An Amiga that never saw the light of day #guestblog

Hi everyone,

First of all I’d like to thank the Retro Game Team for letting me be a guest-blogger on their site. I’m excited about this and hope we can do something similar in the future. Some of you may know me from Old School Game Blog. On that blog I write a lot about my Amiga stuff, as well as related news, rumours, games and so forth. I occassionally write about other platforms, but not often. I guess I am an “Amigaholic” and I’m not afraid to admit it.

AN AMIGA THAT NEVER SAW THE LIGHT OF DAY

Today I’d like to write about a special Amiga that never got released. It was known as the Walker (also Mind Walker) and it looked like a vacuum-cleaner, a sexy one that is. 

[Filename Walker – Taken from Amiga University]

When Commodore went bankrupt back in 1994 (20 years ago – how time flies!), there was a race between various companies to buy up the rights to make and distribute Amiga computers. Escom won the bid in 1995 and quickly went ahead to get Amiga 1200’s and 4000’s back in the shops and to mail order companies. It did not stop there though, the German company also had plans for new models. Enter the Walker. 

The design was made by Frog Design in 1995. According to Amiga University, it has been compared to a Darth Vadar helmet, a hoover and a robot dog called K9 from Doctor Who. 

Personally I like the looks of it and I think it is a shame that it never got released due to Escom going bankrupt. 

Now, what was hidden under the hood of this beast? Let us have a quick peek at the specs:

 

CPU: 68030 40MHz with room for an FPU

RAM: 2MB Chip-RAM and 4MB Fast-RAM + 1 SIMM-slot expandable to 128 MB.

ROM: Kickstart 3.2

Chipset: AGA

Storage: Internal HD, 4x IDE CD-ROM

Expansion: Room for accelerator, possibly graphics card. PCMCIA port in prototype.

Source: http://www.amigahistory.co.uk/walker.html

 

The specifications might not seem impressive today, but back then it was quite OK. I remember reading about it in a magazine and dreamed of having this computer on my desk. Would have been a great Amiga and definitely a worthy follow-up to the Amiga 1200. The Amiga 1200 came with only 2 MB of RAM as standard and a slower CPU (68020), so the Walker was definitely faster and more expandable.

Hope you’ve enjoyed reading this post. Thanks again to the Retro Game Team for letting me publish this on their blog.

Cheers! 🙂 Twitter.com/AmigaOldSkooler

 

*If you would like to be a guest blogger for Retro Game Team – contact us here or on Twitter.com/RetroGameTeam*

Apologies

Well where do I start?

I haven’t posted on this site in 2014 – pretty poor eh? So an apology would be a good start – sorry everyone!

I could go on about my hardships in the last year, but it isn’t particularly interesting, and I’ll need to be slightly creative (lie) about some of the issues I’ve faced, so let’s just say that I’ve been really manly and climbed some mountains, built some schools, and haven’t gamed enough!

So, back to it – I will start this up again dammit but I need help. I need help from the Retro Game Team – you guys. Do you want to write/blog? Get in touch via twitter @retrogameteam initially, and we’ll go from there.

If you love retro gaming and love to write, this is your ideal opportunity to show the world!

Speak soon, much love x

PS2 fun and an apology!

Okay, so first off, apologies for not blogging in the last few months-lots going on!

I’m in the process of displaying my collection in a much better way at home, and at the same time I’ve started playing my PS2 again.

The PS2 had some really cracking games, and I always remember being impressed when it started up – it sounded powerful and you knew that something good was going to happen (probably just me)!

Anyway, I’ve dug out my old games and decided to boost my collection, in the last few days I’ve bought Bully and SSX3 for £1.99 from the local Ty Hafan charity shop, and today I’ve bought Crazy Taxi and Legends of Wrestling for 99p each from Cash Generator (everybody’s doing it apparently).

Oh and I bought Sega Superstars which requires an Eye Toy camera which I’ll now need to buy (must read the box first before buying!).

I’m really happy with my purchases but I’m equally concerned about how I can pick games up for £1 or £2. I think I may need more space…

The trouble with my Sega Game Gear

Guess what time it is?

Nope, it’s not Hammer time, it is time for me to try out my one and only (poor me) handheld console from my youth, still in great aesthetic condition – the Sega Game Gear.

Ah I loved this little machine, sure the screen kinda hurt your eyes with the scrolling after a while, but it was in colour!! How did they get a TV inside this thing (my thoughts as a child)? OMFG this was revolutionary.

Okay so I found my old Game Gear complete with one game in the back (‘The Lucky Dime Caper with Donald Duck’ – one of the classics), I have no charger and no idea whether this will work, but after hunting around the house for – and amazingly finding – 6 new AA batteries, it works!

I guess the word ‘works’ is a little subjective, it does work, however the screen is very dark and the sound is very quiet. I consulted my friend Mr Google and this is apparently quite common and is to do with capacitors and some other electronic stuff I dont quite understand. The fix is meant to be relatively easy (the sound fix is easier than the screen as there is no soldering required for the sound fix), providing you can use a soldering iron (I last used one in school around 17 years ago).

So I’m torn, do I fork out for someone else to do it, do I have a go myself (and potentially wreck the one I have), do I plod along with the poor screen and sound, do I just ignore it and get distracted by something shiny (most likely)?

Looking at some of the games available for very little on eBay, I think it would be pretty cool to get it up and running again so I’m pretty sure I’m going to get it fixed in some way. Then I’ll buy an AC Adapter and some new (old) games like Streets of Rage 2 and numerous Sonic incarnations – living the dream!

Sim City

I loved Sim City on the SNES, to the point where I got a bit obsessive at times, so when I saw it on the iPad I had to download it! I’m a little disappointed though…

I can’t put my finger on it, I don’t find it as intuitive as the old game, there is more depth but I can’t work out how to actually do a lot of things (it could be old age), so I’m going to get the SNES out later and give it a whirl to see if its as good as I remember, if it is-goodbye weekend!

My new (old) Sinclair Spectrum 128k

Remember those games I got a little while ago? Well now I have a Spectrum to play them on!

I picked this up from someone on Gumtree for £15 (after a little negotiating), it’s in the original box, comes with all of the leads and the original manual, it’s in great condition and its a welcome addition to my collection.

Some pics below:

I’ve got a few games to start with but I’d love to know what games you’d recommend? It’s my first Spectrum (had a C64 when I was a kid), so I’d really like to get your feedback.

Further post to follow later when I’ve hopefully got it up and running!

Thoughts on emulators versus the real thing

I’m quite new to retro gaming (which I guess is a contradiction in itself) and I’ve been thinking about the pro’s and con’s about emulators and the real thing – the actual computers, consoles and games that we grew up with.

A few years back, I installed some emulators on my PC for a few systems (I cant even remember what they were, they made such an impression) and various ROMs to play, but it just wasn’t the same. Yes there were little moments that I thought ‘I remember that bit!’ and so on, but for me, it just wasn’t the same.

As you may know, I bought a couple of Amiga’s recently, and I’m in the process of building up a collection by looking for more retro bargains, and the experience playing on that was fantastic.

I guess that’s a pretty obvious conclusion, but I just want to call it out and get other people’s opinions.

In terms of emulators, these are my thoughts:

Pro’s:

Easy to use, cheap (/free), no real set up required, lots of choice available

Con’s:

Not the real thing (and not a true experience as a result), difficult to find games/emu’s that work (in my experience), becomes more of a throw-away experience (just like Browser Flash games)

The real thing:

Pro’s:

The true experience from day’s gone by! The feel, sights and sounds of your childhood, available to buy from various place

Con’s:

Bulky! Machines and games take up a lot of space. Machines can be expensive in some cases and require some travel to collect (or a big postage fee). Potential that machines dont work or are missing parts.

Conclusion

So for me, if you have the space (and patience), it’s the real thing every time. I dont feel that you can get a true retro experience from an emulator, though I’ve seen some cool things on the Raspberry Pi (Spectrum emulator) which could become a new way of looking at it all.

If you have any thoughts, or links to emulators and roms that you have found really good, then please post them in the comments.

Thanks for reading.

Stunt Car Racer – one of my favourites

This was one of my all time favourites – I loved the scream of the engine, the drama of the fire popping, the 3D tracks (sort of), and the jumps – awesome game, that now looks a little dated but still plays well.

I played this recently and I was still leaning in to the corners so the car didn’t flip or fall off the track (yeah I’m a loser).

Here’s a little pic of me getting returned to the track after realising that my leaning wouldn’t work:

These are interesting!

Saw these on eBay, pixel glasses! Very different! 🙂 eBay link

Easily beaten on FIFA

Okay so I loaded up the classic FIFA International Soccer on my Amiga 500+ the other day. It took quite a while to load, and after swapping the four discs intermittently, I was eventually shown the screen below…

I played as England against USA and almost immediately conceded a goal, it was 3-0 by half time (which is when I turned it off). The controls were difficult and the players were pretty unresponsive, it wasn’t the best.

Amusingly, my 8-year old son – who was playing FIFA 12 on the iPad at the time – thought it looked ‘cool’ and he actually wanted to give it a go! Retro games still rule, it’s official.