Time Switch

IPC Business Press, R.D. Foord Software, Your Computer 1983

Aka:: Time Zone, Time Sliders, Timeswitch, Timeslide
Language:: English
Authors:: Colin Carruthers
Platforms:: Spectrum
Genres:: Time travel, Type-in
Entered by:: dave, Garry, Gunness, iamaran, Strident
Added:: 23-05-2010
Edited:: 14-05-2022

Synopsis

Plot

Your time machine has crashed in the dim and distant past. To return to your own time you must repair your machine.

Notes

This was originally published for the Spectrum ZX by IPC Business Press as a BASIC type-in listing in Your Computer, vol. 3, no. 8, August 1983, pp. 64–65. The article title is titled 'Time Sliders', but the adventure is titled 'The Time Switch'.

It was ported to the Oric by Lars Lundgren in 1983.

It was ported to the ZX-81 by Kevin Bevan and published as 'Timeslide' (one word) in Sinclair Programs, issue 16, February 1984, pp. 34–37.

Three versions of the game (two under the title Time Switch and one as Time Zone) were later created by R. D. Foord Software for the ZX Spectrum and feature location graphics. These versions are credited to R. D. Foord and seem to date from 1985. Time Zone appears to be the 'final version' of the game, as it has expanded text and a "faster" graphics engine. It's unclear if the R. D. Foord games were commercially released.

R. D. Foord also used the ZX81 version of the game as the basis for a demonstration adventure that he included in his GFA BASIC 2-powered Atari ST Adventure Writing System (ST_AWS).

The original game was ported to the BBC/Electron by Jon Ripley in 1989.

Jim Gerrie has created a version of the game for the TRS-80 MC-10.

In 2016, the game was ported to the NewBrain; see here for details.