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intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Fri Jan 05, 2018 4:50 pm

Bulletdust:
Nah, I live in Australia
Oh, that's right! Sorry I forgot about that.

Man, so many great things coming out of Australia in the late 80s/early 90s.
  • Directory Opus
  • SysInfo
  • The Phoneix!

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Bulletdust

Posted Fri Jan 05, 2018 5:24 pm

intric8 wrote: Man, so many great things coming out of Australia in the late 80s/early 90s.
  • Directory Opus
  • SysInfo
  • The Phoneix!
That's because the Amiga was just so popular!

You'd think that because there were so many Amiga's around they'd be cheap on the second hand market wouldn't you? They're far from it, my A1200 cost me AU$550.00 as a bog stocker - Admittedly it's in pristine condition. My A500 was a reasonable price, but I admit, since getting the A1200 there's really no need to use the A500 anymore.

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Shot97
Detroit, MI, USA

Posted Fri Jan 05, 2018 6:10 pm

Just based on your one screenshot of those games for WHDLoad I've got Sim City, Barbarian, Barbarian 2, Battle Chess, Beneath A Steel Sky, Civilization, Defender of the Crown, Dungeon Master II, and Eye of the Beholder II --- All NTSC games.

Did you know that? They are. And even WHDLoad will screw them up unless you boot the machine into NTSC at the start. They play slower. 10 seconds every minute, 1 minute every 6 minutes, 10 minutes every hour. Regardless of if it's a fast paced game or if it's a slow strategy game, you're losing precious time in PAL mode. Accelerators are not the same when you're dealing with clock speed and screen refresh rates. Beyond that, and most importantly, it's the art. People claim they love these machines, but do they really when they sit there and stare at stretched widescreen graphics for games meant to be shown in 4:3? When they complain about a Test Drive II running a bit slow, but its in PAL mode? When people are here pointing it out to them and they still refuse to even care... Do they love the Amiga? I hope you do.

There are a thousand plus Amiga games. Most of them are terrible. Yes, most of them are PAL... and most of them are terrible budget priced games that nobody, even in Europe, are going to like. There are hundreds of NTSC games, and nearly all application software was made for NTSC machines. While there will be less NTSC games you will notice that of that smaller selection the quality of the titles are going to be much higher, because they were designed for a market of adults with pocket money where as in Europe it was a very different market. It's important to understand these differences, because life is not black and white, it's shades of grey. Plenty of awesome games game out in the NTSC market, and it's important for the PAL lands to understand this and care... because right now 99% of videos and screenshots are showing these games wrong... I count 32 of the top 100 Lemon Amiga games to be NTSC in design, and they're being played not as designed. People should care about that. I could personally fill that top 100 list with a whole lot more. Some of it is indeed taste, but obviously when a very European board like Lemon has 32 NTSC games in their top 100 list and nobody is even talking about this problem, well.... Then there most certainly IS a problem.

User avatar
themmc

Posted Fri Jan 05, 2018 9:06 pm

intric8 wrote: Man, so many great things coming out of Australia in the late 80s/early 90s.
  • Directory Opus
  • SysInfo
  • The Phoneix!
I went to school with Jon Potter who wrote Directory Opus. So, both that and The Phoenix came from Adelaide originally.

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Bulletdust

Posted Fri Jan 05, 2018 9:16 pm

My library isn't that big Shot97, I only want the titles I played as a kid and the original boxes don't interest me - Furthermore, I'm aware of the differences between NTSC and PAL, hence why games were coded specifically.

I'm also into the Amiga demoscene, in fact that's a big part of my love for the Amiga (I actually preferred the C64) and most titles were coded for PAL.

Fact is, my A500 is in storage and my A1200 plays and runs all the software I can throw at it just fine using a 68030 accelerator @ 40Mhz and 128MB of fastram straight off the HDD using a pleasing GUI - That's the benefit of WHDload as I don't have the space to have all these machines set up at once. Outright compatibility is a priority for me, more of a priority than doing things the 'old way' - Which I hated anyway, even back in the day.

The way you inserted a disk to play a game on the Amiga, totally bypassing the OS unlike the C64, always frustrated me - The machine felt more like a console! All I ever wanted was a HDD to store my OS and all my games on, but they were expensive and the tech didn't exist at the time to really do so - The tech exists now and it's affordable, so that's what I'm interested in.

My games are scaled perfectly via my Indivision and playing exactly as intended, I'm aware of your issue with screenshots, the issue exists because screenshots are taken using PC's and UAE.


Cheers all.

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Bulletdust

Posted Fri Jan 05, 2018 11:01 pm

themmc wrote:
I went to school with Jon Potter who wrote Directory Opus. So, both that and The Phoenix came from Adelaide originally.
They had an awesome retro scene in Adelaide that recently looked like it was closing down due to management issues, luckily it looks like some enthusiastic individuals are going to step in and keep it running!

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SEADRIVE

Posted Thu Feb 15, 2018 10:43 pm

I originally grabbed an Amiga 500 literally 2 weeks after someone showed off their loaded Amiga 1000 in the fall of 1988...there simply was nothing like it! I used my A500 for years until grabbing up an Amiga 1200 in 2012. Over the past 10 years, I have gotten hold of some A500's and own 2 A1000s and would have loved to grab hold of a Phoenix board. One of my old buddies would have been one of the few who originally purchased the upgrade, I remember checking his machine out, it was simply astounding. I would like some replacement cases for my A500s, for they are extremely brittle these days, but over all, would like to see some more Phoenix solutions for the A1000. After all, the A1000 was the original baby created by RJ Michael and J Miner back in the day and to me, it's the "real" Amiga. I love my A500s, but the separate Keyboard of the A1000 just seems so much more formalized...I cannot believe how decent the keyboards still feel to this day. Congratulations on finding a Phoenix board, I am envious.
regards,

Joe Cimmarrusti

User avatar
intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Thu Feb 15, 2018 10:56 pm

Thanks for the kind words, Joe. I definitely recognize that I'm an extremely lucky guy.
I would like some replacement cases for my A500s, for they are extremely brittle these days
Well it looks like you're in luck! The A1200NET guys announced today that they are about to launch a Kickstarter campaign for the 500 case. They said it would go-live once the keycaps ship some time in the next 1-2 months. It's going to be hugely popular I'm sure, even if it does take 2 years to actually deliver the cases.

And hey - thanks for joining AmigaLove. I take it you're from Australia?

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Bulletdust

Posted Thu Feb 15, 2018 11:17 pm

The case on my current A500 is still in really good nick, I've also got a spare case and motherboard under the bed. ;)

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SEADRIVE

Posted Sat Mar 31, 2018 10:01 am

Back in 1989, I grabbed my first A500 after a friend showed me his Amiga 1000...it was simply magic. Later he upgraded to a Phoenix Board, which I believe he still has stored in a dry place. I also have been looking for a Phoenix board upgrade and am bitter to have missed the new ones that were built I believe in 2011. Like many, I left the Amiga scene when Commodore was closing down it's operations, but over the years have obtained several Amiga products including some A500s and 2 - Amiga 1000s. This upgrade may seem unimportant by many, but will remain the holy grail for A1000 owners like myself...enjoy!
Cheers, :)

SEADRIVE





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