Amstrad CPC memories!

I first experienced an Amstrad CPC for myself at the age of 13, when my parents bought me a CPC 464 as a Christmas present in 1986. Previously I'd only been able to gaze enviously into shop windows and at the machines of the lucky few of my schoolfriends who already had one. How cool it was, with its built in tape deck, funky multicoloured keyboard and dedicated monitor. How powerful it was, with its 4Mhz Zilog Z80A CPU, 64K of RAM, 27 colour palette, multiple modes of "hi-res" pixel graphics, 3-channel (+ noise!) sound and advanced built-in BASIC. I had been using a Vic-20 before this and the CPC was a technological leap forward for sure!

I soon discovered the power of the built in Locomotive BASIC language and quickly started cranking out simple (today they would probably be classed as "casual") games, further developing my programming skills and knowledge of the workings of the CPC. Some were adapted from the many readers' type-in listings that were available in the magazines and books of the time, but most were of my own invention. These included a cockroach racing betting game, a couple of shooters and platformers and a version of the Star Wars "Death Star Trench Run" to name but a few.
 
It was the tail end of the era of the "bedroom programmer" and, like many other bright, young things at the time, I had my dreams of becoming rich and famous (mostly rich, admittedly - I'll take the money, you can keep the fame) by developing an insanely popular, world beating computer game by myself in my bedroom. I started work on a vertically scrolling shoot-em-up written in 100% Z80 assembly language that had some pretty advanced features for the time. There were many types of air and ground borne enemies to blast, scientists to rescue and even money to collect and spend in the power up shop, Honest Xorg's Weapons Emporium. I got as far as making a one level playable demo, which you can grab from my CPC Downloads Page along with the full source code and other development materials.
 
Even without my contribution, the CPC was still well supplied with high quality games. You can find the special few I care to remember on my CPC Games Page and even play a few online, right in your browser at my CPC Online Arcade!

In fact, games took up most of my time on the CPC. I believe I found my true calling when I discovered the fun of bypassing the copy protection systems on the games (hacking) and creating cheat (trainer) programs for them! Who else remembers the tricky DJL Speedlocks, the mega XOR looped Appleby loaders and their friends? I do, and I beat them all! Except "Deflektor".
 
The first game I hacked in this way was Gothik from Firebird Software, in October 1988. To this day, I still remember the moment well: me aged 15 sitting on the floor in my brother's room (mine was being decorated or something) in front of my 464, the tape deck clicks to a stop, Gothik starts and I had infinite lives! I'd done it!
 
Over the next two and a half years I made cheats for many games, and even got them published in some magazine cheat columns - Amstrad Computer User's (ACU) "Hairy Hackers Haunt" and Amstrad Action's "Cheat Mode". I was occasionally prolific and, some months, the entire section was given over to my programs alone! You can find more information about my CPC hacking activites at the Hairy Hacker's Haunt, or visit the CPC Downloads Page to grab an archive of all my CPC cheat & hacking related programs.
 
Floppy disk drives were becoming less of a luxury item at the time, but disk based games still commanded a significant price premium over their tape based counterparts. Another type of hack popular at the time was therefore to transfer a tape based game to disk, and I got my hands dirty with these as well. Exolon from Hewson was the first game to be given the treatment and I remember the amazement I felt as the disk version only took two or three seconds to load the 16K "loading screen" (remember those?) from my new DDI-1 3" floppy disk drive (holding a massive 178K on each side of a double sided disk). I'm sure I reloaded the game a fair few times just to watch the screen appear so quicky!

The last CPC game I hacked was Shadow of the Beast from Psygnosis in May 1991 - quite appropriate really since I had just bought an Amiga 500 and Shadow of the Beast was the "killer" game on the Amiga platform at the time. This was the end of my Amstrad CPC career, as I didn't have the space to have two complete systems up and running. The trusty old CPC 464 that had served me so well for so many years got packed away in favour of the shiny new Amiga...
 
By the time it was retired, my CPC 464 had been heavily expanded from the standard configuration:

• CPC 464 with monochrome "green screen" monitor
• DK'tronics 64K RAM expansion pack
• Amstrad DDI-1 floppy disk interface
• 3" 178K x 2 floppy drive
• 3.5" 720K second floppy drive
• ROM board with various expansion ROMs
• Multiface-2 freezer cartridge

Most of this hardware is still kicking around somewhere, though I know some has been lost or broken in various house moves over the years. Someday, when I'm rich and idle, I'll set up my CPC system again and have a real nostalgia trip!