There were other talented programmers but they usually don't care much anymore about this little Spectrum computer and don't come here even to say "Hi" and write a single post in half a year.
Jof was different. He never behaved like a star. He gave very much to this community. Sometimes (maybe often ;) ) his posts were really crazy and weird but between these mad lines you could feel that he's really a FRIEND.
Cheers Ralf, I reckon this reflects the feelings a lot of us here have, and also explains why he's got a bit of a legendary status around here.
(Last night I downloaded some pictures from my phone to my PC and found some old pictures of hashed up plates of food that I'd taken - I wonder where the inspiration for that came from! :razz:)
Anyway, I'll finally be raising a cold beer to celebrate his life this evening..! :smile:
Thanks for dropping by, it was really nice know he knew we cared. Its brought a tear to my eye reading it, so much as it took me a while to reply.
I've been on these forums for a while now and I must confess that it was only in the last 18 months or so that I realised that our friend Frobush who we'd all been conversing with, was in fact the legendary coder Jonathan Smith ( I know it was dumb of me). Thats because he never shouted about who he was, a humble man, a very rare quality in this age of 'Look at me!'. Dispite all the games and things he's been involved with, he really was great and really brought good humour to these forums and pleasure to me. That humour is sadly missed. It made visiting these forums a real joy to see what madness he was going to present us next. His videos gave me a belly laugh almost every time. A really great guy Joff was. Then I hear he was involved in designing the computer animations for red Dwarf series 2 and 3. Did this man's talents never end??
.
To sum it up he was our local hero. (cue Dire Straights).
Chris it would be an honour and a joy to have you stick around and make more postings to us.
Not really much I can add to what these fine people have already said. Your brother was a legend and one of my childhood heroes, it was always a great honour for me to exchange messages with him when I first joined the forums here. He was always giving me praise for my music, and would have a joke and cheer me up when I wasn't in the best of mindsets. It's amazing that this guy that I idolised and looked up to as a kid actually (despite never meeting him in person) became a good friend. He will be, and indeed already is, sorely missed. :cry:
I think Jof was the only person on the forums who could reply to a post with "Sod Off!" to anyone else on the forum and everyone knew he was having a laugh. It's a rare thing on forums, his personality (caution, may contain nuts!) shone through his posts.
He will be missed by all. Chris, thank you for posting.
I'm probably not the only one who was deeply impressed by Jonathan's games in their childhood to the point of being utterly intrigued. The first Joffa game I ever played was Hyper Sports - I had owned my Spectrum for about a year, and it was so much better than most other Spectrum games I had seen at the time. I noticed the programmer's name in-game and even though I was only about 13 years old, I could not stop wondering: what kind of person is this bloke who writes awesome games and his name in such a weird fashion?
As the years passed, I got to play more of Joffa's games and my respect for him just kept rising with every masterpiece. Warped as my mind may be, how could I possibly have imagined participating in silly banter with the very man, online, a few decades later? What can I say, it was an honour and it was great while it lasted. Alas, it's "game under" now :cry:
I think Hyper Sports was responsible for the most broken rubber keyboards and Quickshot Pro joysticks in recorded history; the makers of the Quickshot should build a statue of Joffa standing atop a pile of broken joysticks as a fitting truibute.
I think Hyper Sports was responsible for the most broken rubber keyboards and Quickshot Pro joysticks in recorded history; the makers of the Quickshot should build a statue of Joffa standing atop a pile of broken joysticks as a fitting truibute.
Great story but............. i think the winner of that was Daley Thompsons though which was famous for breaking manyyyy Quickshots.
Daley Thompsons was superb back then, to a 12 year old kid back then you had your own version of Track n field which was stunning. Hyper Sports i always thought of as Decathlon II but was more polished, the events were better as well i thought.
Thanks for posting, Chris. It's good to know that this site has a purpose beyond a bunch of thirty and fortysomethings talking about their favourite old computer games. I think I might have said before but this is the only retro-computing site I've encountered that feels like it has a proper "community".
I remember when I first discovered that "Frobush" was the infamous "Joffa" from many of my favourite Speccy games...I was amazed that someone who made some of the main source of entertainment I had in my formative years was on a forum talking like a "normal" bloke...
And then when I finally got talking to him, and realised he was anything but "normal" that just made it all the better! :lol:
:cry:
He is definitely a legend among us World Of Spectrum folk, and will never be forgotten as long as somebody somewhere is still firing up a Spectrum! I'm going to miss his Youtube vids, his kindness, and pictures of his dinner and his general chat about everything and nothing and his great sense of humour...and I guess I'll have to get someone else to nab me a pair of trainers from the Adidas shop in Liverpool ;)...but as everybody says, he lives on in our memories, and he made a big enough mark with his games to be talked about long after all of us have gone too!
I offer my deepest sympathy and regards to you and your family. And thanks again for posting..it means a lot to us folk here that you shared his final moments and said thanks during an obviously difficult time.
Hi Chris, thanks for taking the time to post that message, it really did choke me up, Joffa was well loved on the site by us all and he is going to be missed terribly. At least he left behind many great games that we can enjoy for many years to come.
Thank you Chris for taking the time and sending us all a message. Your message brought a lump to my throat again. It just goes to show how much everyone on here thought of your brother. He was truely loved. He made absolutely cracking games and cracking posts on here, too.
I'm always close to tears when I read the threads about him on here even though, like most on here, I never met him but I LOVED reading his posts.
As someone further up this thread said, stick around, Chris. We're not a bad bunch and we sometimes talk about things other than the Spectrum ;)
Your brother will live on in our hearts forever. I'm so sorry for your loss and it is really good to know that he was at home with his Mum and Dad during the last few days.
Take care, Chris :)
R.I.P Joff :(
Also, thanks to the people who wrote the memorium page.
I'm mainly just a lurker on these forums but I'll tell you what I remember....
Being totally amazed at the fact that Jonathon Smith (yes, and others) posts on these forums.
I know it's been said above but it's just wierd to someone like me who's basically a games player to find out that proper (80's) programmers are real people.
We were all shocked to hear of his passing - he wasn't just a very clever programmer, but also a great friend. I personally never met him (I don't go to many computer shows) but we had some great exchanges on both the forums and the private message system, and I did consider him an "online" mate - he even sent me a friend's request, which I thought was great from a Speccy legend like him.
Joffa could always be relied upon for a very clever insite into a complication coding problem, or a slightly barmy bit of humour, whichever the thread in question called for.
His death is a tragic loss for the Spectrum world, but of course that's nothing at all compared to the loss for his family and friends, and our hearts go out to you all.
I don't think we ever could. Everything I do seems to remind me of him. Last night I was listening to "Love Song For a Vampire" by Annie Lennox and the worlds got my throat lumpy.
I can only add to what's being said here in way of how sad this is...I never knew your brother personally but his games formed a big part of my childhood growing up and games experiences and I extend my condolences to you and your family
Comments
Cheers Ralf, I reckon this reflects the feelings a lot of us here have, and also explains why he's got a bit of a legendary status around here.
(Last night I downloaded some pictures from my phone to my PC and found some old pictures of hashed up plates of food that I'd taken - I wonder where the inspiration for that came from! :razz:)
Anyway, I'll finally be raising a cold beer to celebrate his life this evening..! :smile:
I've been on these forums for a while now and I must confess that it was only in the last 18 months or so that I realised that our friend Frobush who we'd all been conversing with, was in fact the legendary coder Jonathan Smith ( I know it was dumb of me). Thats because he never shouted about who he was, a humble man, a very rare quality in this age of 'Look at me!'. Dispite all the games and things he's been involved with, he really was great and really brought good humour to these forums and pleasure to me. That humour is sadly missed. It made visiting these forums a real joy to see what madness he was going to present us next. His videos gave me a belly laugh almost every time. A really great guy Joff was. Then I hear he was involved in designing the computer animations for red Dwarf series 2 and 3. Did this man's talents never end??
.
To sum it up he was our local hero. (cue Dire Straights).
Chris it would be an honour and a joy to have you stick around and make more postings to us.
Not really much I can add to what these fine people have already said. Your brother was a legend and one of my childhood heroes, it was always a great honour for me to exchange messages with him when I first joined the forums here. He was always giving me praise for my music, and would have a joke and cheer me up when I wasn't in the best of mindsets. It's amazing that this guy that I idolised and looked up to as a kid actually (despite never meeting him in person) became a good friend. He will be, and indeed already is, sorely missed. :cry:
He will be missed by all. Chris, thank you for posting.
As the years passed, I got to play more of Joffa's games and my respect for him just kept rising with every masterpiece. Warped as my mind may be, how could I possibly have imagined participating in silly banter with the very man, online, a few decades later? What can I say, it was an honour and it was great while it lasted. Alas, it's "game under" now :cry:
Great story but............. i think the winner of that was Daley Thompsons though which was famous for breaking manyyyy Quickshots.
Daley Thompsons was superb back then, to a 12 year old kid back then you had your own version of Track n field which was stunning. Hyper Sports i always thought of as Decathlon II but was more polished, the events were better as well i thought.
And it's a community that's missing Jof terribly.
I remember when I first discovered that "Frobush" was the infamous "Joffa" from many of my favourite Speccy games...I was amazed that someone who made some of the main source of entertainment I had in my formative years was on a forum talking like a "normal" bloke...
And then when I finally got talking to him, and realised he was anything but "normal" that just made it all the better! :lol:
:cry:
He is definitely a legend among us World Of Spectrum folk, and will never be forgotten as long as somebody somewhere is still firing up a Spectrum! I'm going to miss his Youtube vids, his kindness, and pictures of his dinner and his general chat about everything and nothing and his great sense of humour...and I guess I'll have to get someone else to nab me a pair of trainers from the Adidas shop in Liverpool ;)...but as everybody says, he lives on in our memories, and he made a big enough mark with his games to be talked about long after all of us have gone too!
I offer my deepest sympathy and regards to you and your family. And thanks again for posting..it means a lot to us folk here that you shared his final moments and said thanks during an obviously difficult time.
Some of the lads helped prepare an In Memoriam page for Jof on this site.
You may have seen some of the parts already.
I'm always close to tears when I read the threads about him on here even though, like most on here, I never met him but I LOVED reading his posts.
As someone further up this thread said, stick around, Chris. We're not a bad bunch and we sometimes talk about things other than the Spectrum ;)
Your brother will live on in our hearts forever. I'm so sorry for your loss and it is really good to know that he was at home with his Mum and Dad during the last few days.
Take care, Chris :)
R.I.P Joff :(
Also, thanks to the people who wrote the memorium page.
I'm mainly just a lurker on these forums but I'll tell you what I remember....
Being totally amazed at the fact that Jonathon Smith (yes, and others) posts on these forums.
I know it's been said above but it's just wierd to someone like me who's basically a games player to find out that proper (80's) programmers are real people.
All the best anyways to all of ya, Garry.
Dammit. I just missed the start of The IT Crowd.
Joffa could always be relied upon for a very clever insite into a complication coding problem, or a slightly barmy bit of humour, whichever the thread in question called for.
His death is a tragic loss for the Spectrum world, but of course that's nothing at all compared to the loss for his family and friends, and our hearts go out to you all.
We won't forget him.
I don't think we ever could. Everything I do seems to remind me of him. Last night I was listening to "Love Song For a Vampire" by Annie Lennox and the worlds got my throat lumpy.