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Dr. C. Wacko's Miracle Guide to Designing and Programming Your Own Atari Computer Arcade Games
A comprehensive software package for designing and programming arcade games on your Atari computer. The double-sided disk contains forty-nine programs that track, chapter for chapter, the programs found in the book.
235 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1984
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
August 4, 2017
When I first started playing with computers in any serious way, it was on an 8 bit Atari & this was my introduction to programming. Can't think of a better one. It looks kind of stupid, but there was a lot of great information put into this slap-stick comedy routine. It managed to make a lot of boring, complex information fun & easy to understand.
It also taught concepts very well. For example, IIRC, joystick routines were regularly 4 lines of BASIC code & this book had an elegant one line solution. It doesn't just list the routine, but made it part of a sample program that actually did something. Right from the start, all the programs did something so there was a sense of achievement. I'd love to see more programming books like this to teach kids now.
It's probably of no use to anyone now, but if you want a copy of this book, it's available for free on the Internet Archive here legally for free.
If you really want to play with it, I suppose some old 8 bit machines are still around or you could install an Atari emulator. Yes, there are several available including this one from SourceForge here because of course there are people who still miss those machines even more than I do.
Simpler days? Not really. Those were the good old days when we had to write assembly language code to bank switch memory since the CPU couldn't address more than 64kb RAM. A 720kb 5-1/4" floppy was considered high density, even though we had to use a hole punch & flip it over to get to those high heights of storage. Black Box was a startup that sent out a single page for its catalog & touted both a 1mb & 3mb hard drive for these machines. That was only 30 years ago, but seems like a lot longer. I think computer years are worse than dog years...
:)
It also taught concepts very well. For example, IIRC, joystick routines were regularly 4 lines of BASIC code & this book had an elegant one line solution. It doesn't just list the routine, but made it part of a sample program that actually did something. Right from the start, all the programs did something so there was a sense of achievement. I'd love to see more programming books like this to teach kids now.
It's probably of no use to anyone now, but if you want a copy of this book, it's available for free on the Internet Archive here legally for free.
If you really want to play with it, I suppose some old 8 bit machines are still around or you could install an Atari emulator. Yes, there are several available including this one from SourceForge here because of course there are people who still miss those machines even more than I do.
Simpler days? Not really. Those were the good old days when we had to write assembly language code to bank switch memory since the CPU couldn't address more than 64kb RAM. A 720kb 5-1/4" floppy was considered high density, even though we had to use a hole punch & flip it over to get to those high heights of storage. Black Box was a startup that sent out a single page for its catalog & touted both a 1mb & 3mb hard drive for these machines. That was only 30 years ago, but seems like a lot longer. I think computer years are worse than dog years...
:)
February 7, 2013
This book is of course very dated nowadays. Back when it came out, it was a bomb. I wore my copy out. I mean I was 11 and programming my own Space-Invaders looking games. How cool is that?
This book took a comic-approach to some very technical stuff, much like the “For Dummies” books that came out years later. It assumed you understood a lot of the basics of programming in BASIC and then went further to explain character redefinition (the precursor to sprite graphics), sound, game theory, etc. etc. I wish I had a functional Atari computer so I could play around.
This book took a comic-approach to some very technical stuff, much like the “For Dummies” books that came out years later. It assumed you understood a lot of the basics of programming in BASIC and then went further to explain character redefinition (the precursor to sprite graphics), sound, game theory, etc. etc. I wish I had a functional Atari computer so I could play around.
December 16, 2019
Wanna learn to program games for the best of the old 8-bit computer families? This book was tons of fun when I was 13, and I still love it today.
March 22, 2025
This book started me on a path I am still on today - as a professional programmer and technologist.
I just got myself a new copy as my old one is long gone. Such a pleasure to revisit this class. So much nostalgia!
I just got myself a new copy as my old one is long gone. Such a pleasure to revisit this class. So much nostalgia!
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews