Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!ccwf.cc.utexas.edu From: greg@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Greg Harp) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.programmer Subject: Re: Lemmings - a tutorial Part IV Message-ID: <46484@ut-emx.uucp> Date: 31 Mar 91 04:04:54 GMT References: <1991Mar29.230632.7066@grebyn.com> <46443@ut-emx.uucp> Sender: news@ut-emx.uucp Reply-To: greg@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Greg Harp) Organization: The University of Texas at Austin Lines: 140 In article mykes@amiga0.SF-Bay.ORG (Mike Schwartz) writes: >In article <46443@ut-emx.uucp> greg@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Greg Harp) writes: >>Correct. Commodore _was_ comparing the 500 to the NES, but they were saying >>that the 500 was _more_ than a game machine. The whole idea of the ad was >>that your kid can play a game on the NES and learn nothing or you can buy >>your kid an Amiga and he/she will actually _learn_ something. > >The NES sold 5x the number of machines as Commodore did in a shorter amount >of time. And? The NES is cheap and it plays halfway decent games. It doesn't do anything else. The two machines aren't aimed for the same market (regardless of what you have been saying on the subject). BTW, have you heard that Nintendo has hired Sting to do the add for their new BASIC cartridge? Something about "Sending out a NES OS." ;-) (pun stolen from my roommate, Logan Shaw) >Commodore is clearly marketing the Amiga to TWO audiences. One audience >they are having success with is game players with the A500. The other >are the Unix/hacker/desktopvideo types, which they are doing so so. The >A500 will eventually be the machine that the C64 used to be (a huge player >in the games market and a big seller). The only totally game-oriented Amiga advertising I have seen came from Europe. I have yet to see an ad placed in any US media that touted the A500 as a game machine. The closest they have come was the educational games (like "Where in the Hell is Carmen Sandiego" (: ) and one quick shot of F/A-18 (I believe -- it has been a while since I saw that one). What the European-based ads have done has made some immediate money for them, but it has only damaged the fate of the machine. It has hurt the attempt to shake the game-machine image of the entire line that has existed since the Vic-20. Commodore has been advertising the A500 as an educational tool -- and, oh yeah, it plays nice games too. >>Well, my 500 will be running UUCP (and possibly a BBS) beginning this summer. >>That means no OS-stealing, non-multitasking games will be run on it. That's >>fine by me because I won't be buying any of those programming failures >>anyway... > >Good for you. The C64 can probably do it too (assuming someone wrote the >UUCP software for it). And I bet your machine gurus often enough anyway >that you won't want to touch it when you don't want it to crash. Try the >following experiment: Run DPaint, then Run Crystal Quest. Do they multitask? >I dare you to pop a floppy out of the drive while the light is on. Funny. The OS seems solid enough. (Under contract I can't tell you what version it is, though.) Nope. No crashes from any of the solid software I run. I have found a couple bugs in some things, but nothing that I expected to work perfectly (or, in fact, depend on anyway). Mainly, the OS-unfriendly software causes Gurus when it _can_ be run with the OS intact. >>I know of quite a few A2000s with one or two floppies and one meg of RAM. I >>wouldn't mind seeing stats on how many A2000 owners actually own hard drives. > >I worked out the numbers. It translates to at most 3,000 sales for a _HIT_ >game. A _HIT_ game can do as many as 97,000 units on machines without RAM/HD >expansion. This is based upon installed base and a 5% market penetration. >There is NO excuse for software to not function on any configuration of >the Amiga. PERIOD. I agree with you about that last statement. However, your compatibility- testing method is unacceptable to me. You make the assumption that if your program runs on all versions the OS you can currently access and on all the machines you can currently access that it is compatible. Keep some of that software around and see how much still works a few OS revisions and machines down the road. I _seriously_ doubt it will. Many users won't buy something that they can't take with them when they upgrade, also. Hurt your customers once and they might not give you a second chance. >The C64 programmer's reference guide didn't suggest that you take over that >machine either. The Epyx fast load cartridge was a major success because >it did what people wanted and did what the C64's OS didn't do well. One of >the RKM manuals tells you everything we game programmers do and how to do >it. They don't say to use the system, nor do they say not to. They just >tell you what to do in either case. Your example of the Epyx cartridge is not parallel to your OS-stealing games. The Fast Load cartridge did what the C64's OS didn't, correct. However, it still worked with most of the software. It could have worked with more (if not all) if they had worked a bit harder. BTW, not looking for the list of what you can and cannot do to the OS (by simply looking in "Appendix A of the Hardware Reference Manual") does not mean that such a list does not exist. The other RKM's provide lots of example code and things that _are_ OS legal. You can at least gather what info you need to write code that will work on all future machines and OSes. To not do so is to shorten the life of your software. There are OS-legal ways to hack the hardware. Too many people just simply do not pay enough attention to learn them. >>An A500 is no less capable of doing work than an A2000, except for the >>obvious lack of a video slot and the IBM slots. (PC emulation and CPU >>expansion are both available.) In my case, I didn't need either of the >>lacked features and I couldn't afford the A2000. I knew I would pay more >>later due to the more difficult expansion but I knew also that spreading >>out the money spent was the only way I could do it. That's just like >>using a credit card or getting a loan/mortgage. > >A STOCK Amiga 2000 has twice the memory and can do more work. Did you look >into an educational discount program? I don't know about you, but I've owned my Amiga since long before the educational discount program commenced. In the summer of '89 my roommate bought an A2000 with two floppies, one meg, and a 1084 for $1000 more than what I bought my A500/512K/1084/1010 for (I believe it was 1987, but I don't remember exactly). >Why don't you save up your money for a second A500 so you can play games >on it while you multitask on your other one. Or better yet, save up for >a 2000 and expand it. You won't regret it. Actually, I already have an A3000 (or maybe a 'T') planned for part of my summer funds, so an A500 or A2000 isn't necessary. At that time I will probably sell the A500, since I don't need another machine to take up space, and I usually only play games while downloading or other _multitasking_ work anyway. I can live without those non-multitasking games... [Re: Taking a cut at my sig...] >******************************************************** >* Appendix A of the Amiga Hardware Manual tells you * >* everything you need to know to take full advantage * >* of the power of the Amiga. And it is only 10 pages! * >******************************************************** Smiley or no, _you_ have no business attacking my .sig with an outrageous one such as yours. Greg -- Greg Harp |"How I wish, how I wish you were here. We're just two |lost souls swimming in a fishbowl, year after year, greg@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu|running over the same ground. What have we found? s609@cs.utexas.edu |The same old fears. Wish you were here." - Pink Floyd