In celebration of the 30th anniversary of the release of Elite I have a go at the original version on an emulated BBC Model B and discuss some of the underlying technology designed with a mind to fitting the game into the 32k of memory.
I work at the national museum of computing here in England and I must say among all the classic games people might try to imagine this is the one that makes grown men suddenly turn into teenagers again and reminisce. Quite often people sit down at the BBC's and other people come over and they chat and give advice about this thirty year old game as if it was a modern game. It really is so impressive to me to see what effect it has on people.
I'm too young to know started on elite dangerous but it is amazing to me that the original came out in 1984 ten years before my birth I've been playing elite dangerous since 2016 when I discovered it
I first came across this in June 1988 when I was 12 during a school activities week. It blew my mind. We got an Amiga A500+ in Christmas 1991. I saw Elite and got it in April 1992 and have been playing it since. I got an Amiga A600 in April 1994. I was impressed they used the Fibonacci series to generate the planets, very clever. Good use of maths. I help run a Code Club and thrilled my kids like programming. Use my Raspberry Pi to run my business. I understand David Braben was one of the supporters of the Pi. Elite really got me into all this.
We had this on the BBC B when I was very young. The first time I saw it my jaw dropped. I was like nothing I'd ever seen. To think now it was all running in 32K! For me this is the greatest game of all time...
Oh the memories that comes with this game. So many hours just spent flying around space, ferrying cargo, shooting pirates and all but one time crashing as I was trying to do dock with a station. You really did get the bang for your buck with this game.
Ah, one person flying, one on the keyboard and selecting music on the stereo (Hawkwind, Ozric Tentacles, Oroonies , The Orb to name e few soundtracks to our adventures)and one person making pots of tea and rolling joints. Loved this game.
If I remember correctly, just the *screen* that Elite used on the BBC Micro used 10kB of RAM, leaving 22kB. And the BBC OS occupied another 4kB, leaving a grand total of 18kB for both the code and game workspace. (Plus, they also developed an awesome trick to change screen modes half-way down the screen, which is why the top is high-res B&W and the bottom is low-res. The psychedelic colours during hyperspace was done by replaying the launch animation, but with this system turned off, so you got to see the B&W framebuffer in colour.)
I had this on my Commador 64, then on the Omega. I loved it and couldn't wait till school was over so I would rush home and play this for hours. Thanks for bringing back memories of an unbelievably wonderful childhood.
Thanks for this Scott. I was lucky enough to play test this all those years ago. I worked at a computer company back in the day right next door to the Acorn North West HQ. They gave us the game to test as we had all the various devices the BBC could have attached. We could get the ship to do a full stop with the Bit Stick and found that it would run no matter what you had attached. Great game, great times! P.S. Gratz on the Anniversary!
Thanks for the flashback, and making me feel old! I played a lot of Elite on the Commodore 64 when I was a kid too. Really loving your reviews of the Elite Dangerous development. it has the stuff we loved about the original game with all the beautiful updates that technology adds today. Happy Anniversary to you as well!
The Acorn Archimedes version was also considered as one of the best ports. I can confirm this as I spent ages on it! FYI you made 490 credits trading profit on your booze cruise and checking the prices, booze was the best option (along with slaves, also 14 credit profit/tonne). You could have also made a little bit extra on the precious metals and gemstones tho :) The big question though is don't I have anything better to do?
Glorious. Always great to look at the Beeb version - especially after putting way too much time into a series on the C64 one (and boy, did I have a lot of fun hunting down that blasted Constrictor). Would love to see your take on that mission sometime :)
Great Vid !! Oh the Nostalgia. I first played this on my friends BBC then got it when it came out on my c64 (also played on friends spectrum), then elite plus - pc,still playing it ( on my pc last few years Elite TNK), now Elite Dangerous. Without Elite, computer gaming would not be what it is today. The innovation & new way of thinking about how games could be played, a hell of a lot is owed to this game & the ppl who made it. So Many ppl will never realise just how much !!
Interesting factoid: all the objects in the original elite were so-called "convex objects"--in other words, they were designed in such a way that the lines making up the edges were either entirely visible or entirely hidden, so the game engine only had to check the endpoints of the line to decide if it should draw it or not. Didn't work if two ships overlapped each other, but that was a rare enough occurrence they could get away with it!
For some reason, I never got my hands on Elite back in the day. But the one that was inspirational to me, and got me started similarly to what you described, was Starflight.
I remember this game...and at the time I found the graphics awesome...lol Because of this game i went later to wing commander...and sequals Now i am in elite dangerous
I had the NES version. I had a special technique to deal with the Thargoids(?) the aliens. Fly in close proximity, release a missile before they can EMP. I used to do bounty hunting with a bit of commerce on the side. The initial part before you buy a better laser is a chore but then the reward is great. What a jewel of a game.
David Braben and Ian Bell were the developers if I remember correctly. I bought it as soon as it came out on the Electron. It was damn hard to get hold of. I never made it to Elite (deadly or dangerous I think)but it was incredible at the time 👏👏👏
I had the Spectrum version back in 1985. I'm not surprised they there were so many pirates. The world you hyperspaced to was Multi-Government which was one above Feudal. With that amount of money you could've bought military lasers which were the best which you need for that mission. The Archimedes is supposed to be the best version. As soon as a I find a working emaultor, I'm gonna try that version of Elite on it.
Mr Manley, thanks for sharing this! I "missed" Elite, but I had Frontier: Elite II... .. and I'd not been paying attention, so I managed to miss E:D launch! Looking into HOTAS at the mo, and planning to pick up E:D before Horizons launches! Cheers, sir. :)
As a kid, I put years worth of time into this game. P.S. Happy Wedding Anniversary! P.P.S. Your wedding anniversary is on George RR Martin's birthday... well done.
It cannot be overstated how much this game changed so many people's perspective on what computers were for and could do. Braben and Bell should have been knighted (different times of course). The efficiency of their coding was groundbreaking and has inspired so many others. Spent many hours on a Beeb B playing this when A level revision should have taken a higher priority... Only reached Deadly status before cars, beer and women became more appealing.
Aaahhh I lost a whole summer holidays playing the original elite on a bbc micro. The joys of hidden line 3d + tape loading and saving.....gosh I'm old 8O
Oddly enough, an old game I was most fond of on old computers was "The Halley Project" but it came in 1986 I think. I didnt play elite itself, but played another game which I cannot find the name anymore (tought it was starflight, but isn't). Now that I think about it, the oldest game I remember playing at a really young age was "Sea Dragon" on my father's TRS80. At any rate, happy b-day Elite! and thank you Scott for visiting old stuff for us. I love LP's/Demo's of these old games you do every now and then.
...Starship Command... where the disposition of the 'bosses' was proportional to the progress, ahem and demise, of your last ship... suitably level-headed, you might be granted control of a replacement ship.... the lingo conveyed feedback as to whether the boot was proximal, good ol' days they was!
@@RexRioch And I digged that other game name as well.. It was "Omnitrend Universe" - complex as eff but it had a awesome setting. Wow 7 years ago... Time flies.
Fond memories of playing the Amiga port of this, though it's weird seeing it with just the wire-frame models and the minimalist graphical inputs. I remember how stern and angry all the people on the system information screens looked to my much younfer self :D
Loved playing this on my Micro. Younger guys will laugh at the graphics but back then they were state of the art and the game play was addictive. 2 main games stand out in my memory this and prince of Persia. Just bought the new elite dangerous and only playing solo mode currently but love it.
Its amazing to think how far computers have come :) This is a little before my time but I remember in the Early 90`s using an old Spectrum, then an Amiga 900 then Sega Megadrive, then onto the first Playstation.......
Never played the NES version, but surely Archimedes version is by far regarded as the best. Though NES perhaps the best 8 bit version (Archimedes being 32 bit). The original BBC B disc version is the most memorable though, given I played it so much.
Bitness is complicated, but the 68000 is a 16/32bit processor and in the peak gaming days the Amiga was talked about as 16bit though had 32bit registers, 16bit data bus and 24bit address bus. Was designed so you could write pure 32bit code so 32bit instructions and addressing and it would sort it out under the hood, but at a performance cost. As I understand it a lot of games were highly optimised to only need 16bit architecture and in particular aimed at the 24bit address bus. Similar thing with the Archimedes. The ARM2 & ARM3 were 32bit RISC processors but again 24bit address bus. Games were written for this, which is why a lot of old games don't run on modern ARM chips, such as in the Raspberry Pi even though it can run RISC OS. At least not without the author recompiling it to pure 32bit. Regardless though, the Archimedes Elite was a unique version that simply looked gorgeous and it played so well.
Tim Moore Only the Amiga 1000, 500, and 2000 used a 68000. The 1200 was an '020, the 3000 was an '030, and the 4000 was an '030 or '040 . Any of the 68000 Amigas could take an accelerator card and run pure 32-bit.
Good point. But you don't often see this with video games, due to how limited the tech was back then. Normally when a 10-20yo game gets revived it has changed significantly, for the better. Look at Fallout for example. This has managed to stay exactly the same *thirty* years later and still be incredible.
Funny to see the similarities between elite: dangerous, which I've been playing for the past 2 years, and the og elite. That game was WAY ahead of its time, I'm not sure how any computer could run it
People complain about Elite: Dangerous for this reason or that, but at the end of the day, it's basically an adaptation of the original Elite, and that's all it needs to be tbh. It's gorgeous and has expanded gameplay basically directly influenced from the original game. Mastapiece 👌
I was six when this came out, it was the first game I ever played and the reason why I am who I am today (massive gamer geek and aspiring scifi author)! I remember playing an even more basic version than this one on my acorn electron, no fancy colours or messages when you docked, seriously simple! Also the tape deck wouldn't save the game (no disk drive available) so I had to leave the little machine on for ever. I got to dangerous when a power cut turned it off. I cried!
5:16: Known for lethal brandy and deadly tree ants. Sounds like a good place to raise a family... 16:27: Was the Constrictor also procedurally generated? What an awesome old game. Have fun on your anniversary thing!
With all seriousness the gameplay and atmosphere beats the hell out of most modern releases. I do hope that it's not just those us who grew up playing games in the 80s that feel this way.
