Level 9 adverts

[8bitAG]

Just heard back from the Nascom archive... They've found a submission that was the real version of Colossal Adventure.

Adventr.zip

(44.36 KiB) Downloaded 100 times

[fuzzel]

8bitAG wrote:
The Level 9 game has a whole unique, extra 70 location sequence at the end of the adventure. If that's in the 16K file, then it's Level 9. If it's not, then it's the 16K Syrtis Adventure.

I don't want to put a dampener on things but it's possible that, given the 16k limitations of that version, the extra 70 locations weren't included in the 16k version. If only we had one to try...

[hoglet]

Just heard back from the Nascom archive...

Does the Nascom archive have a website?

[8bitAG]

I don't want to put a dampener on things but it's possible that, given the 16k limitations of that version, the extra 70 locations weren't included in the 16k version. If only we had one to try...

The 70 extra locations were in the 16K version. That was one of the selling points in the advert.

See the earliest advert (April 1982) on the page...
http://8bitag.com/info/level-9.html

However, as noted, above and over the page, the 16K and 32K versions on the Nascom Homepage are for Syrtis Adventure not Colossal Adventure but they have recovered an actual version of Colossal Adventure (from an overlooked email submission who obtained it from the Digital Antiquarian) and that should be up on their site soon. I'm presuming it will be the 32K version and, sadly, not the earlier 16K one.

You can see screenshots from the (probably 32K) Nascom Colossal Adventure on Jimmy's site...
https://www.filfre.net/2012/10/level-9/

[To answer the question above... http://www.nascomhomepage.com/#TheNascomRepository ]

[fuzzel]

Pernod wrote:
Go ahead, no need to credit. They're created with MAME, very easy to use

I need help getting Mame to work. I can play arcade games by putting the rom zips in the Mame roms folder but I can't see how to play 8-bit micro games. The latest version of Mame ran through the dos prompt doesn't recognise the zip file Adventr.zip.

Could someone give me a bit of advice on how to play 8-bit micro games please on Mame ? My GUI from a few years back which I use to play Galaxians, Mr Do and others only seems to refer to arcade roms so the Adventr.zip file I put in the roms folder wasn't recognised.

[leenew]

Just heard back from the Nascom archive... They've found a submission that was the real version of Colossal Adventure.
Adventr.zip

Good find!
I like your dogged determination.
It reminds me of a less-lazy version of me
Let's just hope the beeb versions turn up!

Lee.

[Pernod]

Just heard back from the Nascom archive... They've found a submission that was the real version of Colossal Adventure.
Adventr.zip

Excellent

0004.png (6.72 KiB) Viewed 5592 times

I'd say that this confirms the current 16K is by Syrtis, as I'd expect the Level 9 version to have a similar intro that says it's from Level 9.

I wonder what else they have that's not available on the site.

I need help getting Mame to work. I can play arcade games by putting the rom zips in the Mame roms folder but I can't see how to play 8-bit micro games. The latest version of Mame ran through the dos prompt doesn't recognise the zip file Adventr.zip.

Could someone give me a bit of advice on how to play 8-bit micro games please on Mame ? My GUI from a few years back which I use to play Galaxians, Mr Do and others only seems to refer to arcade roms so the Adventr.zip file I put in the roms folder wasn't recognised.

I'll take MAME questions in my How to thread, rather than take this off-topic.

[8bitAG]

I'd say that this confirms the current 16K is by Syrtis, as I'd expect the Level 9 version to have a similar intro that says it's from Level 9.

I wonder what else they have that's not available on the site.

Yes, they've labelled the 16K and 32K as such now.

The communication with the Colossal Cave file was just accidentally overlooked; it's significance wasn't realised as they're not text adventure "specialists". It was just a one off, I believe, I don't think they generally have a pile of files that aren't on the site. New material goes up periodically.

Thanks for your help unravelling the mystery, Pernod. I hadn't heard about the Syrtis Adventure less than two weeks ago... and now we've got playable files of both versions! If only every bit of research yielded such quick and fruitful results!

[fuzzel]

I've just been thinking about these 16k versions of Colossal Adventure, Adventure Quest and Dungeon Adventure. Looking at Colossal Adventure as an example, the size of the game is 28,159 bytes of which 18,518 is the compressed text (residing in memory between &2860 and &70B6). So the game code itself which also includes the dictionary for the compression takes up 9,641 bytes. If 16k is 16,384 bytes how did they manage to reduce the text down from 18,518 bytes to say 5,000 bytes (an educated guess here, I'm not sure how much memory they would actually be able to use). They'd have had to cut the messages down, for example, from "You are standing beside a small brick building at the end of a road from the north. A river flows south. To the north is open country and all around is dense forest." to "You are standing beside a small brick building." I'd love to see it of course but how impressed would I be with the actual game?