Spring 2020: there’s a scent of change in the air SUMMARY <HIDDE N> Despite the frankly somewhat dark times we live in, this late spring brings many changes in our lives. Perhaps even finally a return to life as we know ◊ MISTER FPGA, one year later… Page 3 it, after the CoViD-19 nightmare. Even within our editorial initiative there ◊ Interview with Francesco Sblendorio Page 7 are no shortage of changes on the horizon. Indeed, many have already started or will soon be under way. ◊ FAST BASIC – a Locomotive Basic Page 14 compiler in CP/M Let's start with the name of your (hopefully) beloved magazine. From this issue the name of the magazine changes to RetroMagazine World. We ◊ Star Watcher Page 17 have been thrifty and modest: we have only added a small word ("World") ◊ Playing infinite lives with your C64 – Page 21 to our historical name, mostly in order to show our new intention to The challenge goes on address the entire international community and no longer only our numerous Italian readers. ◊ Retromath: Secret Codes Page 24 ◊ 3D Graphs with few lines in BASIC Page 27 How do we intend to do this? Well, actually, we already did it last May 2nd, with the release of issue zero of RetroMagazine English, a pilot publication ◊ Japan cronicles: A new Game & Watch? Page 32 entirely in English, dedicated to all the retrocomputing, retrogaming and retrocoding fans scattered all over the planet. These readers have long ◊ How I discovered RPG games on my Page 36 been asking us to bring in a "neutral" language (an official language, TI99/4A understandable to all) for the content and columns that for over two years ◊ KNIGHTMARE SAGA (MSX) Page 42 have been reaching Italian readers. The success of this release has gone beyond all expectations and has definitively convinced us to continue the ◊ CITY BOMBER 4K (C64) Page 44 publications in English. So, starting from this issue #23, a complete ◊ CLOUDY MOUNTAIN – a boardgame for Page 45 English translation will be published about a week or two after the Italian one player one. The English release of RMW will also include a selection of the most interesting articles and reviews from the first 22 Italian issues. ◊ GRAND THEFT AUTO I (MS DOS) Page 48 Also our logo and general graphic design have been slightly modified, with ◊ TRAKERS (Amstrad CPC) Page 50 the addition of a small planet in 8-bit graphics (see cover) and the ◊ CRYSTAL CASTLES (MS DOS) Page 52 appearance of a new slogan ("Future days are back"), which deserves a few words of explanation. Sure, it's a bit nostalgic, but it also tries to ◊ CORNER OF DARKNESS SEPTERRA CORE Page 54 combine our past of being geeky kids and tireless gamers with the future (PC) that many of us saw then, imagining maybe even making a profession out ◊ SONIC THE HEDGEHOG (SEGA) Page 56 of what at the beginning was just pure passion. At that time, we had the feeling that everything was possible in a world that was gradually opening ◊ ASTAL (SEGA) Page 58 up to the digital age and we felt a constant amazement when faced with games, applications and graphics/sound demos wonderfully generated by ◊ POWER SPIKES (Arcade) Page 60 our humble 8-bit computers. In this present of ours, somewhat very ◊ CHUBBY GRISTLE (C64) Page 62 uncertain, we can still rediscover those feelings, going back to the origins and to a simpler conception of computer science by using our old machines in a modern way. One of the best methods to achieve this People involved in the preparation of this issue outcome is by reading the issue you have in your hands right now. Because that's what we at RMW do: we try to give you back those days of light-hearted, optimistic fun, without forgetting the technological • Alberto Apostolo • Flavio Soldani advantages that the present can provide. • Carlo N.Del Mar Pirazzini • Francesco Fiorentini The novelties for RMW and for all of our readers do not end there. Just a few days ago we opened our official Twitter profile @RetroMagazineW, • Daniele Brahimi • Giuseppe Fedele which we invite you to follow to be always updated on our publications, read our posts with previews and news about the latest games and • David La Monaca • Marco Fiaschi applications produced by the whole international community. (Cercamon) • Marco Pistorio From this issue on, we are publishing our magazine through the Creative Commons 4.0 International license, reaffirming the absolutely non-profit • Edoardo Ullo nature of our editorial initiative, free of advertising and totally free for our • Michele Ugolini readers. On the last page of this magazine you can find the "Disclaimer" • Ermanno Betori/ box with the details about the distribution license. • Roberto Lari Alessandro Tiso Still not enough news? Then let us tell you that we are also working on the • Starfox Mulder new RMW website and many other exciting retro-projects that we will • Federico “Arzak1” Gori reveal in the coming issues. The issue you have just downloaded is full of interesting and hopefully stimulating content. Among the many great contents we’d like to highlight More credits the article on Cloudy Mountain, an original and exciting board game, • Graphic support: Irene G. Valeri created by Giovanni Galli. This is another way to feel, at least for a few hours, that your future days are back! Happy reading to all! • Cover: Flavio Soldani David La Monaca • Proof-reading: Francesco Fiorentini, David La Email: [email protected] Monaca, Robin Jubber, Giorgio Balestrieri, Alberto Facebook: www.facebook.com/RetroMagazine-2005584959715273/ Twitter: twitter.com/RetroMagazineW Apostolo, Leonardo Giordani, Gianluca Girelli Page 2 of 63 RETROMAGAZINE WORLD ENG YEAR 1 - ISSUE 1 HARDWARE MISTER FPGA, one year later... by Roberto Lari Hi everyone, it's been a year since I last wrote about some useful with some cores such as PC486 and Amiga. Even FPGA systems (MISTer, MISTICA and MIST) on RetroMagazine if your LAN router is not properly configured for SSH, you (Italian version) and in this article we’ll talk about the can always access via FTP using a client like the good MISTer, which in my opinion represents the most powerful old FileZilla. FPGA system in 2020. Together we will discover and Another MISTer interesting feature is booting from an examine all the updates and news of these last 12 months external memory device. It works but I didn’t test it that made the MISTer even more interesting and irresistible. thoroughly. What I have noticed is that from an external If you are not familiar with the MISTer and FPGA systems device you cannot launch scripts but this feature aside in general, I invite you to look for information on the Web, everything is quite the same as the with the usual MicroSD. as my previous articles appeared in issues #13, #14 and And yes, it feels very comfortable when you can boot up #15, which at the moment are only available in Italian. from a multi-terabyte hard disk! RetroMagazine World will publish these in the next few Each core you use has its own rules, but generally they months. In short, these FPGA-based systems will introduce look for games and ROMs within folders that have specifica you to a whole new world of reproducing our beloved 8- names. If your games and applications are copied into and 16-bit vintage computers, as well as the old consoles, these folders, it will be easier for the core to find them, and even an ever increasing number of arcades (i.e. video as typically cores are not allowed to reach the root folder games as they were available in bar cabinets then typically of the MicroSD. This of course forces us to navigate inside converted to home computers). FPGA systems have the subfolders in order to find the game file we are looking absolutely nothing to do with the typical software emulation for, but generally the core searches directly into the folder that you may know as they run on your PCs and Raspberry with its corresponding name. PIs. For example the Minimig AGA searches for the folder Let’s dive into the MISTer features. The Linux operating “Amiga”, the C64 core searches for the folder named system, running on the ARM CPU, is now equipped with a real shell (retrievable by pressing F9 on the initial menu screen). From there, after logging in with user "root” and default password “1”, we can issue some of the basic commands of the operating system. It's actually a small environment and not a full Linux OS installation. This "micro Linux" has absolutely no impact on the quality of FPGA hardware reproducing consoles or computers as it is completely independent and transparent. From the Linux console you can launch the MC program (the classic Midnight Commander), a file management tool that allows 2 windows on the screen to easily create folders, copy or move files, rename them, delete them, etc. It is very comfortable because it also supports the use of a USB mouse and external mass storage devices (drives and/or hard disks) to exchange files to and from the MISTer MicroSD card. But be careful, external memories cannot be controlled inside the computer/console cores, so you cannot use them to load games directly. Speaking of Linux shells, if you have the MISTer connected to the Internet (which I highly recommend), you can also access it from your PC via SSH, establishing a connection through a program such as Putty (Windows). From every SSH client you can perform the same operations, such as running updates, modifying the configuration when necessary, etc.