Resource centre for ZX Spectrum games
using Manic Miner and Jet Set Willy game engines
Archive of the
Manic Miner & Jet Set Willy Yahoo! Group
messages
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Message: 3782
Author: andrewbroad
Date: 10/10/2003
Subject: Re: Manic Miner - When did you Start playing it?
(This is a reply of sorts to Message 3549)
Manic Miner (Software Projects edition) was among the first games I
had for my 48K Spectrum back in c.1984, along with Thro' The Wall,
Zap (Aliens), The Hobbit, Sabre Wulf, Pssst and Chequered Flag.
I never owned a legal copy of Jet Set Willy, because my father
wouldn't purchase it until I had completed Manic Miner, and I never
got past "Skylab Landing Bay" until I reverse-engineered the room-
format in 1991. I'd been told about POKE 35136,0 for infinite lives
and "6031769" to make a boot appear by the remaining lives, but these
don't work on the Software Projects edition, so I couldn't cheat
until I found the Bug-Byte edition on the Internet in 1996.
I first played JSW at a friend's house. I remember him saying that
Maria was Willy's wife (though they don't get married until Party
Willy in 2004), and that the game had "a lot of baddies"!
This friend copied Jet Set Willy for me, but I couldn't play it for
weeks until his mother wrote out the colour-code grid for me. I
copied Jet Set Willy II off another friend in c.1987, but my 48K
Spectrum died soon afterwards, and the tape wouldn't load when I got
my Spectrum +2 in 1988. In 1991 I managed to rerecord JSW II such
that the Spectrum +2 could read it, by dint of a tape-to-tape
transfer involving two tape-recorders.
In 1991/92 I worked out the room-formats for MM and JSW and wrote
Screen Editors for each, although JSWSE was very rudimentary and
couldn't edit the guardian-class table or the item-table because I
didn't know about them (in 1997 I started writing JSW CK from
scratch).
I used my Screen Editors to write Jet Set Dizzy in 1992, JSW:MM in
1993, MM:JSW 1993-1996, and Manic Miner: The Buddha Of Suburbia in
1994. Jet Set Dizzy and JSW:MM were never completed, but the rooms I
wrote for them will appear in revamped form in Toy and Party Willy
respectively - Party Willy will be released in April 2004, and Toy
possibly by the end of 2004.
I discovered the Spectrum-emulation and MM/JSW scene on the Internet
in 1996, when I suddenly thought to try an AltaVista search - and it
yielded amazing results!! I hadn't done any MM/JSW editing at all
since 1994, but this find rekindled my interest and inspired me to
write Manic Miner 4, with which I introduced myself to the scene in
September 1997.
My interest in MM/JSW has mushroomed since then, even to the
exclusion of other Spectrum games, although I am finally and slowly
beginning to get back into them again...
My Spectrum +2 died in April 2003 (well not exactly, but the motor on
the datacorder burned out, rendering it almost useless), by which
time I had already released MM:TBOS (April 1998), We Pretty (December
1999), Manic Miner: The Hobbit and Jet Set Willy: The Lord Of The
Rings (January 2000) and Goodnite Luddite (December 2002), and had
safely typed Ma jolie into emulator-format for a 2003 release (it is
now fully released).
Very fortunately, the only MM/JSW material I lost when my Spectrum +2
died was about three days' effort on Party Willy, and the first room
of Manic Miner: Allana Truman. But I have lost several BASIC games
that I had written, a 3D Construction Kit model of my house, several
Games Designer games and Marble Madness edits. Due to my continuing
obsession with MM/JSW, these losses still haven't hit me, although I
may return to these other interests when I've had my fill of MM/JSW
in, say, 2015!
It seemed like a complete tragedy at the time, but thanks to the
RealSpectrum emulator I am able to continue my beloved Spectrum
activities on a PC (prior to April 2003, the only emulator I was
using was MacSpectacle, on an Apple Mac LC II which died in June).
It's actually proved to be a blessing in disguise - no typing of data
between the real Spectrum and emulator-format, no loading/saving
time, much less crashing, and the ability to save snapshots. More
time for editing, and eventually for playing games other than my own
again.
--
Dr. Andrew Broad
http://www.geocities.com/andrewbroad/
http://www.geocities.com/andrewbroad/spectrum/
http://www.geocities.com/andrewbroad/spectrum/willy/
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