Since you got on this page here, you seem to be interested in my personal MSX Activities. Well, that's what I created this MSX Activities Log (MAL) for. In this log I type every week what my activities on my MSX were in the previous weekend or some extraordinary stuff in the previous or current week. If you've been reading this before, you can proceed to the latest entry immediately (wow, did I steal this from Parallax!). So, here it is:
- 01-09-1997 -
Well, I've done quite a lot of things lately. To name some: I've been at Eric Boon's place to listen to the Moonsound he borrowed from Martin (the other Aurora-member). It sounded incredible! Everybody should have heard that, or just have such a brilliant sound-device. Then I've organised (with Leon Coolegem) a little MSX meeting at Leon's place. Too bad the only ones who made it were me, Leon and Aurora... But it was usefull for making plans... (By the way, if you live or work near or in Nijmegen, contact me!) Then I've again visited Eric, just to do some cosy MSXing for one night. It was nice (especially that FAF - Federation Against FAC - demo, never seen it before!). The next day (that was Saturday 30 August) I went to Frank Druijff to lay-out a little - 2 pages! - article about those nice Turbo Pascal libraries made by Kari Lammassaari. Today I finished the article at the university. Of course I've actually done much more (like showing Oracle to Eric, playing the Core Dump promo, replaying Ys II in English, listening to Audio Wave 3, playing a little part of Ys III English, etc.), but that's maybe not so interesting. (Hmm. Maybe this entire part isn't that interesting... Well, too bad if it isn't!)
Ok, that's it for this time, folks! See you later!
- 11-09-97 -
Last weekend I tried my download "risk2e.lzh" from FUNet... When it started to play a music, I immediately recognised the intro-song from "Great Strategy II". Apprearantely this was the Campaignversion (if you can give me more info about this - I didn't know there were more versions - mail me!) of that game. Don't think I have GS II, but I recognised it from "Micro Music 3.00". Anyway, I played it for a while, and it's very nice. The only bad thing about it is that the computerplayers take a lot of time to think... Sometimes even 10 minutes! Is it possible to play this with 2 human players? I wonder...
See ya! (not an original remark, but who cares)
- 15-09-97 -
Now, I finished Ys II for the second time last weekend. Rather stupid that Oasis forgot to translate the text that the ultimate-boss-monster says when you get in his room... Anyway, I now started playing Ys I... I'm level 8 now, and exploring the caves. That's it!
Bye!
- 22-09-97 -
Ok, I made it to Zandvoort! I got up at 6.15 a.m. to make it on time... I met Leon Coolegem at the trainstation, and off we were... I arrived at 9.34 a.m., and there was no queue at all, so I could immediately enter (free, with the "standhouderskaart" I got from Aurora, thanks dudes!). Well, it was a really cosy fair for me, but it was unfortunately anti-crowded... Never seen a MSX fair with so little visitors... Now, I finally took a subscription to Future Disk (they rule!) and found out Koen Dols is a really nice guy (although I suspected that already). Well, actually, almost all MSXers are nice people. Anyway, I also bought Bomberman 2, a couple of magazines, the Oracle update (with the manual) and nothing else. For release info, see the news-section!
CU...!
- 07-10-97 -
So, long time no see! I had no time last week to write something here. Anyway, I now have maximum level at Ys I, and I'm trying to beat "Dark Fact" on the top of the Darm (who knows what this word means??) Tower. The problem is, that I can hardly hit this sucker! ("Wat een klotebeest!") Even though I have a flame sword. I think I need something like crelia sword and armour. But where could I find that?? Any clues are welcome...
Bye for now!
- 13-10-97 -
Yes! I finished Ancient Ys Vanished Omen last weekend! I just had to use the silver equipment to kill Dark Fact. After killing him I got the last Ys-book, and after having read it, the end-demo followed. Now I have begun on SD-Snatcher... I hope to get my SCC soon! That would make it a lot nicer, as far as the sounds concerned. And of course I'll get Martin's Moonsound today, so I can experiment with it this week. I'm expecting a lot!
That's all folks!
- 20-10-97 -
I started playing SD-Snather in English... Wow... Is this game great! But not very hard... Of course I also played with the Moonsound I borrowed from Martin Krooshof (of Aurora). Thanks again Martin! The sound-quality is SUPERB! Yeah, on the sound part, MSX is totally up to date with the Moonsound! More next week.
Doegie!
- 28-10-97 -
Didn't get my (almost free) SCC yet from Maggoo (although he posted it last Monday!), so I have not played SD-Snatcher this weekend. But, I did play a bit Ys-II (Wanderers from Ys). The problem is: what a hard game! Maybe I should try rank 'easy'? Anyway, I'm level 2 now, but in the second part of the first cave (with those birds and walking creatures), I'm almost dead when I get hit! Hmmm...
Ok, see you next time!
- 03-11-97 -
Yeeehaa! I got my SCC! Great musics... I played a big deal of SD-Snatcher, with SCC music.. Ah.. That's a lot better! Another thing: I now have a standard VG-8235 from Philips in Nijmegen.. It belonged to the family of my girlfriend... Now I can have it.. Great.
Gotta run! Bye!
- 25-11-97 -
Gee, have I been busy last time!! I did a lot: downloaded a lot of MSX1 games, uploaded to FUNet by Werner Kai (thanks dude!), worked on a nice lay-outed version of the Great Strategy II/Risk II Campaign Version manual, translated by Takamichi Suzukawa, been to the small MSX fair in Almelo together with the Aurora-crew, played another piece of SD-Snatcher, tried to find Bubble Bobble on the net (not succeeded...) and probably a lot more what I can't remember now.... Well, I'm going back to work now!
Till next time!
- 17-12-97 -
Yes! I finished SD-Snatcher the weekend before last! Last weekend I stayed in Nijmegen, yes, that city where I don't have a good MSX to play with... But I had a great day in Amsterdam though on Saterday. Anyway, I still hope to get some good versions of F1-Spirit, Nemesis 2, Nemesis 3, Quarth, Space Manbow, Salamander, Parodius and Pennant Race that work with the SCC in slot 1 on my REAL MSX. If someone has them: feel free to contact me, or just upload them to FUNet. Thanks in advance! Some strange thing that occured: my father got addicted to Sokoban! ARGH! But ok, it's a nice game. Well, now I really have to go to my `Electronics' course...
Bye peoples! (If anyone reads this anyway...)
- 05-01-98 -
First of all, a very happy 1998! Idem for 1999, 2000, 2001 and the rest of your life! Ok, now skip the not-funny intro's Manuel, and type something useful... Err... I don't know how to type something useful! Then, I'll type some unuseful stuff. What I did the past few weeks... Quite a lot: I restored my MSX DOS 2 system disk, after my brother Jochen erased the entire directory of the disk... (not even one file was lost! Am I glad most of the files were in subdir's...), I programmed in assembler (YES!) and made a kind of STUITER... Maybe I'll put it online later. Further, I played some games (Solid Snake a bit, Pennant Race II, Space Manbow, etc. also to play with the SCC) and some more I don't remember right now. Too bad for you dudes! Anyway, I got a mail from a Finnish guy that read my homepage! I have to state here, that this was only the THIRD feedback mail I received in 2 years! THANKS A LOT DUDES! (Note: consider this as a hint to give me more feedback!). Another thing: I finally know where the items "Dagger" and "Vase" are in the great game "The Maze of Galious". For info, check Sean Young's pages!
Signing off...
- 06-01-98 -
Ok, I'm putting that ML bounce-scroller-kind-of-thing online today! Look at the software section... It's work-name is scroll5.*...
'till next week!
- 19-01-98 -
Last weekend I installed some old MSX1 software again on some MSX disks, I played some Konami's and I tested the basic compiler of Egor Voznessenski (none of the three tested programs worked as expected or didn't work at all, or let the compiler crash or give errors that I cannot explain.......). I also downloaded some nice Moonsound songs... Especially the cover of Children (Robert Miles) by Bart Roymans is fantastic... Too bad he isn't MSXer anymore... (I saw a promo-demo for "The White House BBS" once, in which he tells he is 14 years old! ;-) I wonder if he'll ever read this... BUT: Compjoetania TNG is doing a great job. I hope they finish Compass 2.0 very soon! (HINT!)
Bye! (You see, Merri, I AM an active MSXer!)
- 27-01-98 -
Didn't do that much last weekend: I checked out some Japanese software made by TEMPEST (see the bookmarks). I also put my MSX-books in a textfile. That's all I believe...
Maybe next week more?
- 03-02-98 -
I played about 14 stages of King's Valley II last weekend! I was at stage 34 three years ago and last weekend I continued playing KVII... This game rules! Am I glad I have an SCC now... And of course I already had the MSX2-version. Next weekend I hope to play some games that I copied from my MCCM CD-ROM.
Hasta la pasta!
- 10-02-98 -
Yes! I finished the final stages of King's Valley II! Great game. I also played some games from the MCCM CD-ROM on my MSX. Like DASS, DIX and Blade Lords. I'm gonna have to put some more images to real disks. However, the MSX emulator fMSX-DOS is working great on these Pentium 200 MMX machines here at the university. But I miss the spirit of the real MSX... I really prefer a real one, despite of the fact the MSX in fMSX-DOS seems to be running smoother than my real one. Of course that may be caused by slow cracks of MegaROMs. (E.g.: Vampire Killer). Shit, I still need F1-Spirit with working SCC support for my REAL MSX! (And Salamander, etc.)
Hasta la Alta-Vista?
- 18-02-98 -
Another weekend of great MSXing (!?)... Last weekend I only tried the 47 disks I filled with images from the MCCM CD Millenium... Some things (about 11 disks) didn't work (properly) though... I wonder what is the cause of this. This week I'll retry and see them if they work with the emulator. Maybe formatting single sided will work (for single sided diskimages of course!). We'll see.
Dagggg! (This is what they say at the "Jeugdjournaal".)
- 03-03-98 -
As you could see I had a week off. Almost the entire week I played "The Witch's Revenge" (by Umax) together with my brother. I must say, this is a nice game indeed! Further, I played a bit of Parallax' Blade Lords, with my brother... I think we reached stage 5-2 or something. Discovering that the server is again offline, I greet thou all!
Greetz!
- 09-03-98 -
Again I've been playing "The Witch's Revenge", but I've also read/viewed/listened to the new issue of the Futuredisk that dropped on the mat the last day of my previous holidays. It's great! Take a subscription NOW! Contact these guys (see my bookmarks) and subscribe. They can use a little support, because they work real hard to make this. (En nee, ik zeg dit niet om te slijmen, Koenie!!)
Later!
- 16-03-98 -
Ok, last weekend I mainly checked out some software I received (I need even more! Check my MSX page!). Actually I celebrated my grand-grandmothers birthday also, so I didn't have a lot of time. Therefore: that was all.
Next week more? Who knows!
- 16-04-98 -
Weh, didn't do so much interesting stuff... That's why it's a month ago I wrote in this log. All I did was playing some Witch's Revenge and checking out some downloads. I was very busy with The Ultimate MSX FAQ during the week. Last weekend (Easter) I decided to play Solid Snake again. I started quite some time ago with it, but I didn't play it very far. So I continued playing, and playing and playing and at Monday afternoon I finished it! Great humour... Especially about VRAM 01K... ;-)
Next time!
- 12-05-98 -
Well, I've been to the great MSX Fair in Tilburg on the 25th of May! Although
many people complained there wasn't much new stuff, I think there actually were
quite some interesting things to see. Of course I bought the new Umax game "The
Lost World" which has a very nice manual by the way (produced by Club Hnostar...
They rule!). Further more, Erik Maas was so kind to build in a switch in my
Nemesis III cartridge of which the game was disabled. Now I can play the game
AND use it as SCC-cartridge. It was a great but exhausting day. I nearly talked
to anyone I know (who was present of course) and got to know the faces of some
people who I only knew from the Internet (like Sean Young). I even sold some of
my MSX Computer Magazines... I still have a lot of them to sell, check my MSX
page for that. If you want to know more about Tilburg: just mail me. Maybe we (I
and David Heremans of Compjoetania who brought up this idea) are going to write
a piece of text ('beursverslag' = 'fair-report'?) about Tilburg and put it
online somewhere.
Some days after Tilburg I went on holidays to Spain (until the 6th of May).
Coincidence wanted that the Barcelona MSX Meeting was just in the same period.
So went to that little fair! And I have to say that I really liked it. Together
with Koen Dols of the Futuredisk, I (we) were the only foreigner(s). Too bad so
little Spanish people (dare to) speak English, but hey, I had a nice time. I
really laughed at that video Koen taped at Tilburg...
Last weekend I made a start at The Lost World. Unfortunatly there seem to be
some bugs in it when it's played on MSX2 (Peter Meulendijks only has a Turbo R
and didn't test it on MSX2...). But Peter already found a solution for the
problems. If you experience the same problems (hangups) then mail Rob Hiep, he'll tell you what to do.
Ok, that's it for today, hope to see you next week. Bye for now! (Aren't that the words of the presenter(?) of "Today's the day", that BBC2 programme before Star Trek?)
- 05-06-98 -
Ok, almost another month has passed since I last wrote something in this (boring? let me know!) log. Who cares, no-one seems to read it, except Harri Mahonen. Anyway, I've been playing a lot of The Lost World! I also downloaded some old MSX software from the web, and: I've been programming again! Yes! I one time made a vertical scroll-routine that worked like this: print the text on pages 1-3 and then copy line-by-line those pages to page 0 and after every line, scroll the screen up one line. (VDP(24)) This actually works in BASIC, but of course it's very slow. It works amazingly fast in KUN-BASIC! But still, it's very slow to print the entire text, and the text is of course very limited in length. Therefore, I made a new program that prints a line (in 8 parts) on the invisible part of the screen and after every part, the screen is scrolled one pixelline. BUT: in MSX-BASIC (nor KUN-BASIC) it's impossible to print on the lowest 44 lines of the graphical screen, which are normally invisible. So therefore: this works, but it gives a large gap. It's even not faster in KUN-BASIC than in normal BASIC. Therefore I made it in Pascal. But the GRPPRINT.INC library uses the BIOS, so again: a gap... But in Pascal the speed is very reasonable. Too bad that gap is still there... I already asked Kari if he could study the problem. Of course, a way to avoid it, is just printing the text on page 1 or so, on pixelline 0, e.g. So I made the adaptions to the Pascal source, but what happens: after compiling I want to run the program and then the computer crasssshhhhes!!! SHIT! Still no idea why... If you have any idea why, please contact me! You can try the programs yourself, if you like!
Bye again! (SHIT! I have exams this month! And: I forgot to adjust the "proceed to the last entry-link the last 2 times!)
- 17-06-98 -
Last two weeks I played The Lost World in one weekend, and in the other weekend I went to Hoorn to buy a Sony HB-501P, Sony HB-75P, SVI-728 and a Philips VW-0030 (see the MSX page). For only 20 guilders! Wow! I'm really happy with this, especially the 501 is very cool. At the moment I have some more good deals with people who want to get rid of their MSX stuff. Who knows what I will have next time I write in this log?
Come and see! Next time!
- 23-06-98 -
Just wanted to say that the crash is resolved! It was due to my Pause procedure, which was unnecessary, because I forgot TP features a Delay procedure.... Because a certain INClude file didn't turn the interrupts back on, the program crashed.... Thanks to Kari for debugging! You can also expect some new INC files of him in the near future (in a couple of weeks) and I'll probably put the Scroll-program I made online soon. I also played a lot of The Lost World last weekend. Too bad I got stuck at about 3 p.m.... even worse was that I found out what to do at 16.55 h, which is 5 minutes before I had to have dinner... After dinner I went to Nijmegen... So in about two weeks I'll continue my quest in "Ysserria"! Also next time: really the new MSX stuff I got... (don't have it yet, right now!).
Next time, really!
- 08-07-98 -
Ok, a list of the new MSX stuff I have can be seen on my MSX page! Last weekend I again played The Lost World! I got a lot further. I also made my Vertical Text Scroll better, with the help of some new INC files by Kari Lammassaari. He's working on some heavy font and print routines! When they are as good as finishied, I'll publish them on my MSX pages, of course. Also, the Scroll-program, when I'm satisfied enough. Further I tried to put some MSX1 games from tape to disk, but I hardly succeeded. Check the list on my MSX page! Maybe you can help me. Well, further I tried some Japanese MSX game called Kame... And some more downloads from Japan. Next time I knew, was that it was time to go back to Nijmegen...
Bye dudez!
- 27-07-98 -
So, The Ultimate MSX FAQ is now on MSXNET! Thanks to Sean Young and Ben & Goran of course. Furthermore: I'm working on a game, written in Turbo Pascal! More about this later!
Game on, gamers!
- 31-08-98 -
I've worked hard on my game! Still have to make a menu, but that is so boring... And only one bug left to solve! Furthermore, I first need a good DOS1 MBPLAYER and some other TP stuff. I hope Kari can make it for me.
I have been playing The Lost World, but we (my brother and I) are totally stuck in this game. We don't know what to do after entering the Kir Abbey! If you do, let us know!
Last weekend I felt like playing Ys III again. Now I destroyed the first two bossmonsters and got to level 5 or so. This game is really great! Especially the nice backgrounds with multilayer scrolls!
(Like Trunks:)Ja matta! (whatever it means....)
- 29-09-98 -
I haven't been working on my little game anymore, but I probably will in the near future. I've been to the Zandvoort MSX Fair of course, for pictures, see the MSX page. News: I'm finally not stuck anymore in The Lost World! And I'm quite far in Ys III. In the next weeks I'll probably continue playing these nice games. Last weekend I've been putting some MSX cassette's I bought on disk. But I only succeeded with 'Diamond Mine II' and 'Captain 'S''... Can anyone put 'Colony' on disk for me?
Another nice news-item: I'm going to release Arranger IV, which is not 100% finished, but the musics work fine, as does the replayer. Ruud v/d Moosdijk and I are now preparing it to release it on Tilburg '99. Ruud will also release Arranger Gold there, a CD with all musics from Arranger I-III. Nice eh!
See you in real life on the next MSX fair!
- 06-10-98 -
Yes! I finally finished Ys-III!! But too bad, the end-story wasn't translated... If anyone can tell me what is said in that scroll that rolls over the big Adol-picture... Let me know!
I advanced quite a bit in The Lost World, too. I hope to finish it in a couple of weeks!
Hot news: Arranger IV will be totally completed by Zodiac! But they've given me the rights for distribution and stuff...! If all goes well, I'll be selling it at Tilburg '99!
Game you later!
Last weekend I finished The Lost World! Finally...
Last week I did some major picturescanning... Now I hope Tristan will put them online this year...
Gotta go shopping now...
This page is online since 07-01-1998, that's the day I seperated the MAL from my MSX homepage. I hope you like it!
Visitors, please send me some reactions.... I'd really appreciate that!
Text © 1997-1998 by Allosoft (i.e. Manuel Bilderbeek, see, other pages)