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intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Sun Aug 09, 2020 10:19 am

One more bit on this, which I just discovered this morning after talking to my brother about the Blue Android piece, "The Embrace". Seeing that image yesterday really slapped my face as I KNEW I'd seen it multiple times but could not for the life of me remember where.

I thought maybe OMNI magazine, or Heavy Metal. Anyway, I just kept looking.

When I was a teenager, I collected ... strange comics. I wasn't into super heroes by and large. But I loved horror comics; the really old ones from the 1950s and 60s up to present times (1980s). And back in the 80s, there was a series by Bruce Jones that was exceptional called Twisted Tales, published by Eclipse in 1986 - the exact same timeframe as the games above. Imagine a Twilight Zone comic book with several short stories, each drawn by masters of the macabre including my heroes Bernie Wrightson and Richard Corben. I still have that entire set, and to this day I've never seen anything ever come close. At the time I was too young to buy them (they had age restrictions and were put in special locations in some stores) but my brother would help get them for me.

Jones also released a trippy sci-fi series called Alien Worlds covering the same general idea, and with some of the same artists. Issue number one? Guess who painted it? Yep - Joe Chiodo.
s-l1600.jpg
See "CHIODO" there in the bottom right corner?

Looking through that set even further, I found the Blue Android picture I linked to up above that's been driving me crazy. I've had this comic in my possession for most of my life (albeit in plastic, in a box, carefully stored). I only look at these about once every 5 years or so maybe even a bit more, so I don't feel too bad it didn't come to me straight away.
s-l1600-1.jpg
He even did more covers from that series. To think after all these years I've now had conversations with this artist kind of puts me on cloud 9! I've since pinged him about "The Embrace" as well. =)

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Zippy Zapp
CA, USA

Posted Mon Aug 10, 2020 9:59 am

Awesome artwork and research there intric8, love it!

As to the game I know I played it back in the day as I had bought it. Back then we didn't care too much about imperfections, be it game play or graphics. "Ultima like" games were popular and popping up all the time. EA had several as did many other software publishers. Most of them were for sure worth playing. If it was Ultima, or "Ultima like" I played it, usually.

Today we have access to so much software and hindsight so it is easy to cherry pick. However, since you bought it, I think it is for sure worth a play IMHO.

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rpiguy9907

Posted Tue Aug 11, 2020 8:02 am

Amazing detective work on the artist!

There were so many evocative game covers I wonder how many he did.

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intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Sat Oct 21, 2023 9:32 am

Last week I decided to finally sit down and prepare to play Wizard's Crown - at least to create a party and check out the beginning stages.

One of the first things you need to do is create a game disk from the original. The original disk comes with a built-in copy program you use to generate Disk 1 and Disk 2 (taken from Side 1 and Side 2 of the original disk) to play the game. The copy program reads the original disk and writes to a new blank disk.

I wanted to play Wizard's Crown on my C128D so I started the process after finding a blank 5.25" floppy.

The program slowly formats the blank disk and it starts to copy Side 1. And oh my god, swap-swap-swap-swap-swap-swap-swap.

Flip.
Format.
Swap swap swap swap swap... and then I got an error!

Surprised (legitimately surprised as my disks virtually never go bad) I went and found another blank.
Swap swap swap swap swap...

I did this a few more times and easily wasted a couple of HOURS before finally deciding my original disk must be bad on the back side. I could always load the program and copy Side 1 to Disk 1, but every single time I was trying to do the back side of the original disk the process would fail.

Disappointed, I found another boxed copy on Ebay for only $20 (an auction) and bid on it. To my surprise, I won without anyone else trying to bid. I got it for $20. Worth it!

I got it this week and last night started the process again. That's how I spend my Friday nights, guys. I'm cool like that.

Swap swap swap swap swap...flip, format, swap swap swap swap ERROR!

I sat there and stared at the machine for a moment, then looked at this new box. It had a sticker on the box in the lower-right corner that showed this was a game for the C64. This print is so old it was released and sold before the C128 was even a thing. It was right on the cusp, at least.

As a last ditch effort I pulled out my trusty C64 Reloaded, a 1541-ii and 1702 monitor. I decided to re-use the new 2nd box disk and started making the disks again.

Side 1 did what it always did.
Side 2: Swap swap swap swap swap... swap swap swap swap (there are many more swaps than this but you get the idea)! COMPLETE

IMG_4207.jpg

Wizard's crown is SO old and so specific to the C64 that something about either the C128 or 1571 or the combo of both was killing this process and making it unplayable on my C128Dcr.

But it made no sense to me because my original boxed version has a sticker that claims to work on the C64 and C128. But maybe that was still intended to be used with a 1541. I really don't know as I don't have a C128 wedge to test that theory. But, regardless, I adore my Commodore 64. :disk:

IMG_4206.jpg

So now I have 2 copies of Wizard's Crown. And even though both original disks perform the same way I found another interesting thing about this game, or at least how they were made.

There were 2 differently colorized manuals. The initial C64-only release had a green cover, and the later C64/"128" release had a blue cover. In the bottom-right, it also says "All Versions" so presumably they started using this manual for other ports as well like the ST, DOS, etc.

IMG_4208.jpg

Kind of interesting. In other words, if your copy of Wizard's Crown only says C64 on the front and has a green manual, you've got the earliest original release. If yours says C64/128 and has a blue manual, you've got the later one. Aren't you glad you know that now? ;)

My guess is it would be OK to play this on the C128D. I guess I won't know if it'll fail until I try...

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Zippy Zapp
CA, USA

Posted Mon Oct 23, 2023 8:30 am

Well this brings back memories, haha. When I got a C128 and 1571 so many years ago, 1986 IIRC, I remember a similar experience with a few games. As you say, it is probably the 1571 since it has I think 3 modes it can operate in only one is 1541 compat. mode.

I had a similar experience with a game that would not finish copying with built in utility and I could not play the game. When I switched to a C64C and 1541C later on it had none of these issues. I don't remember the specific game but it very well could have been an SSI game from this era as I was playing a lot of RPGs back then, all that I could get my hands on.

Well hey, now you have a spare copy of the game. hehe. Or if you decide to sell or trade it I am sure you could get something good.

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intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Mon Oct 23, 2023 8:59 pm

Interesting. I wonder if Eternal Dagger was another that foiled your plans? I think it may have used the same disk-copy paradigm.
The_Eternal_Dagger_Coverart.png

User avatar
Zippy Zapp
CA, USA

Posted Tue Oct 24, 2023 11:05 am

Hard to say. It could have been because wasn't that the sequel? I seem to think it was an earlier game but who knows that was a long time ago. Man I wish my memory was better. My hard drive capacity is single density.

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intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Tue Oct 24, 2023 10:27 pm

wasn't that the sequel?
Yes indeedily doo.
Screenshot 2023-10-24 at 10.26.52 PM.jpg





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