Nick Prosch online

A weekend in Brighton and London

Sunday, February 24th, 2013 | Activities, Sites | No Comments

Tags: brighton, guinness, guitar hero, hang on, london, retro

5 retro games I should have played

Wednesday, September 1st, 2010 | Games, Misc, Tech-savvy | 6 Comments

I recently started a list of games that I played for record keeping and nostalgia reasons. Doing so I came across a few games that people used to talk about a lot or that seemed to be important in some way at their time in gaming history.

I tried to pick the top 5 retro games I should have played (High Fidelity anybody?).

1985 Bard’s Tale, The (C64)
I love RPGs (like Eye of the Beholder, Ultima) and I guess The Bard’s Tale series would have let me dive into a great fantasy world that I just missed by a few months of age – at the time I didn’t own a Commodore 64.

1985 Super Mario Bros. (NES)
My fist (non-handheld) Nintendo was a Super Nintendo. I already played Super Mario Land with great enjoyment, and loooved Super Mario World. I missed out on the “original” Super Mario Bros. though (I consider this the original, not the single screen arcade Mario titles).

1986 Metroid (NES)
One of my all time favourite game is Turrican (respectively Turrican 2). Well, this reminds me of Turrican AND I loved the Metroid Prime games on the GameCube.

1985 Elite (C64)
In fact I don’t know much about this one, except that it is some kind of space trading simulation, right? Anyway, one of the first games that everybody talked about and I didn’t have a clue what it was all about, it just seemed to be an unmissable game at the time.

1985 Thexder (PC)
Years after I madly fell in love with Turrican I realised that there used to be a title that reminded my of Turrican. So I guess I would have liked Thexder.

Writing this list I did not realize that almost all games I kinda missed out on were released around 1985. I guess this is due to my increased interests in computers at the time without owning one yet. I got into computing with an Commodore Amiga 500 in 1986 and into “consoling” with a Super Nintendo aka Super Famicon in 1992 (apart from the original GameBoy in 1989).

BTW: This is NOT me, just a fun 80′s picture. I would have never put up a Duck Tales poster (the rest is pretty close )

Tags: 80's, gaming, old school, retro

75 GB

Wednesday, August 11th, 2010 | Misc, Tech-savvy | No Comments

Ever dl 75 GB of data to play with an emulator? I just did. Crazy times we live in …

Tags: emulation, retro

Getting out of bed the right way

Tuesday, August 10th, 2010 | Gadgets, Games, Misc | No Comments

I think I kinda found the perfect wake up sound – the Monkey Island Theme!

Apart from being a brilliant computer game’s tune it starts with a dingelingding that draws your attention (thus “wake up”) but gives you enough time to hit snooze or get up before the song really kicks in.

From a psychological point of view it is a also a good start into the day because it subconsciously reminds me of childhood memories that draw a faint smile on my face – even though I have to get up… try it yourself

Tags: monkey island, mp3, ost, retro

w00t! Got my Comptroller Shirt – finully!

Tuesday, July 27th, 2010 | Music, Reviews, Tech-savvy | 6 Comments

Wifey already told me on the phone that my Comptroller shirt arrived today. (The first one got lost during the postage process…) I asked her to open the package to see whether I could expect something my belly actually fits in. She said: “Yeah, seems to be quite your size, but wait – what is this? There’s a mini CD!” I was like “WHAT? How kewl is that?” I had no idea! The order form didn’t mention a CD when I used it (afaicr), therefore I was surprised big time. Right now I am listening to an interpretation of the C64 classic “Last Ninja 2” – awesome! No really, go get Comptroller‘s stuff, it’s so much fun to listen to his chiptune sounds in the car while your passenger cannot decide whether to escape at the next traffic light or dare ask for a copy

Excerpt from the mini CDs inlay:

Directions to use -
a) Put on your Comptroller t-shirt
b) Activate CD
c) Get pumped!
d) GO GO GO

Brilliant! Thanks Comptroller for making my day And thanks Jack for your “protekshun” …

Tags: 8bit, chiptune, gameboy, ost, retro

Home Sweet Home

Friday, July 16th, 2010 | Tech-savvy | 1 Comment

Not exactly, but pretty much! I’ve just come back from a road-trip around the UK. It was a brilliant jaunt, but after almost three weeks I am happy to bum on my couch for a few days before going back to work. Expect some random impressions at this blog soon.

@see http://www.armyoftrolls.co.uk/

Tags: arcade, pixel art, retro

Chiptune Madness

Wednesday, June 9th, 2010 | Gadgets, Misc, Music, Reviews, Tech-savvy | 1 Comment

Thanks to my favourite emag Lotek64 I stumbled upon some really interesting music: Chiptune!

I like to listen to OSTs of games and films (favourite game OST: Turrican 1/2 by Chris Hülsbeck, favourite motion picture OST: Avalon by Kenji Kawai). Reading Lotek64 the absolutely stylish cover arose my initial interest, reading the review I decided to give it a try:

(Chip) Comptroller veröffentlicht mit seinem RPM2010-Album auch sein Debüt. Zwischen schnellen und wütenden Chipbeats kommen dabei auch immer nette kleine Melodien zum Vorschein.

Free Download @ http://comptrolleralpha.co.uk/album/comptroller

Listening to this artistic musical creation reminds me of endless GameBoy sessions and the time I connected my GameBoy to my home stereo to listen to the music of Super Mario Land and, naturally, Tetris. The sound of Comptroller is “great” in the sense of interesting/disturbing – sometimes even toothaching listened to at the right volume

Lotek64 Issue 33 has more interesting musical reviews, such as an 8bit NES chiptune version of Pink Floyd‘s “The Dark Side of the Moon” called Moon8.

(Remake) … Wer das nur für einen musikalischen Scherz hält, irrt. Mit Moon8 tut Brad Smith Pink Floyd einen großen Gefallen, indem er die Stärken des Albums offenlegt und mit seiner klanglich zwangsläufig äußerst minimalistischen Auslegung der Kompositionen zu einer Entmystifizierung dieses überhöhten Werks beiträgt. Hier wird auf unerwartete Weise hörbar, wie The Dark Side of the Moon klingen könnte, wäre es nicht so hoffnungslos überproduziert und verkitscht worden. Moon8 ist die bessere Version des Albums, dessen Qualitäten endlich auf würdige Art hörbar werden.

Free download @ http://rainwarrior.thenoos.net/music/moon8.html

Crazy shit indeed! Thanks Lotek64 for providing these reviews!

Googleing I also found two blogs (The Chiptune Blog, Stadkind: Berlin), just in case you want to listen to some more chiptunes. So far, I like the idea a lot!

Tags: 8bit, avalon, chiptune, chris hülsbeck, gameboy, kenji kawai, lotek64, ost, retro, turrican