Atari memories (well, UK, anyway)

[snicklin]

For a long time I used to read the New Atari User magazines over and over. I remember one of their advertisers which was "Miles Better Software" from Cannock.

 

I lived about 15 miles away from Cannock but couldn't travel as I was a kid.

 

Then one day my Dad was going to Cannock so I said, "TAKE ME!!" and after finding it hard to find a car parking position, we finally made it into Miles Better Software.

 

WOW!! It was wonderful. Instead of one vertical rack with about 9/10ths of the games being for other formats (which I was used to in Tamworth), this place had a whole Atari section with loads and loads of games.

 

I only had enough pocket money left though to pick up one game. So I bought "Gauntlet" and absolutely LOVED the game.

[+orpheuswaking]

Growing up in the UK but now living in the USA is making it hard for me to find and complete my Atari User/Page 6 collection. There are a few on ebay right now but with the exchange rate and shipping costs it's just crazy. If anyone reading this thread has any of the following issues (hopefully in a bulk lot) please let me know.

 

Atari User (Database Publications) VOL 1 --- Issue #9
Atari User (Database Publications) VOL 2 --- Issue #10
Atari User (Database Publications) VOL 3 --- Issue #7 & #10

Page 6 Magazine Issues #1-20 & #35

Page 6 New Atari User (Smaller A5 format) Issues #76-85

[Mclaneinc]

Just reread the whole thread and its lovely rereading all the stories from folks, huge feel good factor..

 

Sort of begs for a personal time travel device just to pop back and be there again but you know no matter how good it felt it was never as good as the first time. A little while back I drove down to where Silica was in Kent as a little pilgrimage, the shop is still there, something to do with electronics now but it was nice to see it still standing unlike a lot of places. I drive past what was The VIC Centre in Acton where the not yet famous Jeff Minter used to go to show his Vic 20 and later C64 games to the lads that ran it. Jeff was a lovely down to earth guy, he treated you like an old mate he had known for years and happily talked about games etc for AGES.

 

Not been to Central London for a walk around in years, way too busy for me, the only times I've been there recently is to see a little company called Artbox who specialise in Manga and Japanese culture which my daughter LOVES, wish someone would write a Hello Kitty game for the Atari so I could get her more in to it (she's a console nutcase). I'm sure CEX is still there just off Tottenham Court Road but I've no wish to go there as its full of young lads playing some sort of hardcore metal music full blast and staff that have no people skills.

 

I'm just happy I have all the wonderful memories of those first years of home computing, the young cannot (and I feel sorry for them) grasp the enormity of being there at the start of home computers, arcades and the like, these machines were never around before that in a home way, it wasn't like the launch of a new console, it was the beginning and it was beautiful. Never lines and a dot on a screen looked so damn nice, I played my late mother at pong for ages but to walk in to these new digital arcades where spaced between the pinball machines and one armed bandits was a proper arcade game and the atmosphere was electric but fun and happy. Then having the ability to play these games in some form at home just blew you away but then to see new games being written in bedrooms etc being sold in magazines with beautiful artwork that never matched what actually booted up but you were still hooked and then my beloved Atari landed and of all the machines I'd owned before this was by far the best of the lot, my first game of Star Raiders just hardwired a HUGE smile on my face. Visiting Silica at the time when the Atari hit these shores was massive, the people just went crazy for ther machine and that shop shall we say 'rocked', I wish I'd recorded just the sound you heard as you walked in on a Saturday, computing bliss.

 

As computers became more matter of fact the excitement dropped a little but the magic was still there seeing the first of the new 8 and 16bit machines, good times...Very good times.

 

If you want to get a taste of the industry starting in the UK then I beg you to watch From Bedrooms to Billions, its a wonderful fan made and star studded team of people from all parts of the UK industry telling the story of the advent of what was to become the UK computer home industry. Its a must watch and pretty much has anyone that mattered in the UK at the time. From an Atari POV its limited but its more about how it all started and the people rather than machine orientated but its a great watch..

[DGS-Atari]

If you want a realistic old-style arcade experience these days, try to get over to the National Media Museum in Bradford ( http://www.nationalmediamuseum.org.uk/). Along with a small computer museum on the ground floor, they have an arcade floor which is literally a room filled with original arcade machines (upright and cocktail style) and old computers and consoles which are all playable. The arcade machines still have their original 10p/20p coin slots! There were even a couple of guys behind me watching over my shoulder as I played Galaga just for that extra bit of authentic experience!

[Mclaneinc]

Trailer for Bedroom 2 billions

 

[José Pereira]

For a long time I used to read the New Atari User magazines over and over. I remember one of their advertisers which was "Miles Better Software" from Cannock.

02

I lived about 15 miles away from Cannock but couldn't travel as I was a kid.

02

Then one day my Dad was going to Cannock so I said, "TAKE ME!!" and after finding it hard to find a car parking position, we finally made it into Miles Better Software.

02

WOW!! It was wonderful. Instead of one vertical rack with about 9/10ths of the games being for other formats (which I was used to in Tamworth), this place had a whole Atari section with loads and loads of games.

02

I only had enough pocket money left though to pick up one game. So I bought "Gauntlet" and absolutely LOVED the game.

Hey that was the store that in my 92 inter-rail and 1week at U.K. I could find more stuff to buy, about 30 tapes but remember they had lots more stuff including discs but at that time I hadn't a disc-drive.

Other place that like this had stuff was Sunaro that I knew because of their advertisments on Atari magazines but can't remember why I didn't went there.

[snicklin]

Hey that was the store that in my 92 inter-rail and 1week at U.K. I could find more stuff to buy, about 30 tapes but remember they had lots more stuff including discs but at that time I hadn't a disc-drive.

Other place that like this had stuff was Sunaro that I knew because of their advertisments on Atari magazines but can't remember why I didn't went there.

 

I am so jealous of your trip. As you were older than me, you could get about in the UK and visit all the places that I wanted to go to.

 

Which towns did you stop in on your travels and where were you staying in hotels?

[José Pereira]

Yes, that was a nice trip.
In U.K. I was almost a week and big cities I only went to London and Manchester. A8 related

I visited Miles Better Software that I remembered that I had to take a train then a bus to

get there but I also, like you know went to Page6/New Atari User at Stafford and Red Rat

Software/Atari World in Manchester on that sadly later bomber Fennel Street (shame I didn't

know back then that Ocean Software wasn't far away and that I coulsd had complaint about

their lack of software for ours machines and saw with my eyes if they had or not the

'famous' 800XL inside so I could ask for what reason they had it...).
Then there was also the big names shops on the streets but don't remember seeing much

there. There was also some small stores like one outside Manchester (remember I saw a large

Cadbury chocolates factory near ) that the guy inside, a Pakistan/Indian one had lots of

budget tapes and where I bought all and saw for the first time the Hi_tec games (sad that

only when I come back and load them to saw how anwfull and that the backs of tape

screenshots of the C64 version hadn't nothing to do with the A8 version ).
My trip taked around 3Months where, like I said, about 1 just on U.K. and for Atari. Had I

at that time a disc-drive and I could got, as far as I remembered some discs also that I

think Miles Better had some.
Regarding sleeping I never got into any hotel and food I never entered on a restaurant

other than Mac donalds and similars because the money was distributed for about 1/3 for

Atari and the others 2/3 for food and travel. I spent something between 800 and 1000euros

in todays money but could get back with around 40 A8 tapes and went also to some cities

in Europ like Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, Vienna, Monte Carlo, Bordeus, Nice, Roma and

Veneza but also because it was 1992 here on my country's side Spain had Sevilla with the

world expo, Madrid with European capital city of culture and because it was July they also

had the Olympic games in Barcelona.
I usual plan the travel to be and sleep on train at night but in U.K. I had to sleep in

stations and even outside when they decided to close them. Other thing when we go to a

place and had to return to the same place you drop your unused luggage just for some bucks

on those large boxes that were very common back then on the the railways stations (for

example, in U.K. I dropped most of the things in London and only got them back in the last

day when I had to take the channel boat again in Dover, there wasn't the Euro tunnel train

so I did Paris/Calais to Dover/London and back to Oostende/Belgium to go to Brussels and

Amsterdam).
There is always stories that takes us for all our lifes and one was in Manchester. I always

asked first if the station will close or not and they sais at central Manchester's station

they wouldn't but at around 1 or 2a.m. they wake me up saying that they had to close it. it

was the time of you there had that terrorism IRA problems and was my first time and luckily

never again to saw metal detects and hardly armed police in stations that I only ver saw on

tv and cinema. When I was out there were 2 or 3 guys speaking, British ones and then a guy

lots more older than me, around the age I have now that is 40s (I had 20) and saying that

if I was going to stay there they will assault me and he taked me to the right side of the

station that if you know it has the underground metro entrance showing me the place they

will take and attack me). And there I was asking myswelf if I would go or not with him.
Don't know or perhaps was god with me that I decided to go with him and accept his offer to

pass the night in his house that he said he lived with his mother outside Manchester. We

went out of there, first by walking because he said I must have to first go eating

something and that he know a place that was opened untill last night. First place and was

true and I was starting to feel that I had made the right decision because it was a sort of

burguer house that the owner, a very kind Pakistan/Indian offered me 2burguers and

potatoes.
Next we taked one of your old English taxi (another new and fine experience ...) and I

remember that because of the feeling I had because of the guy's bad looking, after some

miles and we were already totally outside Manchester, the taxi driver stopd the car and

said we will not go more further where 'my new friend' said him loud and show him money

that he had to drive because he wanted and will pay. I must say that I was again with some

fear .
Then we finally stoped at one of those houses and houses of bricks that are traditional

over there and that seemed all the same, ground and 1st floor or was me but because there

wasn't almost no lights. We enter in one and at bottom of a corridor there was a light and

a nice looking old traditional looking English lady. We talked almost all the night

together with a LARGER MONSTER dog (Do you guys remember that Hanna's Barbera Dinky Dog

cartoon? That one that was the smallest puppie in the store and then it grew grew and grew

and was enormous and destroyed everything he goes over or takes in front of him? Yes, it

was exactly a copy of that one ). Then at around between 4 and 5a.m. that I noticed

and asked her what time it was and that she said to me that it was the first daylights in

this time of the year there where here we can never have before around 6a.m., yes another

new experience ).
Sadly and when on the other day he taked me to the near bus stop and give me a paper with

his adress and I to him mine. Don't know what but when I came back I hadn't the adress and

he also never sent me a letter. His mother for sure isn't alive today but I hope him is

O.k. or at least they had a good life because of what they were and did for me ).
Yes, like I said I have to keep the finances correct. Me and two friends were for about

2years saying that we will get a job to have money and go on the next year but then

nothing, always the same that is they hadn't got a job or spent all money buying things and

going out at night.
So in 92 I was the only of the three that had a real and full-time job for 2years and was

the first year that I will have a complete 1month of vacations so I waked up in a morning

and in an instant it made a click on my head, in minutes I was out and on Wasteels

traveling Agency buying the monthly Euro-Rail train tricket, then afternoon I went to the

bank changing the first two countries money, France and England. At night I was knocking at

another friends house that was a scout asking him to give me his large bag and camp bed.

Next day at lunch time I was taking the Sud-Express train to Paris and next day there I was

at Paris. My crazy for Atari and I walked from one side to another to the other Paris

railway station that is the one that we is the train to Calais to the boat to cross the

channel, I had to pass the night inside the boat so I could sleep ...
Yeah so much more I could say but here's a samll maybe large part but don't want to bother

you more ...

[José Pereira]

Oops and I can't edit it anymore but you for sure got it from other linest that my trip taked around 3weeks that about 1 at England (not 3months) though the inter-rail ticket was for a complete month but when I decided to go 1 week of vacation was lost here doing nothing.

And also sorry for so many errors because I was typing with the phone and is too late here and at bed wanting to answer.

More than time to sleep now.

Edited April 7, 2016 by José Pereira

[snicklin]

You never fail to amaze me. What a trip that sounded! I'd be a bit scared at times too.

 

The cities were always more heavily protected by Police than the towns. At the time I didn't live a big city (small town), so I didn't see much of the Police. They didn't have problems with the IRA.

 

I've slept outside a train station a couple of times too. It isn't a pleasant experience. I say that I've slept outside them, but I couldn't actually get to sleep either time.

 

Ahh, the black taxi cabs. They used to be made in my town (Tamworth). Not anymore though, they're made in China now.

[Mclaneinc]

Don't talk about the IRA, back in the day there was a car found in Chelsea (I think, it was all over the news) and it had a Maplin catalogue in and bomb making equipment so the specials came to my branch as it was the closest London branch and grilled us all. My dumb deputy manager though it was hilarious to wind me up about telling the Police I was from Belfast, thankfully nothing came of it as I'd lost my accent years ago but one of my staff said they remembered one of the guys in the photos they brought and told the Police he could recognise him. I looked at him and said "Martin, are you willing to go to court and ID an IRA terrorist?", he looked at me and then the fear hit home and he then told the Police he wasn't so sure...

 

Considering we left Belfast in the middle of the night after being told by a group that we left or we would be burnt alive (parents were married from the two big religions, not a good thing at the time), was like a scene from one of those films, all the lights in the house went off and as it was a gatehouse for a hospital it was in the middle of nowhere, all the windows came in and a huge group emerged from the tree's, as a 7yr old I was scared to death......

 

We left, middle of the night, me in PJ's off to get a ferry to England...

 

Sadly no Atari's involved...

Edited April 7, 2016 by Mclaneinc

[Defender-ace]

Being from Cannock Miles Better Software was a regular haunt for me,I can remember paying weekly for a 1010 recorder. They always stocked hardware and software. Used to travel to Brum often also to go to the Broad Street Atari shop and eventually got me a 1050 from there.

My favourite memory was in the mid 80's Boots the chemist stocked micros and displayed them powered up to televisions. I used to quickly type a basic program that would countdown a timer on the Atari, turn the volume up to full on the TV and make my escape. Then all hell broke out with a screaming flashing TV, very amusing for 16yr olds!

[kiwilove]

I did spend about a year looking through computer magazines trying to find the best computer available. The Atari 800 did seem the most suitable - because I was very much graphics orientated and I wanted a computer capable of delivering decent quality home versions of the then arcade coin-op videogames. The TRS-80 and Atari 2600 did not interest me at all because of their blocky graphics.

I do remember typing in some short BASIC demos from Compute on an Atari 800 at a local computer store in Dunedin, New Zealand before leaving overseas - months? later on. I had it in my mind to purchase an Atari 800 from Maplins in Hammersmith, London in Dec 82, before journeying onto North Humberside - which was to my temporary base while staying in England. The price did drop a little, and it would be way cheaper than in NZ.

I did end up staying for 10 months - and progressed from a 1010 tape recorder to an Atari 810 disk drive. I did collect copies of heaps of games to take back with me in late 83. I did meet up with Andrew Bradfield in January 84 who was eager to get any copies of any games that would run on his 16K Atari 400. He soon upgraded to an 48K Atari 800 like mine - and got an 1050 disk drive, when that became available. He did insist upon making sure that a diskette of copied games did run alright on it, before purchase. This somewhat fazed the retailer looking on - as it would not be the usual test he was expecting to be made, before a purchase.

Probably late in 84 he started learning 6502 assembler from a Compute! book because it was in 1985 that Laser Hawk was worked on. He did take only bout a year to learn to program in 6502 assembler - and Laser Hawk took about a year or just less to write/develop. He did try Atari BASIC but he found assembler more to his liking. Hawkquest started it's development as soon as Laser Hawk was completed.

 

Somehow it was always the Atari community as such - it's users that I found the most interesting and fruitful connections with. Although I did frequent a Central City Computer interest group, a C64 one and an Amiga one. I was not one to make much of an impression upon people - because of a very quiet and shy nature, that I was. Andrew was likewise of a quiet nature also.

Maybe because I was instrumental to help form an Atari User Group and edited 2 issues of a small 'zine called Go Atari.

 

Harvey

[DGS-Atari]

I'm getting all nostalgic here, so I've dug out a couple of old photos of mine. This is my Atari setup (800XL, 1050, 1010, 1020 plotter) in 1987:

 

 

 

And here I am doing some sound sampling with my Replay cartridge:

 

[snicklin]

Don't talk about the IRA, back in the day there was a car found in Chelsea (I think, it was all over the news) and it had a Maplin catalogue in and bomb making equipment so the specials came to my branch as it was the closest London branch and grilled us all. My dumb deputy manager though it was hilarious to wind me up about telling the Police I was from Belfast, thankfully nothing came of it as I'd lost my accent years ago but one of my staff said they remembered one of the guys in the photos they brought and told the Police he could recognise him. I looked at him and said "Martin, are you willing to go to court and ID an IRA terrorist?", he looked at me and then the fear hit home and he then told the Police he wasn't so sure...

 

Considering we left Belfast in the middle of the night after being told by a group that we left or we would be burnt alive (parents were married from the two big religions, not a good thing at the time), was like a scene from one of those films, all the lights in the house went off and as it was a gatehouse for a hospital it was in the middle of nowhere, all the windows came in and a huge group emerged from the tree's, as a 7yr old I was scared to death......

 

We left, middle of the night, me in PJ's off to get a ferry to England...

 

Sadly no Atari's involved...

 

That is quite some story. I don't know what to say, so I'll say nothing more.

[Mclaneinc]

Sadly all as it was, no embellishments, incredibly scary for a 7yr old, my old man had been warned that something would happen as she was Catholic and him Protestant but I don't think he realised just how serious they were until that night.

 

As for the Maplin thing, could have turned real nasty especially if they found out who I was and the dirty family secret of the marriage...

 

You could say I've had an interesting life....The things I saw in Belfast should not be seen by a child....

 

But I've had a great Atari life so there's pluses too

[snicklin]

Sadly all as it was, no embellishments, incredibly scary for a 7yr old, my old man had been warned that something would happen as she was Catholic and him Protestant but I don't think he realised just how serious they were until that night.

 

As for the Maplin thing, could have turned real nasty especially if they found out who I was and the dirty family secret of the marriage...

 

You could say I've had an interesting life....The things I saw in Belfast should not be seen by a child....

 

But I've had a great Atari life so there's pluses too

 

Me and the missus are Protestant and Catholic. Generally it never becomes an issue, not until she wanted to enrol our daughter in a Catholic school. I want to keep religion out of my daughters life (I won't go into the reasons), except for some Atari worshipping of course.

 

No, you shouldn't have gone through that as a child. Did you deliberately attempt to lose your accent for your safety or due to your young age at the time? In Australia I haven't attempted to amend my voice, though I did when I went to Germany, speaking more clearly and removing all colloquialisms (when speaking English). Now I am unable to use a lot of colloquialisms as I trained them out of my speech.

 

Speaking about my daughter, she asked the other day to play Pac-man. I didn't want to pull out the Atari stuff, so I got her onto MAME. She's 4 1/2 and struggles a bit with the concept of "press up to go up". She can do it, but it takes her ages before she maps what she's doing on the screen to what she does in her hand on the controller. Does anyone know by what age they're normally adept at this?

[Mclaneinc]

Hand to eye is pretty much a work in progress at that age, using a controller is a pretty odd concept for a young child but it comes, just let her enjoy with the odd hint, it will come.

 

As for my accent, I'm a chameleon with accents, I adapt to my surroundings, I sounded like Ian Paisley when I came here but after a short while in Marlow I was speaking like a local and then when we moved to London in the East End I sounded like a proper cockney until now where I'm a bit of a mix depending who I'm talking to

 

Sadly I've never been home because I fear I'd be taken for a Policeman or army as I'm always in military short hair and a big old lump, get mistaken for Army and copper all the time which isn't good if you live in the middle of a crime hotspot as I do

 

One day I may go back just to have a look but until then its Google maps only

 

Can't blame you with the non religion for your daughter, because of what I've seen (tar and feathering, knee capping and the like) I've no time for religion, I don't begrudge people having faith in it but its just not for me and although my Wife and In-laws are Muslim (the nice Muslims) I've shielded Serena from being pushed in to it, I sat down with her a while back and told her that until she can understand what religion is and what is behind it that she should just look and when she's old enough if she chooses one then its her choice but she has to understand it. Myself and Cindy are totally agreed that its the best way for her and Serena who is 16 now is seeing for herself what is happening in the world and making sense of it.

[AlegisDownport]

Atari will always have a special place in my heart as without it, I wouldn't have been able to change career direction and work with computers (technical support), a career that has so far lasted me nearly thirty years. Though that was with the ST, the A8 has always held a fascination for me and I'm currently obtaining some A8 kit.

 

I remember buying copies of Atari User reading not just the ST content, but the A8 as well and having a heavy Amercian slant with the software was an interesting angle for me. I also serviced an 800XL for a friends sister and I held onto it for as long as possible, playing Star Raiders to death, something that has stuck with me for more than twenty years.

 

The first Atari shop I went to was Software Express in Alum Rock in Birmingham, just before they moved to the Broad Street shop in 1986/7. It was packed to the hilt with Atari goodies and I ordered one of the first copies of PC-Ditto (software MS-DOS emulator for the ST) even before I had my Atari, which I had to be shipped direct from the US and took weeks to arrive.

 

I got through college with that Atari, completed my COBOL and Turbo Pascal parts of my course using PC-Ditto and the ST for everything else. I made friends (with whom through I eventually met my wife!) that I am still in touch with today, introduced them to Atari's - so in some ways my life has been shaped significantly by that little grey box!

[Ely]

Ah that reminds me. I spent May day bank holiday 1990 debugging a TurboPascal program for a college assignment on my ST running PC-Ditto! Jeez it was slow going, the hours I spent figuring out that a semi-colon was missing. Those were the days