Death Pit Preservation

andrew_rollings · January 2007

Clive Townsend has found his Death Pit tape and cassette inlay....
He also had a microdrive cartridge apparently containing the game...

What's the best advice/suggestions I can give him from the STP experts to make sure everything possible gets saved?

Thanks
Andrew

Andrew Barker · January 2007

Just so the rest of yas know, I've offered my services to recover the carts.

Andy

andrew_rollings · January 2007

Andrew Barker wrote: »

Just so the rest of yas know, I've offered my services to recover the carts.

Andy

and I've gratefully accepted...

Andrew

Arjun · January 2007

Hurrah!

yesindeedyshortposty

Ian Hamilton · January 2007

Now you've got to choose a well-populated environment to make the exchange. A neutral observer must be present to make sure the transfer of goods goes smoothly and of course there's the necessary forms to be filled out by both donor and recipient.

Necros.

Gilby · January 2007

Re. the tape tself, my advice is to get your contact to make a tape to tape copy of it, then forward the copy to either Andy or myself so we can get it dumped...

Steve

Uros Zupan · February 2007

Andrew Barker wrote: »

Just so the rest of yas know, I've offered my services to recover the carts.

Andy

Hurrah!!! :)

Uros Zupan · February 2007

Andrew Barker wrote: »

Just so the rest of yas know, I've offered my services to recover the carts.

Andy

So, Andy...how it is? You done any check of tape or cartridge yet? Transfer to tzx file in progress?

Andrew Barker · February 2007

It's early days yet, I don't have them in my mits.

andrew_rollings · February 2007

Andrew Barker wrote: »

It's early days yet, I don't have them in my mits.

I should be getting them today...

Will be sending them off tomorrow morning.

Andrew

beanz · February 2007

andrew_rollings wrote: »

I should be getting them today...

Will be sending them off tomorrow morning.

Andrew

Great news, that would have been a great exclusive for you book had it been a few months earlier.

No sneaky loading it up when you get them.....

Uros Zupan · February 2007

Any news on Death Pit preservation progress?

Andrew Barker · February 2007

I'm working on them ;-), done 9 of 20 so far, but will need to transfer on
a file per file basis too, as well as the sector:sector MDR dumps I've currently made (Thanks Jim (jp) ;-) ). Then I imagine it's up to Andrew/Clive as to what data they want to release if any. There's screen shots and graphics screen layout as per the Ocean carts I dumped for Mark R Jones.

Cheers

Andy

Gilby · February 2007

OK, I've been given the nod from Lee.. So I can reveal what's been preserved so far...

There's a couple of microdrive carts that have been recovered of Death Pit, one partially works, the other looks like it's fully working apart from a glitch with the redefined keyboard option.. Cursor keys work fine though.. between myself and Andrew Rollings, we've managed to also create a working tzx file of Death Pit...

Another cart contains a small demo of Saboteur... and a few work in progress loading screens.. It appears that the game was originally going to be called "Ninja Darkness". On the same cart is another demo called Skidoo. Due to the motion of the craft... it is obvious that this was a testbed demo that eventually became Critical Mass.

Another cart contains a working game called Trojan. It's possibly the unreleased games of the same name that was planned to be released by Elite. The game is a flick screen beat 'em up... Looks ok...

There's another RPG sort of game that may or may not be playable.. There are sample bits of code and graphics scattered around that will need looking at...

To sum up, the stuff that Andy has recovered so far is amazing, which I'm sure everyone on here will enjoy reading about when the next issue of ZX Shed is released.

Steve

andrew_rollings · February 2007

Gilby wrote: »

OK, I've been given the nod from Lee.. So I can reveal what's been preserved so far...

There's a couple of microdrive carts that have been recovered of Death Pit, one partially works, the other looks like it's fully working apart from a glitch with the redefined keyboard option.. Cursor keys work fine though.. between myself and Andrew Rollings, we've managed to also create a working tzx file of Death Pit...

Another cart contains a small demo of Saboteur... and a few work in progress loading screens.. It appears that the game was originally going to be called "Ninja Darkness". On the same cart is another demo called Skidoo. Due to the motion of the craft... it is obvious that this was a testbed demo that eventually became Critical Mass.

Another cart contains a working game called Trojan. It's possibly the unreleased games of the same name that was planned to be released by Elite. The game is a flick screen beat 'em up... Looks ok...

There's another RPG sort of game that may or may not be playable.. There are sample bits of code and graphics scattered around that will need looking at...

To sum up, the stuff that Andy has recovered so far is amazing, which I'm sure everyone on here will enjoy reading about when the next issue of ZX Shed is released.

Steve

The "Trojan" game is apparently the first three levels of a multi-load 6 level title...
I'll check with Clive as to who was supposed to release it.

Right! I'm off to play Death Pit! :)

Andrew

Arjun · February 2007

Excellent bit of news! Looking forward to the games as well as the ZX Shed article!

Gilby · February 2007

Just a word of caution though, Andrew has to check with Clive as to what exactly can be released eventually.

My plan is to keep everything under wraps until Lee can release the next issue of ZX Shed, so he gets the exclusive.

Once the screenshots etc have been circulated, then I'm planning on releasing a quick tzx vault update to support the carts that can be released, plus a few gap fillers for Infoseek, if Tony Barnett and myself can sort it out in time.

Steve

Uros Zupan · February 2007

Great news for entire Speccy community!
I am looking forward for exclusive article in upcoming ZX Shed issue and Death Pit TZX release as well! :)

MartynC · February 2007

I'm not sure where you'd stand with releasing Trojan, as it's a port of a Capcom arcade game.

http://www.klov.com/game_detail.php?letter=&game_id=10202

Would distribution be denied?

Ivanzx · February 2007

MartynC wrote: »

I'm not sure where you'd stand with releasing Trojan, as it's a port of a Capcom arcade game.

http://www.klov.com/game_detail.php?letter=&game_id=10202

Would distribution be denied?

I hope not!

Anyways there is an unoficial version of this game, by Topo Soft, a good game by the way :

http://www.worldofspectrum.org/infoseekid.cgi?id=0003156

jp · April 2007

buuummmppp (bump too short)

beanz · April 2007

How amusing it would have been if Andrew had put up a joke sale on Ebay for this....I can imagine the uproar on the forums and groveling apologies after he revealed the sale as a joke....I'd have done it :D

Uros Zupan · May 2007

No jokes here, please! This is serious recovery of previously unpublished tape. So, preservation team, when we will be able to put our "rubber" fingers on Death Pit? :)

Mark R. Jones · May 2007

This is gunna be so surreal, being able to load up Death Pit 22 years after seeing the ad in my English class at school and thinking it looked good! Haha!

Gilby · May 2007

The holdup is due to the delay in ZX Shed being released. The microdrive and tzx images have been done for months now, but with ZX Shed getting the "exclusive" you're gonna have to wait on Lee...

Any news Lee on the next issue?

Steve

jp · June 2007

What's going on then ZX Shedders?

Mark R. Jones · July 2007

Are we gunna have to wait another 20 years? :p

Lee Fogarty · July 2007

The old issues of ZXS are being re-done for print. We are currently 75% done with these and anticipate a whole new issue being released in mid-august (but knowing us it will be mid-september lol).

We've waited 20+ years for this game so another month or so won't hurt :)

Tom-Cat · July 2007

Oh it hurts... it HURTS :-) (ok, it doesn't really, but one has to complain... ;-) )

VanTammen · July 2007

so... how is this going?

Lee Fogarty · July 2007

VanTammen wrote: »

so... how is this going?

Read up half a page to see the reply I made 2 days ago.

Death Pit Preservation

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