Apple II Bits

Four months ago, Game Informer‘s print magazine featured an interview with Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple Computer Inc. and inventor of the Apple II. I shared on this blog what little of the print-only interview was also published online, that being Wozniak talking about his love for Tetris.

Game Informer has now released the entirety of that interview online, with a 2,000-word transcript and several additional videos. Appropriate to the magazine’s scope, the conversation focuses largely on Woz’s gaming history, from how he created Breakout for Atari to what he thinks of Apple’s future in the gaming industry.

Reflecting on the early days of game programming, Woz demonstrates his usual humility: "Hardware games — I’m sorry, it’s not like software… I was one of the greatest designers ever; I was working on the iPhone 5 of its day — the hottest gadget product in the world."

More important, the above video once again reaffirms that the Apple II was designed to feed its creator’s gaming habit:

I built paddle hardware into the Apple II deliberately for the game of Breakout. I wanted everything in there. I put in a speaker with sound so I could have beeps like games need. So, a lot of the Apple II was designed to be a game machine as well as a computer. That is the way to get it to people, to get people to start buying these machines.

Why are games so important? Easy: "Your life is all about happiness — that’s how you judge it. It’s not how successful you are, or how many yachts you own, or that kind of stuff — it’s how much you smile."

By that standard, I wonder how happy a life Woz would feel Steve Jobs had?

The full, 48-minute interview is available after the break.

Read the rest of this entry »

There was an occasion last year where I wrote a blog post for Apple II Bits but, prior to clicking "publish", realized the subject had a broader appeal. The same thing happened today when I started writing about the new trailer for the Steve Jobs film. Previously we saw only a clip of the movie, resulting in mixed receptions. Now that a two-minute trailer garnered two million views over the weekend, has public reception to the movie changed?

Find out by reading my Computerworld blog — but you can watch the trailer here, or see the film in theaters on August 16.

Steve Wozniak is said to have created the Apple because he wanted to play arcade games at home. But the Apple wasn’t Woz’s only game machine; he was highly addicted to the Game Boy, Nintendo’s handheld that came packaged with the puzzle game Tetris. For as long as the official Nintendo Power magazine printed gamers’ high scores, Woz reigned supreme as Tetris champion.

Now you can watch him tell the story himself as he revisits his favorite game. The digital edition of latest issue of Game Informer magazine features a video of Steve Wozniak getting his Tetris on while he recounts his encounters with the game and his evangelization of the Game Boy to world leaders of two decades ago.

From Woz’s repeated exclamations of "Uh, oh — I’m in trouble here!" and the lack of direct screen capture, it’s hard to tell if Woz is still the Tetris master he was in his youth. But it’s nonetheless fun to watch his boyish amusement with the world continue to shine.

Last week, Gizmodo posted a clip from jOBS, a biopic of the life of Steve Jobs. In this scene, we see Ashton Kutcher of That ’70s Show as Steve Jobs and Josh Gad of The Book of Mormon at Steve Wozniak.

Like Gizmodo reporter Jesus Diaz, I had an initially positive reaction to this clip. I liked his disparate the personalities were, with Woz taking the time to greet a co-worker while Jobs is more interested in furthering an agenda. I liked that only one of them had an inkling of the revolution they were about to launch. And I liked that Jobs appeared to be taking advantage of Woz, which struck me as consistent with what I know of Jobs.

With that in mind, I shared the post on Facebook. It wasn’t long before other Apple II enthusiasts shared observations I’d overlooked. "Kutcher isn’t trying to pick up any vocal mannerisms… I’m sure the script is great, I liked the dialogue I heard in the clip above. I just think the actors they got are sub par in their delivery," wrote Marty Goldberg of the Electronic Entertainment Museum. Added Atari historian Curt Vendel, "If they are going to do something based on real characters, then they should actually try to nail it down better… I think iJobs is going to crash and burn because of the lacking of strong character portrayal." Even Apple II veterans Mark Simonsen and Don Worth were unimpressed.

One of my favorite comments came from Apple II game reviewer and programmer Brian Picchi, who suggested the best person to play the role of Woz is Woz. Gizmodo must’ve agreed that Woz would have some insight into Gad’s character, as they published a follow-up with Woz’s thoughts on this one clip. He was quick to point out that the scene featured in this clip never happened, though he points out such factual accuracy is unnecessary — the film is a dramatization, after all. More important is how untruthful the personalities are:

Personalities and where the ideas of computers affecting society did not come from Jobs… A more accurate portrayal would be myself in the Homebrew Computer Club (with Steve Jobs up in another state and not aware of it) being inspired by liberal humanist academics from Berkeley and Stanford and other places speaking of these high social goals. I decided then and there to help them reach those goals by designing a computer that was affordable. I gave it away to members of this club to help them. My goal was not money or power. In fact, when Steve came down and came to the club and saw the interest, he did not propose making a computer.

Will the film fail as fully as Vendel suggests? Probably not, I think. As Jason Scott added in the Facebook thread, "Spoiler Alert: This movie is not for vintage computing nerds."

jOBS — which has official presences online, on Facebook, and on Twitter — comes out April 19 from Open Road Films. It is not to be confused with Sony Pictures’ bigger-budget adaptation of Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs.

As I previously blogged, I’m not a fan of the new Karateka. I admittedly did not play the full, commercial version of Jordan Mechner‘s new game, but those who have reaffirmed my opinion: the game has a 62% aggregate rating on Metacritic, based on two positive reviews, one negative review, and 11 mixed.

But I’m still glad Mechner revisited his classic Apple II property, as it’s proven an elucidating experience, one that he’s chosen to share with the retrocomputing and game design communities. On his blog, Mechner reflects on making and remaking Karateka. Much has changed from the original game’s release in 1982 to the remake three decades later, with Mechner commenting on the experiences and inspirations across four short videos themed around inspiration, animation, audio, and gameplay.

For those who prefer a more textual experience, Mechner has followed up his previous e-book, The Making of Prince of Persia, with a complement, The Making of Karateka. Both books are published in ePub, PDF, Kindle, and (coming soon!) paperback, with free samples available for download.

With his recent iOS re-release of The Last Express, I think Mechner has now tapped all the properties with which he launched his career. Might we see something original next?

David Greelish is petitioning Apple to include a visitor center in their new campus. It seems that Apple is quick to forget their history, offering visitors to their offices little opportunity to reflect where in the evolution of Apple’s product lines the user was introduced to the brand.

It wasn’t always this way. In 1984, Steve Wozniak gave a tour of what was dubbed the Apple Historical Museum. As he works his way through the time tunnel, he presents to the viewers examples of original Apple-1 and Apple II hardware, regaling us with tales of design and manufacture.

What I love about this YouTube video, which was digitized from the Apple IIc rollout VHS tape, is how timeless Woz’s presentation is. His enthusiasm, memory, and didactic nature are just as apparent in this 2010 tour of the Computer History Museum:

I wonder when Woz himself will be worthy of a museum and visitor center?

(Hat tip to myoldmac.net)