computers would probably struggle to run it though.

------
josefresco
This was one of the first PC "open world" GTA style games where I spent more
time trying to drive my monster truck up impossible obstacles and exploiting
the game physics than I did ever racing.

------
hornbaker
The Buy link is broken.

~~~
clarkm
Well, at least you can still download the free trial:

[http://download.microsoft.com/download/monstertruck20/Trial/...](http://download.microsoft.com/download/monstertruck20/Trial/1.0/W97/EN-
US/MtM2trial.EXE)

~~~
Rossimac
Listed as "Abandonware" in one of their linked Fan sites and readily
downloadable if you can't get the trial to work.

[http://vales.com/mtm2/](http://vales.com/mtm2/)

~~~
voltagex_
I doubt it's public domain, but I doubt Microsoft would go after you, too.

~~~
pmjordan
That's sort of the definition of abandonware - the publisher has apparently
given up trying to make money off the thing but also not explicitly released
it for free either.

------
NKCSS
Aaaaaaaand it's gone.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6681746](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6681746)

------
ww520
It renders surprisingly fast. It reminds me of running XP on modern hardware.
Old software just runs so much faster on new hardware than new software.

------
dualogy
Oooh the memories. I was 16 and getting into HTML, but had to time-share the
PC with my lil bro who loved playing this. Hence, I hated this game :D

------
bringking
Makes you appreciate how much layouts have improved with CSS. So much layout
code in the javascript. And tables. Tables as far as the eye can see.

------
Nicholas_C
Is there anyway I can still play this on a modern computer? I did a quick
Google check and nothing came up. This was my favorite game as a child.

~~~
code_duck
Yes, most win98/DOS games can be played through DOSBOX or even WINE if not
directly on modern windows.

------
bbarn
Wait.. shouldn't there be six MSDN/windows forum redirects ending in a page
that says this page doesn't exist anymore?

------
eksith
I was wearing headphones (just finished listening to a song) and the "Yeehaw!"
made me jump out of my seat.

------
noonespecial
Ahh lan gaming over fiddly IPX networks. Fun on a bun.

Maybe after MTM some doom2 or even some quake for those with Voodoo Rush
cards?

------
Intermernet
But... there's an add in the top bar for "Links 2001"! Surely this dates the
page beyond 1998?

------
RafiqM
That "Yeehaw" terrified me.

~~~
prawks
Same, nearly jumped out of my seat. That's some effective salesmanship!

------
izietto
Monster Truck Madness 1 was a masterpiece, I remember it clearly! Never tried
the 2 though

------
elijahmurray
Just keep refreshing for nonstop, entertainment. Boy, makes me want to buy!
[audio]

------
mwc
"Simply put, these are the best racing graphics I've seen on a PC!"

------
l33tbro
I take it you found this on after checking out the new Wayback Machine?

~~~
code_duck
It's still live on MS's site and this comes up every year or so on reddit.

------
rappuccino
So I found out this actually installs and runs on my XP box.

------
gbraad
... And so is the game... Nothing to see here. Move along.

------
granttimmerman
Lol, the whole website is inside a <font> tag.

------
statenjason
Sound still works

------
dupa99
There were no Math.random back then ?

------
gcatalfamo
Nostalgia

~~~
rob-alarcon
Yeah, one of the firsts PC games I ever played.

------
niix
heybuddy.wav

------
AsymetricCom
How do you report?

------
hariharasudhan
Does it still work on IE?

------
jebblue
The past two weeks there have been at least one and usually two or more
Microsoft related articles. This is even more annoying than the drivel posted
by the NY Times.

