Commodore stuff, EA stuff, GEOS stuff, word processing, etc.
Matt Barton wrote:
This is fantastic stuff, Bill. I wish I still had some of my old art and mod files! It's easy to get so carried away talking about games for these old systems that we totally forget the awesome productivity stuff. Dpaint IV for the Amiga was a highpoint for me, as was Sonix and Deluxe Music Construction Set, Octamed, etc.
It looks like you were playing around with GEOS. I didn't get much exposure to that, though I thought it was quite cool. Too bad it didn't come out about 5 years earlier; then it really would have been revolutionary.
I am still impressed with some of the old artists like Sachs. I remember seeing an image Sachs had been working on for a planned time travel game that never made production. Just seeing the image made me want to play the game!
That Sachs game you're referring to was the one with the Dinosaurs in the ad, right? I remember coveting that too. I never did get his first game, which supposedly was heavily pirated, hence no second game (the first game was the one in the ads with the UFOs around Washington, DC). Sachs did great Amiga artwork too.
I originally got GEOS with my Commodore 64c, which needed to replace my buggy C-64, which got hit by lightning (causing a graphical glitch; I still have both machines). I also eventually somehow got GEOS 2.0 (I have that boxed - I don't recall the C-64c coming with a boxed copy). In any case, GEOS was quite cool and quite capable, if a bit annoying with all the work disks you had to create. For a 64K budget machine, it was a marvel, creating a Mac-like environment. Once I got GEOS, I switched my word processing efforts over to it, since it could print text as graphics on my dot matrix printer, allowing for much better quality than what could be achieved with the built-in fonts. I also obviously dabbled in the built-in drawing program. It was quite powerful, but not quite as much fun as Doodle. I even got the C-64 mouse for it, which worked reasonably well. Of course today I have a boxed copy of GEOS 128, a JiffyDOS C-128DCR and a 512K RAM expansion, so I could really make good use of the environment (perhaps the ultimate 8-bit GUI?), but that will be a project for another day.
By the way, my first PC (used at the same time when the Amiga 500 was still my primary machine), a 386 SX-20 Magnavox computer with 1 or 2MB of RAM (soon expanded to 5MB), originally came with DOS and GEOS (on a 40MB or 85MB HD). I eventually switched over to Windows 3.1 out of necessity (that's where the GUI software was), but GEOS was quite neat on that relative clunker of a system.
I topped out at Deluxe Paint III myself, simply because I never went beyond the Amiga 500. Of course now I have a range of Amigas, including the AGA models, and Deluxe Paint IV. It's a shame the Deluxe Paint line never continued on the PC. Deluxe Paint II (DOS) was used for years on the PC for game creation, well beyond its retail lifespan (at least into 96/97), simply because it was such a good pixel program.
While my memories are fond, I don't have fond memories of word processing until getting into AmiPro on Windows, where things began to stabilize (and eventually shifting to Word). It was a bit too slow on GEOS on the C-64 and too buggy in Final Write on the Amiga. I even used the Adam and its horribly buggy word processor for a time just to make use of the daisy wheel printer...
Wii: 1345 2773 2048 1586 | PS3: ArmchairArcade Bill Loguidice, Managing Director | Armchair Arcade, Inc.
*************************** Bill Loguidice, Managing Director
Armchair Arcade, Inc.
This is fantastic stuff, Bill. I wish I still had some of my old art and mod files! It's easy to get so carried away talking about games for these old systems that we totally forget the awesome productivity stuff. Dpaint IV for the Amiga was a highpoint for me, as was Sonix and Deluxe Music Construction Set, Octamed, etc.
It looks like you were playing around with GEOS. I didn't get much exposure to that, though I thought it was quite cool. Too bad it didn't come out about 5 years earlier; then it really would have been revolutionary.
I am still impressed with some of the old artists like Sachs. I remember seeing an image Sachs had been working on for a planned time travel game that never made production. Just seeing the image made me want to play the game!
That Sachs game you're referring to was the one with the Dinosaurs in the ad, right? I remember coveting that too. I never did get his first game, which supposedly was heavily pirated, hence no second game (the first game was the one in the ads with the UFOs around Washington, DC). Sachs did great Amiga artwork too.
I originally got GEOS with my Commodore 64c, which needed to replace my buggy C-64, which got hit by lightning (causing a graphical glitch; I still have both machines). I also eventually somehow got GEOS 2.0 (I have that boxed - I don't recall the C-64c coming with a boxed copy). In any case, GEOS was quite cool and quite capable, if a bit annoying with all the work disks you had to create. For a 64K budget machine, it was a marvel, creating a Mac-like environment. Once I got GEOS, I switched my word processing efforts over to it, since it could print text as graphics on my dot matrix printer, allowing for much better quality than what could be achieved with the built-in fonts. I also obviously dabbled in the built-in drawing program. It was quite powerful, but not quite as much fun as Doodle. I even got the C-64 mouse for it, which worked reasonably well. Of course today I have a boxed copy of GEOS 128, a JiffyDOS C-128DCR and a 512K RAM expansion, so I could really make good use of the environment (perhaps the ultimate 8-bit GUI?), but that will be a project for another day.
By the way, my first PC (used at the same time when the Amiga 500 was still my primary machine), a 386 SX-20 Magnavox computer with 1 or 2MB of RAM (soon expanded to 5MB), originally came with DOS and GEOS (on a 40MB or 85MB HD). I eventually switched over to Windows 3.1 out of necessity (that's where the GUI software was), but GEOS was quite neat on that relative clunker of a system.
I topped out at Deluxe Paint III myself, simply because I never went beyond the Amiga 500. Of course now I have a range of Amigas, including the AGA models, and Deluxe Paint IV. It's a shame the Deluxe Paint line never continued on the PC. Deluxe Paint II (DOS) was used for years on the PC for game creation, well beyond its retail lifespan (at least into 96/97), simply because it was such a good pixel program.
While my memories are fond, I don't have fond memories of word processing until getting into AmiPro on Windows, where things began to stabilize (and eventually shifting to Word). It was a bit too slow on GEOS on the C-64 and too buggy in Final Write on the Amiga. I even used the Adam and its horribly buggy word processor for a time just to make use of the daisy wheel printer...
Wii: 1345 2773 2048 1586 | PS3: ArmchairArcade
Bill Loguidice, Managing Director | Armchair Arcade, Inc.
***************************
Bill Loguidice, Managing Director
Armchair Arcade, Inc.