Posted on 12/20/2004 8:22:38 AM PST by holymoly
YAMHILL, Ore.--There is a story behind every electronic gadget sold on the QVC shopping channel. This one leads to a ramshackle farmhouse in rural Oregon, which is the home and circuit design lab of Jeri Ellsworth, a 30-year-old high school dropout and self-taught computer chip designer.
Ellsworth has squeezed the entire circuitry of a two-decade-old Commodore 64 home computer onto a single chip, which she has tucked neatly into a joystick that connects by a cable to a TV set. Called the Commodore 64--the same as the computer system--her device can run 30 video games, mostly sports, racing and puzzles games from the early 1980s, all without the hassle of changing game cartridges.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.com.com ...
"Pirates!" and "Elite" just aren't the same on the PC.
WHY???????????????..........
Cool chick: builds/races modified dirt racers and computer chips. All for fun!
Great story - why America is such a great place for people with a great idea and lots of work ethic...
"Elite" was cool.
I still have mine. And software for a GUI. I don't know how they did that with 64k.
Cool product and fantastic story about the designer!
I loved my Commodore 64. As a writer, in economic terms it provided the greatest amount of utility -- i.e., the ability to revised without retyping -- I could then imagine. I wrote a book that was later published on mine!
If your disk drive doesn't have its own CPU and RAM... you just aren't a real man!
C= Forever.
They have the same thing for Intellivision.
You can buy it for 19.95 and it has all the most popular games on a chip and it's just one controller you plug into the TV.
I thought about getting one.
I think the new "all in one" handheld systems are great. There are several for Atari, a couple of Chinese knockoffs for Nintendo, and this one. Even my 7 year old nephew, who's great at all of the major gaming systems (Xbox, PS2, GC) loves these things.
Awesome It's got Jumpman! Definately one of the best home computer games EVER!
The owner/author (Ian Bell) has released it to the public domain. "Elite" (EGA) & "Elite Plus" (VGA) for the PC may be downloaded from his site:
Ian Bell's Elite Pages
Elite Home Page - PC (Download)
ZAXXON!!!
Irony moment. QVC's studios are in Commodore's former corporate HQ in West Chester, Pa.
I used to play a great tactical level military game on the C64 called "Combat Leader" - I'd love to get a copy that would run in one of these devices, or that would run on a PC.
Likewise a late '80s Mac game called "Strategic Conquest"
Was the GUI called Geoworks or somesuch as that? I had a 128...
Well Zaxxon was an Arcade game (full size) that got ported to the home systems... Jumpman, if memory serves (and I could be wrong) was built for the home systems explicitely.
LOADRUNNER was also a classic! Best part was making your own levels!
wholly smoke! Jumpman, never thought I'd see that again. lol
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.