Thanks those are all ones I hadn't thought of I admit. Virus looks rather nice for the Zx81. I was thinking more of like a scientific or educational or strategy program - only thing I could think of was the Rats (not quite an epidemic) I think it had a bit of a research element in it. But a sort of simulation were you had to research or control a virus was the sort of game I was thinking of?
Any game which involves a pathogenic disease (caused by viruses, bacteria, fungi, protozoa, or worms) could be included in that category. I'd nominate ... The Rats
(the game based on the James Herbert horror novel).
If you wanted to allow supernatural vectors such as demons then (although I don't know of any game based on it) I'd nominate ... The Gates (the Iain Wright horror novel series). Then there's Call of Cthulhu, of course, based on H.P.Lovecraft's tales (and those of a multitude of other authors).
Thanks for those - no just games is what I am asking about.
Its a while since i played The Rats - but it was closer to what I was looking for - which would be less arcade and involve more research aspects - I wondered had there been any educational packages - simple introductions like some of the Sinclair range of educational products.
Wow, you turned up some intriguing stuff there. Thanks for those results Crisis. Will give a few of them a look up if I can find some gameplay on youtube.
It would be interesting to have a strategy game in the mold or with the kind of front end of The Fourth Protocol, ie. icon driven, but were the theme is not espionage but rather viral research and you have resources and budgets and if you are successful you get a bigger budget, more staff, and then have to face more serious outbreaks or something like that.
So you would have strategy involving choosing the sort of testing to do, randomised or just test people with symptoms, give advice on whether to call a lockdown or not and for how long.
Just an idea I don't know if anyone would think of writing it. But too much for me personally to probably get my head around at the moment.
Actually I know i could do a search, and sometimes do, but if people always just did a search there would be no discussion - I would know for myself what games there are but no one else. So while i agree the main room so to spreak (spreak?) I mean speak is the archive. I suppose I could go in there and then come in here and say hey look what I found. I don't of course want to waste peoples time, or get them to do my own searching.
I enjoy these game searches, always good to test the old memory cells and some times a littler lateral thinking is required. But I think you've hit on one of the very, very few subjects about which there isn't any kind of programme on the Spectrum. Unless someone surprises us with a late entry?
Agent Orange had some sort of Conway's Game Of Life going on, where you had to harvest the crops but if you collected too much they would stop growing (The oppposite of keeping a virus under control, but still). Never quite understood it. I'm not sure the programmers did either.
Mr Conway was killed recently by Corvid-19. He went into self-isolation and because he didn't have any neighbouring cells then he died off.
Agent Orange had some sort of Conway's Game Of Life going on, where you had to harvest the crops but if you collected too much they would stop growing (The oppposite of keeping a virus under control, but still). Never quite understood it. I'm not sure the programmers did either.
Mr Conway was killed recently by Corvid-19. He went into self-isolation and because he didn't have any neighbouring cells then he died off.
Yeah I wonder about the whole "self-isolation" approach - what about semi-isolation combined with treatment - ie what the medical profession used to do?
That's the amoeba in Boulderdash. If you enclose it, it turns into diamonds. If you fail to enclose it, then when it grows to be 200 squares (I think), it turns into rocks.
Well thats interesting re boulderdash - its pretty much at the other end of the spectrum (pardon the pun!!) of the sort of game I was asking about - but it sounds like a neat idea. I never much played boulderdash but will look it up on line.
To risk going off my own topic for a moment - what was the coin-op game of the same idea - were to get rid of some baddies you had to fire a hose into them an inflate them. I remember playing that a time or two.
Yes that was it - and funnily after posting I was reading the thread on Coin-ops still needing a spectrum conversion and seen it mentioned in the second post in that thread.
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My games for the Spectrum: Dingo, The Speccies, The Speccies 2, Vallation, SQIJ.
Twitter: Sokurah
Any game which involves a pathogenic disease (caused by viruses, bacteria, fungi, protozoa, or worms) could be included in that category. I'd nominate ... The Rats
(the game based on the James Herbert horror novel).
If you wanted to allow supernatural vectors such as demons then (although I don't know of any game based on it) I'd nominate ... The Gates (the Iain Wright horror novel series). Then there's Call of Cthulhu, of course, based on H.P.Lovecraft's tales (and those of a multitude of other authors).
Its a while since i played The Rats - but it was closer to what I was looking for - which would be less arcade and involve more research aspects - I wondered had there been any educational packages - simple introductions like some of the Sinclair range of educational products.
Wow, you turned up some intriguing stuff there. Thanks for those results Crisis. Will give a few of them a look up if I can find some gameplay on youtube.
It would be interesting to have a strategy game in the mold or with the kind of front end of The Fourth Protocol, ie. icon driven, but were the theme is not espionage but rather viral research and you have resources and budgets and if you are successful you get a bigger budget, more staff, and then have to face more serious outbreaks or something like that.
So you would have strategy involving choosing the sort of testing to do, randomised or just test people with symptoms, give advice on whether to call a lockdown or not and for how long.
Just an idea I don't know if anyone would think of writing it. But too much for me personally to probably get my head around at the moment.
But thankyou for your doing the search.
Mr Conway was killed recently by Corvid-19. He went into self-isolation and because he didn't have any neighbouring cells then he died off.
Yeah I wonder about the whole "self-isolation" approach - what about semi-isolation combined with treatment - ie what the medical profession used to do?
Was Zombi an arcade game - I can't tell from the screen shot - looks like menu driven.
And, maybe not disease, but I can think of a few games that start with a small fire which you have to put out before it grows too big.
And then theres Cobra : "Crime is the disease. Meet the Cure.".
To risk going off my own topic for a moment - what was the coin-op game of the same idea - were to get rid of some baddies you had to fire a hose into them an inflate them. I remember playing that a time or two.