Features Archives - Paleotronic Magazine https://paleotronic.com/category/features/ Electronics, Computing and Videogame History! Sun, 13 Dec 2020 19:40:58 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 http://paleotronic.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/cropped-keyicon-1-32x32.png Features Archives - Paleotronic Magazine https://paleotronic.com/category/features/ 32 32 146320098 Paleotronic’s 12 Years of Retro Christmas Returns… Again! http://paleotronic.com/2020/12/14/paleotronics-12-years-of-retro-christmas-returns-again/ http://paleotronic.com/2020/12/14/paleotronics-12-years-of-retro-christmas-returns-again/#respond Sun, 13 Dec 2020 19:06:25 +0000 http://paleotronic.com/?p=15904 Did you miss it last year? Well, here’s another chance to check out Paleotronic’s 12 years of Retro-Christmas, a series of 12 mini-mags looking back at consumer electronics covering the years 1980-1991. It was the [more...]

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]]> http://paleotronic.com/2020/12/14/paleotronics-12-years-of-retro-christmas-returns-again/feed/ 0 15904 Lasers, Discs and Dragons: Remembering Don Bluth’s Dragon’s Lair http://paleotronic.com/2020/06/06/lasers-and-dragons-remembering-don-bluths-dragons-lair/ http://paleotronic.com/2020/06/06/lasers-and-dragons-remembering-don-bluths-dragons-lair/#respond Sat, 06 Jun 2020 01:29:10 +0000 http://paleotronic.com/?p=12635 When animator Don Bluth agreed to animate an obscure laserdisc videogame tentatively titled “The Dragon’s Lair”, little did he know it would become one of his biggest successes… Dragon’s Lair… Dragon’s Lair… ah yes Dragon’s [more...]

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]]> http://paleotronic.com/2020/06/06/lasers-and-dragons-remembering-don-bluths-dragons-lair/feed/ 0 12635 A Tongue-In-Cheek Look Back at Broderbund’s ‘The Print Shop’ http://paleotronic.com/2019/08/20/a-tongue-in-cheek-look-at-broderbunds-the-print-shop/ http://paleotronic.com/2019/08/20/a-tongue-in-cheek-look-at-broderbunds-the-print-shop/#respond Tue, 20 Aug 2019 03:05:19 +0000 http://paleotronic.com/?p=6135 In the early 1980s, if you wanted posters to advertise a yard sale or a party, your options were pretty limited. You could get some blank sheets of paper and some crayons or felt markers [more...]

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]]> http://paleotronic.com/2019/08/20/a-tongue-in-cheek-look-at-broderbunds-the-print-shop/feed/ 0 6135 1980s 8-Bit 3D Adventures with Freescape http://paleotronic.com/2019/04/26/3d-adventures-with-freescape/ http://paleotronic.com/2019/04/26/3d-adventures-with-freescape/#respond Fri, 26 Apr 2019 03:01:41 +0000 http://paleotronic.com/?p=4267 Last issue of Paleotronic, my article on RPG games focused on the birth of RPG games on home computers. It looked at how they were heavily turn based text adventures, inspired by the likes of [more...]

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]]> http://paleotronic.com/2019/04/26/3d-adventures-with-freescape/feed/ 0 4267 Flying to the Moon and crashing back to Earth: the meteoric rise and fall of Imagic http://paleotronic.com/2019/03/20/flying-to-the-moon-and-crashing-back-to-earth-the-meteoric-rise-and-fall-of-imagic/ http://paleotronic.com/2019/03/20/flying-to-the-moon-and-crashing-back-to-earth-the-meteoric-rise-and-fall-of-imagic/#respond Wed, 20 Mar 2019 01:43:50 +0000 http://paleotronic.com/?p=3783 Upon viewing Moonsweeper for the first time the word ‘wow’ just doesn’t seem to do it justice, yet it’s the first word to form in most people’s brains. It just seems to trite, so simple, [more...]

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]]> http://paleotronic.com/2019/03/20/flying-to-the-moon-and-crashing-back-to-earth-the-meteoric-rise-and-fall-of-imagic/feed/ 0 3783 Live from the Moon: One Giant Transmission for Humankind http://paleotronic.com/2019/01/25/live-from-the-moon-one-giant-transmission-for-mankind/ http://paleotronic.com/2019/01/25/live-from-the-moon-one-giant-transmission-for-mankind/#respond Fri, 25 Jan 2019 02:17:10 +0000 http://paleotronic.com/?p=3210 The impact the live broadcast of the Moon walk had on the populace of Western countries cannot be overstated. Witnessing such a momentous event live made people feel they were a part of it, and [more...]

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]]> http://paleotronic.com/2019/01/25/live-from-the-moon-one-giant-transmission-for-mankind/feed/ 0 3210 The Diskee: Apollo’s most important crewmember http://paleotronic.com/2019/01/22/the-diskee-apollos-most-important-crewmember/ http://paleotronic.com/2019/01/22/the-diskee-apollos-most-important-crewmember/#respond Tue, 22 Jan 2019 04:05:46 +0000 http://paleotronic.com/?p=3157 Apollo 11 commander Neil Armstrong’s tense two-word report came over the loudspeakers at NASA’s Mission Control in Houston, more of a question than a statement as he and and fellow astronaut Buzz Aldrin rapidly descended [more...]

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]]> http://paleotronic.com/2019/01/22/the-diskee-apollos-most-important-crewmember/feed/ 0 3157 No Software Required: How Atari Made Its First Video Games Without A Computer http://paleotronic.com/2018/10/05/no-software-required-how-atari-made-its-first-video-games-without-a-computer/ http://paleotronic.com/2018/10/05/no-software-required-how-atari-made-its-first-video-games-without-a-computer/#respond Fri, 05 Oct 2018 02:15:08 +0000 http://paleotronic.com/?p=1668 In the early 1970s, computers were expensive! Like, really expensive, man! So if you were a young Nolan Bushnell entranced by Spacewar and you wanted to bring it to the masses, how could you do [more...]

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]]> http://paleotronic.com/2018/10/05/no-software-required-how-atari-made-its-first-video-games-without-a-computer/feed/ 0 1668 From the Computer Lab to the Arcade: The Journey of Space War http://paleotronic.com/2018/09/25/from-the-computer-lab-to-the-arcade-the-journey-of-space-war/ http://paleotronic.com/2018/09/25/from-the-computer-lab-to-the-arcade-the-journey-of-space-war/#respond Mon, 24 Sep 2018 14:00:42 +0000 http://paleotronic.com/?p=1520 Paul Monopoli takes a look back at the very first video game, and its influence on what would become one of the world’s most popular pasttimes. In 1961 the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was to [more...]

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]]> http://paleotronic.com/2018/09/25/from-the-computer-lab-to-the-arcade-the-journey-of-space-war/feed/ 0 1520 Radio Waves: How the Wireless Made Television http://paleotronic.com/2018/09/17/radio-waves-how-the-wireless-made-television/ http://paleotronic.com/2018/09/17/radio-waves-how-the-wireless-made-television/#respond Sun, 16 Sep 2018 14:00:52 +0000 http://paleotronic.com/?p=1480 So you’ve invented a video camera (or a scanner) and you’ve got something to reproduce the picture on, but how do you get the signal from one to the other? Well, you could do it [more...]

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