Amiga, Commodore and creativity

[octavius]

Yeah, with UU I realized the Amiga was a lost cause.

I went through my old computer magazines a few years ago, and it was interesting to read editorials and comments in the Amiga magazines from that time. So full of denial...

 

[CryptRat]

3D killed video games so it makes sense that it also killed the Amiga.

 

[Jarpie]

Yeah, with UU I realized the Amiga was a lost cause.

I went through my old computer magazines a few years ago, and it was interesting to read editorials and comments in the Amiga magazines from that time. So full of denial...

Many amiga enthuahists get very butthurt and denial-mode when I say that UU and especially Doom killed amiga.

 

[unfairlight]

Doom didn't really kill the platform. Contributed to decline, but Commodore was on its last legs by that time.

 

[Jarpie]

Doom didn't really kill the platform. Contributed to decline, but Commodore was on its last legs by that time.

True but like I said, it was (one of the) final nails in the coffin.

 

[unfairlight]

I wouldn't really say it was a nail in the coffin. I believe not much would have changed if Doom never came out.

 

[octavius]

The PC had its own problems, like constantly new hardware making your newly purchased PC almost instantly obsolete.
I think as a result the Amiga survived a few more years. At least personally I didn't get my own PC until 1996 partly due to this.

 

[unfairlight]

Constantly evolving hardware was a mixed blessing since it meant that the best PC would always be better than the best Amiga.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

I'll write longer post later when I'm back in civilization from my fishing trip tomorrow, but briefly, what killed amiga was VGA games like Ultima Underworld, which I doubt even A1200 could handle. The last nail in the coffin was Doom, so many amiga-users switched from amiga to pc because of that one game.

Many amiga enthuahists get very butthurt and denial-mode when I say that UU and especially Doom killed amiga.

Doom released in December 1993, and Commodore went bankrupt in April 1994, so it really had nothing whatsoever to do with the decline and demise of the Amiga. It is true that Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss and Wolfenstein 3D were both released in 1992 and not only were unportable to existing Amiga models (not a surprise or a blemish for a system released in 1985) but also couldn't easily be ported to the new Amiga models released in December 1992 due to their still lacking support for "chunky mode" 3D graphics. Moreover, by 1992 there were an increasing amount of games with VGA (and soon "SVGA") graphics that were more advanced graphically in certain respects than could be managed on the existing Amiga models. However, this speaks to the broader flaw in Commodore's (mis)management of the Amiga, which is that it refused to release a 2nd-generation Amiga in 1989 and then dawdled until December 1992, more than seven years after the release of the original Amiga, for the release of models with a 2nd-generation chipset Amiga, which was too little too late. The A1200/A4000 actually had a few FPS imitations of Wolfenstein 3D and Doom released for them, but these models would have been insufficiently successful to support Commodore with or without support for "chunky mode" graphics and with or without the popularity of the new FPS genre.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

An off-topic post in another thread by yours truly gains some relevance in this one.

 

[unfairlight]

Puggsy (1993)

Didn't know that Puggsy had an Amiga version. I have emulated the Genesis version of the game, it's a really fun game, also has a clever anti piracy measure. Pretty eerie music too.


Also this made be go down the rabbit hole of retro game anti piracy messages. Alien Breed on Amiga had this

STOP IT =NOW=, OK! You will gain *NOTHING* from breaking this protection,
but I guess you're too fucking ignorant, narrow-minded or maybe even too
stupid to understand that. Yeah, so you and your 'leaders' and 'spreaders'
(that's what they like to call themselves, but they're nothing but LEECHES
gaining some kind of fame from the work you do) will have something to
spread around on BBS', ok... But what the hell do they, or you, REALLY get
for all that, huh? Ok credits... So they can download some shit games or
other software, but in a wider perspective? I'll tell you =NOTHING=. It's
pointless. If you don't realize that now, I assure you that in a few years
you will look back at this time and wonder why you did it. I know that
from experience. Go and do something constructive, like studying,
socializing, programming or whatever! Cracking is not constructive. To
you it might seem like a challenge or something you do to get famous, well
OK it is a challenge to crack, and you do get famous if you're good at it.
Famous for a while, a short while. But nobody will care about that five
years from now. You will benefit much more from getting a job, education
or a girlfriend, I'm telling you because I KNOW. I was a cracker once, one
of the best. In a time when you could actually send the originals by mail,
work for a day or two, and then send the cracked version back, and still
have a world-first release. Then the scene consisted by computer freaks
who made it for the fun of it. The scene today is perverted and lead by
ignorant computer-illiterate idiots, only in for the fame and money. They
think they're famous and legendary, but nobody likes or admires them for
sure. I HATE IT! Now I've realized the stupidity of my actions, and I
wish I could undo them. You'll also do just that in a few years too if you
have a conscience, and wish you had done something else. SO DON'T CRACK
IT!

 

[taxalot]

Five years from that post, a cracker might think what he was doing was a waste of time.

But now ? He'd just fucking understand that crackers are the only people in the world making sure game preservation is possible.

 

[FeelTheRads]

lulz, things like that would make people want to crack that shit even more

Fucking lol at crackers turned game developers suddenly realizing it's wrong when it's about their jobs and their money.

 

[Jarpie]

I think Amiga was doomed to die off for many reasons, but especially because PC had many manufacturers so it wasn't centralized. Sure it brought its own problems with the drivers and support for games etc, but Commodore couldn't have been able to compete against the huge PC market. Another reason I mentioned before, it was VGA graphics and advancement of games, such as Ultima Underworld, X-Com etc. X-Com was ported for Amiga 1200 and 4000 but it was utterly horrible port which ran like utter shit. I think there was a fan made patch which made it run better. Wing Commander was another game which showed that Amiga is falling behind, there was CD32 version of the first Wing Commander but it was too little too late. For some reason many amiga enthusiasts I know get butthurt and gets into denial-mode when I bring this up, "Amiga didn't die! REEEEEEEEEEE!"...this kind of fanaticism is one of the reasons why I ultimately, finally, bought PC and almost completely ditched the amiga-community, with some exceptions.

If Commodore's management would've been actually competent and perfect fit, I think they could've avoided the faith, but when they decided to abandon the plans for the second generation for '89, was when the fate was sealed. There are also claims, not sure how truthful they are, that Amiga 1200 was delayed by 18 months by the management because they wanted to sell their stock of lower end of Amigas before putting Amiga 1200 out. If 1200 would've come out in the spring '91, it might've delayed the inevitable and given C= more time to bring out the third generation, but I think C= management was way too fucking retarded to do anything right even then.

One of the reasons why Amiga was doomed was the reputation in gaming, the big markets and the game developers considered Amiga as something between the consoles and PC, "PC is for the rpgs, strategy games etc, Amiga is for more arcade-games", especially in the very early 90s when the games started to become more ambitious, such as before mentioned Ultima Underworld, X-Com, Wing Commander etc started to come out, PC was natural platform for them, not for the least because PC had hard disks by default.

I still stand by my verdict that Doom was one of the reasons why many amiga users switched to the PC, and was one of the last nails in the coffin. Sure Amiga was already on the death's door, but Doom didn't certainly make it any better. Not sure if you guys remember, but Doom was FUCKING HUGE back in the day, and people were convinced that there's no way Amiga can run anything like it. Although, it was ported to Amiga in '96 or '97 and I was able to run it pretty damn well on my 030/50 A1200 back in the day, but it was 3-4 years too late. Amiga 1200 should've had at least 030 as default, but it would've made it even more expensive in '92.

I try to look things past with more detached and objective manner, rather than nostalgia goggles or reverence, especially the late 90s when the games made for the Amiga were made with the accelerator cards etc in mind, and boy, most of them were pretty damn horrible. There were couple gems though, like Napalm, the RTS which required 060 and graphics card to run with larger resolutions, another good game was Genetic Species, maybe the best Amiga FPS, unfortunately it had 90 degree corners/walls and no height differences. onEscapee I liked as well, nice Flashback-style game, from Hungary I think.

There was very ambitious project by the dev team who ported WipeOut 2097 to PPC Amigas, Space Station 3000, it was going to have station management, you could fly big and small ships, you or the AI could try to invade the space stations in FPS segments, which would've used Genetic Species engine etc... I think you can see why the project died.

 

[octavius]

So I've been meaning to play Evil's Doom.
I downloaded version 2.5 and it worked when I took it for a test ride.
Some months and some Win 7 updates later it was no longer working.

I thought maybe there would be a version 2.6, but instead I found 1.8, which worked.

EDIT: Uh, seems the 1.8 package from "The Company" is actually version 2.5.
No idea why it suddenly works again.

Anyway, when googling Evil's Doom I found this illuminating pieces of information at Indie Retro News.

Welcome to Evil's Doom, one of the last "big" Amiga games; a classic dungeon crawler made by Croatian developers Olympia Entertainment Group that was never officially released. According to some sites it was due to bugs however Evil's Doom became a victim of software piracy, after the beta version was sent to magazines, the first cracks appeared and the developers cancelled the game and left the Amiga.

Amigatards...Amigatards never changed.

 

[unfairlight]

That's pretty depressing. I love scene culture but it's such a shame that it had to hurt the amiga during those days. Although I think this is partly a service issue since games were way more widely available pirated rather than bought. If digital distribution existed during those days I think the piracy issue would have been a lot smaller.

 

[Jarpie]

So I've been meaning to play Evil's Doom.
I downloaded version 2.5 and it worked when I took it for a test ride.
Some months and some Win 7 updates later it was no longer working.

I thought maybe there would be a version 2.6, but instead I found 1.8, which worked.

Anyway, when googling Evil's Doom I found this illuminating pieces of information at Indie Retro News.

Welcome to Evil's Doom, one of the last "big" Amiga games; a classic dungeon crawler made by Croatian developers Olympia Entertainment Group that was never officially released. According to some sites it was due to bugs however Evil's Doom became a victim of software piracy, after the beta version was sent to magazines, the first cracks appeared and the developers cancelled the game and left the Amiga.

Amigatards...Amigatards never changed.

Yeah, especially in the post-95 era when Amiga was basically just a niche computer, amigatards really ate their own. I remember in the late 90s and early 2000s there was big rifts in the user base, between the users/fans of different hardware solutions, such as PowerUp vs WarpOS, the two competing kernels for the PPC accelerator cards made for Amiga. Pure autism and fanaticism got so fucking obnoxious that I went "Fuck you guys, I'm going home".

 

[unfairlight]

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/514621648/tower-57/posts/2135370

AMIGA version is out!

Hello again everyone,

I am happy to announce that the Amiga version of Tower 57 is ready! (the minimum system requirements are posted below)

Although I didn't write the port myself, this is one milestone that is particularly close to my heart, as the Amiga 500 was my gateway into game making. So I'm glad I can finally cross "releasing an Amiga game" off my bucket list, although I'm admittedly about 25 years late (and it only runs on "modern" Amigas ^_^#)

Unfortunately we didn't have a specific Amiga reward tier, therefore I don't have a list of backers who backed specifically for the Amiga version.

So if you would like to play Tower 57 on your Amiga rig, please don't hesitate to contact me either through Kickstarter or directly at benitosub at hotmail.com and I will provide you with a download key!

And finally if you are active on Amiga forums / the Amiga scene, please help us spread the word! I would love to bring more games to the system that made me the gamer I am, so hopefully the reception will be good

Next up, and in no particular order, will be:

- getting the console versions certified

- Linux version

- 3 content updates still in the pipeline

- bug and stability fixes

- physical rewards / boxed edition

So as you can see I've still got quite some work ahead of me! In the meantime I sincerely hope all of you who own a modern Amiga system will enjoy the game.

Cheers,

Marco

MINIMUM SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS:

AOS4: AmigaOS 4.1 FE Upd1, >= 600 MHz, Gfx-card with Compositing support

MorphOS: MorphOS >= 3.9, >= 600 MHz, Gfx-card with TinyGL support

AROS: x86 (e.g. Icaros Desktop >= 2.2), Gfx-card with Mesa3D support

IMPORTANT NOTE: If you wish to play with a joypad or in 2-player mode, you will need an OS supported dual-stick joypad.

 

[Astral Rag]

 

[Luzur]

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the year of 1993 and let me introduce Commodore's CD32 advertising billboard right outside of Sega's UK headquarters

 

[Nano]

Yeah, with UU I realized the Amiga was a lost cause.

I went through my old computer magazines a few years ago, and it was interesting to read editorials and comments in the Amiga magazines from that time. So full of denial...

It's interesting to read old forums from that time.

http://www.verycomputer.com/2_d8552f7ecc5e557f_1.htm
http://www.verycomputer.com/2_af22ab6c1361ef2b_1.htm

The thread in the second link has someone saying that there were plans to port UU to the Amiga. Not sure if he's just bullshitting.

 

[Deflowerer]

"The best way to accelerate an IBM is 9.8 m/s/s".

Beautiful.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the year of 1993 and let me introduce Commodore's CD32 advertising billboard right outside of Sega's UK headquarters

That's a classic, but it would be much funnier if Commodore hadn't been on its last legs by the time it released the Amiga CD32. Although Commodore quickly sold the 100,000 CD32s it manufactured, Commodore's spiraling financial difficulties prevented them from manufacturing more.

The thread in the second link has someone saying that there were plans to port UU to the Amiga. Not sure if he's just bullshitting.

If Commodore had released a second-generation Amiga in 1989, we likely would have seen Ultima Underworld ported for that new chipset, since there would have been a substantial market by 1992. However, the original Amiga, as noted in that thread, simply lacked the RAM and processing speed to run Ultima Underworld well, graphical considerations aside. Although it was common to upgrade the Amiga 500's RAM from 512KB to 1MB, only a small portion of home users would have had substantially more RAM or have replaced the default 7MHz Motorola 68000 processor with something better. Commodore's actual second-generation Amigas, the 1200 and 4000, didn't arrive in stores until December 1992 and sold poorly, so there wasn't commercial justification for porting to this small market (and Commodore went bankrupt in April 1994).

"The best way to accelerate an IBM is 9.8 m/s/s".

Beautiful.

For anyone confused, there are about 3.3 feet in a meter and m/s/s indicates meters per second-squared.

Spoiler

Gravity on Earth provides acceleration of about 32 feet per second-squared.

 

[Luzur]

Sad news as legendary retro gaming music artist 'Ben Daglish' has passed away



Indie Retro News is usually very upbeat and always ready to talk about the latest games or music, but it's with great sadness to tell you all that the legendary retro gaming music artist Ben Daglish has passed away to Cancer at the young age of 52. If you've ever had an Amiga, Amstrad, C64 or ZX Spectrum you would've come across his incredible music with games such as Cobra, Mask, Auf Wiedersehen Monty or even The Last Ninja. So you can understand why we are rather upset especially after listening to his music growing up, and more so that we will be taking one day off from writing to pay our respects to this great man.

http://www.indieretronews.com/2018/10/sad-news-as-legendary-retro-gaming.html

FUCK THIS GAY EARTH