Welcome...
...to the home of Fishsta's Retro Gaming Reviews, the TI-99/4A project, Articles, Music and Verbal Diarrhoea.
Downloadable Software
Last Stand
02/10/11DOWNLOAD laststan.zip
The two new programmes added today are both by a chap called Vince Apps. Nice and basic, this game includes multi-directional control and the ability to hide! Such elements as these surely mean this title was the inspiration behind Metal Gear Solid? Well, perhaps not, but still, this is a nice little diversion, with a nice challenge on the higher difficulty levels. Avoid and kill the aliens, trying to destroy their base at the top of the screen. Use the trees for cover, but don't get yourself trapped! Move with ESDX, fire with the space bar. This listing appeared in Peronsal Computing Weekly.
Rescue
02/10/11DOWNLOAD rescue.zip
The second of Vince Apps' games, another listing from Home computing Weekly, and another simple "Romp to the Goal" premise. An evil wizard has captured the fair maiden and holds her in his castle. All you have to do is reach said castle in one piece... which won't be easy, as the countryside is littered with rocks. Worse, the wizard is throwing more rocks in your general direction, so there's a fair chance you're going to get flattened. ESDX provide your movement, and the best advice I can give is... keep moving.
Forklift Truck
21/09/11DOWNLOAD forklift.zip
Now this one I like. Programme 16 from the British TI Home Computer Users Club, and it's by a chap called Rod Lane. You control an old forklift truck with dodgy batteries, and must attempt to sort out the coloured crates into their relevant containers. Your forks only work to the right, and the game ends when you have loaded the last crate and reverse out of the container. Every movement runs your battery down, you need to top this up by reversing over the spare batteries that appear and disappear with alarming regularity. Speed isn't essential as being at a standstill uses no power, so on level 4 you will need to start planning carefully to conserve power. A nicely made game, basic premise, executed brilliantly. The usual ESDX keys are your controls.
Rifle Range
21/09/11DOWNLOAD rflrang.zip
Now this is one tough game. In fact, it's dang impossible. I couldn't get into it all those years ago, and I can't get into it now. This one, programme 9 from the British TI Home Computer Users Club, is by Julian Dockery. I would suggest you only attempt to get good at this game if you're feeling particularly sadistic, as it's unbelievably hard. Even moreso than TI-Roids. Simply press space to fire your bullet, attempt to hit the falling bottles. They're subject to gravity, and thus accelerate as they descend. Try not to cry with the difficulty you'll be facing.
If you somehow manage to hit a bottle, why not post your best score in the Guestbook?
Space Gun
21/09/11DOWNLOAD spacegun.zip
A nice simple Space Invaders type game, by the hand of A B Chaudhri, and programme number 21 from the British TI Home Computer Users Club. Personally, I would add some sort of penalty for missing the enemies, as you can simply hold the fire button down to ensure complete invincibility, say either only 1 shot allowed per enemy or even lose 5 points for every miss, however I will leave the programme as it is for your perusal. Controls are simple, S for left, D for Right and F to fire. Score 10 points for each alien you shoot down, and 5 points for each Asteroid you destroy.
Forbidden Fruit and The Snake
21/09/11DOWNLOAD forfruit.zip
Ah, a conversion of the famous "Snake" game. Possibly as common as "City Bomber", this game is one of those enduring favourites for people to recreate. Brian Garrod's game, programme 20 in the British TI Home Computer Users Club is an exercise in finger dexterity. Use the traditional TI cursor keys of ESDX to control your snake as you eat the Forbidden Fruit to amass points, avoiding your tail, walls and obstacles. Head down the yellow drain for the next, harder level.
Why not post your best score in the Guestbook?
Slugs and Ladders
21/09/11DOWNLOAD sluglads.zip
Down at the bottom of the garden, among the birds and the bees... Aargh! No! It's not the Poddington Peas, it's some huge mutant slugs or suchlike, and they're coming to get you! Well, actually they're just sitting there, but end up on the same level as a slug and you're in trouble. Luckily Slug Pellets will instantly kill (and dissolve) the little blighters, drop them with the space bar. You can change direction by pressing "R", and that's it. There's a small reward if you manage to get them all and reach the end. A good bit of programming from Barbara Baldwin, published in Home Computing Weekly, 9th August 1983. Watch your oxygen!
TI-Roids
21/09/11DOWNLOAD tiroids.zip
First up in this big update is a ridiculously hard game called TI-Roids by a D. Harrison, and again this was published through the British TI Home Computer Users Club (Programme no 6). Not a great deal to this game, but the person responsible was only 13 at the time, and trust me... you won't last long. 'S' for left and 'D' for right, coloured squares score you points. Enjoy.
Why not post your best score in the Guestbook?
Fas-cination
13/09/11DOWNLOAD fascinat.zip
Programme number 7 from the British TI Home Computer Users club, this time a graphical display programme by a Dutch chap called Jan Barnier. Whilst hardly the longest programme in the world, it certainly gives a nice display. Watch and freak out. No, really.
High Resolution X/Y Graph Plot
27/02/11DOWNLOAD xygraphp.zip
Just because the aim is to work through them all, here's programme 3 from the British TI Home Computer Users Club by a chap called John Stocks. I'm not going to pretend to understand exactly how he does it, but somehow he manages to convert plotted co-ordinates into a sequence of CHAR strings, resulting in the graph that is displayed. According to his programme, editing line 100 will give you different graphs (line 100 being basically y=the function of x), whilst you can also edit the location of the X & Y Axis. Be warned, however, it takes a while to plot the whole graph, so if you're running on emulation, you may want to switch the CPU overdrive on while it computes the graph.
If you find interesting alternatives for lines 100-120, post them in the Guestbook!
Slalom Run
20/02/11DOWNLOAD slalomr.zip
Stephen Shaw is something of a legend of the British TI scene, as well as writing and selling his own games (and publishing listings in the likes of Computer & video Games Magazine, as this one was), he also had a book published, "Getting Started With the Texas Instruments TI99/4A". As well as his own games, he distributed a fair bit too, as you can see from one of his "Stainless Software" lists. Anyhow, this fairly short listing provided a stern challenge of a game, guiding a skier down an increasingly difficult slalom course. Controls are unusual, use the top row of the keyboard (1 to =) to position the skier on the screen. Please note that PC Keyboards have an additional key to play havoc here, the minus key. If you're playing through Classic99, you need to ignore this key. I've not altered the program to retain authenticity, plus if anyone decides to transfer it over to the real hardware, I'm sure they'd rather keep it the same. Still, enjoy! I did!
Why not post your best score in the Guestbook?
Game Of Chase
15/02/11DOWNLOAD gmechase.zip
Parco Electrics were apparently about to start releasing a new magazine, and as a teaser gave away this "First Free Program". It's a nice basic Chase premise, simply avoid having your little man eaten by the smiley face. E, S, D & X provide the usual horizontal and vertical movement, W, R, Z & C provide diagonal movement. To increase your score, pass over as many of the coloured squares as you can.
