News stories for Episode 283, October 15, 2022

News stories for Episode 283, October 15, 2022

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(October 8-October 14)

Coco 1/2/3 (and multi-platform)

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1) Marco Van de Meulenhof has a run of 4K RAM badge replacements ready to go, and for sale for 2 Euro's:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/2359462640/posts/10160156218977641/

They should be showing up on his storefront soon @:

 https://retro8bitshop.com/retrostore/badgeman/

2) Bill Pierce announced that VCC 2.1.0.7 has been released, which adds a debugger thanks to Mike Rojas & an updated manual to cover the debugger functions and how to use them:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/2359462640/posts/10160153503372641/

Direct download link from github:

 https://github.com/VCCE/VCC/releases/tag/vcc2.1.0.7

3) Alderson Retro Computing posted a YouTube video showing his using the newly released VCC 2.1.0.7, which now includes a debugger (thanks to Mike Rojas):

 https://youtu.be/yjJsJ8hrCpE

He also did a video showing his physical MC-10 & Coco setups (a YouTube "short"):

 https://www.youtube.com/shorts/H9rVt5pNH-g

He also did a short 5 minute video on configuring VCC 2.1.0.7:

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2TZELxBpPY

4) Richard Kelly has released (on the Facebook Coco group) "Easy Directory V2 (Beta)". This version adds scrolling of filenames (instead of jumping by a page at a time), still working with key repeat. He is looking for testing and feedback from users:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/2359462640/posts/10160154847842641/

5) John Whitworth of DragonPlus Electronics will again be temporarily shutting down his store as enters his next round of leukemia treatments, starting October 14. He will be shipping orders until the 16th, and then it will be down for a month or 2. To John - we all hope your treatments go well and you can return soon:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/2359462640/posts/10160151990792641/

6) The Glenside Color Computer Club postede the list of the 2022-2023 Glenside Color Computer Club Officers, now including Brian Wieseler as the Secretary:

 https://www.glensideccc.com/congratulations-to-the-glenside-color-computer-club-2022-23-officers

They also posted about their annual picnic, which is taking place on October 22 at 1PM at the Woodfield mall in Schaumberg (right across from the Hyatt Regency that Rainbowfest Chicago was at for years):

 https://www.glensideccc.com/glenside-color-computer-club-picnic/

7) Joel Rees did a blog on building and installing m6809-gdb (the debugger) for XRoar, in his case running under Linux (Ubuntu):

 https://joels-programming-fun.blogspot.com/2022/10/notes-on-building-m6809-gdb-for-use.html

8) Michael Furman released his Developers Video Blog #5 "Coco Debugging with NoICE". He shows how to hook it up using the MAME emulator and talks about running it on real hardware:

 https://youtu.be/FwZXDWmJ7GQ

9) Frank at Retrorewind.ca let me know that The World of Commodore show in Mississauga, Ontario has been announced for December 3-4, and it will be both in person and live streamed. Why am I mentioning a Commodore show, you ask? Because not only is Frank sponsoring their guest speaker (former Commodore UK managing director David Pleasance), but he will also be selling Coco stuff like the CocoSDC at his booth. So anyone in Toronto to Hamilton area that wants to pick up a CocoSDC in person, here is a chance.

 https://www.tpug.ca/world-of-commodore/world-of-commodore-2022/

10) James Diffendaffer posted source code (and a screenshot) of a BASIC program running in PMODE 4 generating a Brownian tree (a mathematical model). Warning: Since it uses so many random numbers in it's generation, it is quite slow:

 https://jdiffendaffer.blogspot.com/2022/10/brownian-tree-in-basic.html

MC-10

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1) Jim Gerrie posted a screenshot in the MC-10 Facebook group of a new SG6 (64x48x4 mode) version of Backgammon that he is working on:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/731424100317748/posts/5428191873974257/

He also posted a video of his conversion of the Model 1/3 version of Backgammon originally written by Scott Adams of Adventure International fame in 1978 (this is more text mode based):

 https://youtu.be/84XDDA6IbYY

2) Tony Jewell posted a request in the Facebook MC-10 group asking for suggestions for some great games for the MC-10 that only require 4K that he can show at the 40th anniversary Dragon show next week (Jim Gerrie already sent over a large list):

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/731424100317748/posts/5436473719812739/

Dragon 32/64

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1) Chris Poacher showed pictures of his newly acquired Microdeal/Tandy "Racer Ball" game (a modified port of Ghost Gobbler from Spectral Associates) to his Facebook Microdeal 8 bit page. He now only has 5 left to complete the entire Microdeal/Tandy run:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/204334613785733/posts/1095133058039213/

2) Another luminary has joined the Dragon Facebook group - John Linney who was part of the software R&D team at Dragon Data starting in 1983 (including on the unreleased Alpha and Beta's). In the comments Richard Harding showed a website that has photos of the Beta that John himself used to own, and John mentions that he was behind the custom font on the Beta (which we have covered before):

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/dragon32/posts/3291565294436450/

3) Julian Brown showed some photos of the trial batch of recreated Dragon 32 motherboards he has been designing:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/dragon32/posts/3290877314505248/

4) Duncan Smeed posted a photo of him and John Linney, and mentioned that he will be bringing his Dragon 64 and a prototype Dragon Alpha (also know as the GEC Dragon Professional) to the 40th anniversary gathering for the Dragon that takes place next weekend:

 https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10166583643760501&set=p.10166583643760501&type=3

Game On news (all Coco related platforms):

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1) A reminder - Paul Thayer is looking for testers for his upcoming Coco 3 game CocoBan. Please contact him (as "Red Beard") on the Coco Discord, on Facebook (or Facebook Messenger) or via email @ "paul.g.thayer@gmail.com": (Facebook post link):

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/2359462640/posts/10160156773682641/

Video of sample game play to show again:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/2359462640/posts/10160146520977641/

2) Nick Marentes posted a new teaser ad graphic for his upcoming Jumping Joey game, which will run on all Coco's and Dragons (with at least 16K of RAM):

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/2359462640/posts/10160153475382641/

3) Paul Shoemaker (with thanks to Pere Serrat) has now posted the special Dragon version of his Ghost Rush: Halloween 2022 Edition) VDK disk image to the Dragon Facebook group. This includes a special Dragon version unique foe in later parts of the game:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/dragon32/posts/3287436871515959/

He also uploaded the raw .BIN file that can be directly loaded into XRoar (and I imagine could be converted into a cassette file later?):

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/dragon32/posts/3287375758188737/

And for those wondering what the Dragon version looks like, he uploaded a gameplay video as well:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/dragon32/posts/3287307001528946/

4) CRPG Addict published their 469th game review in their series of Character Role Playing Games from all platforms - this time covering The Power Stones of Ard: The Quest fort he Spirit Stone written by Bill Cleveland for the Coco 3 exclusively in 1987 and published by Three C's Projects. It includes screenshots, shots from the manual and some details on the gameplay:

 http://crpgaddict.blogspot.com/2022/09/game-469-power-stones-of-ard-quest-for.html

5) Ken Reighard, with help from Mike Miller, now has Robot Nightmare available for the Dragon 32/64. Orderable from the same itch.io page as the Coco version:

 https://www.facebook.com/groups/dragon32/posts/3293931290866517/

Order page ($5.00 for the digital download only):

 https://kenscococorner.itch.io/robot-nightmare

Physical collectors copy in a DVD case with color instruction sheet ($10.00):

 https://kunaki.com/Sales.asp?PID=PX001H9OZC&PP=1

6) AJ & Tim's latest Sibling Rivalry (episode 51) features a game that most people either love or hate (there seems to be no inbetween), but in my experience is universally loved by young kids (and it's 3d perspective is pretty impressive considering how old it is and it's minimal RAM requirements: Dino Wars. It also includes Tim's famous huge Dino Wars banner that he is brought to CocoFests:

 https://youtu.be/79AW6z_Mh-g

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