CASA ::

I'm not sure if there's a single "best" way of doing this. Already it's a bit of a headache at times to recognize these unofficial versions from the "official" ones, especially since they have a strange habit of changing titles somewhere along the way
Introducing a "should work on everything" tag would solve some problems and create new ones, as some BASIC variants are more compatible than others and some program listings would require larger changes to make them work on some platforms than others.

So I'm with Dave here - there usually should be a mention of what platform the game was designed for in the magazine. Still, at the end of the day, if such games are tagged for more than one platform, no great harm is done (I hope!)

Actually mangling the URL that eriorg sent, we can get to page 1, which gives us a list of:

• Alice
• Amstrad
• Apple
• Atari
• BBC
• Canon X 07 (?)
• Commodore
• EXL 100 (?)
• IBM PC
• MSX
• Oric
• Sinclair QL
• Spectrum
• Thomson MO 5 and T0 7/70 (?)
• TI 99/4A
• TRS 80
• ZX 81

Which is the majority of 8 bit computers around the time, including a couple I've never seen before. Further on in the magazine there's conversion notes for the different flavours of BASIC. I haven't read through it all yet (as much as I can with my minimal understanding of French), but it looks like the programs are written in generic BASIC.

Well, I don't know what computer the game was programmed on, and they don't mention it in the magazine, as far as I can tell.

When I look at the listing, I think it should work without any problems on an Amstrad CPC, so maybe it's that... but it could just as well be another computer with a very similar BASIC!

I tried searching the web for the name of the author ("Rafi Deryeghiyan"), and I've found two other programs by the same author, and they're on Apple II... but unfortunately, Sorcellerie totally does not look like an Apple II BASIC program, apparently, so it can't help us!

(By the way, the latter Apple II program, War, is definitely another parser-based text adventure in French. It was "published" in the issue 17 (November 5, 1987) of Tremplin Micro. Or rather, it was too long to be published and you had to buy the disc from the magazine, but the comments about the game in the magazine make it very clear that it's a text adventure with a parser.)

Are there any BASIC experts here who could tell us if there were actually other BASICs than the one from the Amstrad CPC with all these keywords?

• ASC
• CLS
• DATA
• DIM
• INKEY$
• LEFT$
• LEN
• LOCATE
• MID$
• ON <variable name> GOTO
• READ
• RIGHT$
• VAL

By the way, maybe we should also mention on the game page that this is not at all the same game as Sorcellerie, the French translation of the famous early CRPG Wizardry, released a few years before? You never know, some people might confuse them...




EDIT:Here's a better link if you want to search the magazine.

Check this out:
http://dcmoto.free.fr/

At the bottom, there are info/emulator links regarding these and other French computers. The Thomson range has most games available, should be a bunch of adventures among them, e.g. Les Passagers du Vent (Passenger on the Wind)

LOCATE is the key here as all of the others can be found in Microsoft Extended BASIC of the early '80s.

Thanks for the Thomson link. I've been looking at the various machines in that range for some time, but I hadn't found any good sites that offered a compact overview of the games available.

Thank you!

And indeed, there's a remark at line 130 which says that the "LOCATE X,Y" command moves the cursor at row X, colum Y. That makes me sure it's actually NOT an Amstrad CPC program! On the Amstrad CPC, it's the opposite (column X, row Y). I've just checked with an emulator; the "LOCATE 24,10" from line 140 is wrong for the Amstrad CPC: you need "LOCATE 10,24" to put the "PRESS ANY KEY" message centered at the bottom of the screen, as it should be.

I also think it's NOT for Thomson: at least, I've looked at a few Thomson listings, and it really seems they use colum X, row Y, just like on the Amstrad CPC.

It's also not for Apple II. (They use HOME instead of CLS, don't they? And I don't think they use LOCATE?)

Does anyone know what BASIC variants use LOCATE <row>, <column>? Or does anyone know (it must exist somewhere!) of a good site comparing all the old BASIC variants, where we could find that kind of info?

While the BASIC issue listed above is being investigated, I thought I'd weigh in with some input on the French platforms. I've been in touch with Daniel Coulom, author of a heap of emulators. Among other things, he wrote:


Not that it's any guarantee that further games don't exist, but at least it's an indication of where to place our efforts.

It looks like LOCATE row,column is advanced Microsoft BASIC - it even carried through to GW-BASIC.

There's at least Citadelle by Loriciels; I had even added it to the CASA site some time ago.

I still don't know the original platform for Sorcellerie, but I edited the page anyway.

I also added two other text adventures by the same author (on Apple II), although it's very hard to tell if Le monde des sorciers is just a port of Sorcellerie with a different title, a modified version, or a totally different game with a similar premise...

That's an ongoing problem with a number of games. At any rate, it's easier to merge two entries at a later stage than vice versa.

Hello, I am a French Speaker...

I am here to announce that the game Citadelle is now available on EXELVISION EXL100.
http://dcexel.free.fr/programmes/citadelle/index.html


It is also available on Amstrad CPC :

http://cpcrulez.fr/GamesDL_free/index.p ... 482e7a6970

So these are modern unofficial ports? In the past we've tried to stay away from unofficial ports (although some are on the site). It gets more complicated with adventures published with source and conversion notes for multiple machines.

I guess it's down to Gunness as to whether these are appropriate.

Yes these are unofficial ports of a 26 years old software...
The author of the original game is credited.
Maybe it's not the last port (but it's a secret).