Apple II Bits

Although the Apple II was invented and was popular in the United States, it’s fun to see all the other places our favorite retrocomputer has popped up. We know the Apple II community has active contingents in Australia and France, but we’ve also seen the Apple II in more far-flung locations such as from Russia to Korea.

Thanks to a recent YouTube video, I’ve now seen the Apple II somewhere I hadn’t before: Taiwan. It was the focus of a short segment on a television show in which the host introduced several girls to the 1983 game Hard Hat Mack on an Apple IIc:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PrYLTO4xdBc

I don’t have many details about the show seen here: the Chinese caption translates only to "old game era Apple II". But I wonder what the standard format of the show is, that the host didn’t seem to let his audience get their hands on the game.

I can commiserate, though: I too have never gotten my hands on Hard Hat Mack. As a young gamer, my attention was evenly divided between consoles and computers, which may’ve caused me to miss several classic computer games: not only Hard Hat Mack, but Tass Times in Tone Town, King’s Quest, Ultima, and others. It looks like the kind of game I would enjoy, since Donkey Kong always earns my quarter on any visit to Funspot. As one of the first games (if not the first) to be published by Electronic Arts, Hard Hat Mack is a piece of history deserving an experience.

I don’t have much excuse now, though, since Hard Hat Mack can be played online:

There’s no need to go on a Taiwanese talk show to discover the classics — Hard Hat Mack is alive and well!

(Hat tip to Luke Hsu via Jorma Honkanen)