Sir Clive’s In There (that coffin)

[The Culture Bunker]

Nice. Mine came with the Light Gun Action Pack:

Operation Wolf
Probably technically impressive, but I was absolutely shit at it. Don't think I made it off the first level.

Robot Attack
I remember really liking the robots that stood on the side of the screen, but being confused as to what I was supposed to do.

Bullseye
Loved the picture of Bully the cartoon bull, but thought the game was a boring old load of shite. So quite an accurate recreation of the show.

Solar Invasion
Played this one quite a bit. Found the weird, undulating spherical alien things disgusting, and therefore satisfying to destroy.

Missile Ground Zero and Rookie
I have no memories of these. Maybe they were the last games on the tape.

180 was always the best Speccy darts game. Had to wait till my old man stumped up for Master System to experience light gun antics - and even then I got bored of it fairly quickly.

[Mister Six]

Yeah, I got over the light gun pretty rapidly once I discovered the joys of the Your Sinclair covertape and the CodeMasters quattro compilations.

Here's a question - can anyone remember the name of some odd game that was on a YS covertape in which you wandered around some government building (left/right, bit like Dun Darach/Tir Na Nog/Marsport but probably less nicely animated, not Flunky - it was a serious thing) trying to... do something about terrorists, I think? I remember being baffled as a kid, but would like to see if I could get to grips with it as an adult.

[kalowski]

Saboteur?

[darby o chill]

Jeez. Just remembering my Dad buying me a ZX81 circa 1982.
The excitement of seeing the little cursor for the first time on an old portable b&w telly.
Most of the games were rubbish but Mazogs was impressive. I think it needed the 16K ram pack.
This madman built a ZX81 laptop.

https://youtu.be/4TGt7mVZ6to?t=137

[Rev+]

Can't help but wonder if I'd taken the trouble as a six year old to read the manual about BASIC programming whether I'd be a rich man by now. The answer to which is, of course, "no, you daft tit".

I got a Spectrum when I was around 8, and did bother to read that BASIC manual, which led to happily making shitty little games for my own amusement, fucking nerd that I was.  The highlight of my career was getting a barely-visible screenshot in an issue of either Your Sinclair or Sinclair User when they ran a competition for readers to contribute deliberately shit games that they'd written.  The one stipulation to the contest was that it *had* to play the death march when you died in the game.

If it makes you feel better, none of this early dabbling led anywhere and I'm fucking skint these days.

[Tony Tony Tony]

Farewell Sir Clive.

He lived every nerds dream by making shitloads from his inventions (except the C5) and taking up with a young lap dancer. Legend.

[Mister Six]

Saboteur?

No, it wasn't an action game. You were a suit-wearing sort walking around some offices. Or maybe an airport? I think it was one of those "pick up object, give to appropriate person" games, again like Dun Darach.

[seepage]

My intro to "computing" was a Sinclair Cambridge Programmable calculator. 32 steps and the log/trig functions were only accurate to about 2 decimal places. So it's

Spoiler alert

50/50

[close]

still a thank you from me, Clive.

[Sebastian Cobb]

I had a BBC then an Archimedes.

It's clear the Spectrum's ubiquity meant it was probably 'pushed harder' than any similar micro. The CPC very similar and better but rarely got taken advantage of, and Sugar put a decent amount of effort to ensure some Amsoft titles and well-written manuals were there at launch, but due to the similarity and ubiquity of the inferior Spectrum, sadly hardly anyone could ever be arsed writing ports to take advantage of its plus points.

The most fitting eulogy is probably Chris Sievey's 'music video' for the ZX81, that he pressed on the b-side to Sabotage:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8u9ZyV-BHFA

[Glebe]

I think I had a shot at doing a couple of lines of code from the BASIC manual but I doubt I got past the first page.

LET GLEBE = ARSED CIGS.

[ElTwopo]

No, it wasn't an action game. You were a suit-wearing sort walking around some offices. Or maybe an airport? I think it was one of those "pick up object, give to appropriate person" games, again like Dun Darach.

Hijack?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS-_XcjH_1g&ab_channel=Villordsutch

[holdover]

Dead. Ex. 81.

(Stolen from a pal)

[Mister Six]

Hijack?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS-_XcjH_1g&ab_channel=Villordsutch

Yes, you beauty! Thank you!

[Gulftastic]

As he is lowered into the ground, I hope they play the Spectrum 48k loading noise.

[AzureSky]

Nice memories here, thanks.

I had a 128K speccy after playing a mate's rubber keyed 48K. Got it for Christmas, loved it and was devastated when the play button broke on the tape loader. Got it fixed and it happened again later.

Also dropped a whole cup of tea over the keyboard at my nan's and I took it apart and left it to dry in the garden and that's a bingo!, it worked perfectly afterwards.

[batwings]

Cunt ruined my life with his "computers".

[The Culture Bunker]

Hijack?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS-_XcjH_1g&ab_channel=Villordsutch

Like the lad in the video, I played that on a YS cover tape, but being a bit young at the time couldn't really work out how to play it despite knowing the actual idea was sound. If I'd been maybe three years older, it might have clicked.

I remember another YS freebie being one where you drove a train (the name 'Southern Belle' comes to mind) and the best I could do was make the train go really fast until it smashed into the buffers at 100mph in (I think) Bristol station.

[kalowski]

Hijack?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS-_XcjH_1g&ab_channel=Villordsutch

There's no way that Manic Miner is only number 25 in the all time Your Sinclair games. Not with Chuckie Egg at number 13.

[Pinball]

Horace Goes Skiing
Jetpac
Jet Set Willy
Manic Miner

It was only a slight stepup from kids playing with boxes, but I liked it :-)

[batwings]

3D Monster Maze on the ZX81, the first game I had, was genuinely thrilling.

footsteps approaching
Rex has seen you

[kalowski]

Horace Goes Skiing
Jetpac
Jet Set Willy
Manic Miner

It was only a slight stepup from kids playing with boxes, but I liked it :-)

Utter magic.
Also Lunar Jetman, Pssst and Tir Na Nog. Who needs GTA?

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

If it makes you feel better, none of this early dabbling led anywhere and I'm fucking skint these days.

Excellent news. Thank you, it really does.

[ElTwopo]

Utter magic.
Also Lunar Jetman, Pssst and Tir Na Nog. Who needs GTA?

No one needs GTA if they have Turbo Esprit. Four different towns to drive around? Including Romford? Doesn't get much better than that.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Was he introduced to drugs by a man from cookdandbombd? It seems plausible his death was from that.

There are answer machine recordings along the lines of 'get on the benzos Clive you stone cold AIDS wally'

[kalowski]

No one needs GTA if they have Turbo Esprit. Four different towns to drive around? Including Romford? Doesn't get much better than that.

Trans Am, mate. Drive the whole of America. First time I saw the word Albuquerque.

[idunnosomename]

DIRTY OLD BOLLOCKS MAKE NO MISTAKE

[touchingcloth]

Like the lad in the video, I played that on a YS cover tape, but being a bit young at the time couldn't really work out how to play it despite knowing the actual idea was sound. If I'd been maybe three years older, it might have clicked.

I remember another YS freebie being one where you drove a train (the name 'Southern Belle' comes to mind) and the best I could do was make the train go really fast until it smashed into the buffers at 100mph in (I think) Bristol station.

Parkwood or Temple Meads?

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

Not Alive, Interred.

[pancreas]

Well, either he's paid for his doings at this point or he never will - so I should probably let go and leave his crimes in the past.

Maybe he'll be buried somewhere and you can rape his corpse. Hope springs eternal.

[shiftwork2]

I was concerned that his bald fuck status had been overlooked but fortunately it was covered in the first post.  Relieved.