It’s been a few weeks (apparently) since I announced my new podcast episodes here. Episode 127 is about BASIC programming. This one has old stories about programming in BASIC, a few new stories about Visual Basic, and some new forks of the BASIC programming language that are still being updated. Episode 128 is (fittingly) about the Commodore 128. Packed in and around stories about the C128 are a couple of stories about S.A.M., the old voice synthesizer for the Commodore. Episode 129 is all about the collection of arcade games I owned while I lived in El Reno, Oklahoma. The… (read more)
Posted by RobOHara ( @Commodork) on February 21st, 2013 in Apple II, Commodore 64Over the years I have set up and broken down my old gaming systems and computers many, many times. Sometimes — often times, actually — it seems like I spend more time connecting and configuring and reconnecting and reconfiguring them than I do actually playing games on them. When it comes to old hardware I have a softer spot in my heart for old computers than old console gaming systems, but the biggest problem with them is that they take up so much space. At one time in our old house I had over 20 video game consoles sitting on… (read more)
Posted by RobOHara ( @Commodork) on July 10th, 2012 in Commodore 64Commodork reader Frank Burcaw recently e-mailed me the following screenshot from his iPad: I’m not sure how deserving my book is to sit on the same shelf with The Beatles’ Yellow Submarine and Jobs’ biography — even virtually — but I’m tickled nonetheless to see it there. Thanks again for sending me the picture, Frank! As a reminder, both of my books (Commodork: Sordid Tales from a BBS Junkie and Invading Spaces: A Beginner’s Guide to Collecting Arcade Games) are both available via Amazon or from this site as a DRM-Free PDF.
This weekend marked the 9th annual Oklahoma Video Game Expo (OVGE) in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I attended the first show in 2003 as a spectator, but have participated as a presenter (almost) every year since then. Along for the ride this year were my friends Robb and Steve, who I previously mentioned flew in from Colorado and New York (respectively) to attend the show. Robb Sherwin is, among other things, the author of the award winning interactive fiction game Cryptozookeeper. Steve and Robb have known each other since the BBS days. Photo by Brandon Staggs Since our local NBA team (the… (read more)
The 9th Annual (wow!) Oklahoma Video Game Expo (OVGE) will take place this Saturday in Tulsa, Oklahoma. As always, I and some friends will have a table set up and once again the entire hall will be filled with people buying, selling, and playing video games. At my table this year, I will be joined by two friends: award-winning Interactive Fiction author Robb “Ice Cream Jonsey” Sherwin, and the creator of the infamous remote controlled phone video, Steve “Aardvark” Davis. Additionally, I will be sharing a bit of table space with Charles “Ubikuberalles” Pearson, who will be showing off some… (read more)
Posted by RobOHara ( @Commodork) on April 10th, 2012 in Commodore 64Jack Tramiel once said “business is war,” and based on his track record, he must have meant it. He was said, “anybody who sells a product against me I would like to wipe out.” Jack Tramiel was ruthless in business. One of his first tasks at Atari was cutting his new staff of 1,200 employees down to 100 [1]. Chuck Peddle, Tramiel’s right hand man at Commodore, once said of the man, “he destroyed me, he destroyed my family, he did all kinds of terrible things” [2]. If Tramiel’s actions were considered ruthless, he had good reason; up until the… (read more)
Posted by RobOHara ( @Commodork) on January 20th, 2012 in Commodore 64, MainOkay, it’s probably not the “world’s largest” … but it’s the largest one I’ve ever owned. I currently own literally thousands of vintage 5 1/4″ floppy disks. Over half of them are the same ones I accumulated back in the 1980s on my Commodore 64. The rest are ones I’ve picked up here and there since then. Up until recently, these disks have been stored in milk crates, cardboard shoe boxes, and mismatched vintage disk containers. While roaming the stores a few weekends ago I ran across the following storage container: It’s a Sterilite 3-Drawer Cart. They retail for around… (read more)
Posted by RobOHara ( @Commodork) on November 30th, 2011 in Commodore 64, Interactive FictionMy parents bought my Uncle Kenny’s Commodore 64 for me back in 1985. If I remember correctly the sound chip had blown out, so the first thing we they did was have it fixed. Sixteen years later, I still own (and use) that same Commodore computer. I’ve owned dozens of other Commodore computers over the years (many of which are sitting out in my garage, acting as “donor machines”) but I can always tell my main one apart from the others for a couple of reasons. One being, many years ago one of my friends modified mine for me by… (read more)
Posted by RobOHara ( @Commodork) on July 6th, 2011 in Commodore 64I don’t really know “how” to release this. I don’t even know if anyone will be interested. I hope somebody is. In March of 2007, via Craigslist, I purchased a large lot of Commodore hardware and software. For the grand total of $39 I ended up with six Commodore 64s, six 1541 disk drives, a couple of 128s, one Commodore 16, a bunch of monitors, and boxes and boxes of software. A few of the floppies were original games; most of them weren’t. While recently digging through the boxes of disks, I found several disks labeled “CUON.” These disks came… (read more)
Posted by RobOHara ( @Commodork) on June 29th, 2011 in Commodore 64, MainJust a few random disks I scanned in tonight. Once I got up to around 30 or so disks of software, I decided it would be a good idea to number them. This probably isn’t the twelfth disk of software I downloaded, but I’m sure it was pretty early on. Raid Over Moscow and Beachhead II on the same disk? Fun. “Levi Jam” was a Levi’s “Button Fly” commercial someone digitized. It probably took me half an hour to download that 20 second music clip of questionable quality. The “MT44” and “LALALA” written on the sleeve were my user ID… (read more)
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