You probably know some retro events already. In Spain the most known are RetroMadrid (named MadridSX previously), RetroEuskal or RetroMañía. Even Tenerife Lan Party had a retro section this year.

I’m going not to extend my self in this topic very much. Other people have posted about this event already, and we’re after repeating in the near future. Further reading (in Spanish only, sorry) at Konamito and afx blogs respectively.

I also took some photos (more at Konamito’s post).

I, on my behalf, have something else to celebrate: I’ve eventually released 1.0 version of the ZX Spectrum BASIC compiler. You can download it and give it a try, if interested.

If you’re having troubles either installing or using it, or suspect of a bug, please ask for help at the forum.

My favorite subjects are, yes, you guess it, Parallel computing and Computer languages (Compilers, Language processors, etc…)

I’m currently programming a ZX Spectrum BASIC cross compiler in my (little) spare time. It’s entirely written in python, and almost finished (hope to release V1.0 this month). It’s a three stage retargeable compiler. The backend outputs Z80 code, so it should be easily portable to other Z80 micros such as AMSTRAD or MSX. Porting to other architectures, or even to .NET or Java it’s also possible by changing the backend module could also be implemented.

Regarding to the language, It’s not the ZX Spectrum original BASIC but a dialect very close to FreeBasic which allows function definitions and more complex control-flow structures. The URL contains an almost complete specification, although not all of them has been implemented in the ZX for obvious reasons.

Some features:

• Function definitions with local variable scopes and parameters by reference or value
• Multidimensional arrays of any data type
• Strings passed by value or reference
• Dynamic memory heap
• Inline ASM code
• Completely extensible with your own functions

You can download current alpha builds or visit the forum for suggestions, comments, etc.

Update: I’ve just finished it! Visit the compiler page for more information.

The book finish and design is really good. Perhaps what I dislike was the binding glue, which was a little weak, so I went to a printer works to rebind it with a stronger glue.

Back to the book design, it’s perfect. If you have sometime wanted to read a book on ZX which brings you those sensations back, this is your book: Page numbering is made with ZX spectrum gum keys fonts. The books goes in chronological order and it’s pledged of neat artwork from that ages. The Manic Miner, the Alien 8 bot, and so on appears on some pages mixed with some background screenshots.

Each page comments on a game and shows two screenshots of it and the cover tape. It also tells about the programmers of the moment, their lives and the companies they were working on. The book comments 250 games. Some of them where absolutely unknown to me whilst others were very very familiar (of course, Knight Lore and all the Filmation saga from Ultimate).

However, I missed some writtings about others like Bruce Lee, Abu Simbel Profanation (although other Dynamic games are exposed), Wizball (I will comment on it here soon) or Bomb Jack.

Besides that, absolutely brilliant and absolutely a must for any ZX Spectrum fan: every moment, every memory brings that “flavour” back from times that won’t be here anymore.

So I entered the store and reached the 3rd floor (computers & videogames) and saw it behind the pane: Alchemist. I asked the shop assistance to let me examine the case. I read:

«You the most skilled Alchemist on Earth have been summoned to do battle with the Evil Warlock who is terrorizing the land. As you enter his dread castle you wonder if even your formidable powers will be enough to defeat this evil force…»

My English wasn’t good enough to understand many of the words in the game instructions, but becoming a magician in a magic world really charmed me. I bought it. It was my first bought Spectrum game. My Spectrum came bundled with 6 tapes (all of them 16Kb games, and none of them were adventures, which is my favourite genre). So there it was, my first 48K adventure!

Unfortunately, I was unable to finish the game. I wasn’t able to understand my mission due to my poor English: words like “stamina” sounded strange to me by that time, and I ended up frustrated of looking up the dictionary every now and then. I manage to visit almost all the rooms, but didn’t finish the game…

Alchemist was programmed by Ian Weatherburn by 1983 while working at Imagine. He died by the beginning of 90′s (he presumedly commited suicide).

Almost ten years later, I was nostalgic about the ZX Spectrum age (it will really never die to me … ), and was talking about this game to a friend of mine. Surprisingly he told me it wasn’t so difficult, and that he was able to finish it. I run back to home, plugged my old Spectrum +2 (my old 48K was gone), and »Pressed play to give it a try.

My English, by the way, was much better than before. So I started to play and went back to the stamina food rooms (yes, that was the trick) and… YES! I finished the game. I felt very strong emotions that day. It was like returning back to the mid ’80s. But this time I was able to finish it. Yes… I was the most powerful alchemist in the world, and had succeded.

Late, in an emulator, I played and finished it again. I think waiting 10 years is was worth the hassle anyway…

About the Game

The game is very playable from the first time. You can walk or fly depending on your status (you can polymorph to a Magician or to an eagle). When walking like a Magician, you will move slower, but can cast a lightning spell. Beware of your stamina and magic mana. Mana recovers with time (just wait sill in a safe place) whilst stamina decrease with it. You will have to go back to the starting screen to eat some food pieces.

Recover the four scroll pieces and, once you have achieved this, go for the Evil Warlock and kill him (your lightning spell will be much powerful after you have completed the scroll).

Here is a nice map.

Trivia

• The music playing at the start screen is from J. S. Bach

I was about thirteen when I came back from the UK and saw the poster announcing Arkanoid (this was nearly 1987). I felt something that compelled me to buy the game, despite I didn’t know whether I was going to like it or not. Coincidentally, by that time, Spectrum games were being distributed by a company which made history: Erbe Software. They cut the prices of the games from 2.500 pts down to only 875 pts. (that’s about nowadays 5 €).

From Arkanoid, everything impressed me: I quickly run to the shop to buy it, and from the sound of the ball bouncing against the bricks, to the story, everything thrilled me. We were used to be knights rescueing their princesses from the typical bad guy. But Arkanoid was slightly different. Something from this story really thrilled me and I wanted to finish the game. You play as Vaus, an escape pod which manages to get out safe and sound after its mothership was attacked and all the crew killed.

What could you do then? At first sight, only to avenge your killed friends… But no: the game proposes you to fight and defeat the
Dimension Organaizer Header (DOH) which controlles the time and dimensions to you could go back to the past and rescue your friends.

So your task consist in break the walls sorrounding and protecting DOH to defeat it. You have a little ball which bumps the wall bricks and bounces back. If you let the ball to run away, you lose a life.

This so basic approach completes with Power-ups, which allows us to enlarge our ship, to have several balls at once, to pick up the ball (so it gets still for a while), shot laser beams, escape that wall (to the next stage), win an extra life or slow the ball down.

At first the game si simple, since the ball is rather easy to control. But as the ball bounces over and over, it speeds up and it results in an adrenaline raising while your eyes try to follow it and your hands try to push the corresponding keys to reach it. Even more, the bouncing angle depends on wich part of the ship touches de ball, so sometimes you really have to struggle to drive to ball to the remaining bricks.

It’s an ADDICTIVE game, don’t know if the right word is funny, but for me, definitely, the word is THRILLING, because it is able to make speed up your heartbit like the best arcade games.

Moreover, some of the walls are actually mastery achitechtonic designs which mixes corridors in which the ball gets trapped among several unbreakable blocks. Once the ball gets out, it cames back at a really high speed and we’ll probably lose a life if we’re not focused enough.

Several years later, the sequel, Arkanoid II – Revenge of DOH, was released. It was a worthy successor, because it added many more levels and the possibility to choose whether we wanted to take the left or right path after each one (something like Out Run). It also had any player dream: The steel ball, which was able to break any brick along its way without bouncing back.

Imagine set very high standards with this sequel, and it was a worthy conversion of the Taito machine game by that time. No doubt, it enlightened the name of remakable Leyend: Arkanoid.

PookyII
Wow! I was flabbergasted. So I wasn’t the only one among my friend to whom the 8 bits left a deep mark. Amazing. So I asked him some more questions:

• Boriel: I take for granted you finished Arkanoid. Did you also finished Arkanoid II?
• PookyII: Yes, I also did. But I think I used a “poke” that time. I remember a big heart at level 17 (some kind of “final boss”), and finally at 34, again DOH
• Boriel: How did you felt when you finished Arkanoid?
• PookyII: I think you’re meaning if I felt something like when playing “Final Fantasy”. No, I think it was euphoria. But the best of this game is you can keep playing for longer and longer, because finishing it didn’t mean you were to drop it into the ‘Chest of the Forgotten Games’. On the contrary, the thrilling of Arkanoid reached far beyond its “end”.
• Boriel: And with Arkanoid II? Was it a similar experience?
• PookyII: With the sequel I felt quite the same, even though several years had already passed. It was more like the satisfaction for having achieved the mission.
• Boriel: What would you recommend to the people (specially from that time) who would like to give it a try? (e.g. into an emulator)
• PookyII: I’d tell them to try to pass the first level. If they do, then they’re lost!
• Boriel: Another sensation, experience o memory about the game you would like to share?
• PookyII: Yes, lots of nostalgia: I played (mainly Arkanoid II) with a tiny B/W TV as a monitor, and I didn’t miss a color TV or a bigger one. To me, the entertaining technology (since that time) was a way like no other to meet friends and have lots of fun. Sometimes because we did enjoy, others because we simply laught about the game animations and wit.
  I still remember a day four of us spent playing “PaperBoy”. One of use, controlled the fordward and backward movement. Another two guys controlled the left and the right, and I was in charge of throwing the newspapers. What an amazing evening…
  And my last mention goes for “Gauntlet”, a worthy multiplayer game. Rooms appeared and repeated at random, but that didn’t stop us from playing until very late at night and finally having to say goodbye to our host mother in a very tactful manner.
  

And you? Would you like to go back to the past?