Messages in game code for crackers

[Hewitson]

Originally Posted by Paisley_Pirate

The funny thing is - so many of these guys were writing this back in the day "to save jobs and not steal from us" - how many of us would get a pirate copy - try the game out, decide it was shite, and never touch it - OR would find a game we love (PIRATES!, Lemmings, Elite, EliteII, plus many more) and rush out the next day to buy it?

Not many. Why would someone buy a game they already had?

Originally Posted by Paisley_Pirate

My favorite one was the whole Doom (or was it Quake?) "never release on Amiga" BS... they release the code, boom, on Amiga the next week... but hey, whatever. If they'd released either on Amiga, they'd have made their money and then some.

They potentially would have lost money. I'd say at least 99% of Amiga owners back then had an unaccelerated A500, or if they were lucky, a 1200. People simply didn't have the hardware for games like that.

[Paisley_Pirate]

Originally Posted by Hewitson

Not many. Why would someone buy a game they already had?


They potentially would have lost money. I'd say at least 99% of Amiga owners back then had an unaccelerated A500, or if they were lucky, a 1200. People simply didn't have the hardware for games like that.

99%? I'll give you 75% since that matches the "installed base" - but like many things, a killer app would have driven selling new machines.

[-Acid-]

Originally Posted by Hewitson

They potentially would have lost money. I'd say at least 99% of Amiga owners back then had an unaccelerated A500, or if they were lucky, a 1200. People simply didn't have the hardware for games like that.

How could they lose money on something they had already done all of the work on? People in their bedroom ported the game in hours as proven when the source was released so that is a cost of next to zero. Then they could have included the Amiga binaries on the PC cdrom and i'm sure there would have been plenty of Amiga distributors (such as Power Computing or Weird Science) that would have done it if needed and even on floppies.

The market might have been small I grant you... but as evidenced in the PC scene people did spend money on hardware to be able to play this game. It could have extended the commercial life of the Amiga for a couple more years (not that anything was going to stop what was just over the horizon in '95).

[squirminator2k]

Nobody was going to rush out to buy an Amiga so they could play Doom. There was no reality where that was ever going to happen.

[profo]

Originally Posted by squirminator2k

Nobody was going to rush out to buy an Amiga so they could play Doom. There was no reality where that was ever going to happen.

Exactly.
Doom was the last nail in my Amiga's coffin...
Bought a PC an didnt look back for some years. At that time "my" Computer Shop was throwing out Amiga stuff and filled the space with PC games/things.

[squirminator2k]

The last nail in the Amiga's coffin was hardly Doom. Doom was just what happened to everyone else after the lid had been closed.

[DamienD]

Originally Posted by Hewitson

Not many. Why would someone buy a game they already had?

Because responsible people support developers; and purchasing hopefully allows them to continue on other projects.

[Hewitson]

Originally Posted by Paisley_Pirate

99%? I'll give you 75% since that matches the "installed base" - but like many things, a killer app would have driven selling new machines.

25% of Amiga users did not have a machine even capable of starting Doom, let alone playing it at an acceptable framerate.

Originally Posted by -Acid-

How could they lose money on something they had already done all of the work on? People in their bedroom ported the game in hours as proven when the source was released so that is a cost of next to zero.

Producing a commercial port of a game is a far more expensive exercise than some kid compiling open source code in his bedroom.

Originally Posted by squirminator2k

The last nail in the Amiga's coffin was hardly Doom. Doom was just what happened to everyone else after the lid had been closed.

I absolutely believe that Doom killed the Amiga. The Playstation is often blamed, but the writing was on the wall LONG before that was released.

Originally Posted by DamienD

Because responsible people support developers; and purchasing hopefully allows them to continue on other projects.

Come off it mate. None of us gave a shit about being "responsible" when we were kids. All we cared about was getting as many games as we possibly could.

[DamienD]

Originally Posted by Hewitson

Come off it mate. None of us gave a shit about being "responsible" when we were kids. All we cared about was getting as many games as we possibly could.

I'm talking in general.

Yes back in the day I pirated loads of Amiga games; but I also bought a few originals

[Galahad/FLT]

Can someone clean the thread up please, this talk has ZERO to do with the thread title and its being derailed quite badly.

Ta

[mailman]

In the CD32 version of "Alien Breed Special Edition 92" (compilation with "Qwak"), Stefan Boberg wrote:

CD32 Version By Stefan Boberg. Done while listening to the DM In Your Room triple-Maxi CD pack--------------------------------Hangin' on your words, living on your breath, feeling with your skin, will I always be here?

[jotd]

in ATR CD32 startup sequence (not a message for crackers but it's not that nice to Jaimie Woodhouse who probably abandoned ship before I guess)

;
;
;
; This CD was completed with the very kind help of Gary Symons and
; despite all Jamie's "help" :-)
;
; Spadge. Tuesday Feb 14/95 10.15am  *Deadline Day +1* :-(
;
;
; I got doze.. doze last minute deadline hysterics.. yeah..
; (We all got doze...) etc ad infinitum.
;

(I didn't find a thread about funny messages in startup sequence, if a mod finds it, you can move it there)

[ross]

Reach for the Skies:

Hi! My name is Jim.. and I am a computer programmer & funny.
My boss seems to disagree on both counts.. I wonder why?
Anyway.. thats enough about me...
What about you? Do you know any good jokes?
(by the way... the protection is nowhere near here
 - so you may as well give up looking...
try over in the stack segments... theres a good chappie!).

[gimbal]

Now I have to know if the protection was indeed nowhere near that text.

[ross]

Originally Posted by gimbal

Now I have to know if the protection was indeed nowhere near that text.

---

There is a code path in Denaris that fail on 020+ processor because of an unsuccessful jump to 'misaligned address error vector' that end in:

jmp $fce2

Of course is a (love) hidden message for the eventual lurker that is worth more than a written message for an old geezer like me .

[Nightshft]

Originally Posted by gimbal

Now I have to know if the protection was indeed nowhere near that text.

Haha, yes that'd be interesting.


I just checked the bootblock of "Dr. Cubes magic lands" by Scienide.

See picture.
And here the translation from german:
----------------------------------------------
Attn!
This bootblock is not a virus, but part of the program on this disk...
It may NOT be deleted, otherwise the program won't load anymore!!!
************
To every cracker: You'r off the rocker!
>> Pirating software is a serious crime. <<
Pirating is strictly illegal in Germany and almost everywhere in the world !!!
----------------------------------------------

If not crackers themselves weren't they a demogroup who at least wrote some cracktro's?

Trivia: The german phrase actually would be: "Du tickst wohl nicht richtig."

[jotd]

Deep Core, after a lot of loads & some decryption:

PRETTY EASY EH? WELL, YOURE NOT DONE YET !!!

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by jotd

Deep Core, after a lot of loads & some decryption:

Ah Deep Core is for sure a nightmare.....

[jotd]

Mr Larmer speciality is to crack such beasts. Lots of loading & decrunching. Encryption. Time consuming.

Is the game any good BTW? someone compared it to Gods I have my doubts...

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by jotd

Mr Larmer speciality is to crack such beasts. Lots of loading & decrunching. Encryption. Time consuming.

Is the game any good BTW? someone compared it to Gods I have my doubts...

Well the game has a kind of atmosphere. it's nice game to play, but not a super great game AAA.