What was your favourite ZX Spectrum game?

Actually it may have been on some even crappier mag I had.

What is Mark Radcliffe doing on the front of Sinclair user no.30?

!!

]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v417/albaalba/ilx/SUCover017.jpg

I think you mean issue 26 from May 1984

YES YES I DO. Scariest thing is I envisaged the face of #2 from left when I wrote above, and mental picture was totally accurate! The other ones, incl. notable moustache person lower right I have absolutely no memory of, but those were different times, maybe he was then less notable.

They appear to have been called Mensana! That rings no bells either, but offers a hint twds why they would do such a thing.

"MORE PAGES THAN EVER!" The times when it was actually possible to feel there were too few words, sentences and paragraphs to read about your interests...

I envisaged the face of #2 from left

Looking closer, I am not entirely sure that isn't Tuomas, at the exact same age as today, plus hair, plus specs, minus beard?

The guy holding the Spectrum looks like Bamber Gascoine, and the dude with the guitar looks like Chuck Norris! They seem familiar even though I don't recall the name.
The box labelled "Upstream" is a MIDI interface so presumably they were just using the Spectrum as a sequencer rather than as a sound source. Which is a pity as then they'd be the first chiptune band!

And speaking of making music with a Spectrum, this is probably my favourite "Fred Harris demonstrates something" clip - this time the SpecDrum.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=cLfYT6yXgEc

MORE COWBELL FRED!

presumably they were just using the Spectrum as a sequencer rather than as a sound source.

I think this was the case, yes. Prob seems less cool now than using it as a sound source*, but ooth they must've made their own interface to plug into the raw circuitboard exposed at the back-right, which is cool in its own right.

*) also cmon twas a simple on-off-to-the-speaker thing, that would not be specific to the computer and sound exactly the same made by one's own flipflop circuits or whatever.

they must've made their own interface

The interface was a commercial product, but maybe the band were involved in designing it? There's a whole pile of stuff here:
http://www.worldofspectrum.org/
...including a lot of information on hardware. As a BBC Micro owner that was the thing I envied Spectrum users, because they had a vast range of hardware for that expansion slot.

And speaking of making music with a Spectrum, this is probably my favourite "Fred Harris demonstrates something" clip - this time the SpecDrum.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=cLfYT6yXgEc

MORE COWBELL FRED!

-- snoball, Saturday, 29 September 2007 00:36 (1 hour ago)

AWESOME

"it's like a word processor for drum beats"

There's another Speccy/puter mag thread somewhere where I bigged up Sinclair User, which, I believe, became the daddy Speccy mag from issue 56 onward.

It always had really really awful covers though, which went from cheesy photo-covers in the early days to garish, messy drawings in its heyday.

http://www.sincuser.f9.co.uk/019/su019.gif

Okay, WHAT were they thinking?

I am gonna play the shit out of Marsport today.

b-b-but he's not dancing with a spectrum. he's dancing with a ZX81, isn't he?

fools.

i started with sinclair user, then progressed to crash and -- occasionally -- your spectrum. when your spectrum became your sinclair and started ripping off smash hits left, right and centre, it became my core speccy read, and i heartily wish i'd kept all my back issues. t'zer! markus berkmann! phil south! these people helped define my youth. and the free viz giveaway helped define my puerile adulthood.

xpost lucky sod. i need to shuttle about between hospitals and in-laws' houses and shit.

:-(

Hope everything's okay there dude.

ach, it's a slowly ongoing process involving my ageing father-in-law and his surprising lazarus-style japes ;)

i did keep all my back issues :(

there's always this

First snag: can't find any squared paper in the house and I'm too hungover to go buy some. But Marsport is the most user-friendly of the Gargoyle adventures because of its grid layout, so I'm going for it freehand on plain paper.

I dunno, I had Marsport, but I never liked it as much as TNN and DD. Partly cos it didn't quite have the atmosphere, but partly also because it was an example of a software house coming up with an innovative idea and then repeating it with diminishing returns.

It was like Ultimate after Knight Lore. Alien 8 was OK, but then they just churned out further Knight Lore copies to ever reduced effect.

As to the plastic/rubber keyboard thing, I seem to remember that this was keenly debated by connoisseurs of Daley Thompson's Dectathlon. iirc, the plastic keyboard was WELL-favoured for the running events

Oh yeah grimly - wasn't there a pre-"Urban Upstart" game by the same fella? I seem to recall that it involved a desert island. It was my second favourite adventure game iirc (out of two, natch), but I only got about 1/3 the way through it.

the plastic keyboard was WELL-favoured for the running events

The Spectrum +3's keyboard was essential for my dominance in Hypersports. Rubbish for typing but excellent for doing the tricky left/right/breathe combination for swimming, and also hair trigger enough for me to get a perfect score in skeet shooting practically every time.

xpost

Yeah, the plastic keyboard had quite a responsive kickback, iirc.

I'd forgotten how irritating it is when one of those Sept warrior things mugs you and you have to go back to the start and go through all the same tasks again like a soft fucking bastard.

I seem to recall that it involved a desert island.

This narrows it down to 90% of adventures.

There's an I Love Games thread about modern text adventures somewhere.

No.

90% of adventures involve dwarves.

Both are true. 85% of adventures involve dwarves on desert islands.

The very best thing for Daley running etc was a joystick which was both

a) very small (ie fingertip control rather than grabaround) and
b) programmable (ie up, down, left, right, fire could be assigned to the keys of your choice).

My devious trick was to assign the running buttons to Down and Right, so that the distance between the two was very short.

Yes. I remember insanely waggling my Kempston from side to side, while a vein no doubt bulged on my forehead. Didn't think of the down/right trick though.....

I remember that you couldn't do this in front of anyone else (esp. brothers etc.) as the proto-masturbatory symbolism was bound to provoke laughter.

Ha! Pashmina!

I've just done a bit of googling and found out that the "Forbidden" part of Dun Darach was originally called "Lady Q's" and was a brothel.

I got a very early copy, and mine said "Lady Q's" (not "Ladyo's" apparently) and NOT "Forbidden".

I still couldn't find a way in, but some early copies must have got out before the sign was changed to "Forbidden".

Still the intriguing possibility exists that some may have got out with the centre bit still in.....

"invincible island", it'll be. never played it myself, but think i will:

http://www.worldofspectrum.org/showscreen.cgi?screen=screens/load/i/gif/InvincibleIsland.gif

http://www.worldofspectrum.org/showscreen.cgi?screen=screens/in-game/i/InvincibleIsland.gif

cocks, obviously no hotlinking to that one. WoS wanks.

http://www.worldofspectrum.org/infoseek.cgi?regexp=^Invincible+Island$&pub=^Richard+Shepherd+Software+Ltd$&loadpics=on

JESUS CHRIST SIMON

http://www.worldofspectrum.org/infoseekid.cgi?id=0006490

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yt9BsZCifgU&feature=colike

gaming has gone downhill since the 1980s: discuss

challops have gone downhill.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0g1KeQUYA5w&feature=colike

RIP Joffa (3:23 into the first docu)

was looking through Javascript books recently and discovered one by Raffaele Cecco of Exolon/Cybernoid fame

barry mcguigan boxing. has still never been bettered for pugilistic thrills and strategy. daley thompson sports a close runner up

― darraghmac, Thursday, 27 September 2007 13:47 (4 years ago)

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Frank Bruno Boxing had better racial stereotypes tho

http://plus4world.powweb.com/dl/covers/f/frank_bruno_side.jpg

pretty sure this game finished off my keyboard

spectrum keyboard held up better than a, b megadrive buttons under the stress of olympic gold 'battery' technique

the old rubber spectrum keyboard eventually stopped working on some keys, the contacts on the sheet underneath must have worn out

luckily this happened just as i was getting old enough to buy booze

'play the big fist' lol

IIRC the +2/+3 keyboard held up better especially to the rigours of Hypersports.

i spent some of my student grant on a Spectrum 128K, obviously they were right to abolish the grant system