cca@newton.physics.purdue.edu.UUCP (09/02/87)
Well, my Mac II finally arrived, and I'm all set with the basic things like a word processor, a spreadsheet, etc. Finding such software that works on a Mac II wasn't hard. It would also be nice to have a game or two to relax with. Unfortunately, it appears that people who write games for the Mac don't bother reading the Tech Notes. I called up a couple places and found out that (for example) Chessmaster 2000 and Sub Battle Simulator don't work on a Mac II. So, does anybody know of any games that DO work on a Mac II? Charlie Allen cca@newton.physics.purdue.edu ..pur-ee!newton!cca
dplatt@teknowledge-vaxc.ARPA (Dave Platt) (09/02/87)
Funny you should ask. I spent several hours last night installing about 5 megs of public-domain and shareware stuff from my diskette library onto a co-worker's brand-new Mac II. Naturally, we tried out the games. Results to date: about half of the games I tried bomb on launch, bomb when displaying the first game screen, or display sludge on the screen. I imagine that games in this class are trying to manipulate the screen buffer directly, and/or are trying to use the alternate screen buffer (which just ain't there in a II). Most of the rest run OK, but use only the upper-left portion of the screen. These games are apparently using QuickDraw in the approved way, but have hard-coded window sizes/offsets. A very few (one!) uses the whole screen. Here's the summary to date: Game Status Ashes to Ashes Partial screen Asteroids Bombs Banzai Gibberish Bomber Partial screen Brickles, version 4 Partial screen, very fast Crystal Raider Bombs Daleks Bombs Dungeons of Doom Bombs MacBugs! Partial screen MacHeads Partial screen (I think) Megaroids Bombs Missile Command Full screen Orion v1.0 Gibberish Social Climber Partial screen Solitaire Partial screen Space Bubbles Gibberish Space War Bombs The Adventures of Snake Bombs ThinkAhead+ don't remember Wheel Partial screen Wizard's Fire Partial screen My hat's off to those game designers who followed the rules re Quickdraw, didn't hard-code timing loops, and still managed to produce snappy-looking animation... their games run well on a II, even if they don't use the whole screen. [Most of the games on this list should be available via your local public-domain-software trading group, Mac-oriented bulletin board, or information-services network (GEnie, Compu$erve, Delphi, The Source)]
rmh@apple.UUCP (Rick Holzgrafe) (09/05/87)
In article <808@newton.physics.purdue.edu> cca@newton.physics.purdue.edu (Charles C. Allen) writes: >So, does anybody know of any games that DO work on a Mac II? I know of several games that work on a Mac II. All are either shareware or freeware; I don't spend big bucks on games so I can't tell you about any commercial ones. The following seem to work just fine: 1000 Miles, by Robert Harris (shareware $10) Solitaire, by Ron Aldrich (free) MacHeads, by Michael Yourshaw (free, but he likes postcards) Scarab of RA, by Rick Holzgrafe (shareware $10) Rather than try to slip something by you :-), I'll confess that I wrote "Scarab of RA". (I hope no-one minds a mildly commercial bent to this attempt to help out a fellow gamer!) Scarab and the other games are available from the usual shareware and public sources, and I think they've all come across the net in the last year or so; check your local archive. (Don't write to me for copies of anything; that's why Scarab is shareware!) A message went by on the net a while back, from someone whose name I've forgotten. He said Scarab got CoPr errors on a Mac II. I'd like to hear the details of that, because although I haven't rigorously tested it on the Mac II it seems to work fine on mine. I recommend you invoke the shareware purchaser's privilege, and try it for a while before sending money. If it bombs, I'd appreciate a note describing the circumstances. Because of where I work, I must be extra careful about this disclaimer: "Scarab of RA" and Apple Computer have *nothing* to do with each other. I have no relationship with the other authors mentioned above, except as a happy user of their games. ========================================================================== Rick Holzgrafe | {sun,voder,nsc,mtxinu,dual}!apple!rmh Apple Computer, Inc. | "All opinions expressed are mine, and do 20525 Mariani Ave. MS: 27-Y | not necessarily represent those of my Cupertino, CA 95014 | employer, Apple Computer Inc."
drc@dbase.UUCP (09/07/87)
In article <808@newton.physics.purdue.edu>, cca@newton.physics.purdue.edu (Charles C. Allen) writes: > Well, my Mac II finally arrived, and I'm all set with the basic things > like a word processor, a spreadsheet, etc. Finding such software that > works on a Mac II wasn't hard. It would also be nice to have a game > or two to relax with. Unfortunately, it appears that people who write > games for the Mac don't bother reading the Tech Notes. I called up a > couple places and found out that (for example) Chessmaster 2000 and > Sub Battle Simulator don't work on a Mac II. > > So, does anybody know of any games that DO work on a Mac II? The "doesn't run on a Mac II" can result from any of a number of things, some of which YOU can do something about. If it was due to alternate screen buffer, you might as well forget it. If it was due to self-modifying code nastiness like MacWrite, turn off the instruction cache. This is true of many of the programs written with earlier versions of LSC, LSP, Turbo, MegaMax, etc. MegaMax was also infamous for their use of low memory global $2b6 (BasicGlob) which rendered ALL of their programs unrunnable under System 4.1. This can usually be patched by changing $02B6 to $0A78 in the code resources. If it was due to the copy protection, my personal philosophy is that if you buy copy-protected software then you're asking for trouble anyway. Dennis Cohen Ashton-Tate Glendale Development Center dBASE Mac Development Team -------------------------- Disclaimer: Opinions expressed above are my own, I don't know what (if any) opinions my employer has. PS: Yes, we shipped a week ago.