![]() ![]() moving out of state) early on.īolo had to be done in time for a holiday season deadline, but it still had a serious bug in the linked list code that handled the smartest tanks. A friend and I started Bolo together, but he dropped out for various reasons (incl. I think the demo was supposed to show off the machine’s monochrome-only graphics. To the relief of readers everywhere, I haven’t had anything to do with any short-short story (or any other length story) since.īolo was inspired by a game I saw running as a demo on some now long-forgotten small computer. Unfortunately, Keith Laumer refused to write a scenario description. Of course, it also supports three players, but I didn’t have any idea how they could split up the workload.Īs far as I know, Bolo was the first published, commercial game that had a tie-in to a novel (or novels, in this case). It was built that way to allow two simultaneous players one as driver and another as gunner. ![]() There were three sets: the joystick, a set of keys on the left side of the keyboard, and a set on the right side of the keyboard. If you have the original game, and particularly if you have access to at least a picture of an Apple ][ keyboard, take a look at the game controls. ![]() I figured that there would be players much more skilled than I was, and I hoped that the extra 3 levels might be enough to challenge even them. I don’t think I ever won a game above level 6, and even that was rare. Re playing/winning at the highest difficulty levels: IIRC, there were 9 levels. But the first time I did that, they were 8″ floppies, not 5 1/4″ □ Gerald: Yup, I remember cutting notches in floppies, too. I’m not a gamer, but this was one of those puzzles that somehow made its way back into my consciousness, which must mean that it did make an impression that was just waiting to be awakened. I’m curious to know how many others among us, if any, may have had one of those games that you couldn’t pass up when you moved to bigger and better equipment. I’m happy to say that I’ve been successful in getting AppleWin and the old version of Bolo on my computer and still subconsciously knew how to play the game. I can’t believe there are emulators for this - but I guess there’s nothing to do now that the Apple II has been replaced by bigger, better, and more powerful machines. I searched and searched, and thanks to Webomatica, I found out the name of the game and took it from there. The revolution began in the 90s when computers were deemed to be useful tools for every home. Not many people were using computers at all in the 80s. I was determined to find that game to relive my childhood. For about 18 years, I completely forgot about what I did on the Apple II (and my favorite game Bolo, including the title of the game) until the game screen flashed into my head this past weekend. The Apple IIgs days were pretty exciting, but they didn’t leave a lasting impression on me. I remember spending my computer time learning how to use a mouse with some pretty addictive games - and then there was Bolo. I must have been six or seven years old when my father bought it for our family. And now for something completely different. ![]()
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