This game is a really big deal for me! I was addicted to it in high school and it left a lasting impression. Drugwars directly inspired my passion project, Farmhand: https://www.farmhand.life/
I'm a little older so I missed these models of TI calculator.
I loved programming my TI-81 my freshman year of high school. Having a programmable computer on my person-- even one as weak as the '81-- was so cool. I made a bunch of crappy games and graphical "demos", but being that the '81 didn't have a link cable I couldn't pass them around.
I got my '85 my freshman year of college but, by that time, I had a laptop and was much less interested in programming a calculator. I ended up misplacing my '85 in a move. Now that my daughter is old enough to appreciate it I wish I still had it.
TI-83 Basic was the first programming language I really felt like I had mastered. For a while in my first CS college class I was writing code in TI basic and translating it to C++. Drugwars and Bowling were the two really impressive games written in TI-Basic.
But discovering z80 assembly was like magic. It was incredibly exciting to go to my dad's office at the university where he worked (where computers had 2 T1 internet lines) to download and try assembly games when they first burst on the scene (I was in 8th grade). Bill Nagel blew my mind with Turbo Breakout and Snake, and later AShell, Penguins, and grayscale Mario... but the best executed and most replayable games I think were Sqrxz and ZTetris on the TI-86 by Jimmy Mardell. Honorable mention to Galaxian and Falldown. I once downloaded the z80 assembly source for a game, printed it to about an inch of paper, and carried it around for weeks trying to understand it...
It was also really cool for some reason (and would often brick the calculator until you took the batteries out) to type random hex pairs into a program and execute it as assembly. "C063" run as assembly - syntax was the random looking Send(9PrgmA where PrgmA is where you typed the hex code - on a TI-83 would scroll tons of random text in an infinite loop.
Does anyone remember the TI website wars? TI Files (later TI Philes) was "so much more awesome" than "the lowly weak ticalc.org"... but look which one is still around :-)
I'm amazed ticalc.org is still alive and kicking. So much nostalgia. Joltima was what convinced me to learn assembly. So far ahead of its time on the TI-86. Full featured RPG with turn-based combat on a graphing calc. Glad the history is still accessible online.
Man I loved programming TI-82s. So many fun ways to build things. I really didn't learn much math that year - I was too enthralled with writing programs to answer the problems for me.
Oh man, I ported this to the TI-89 back in 7th grade and made it slightly more school appropriate calling it “pop wars”, trading soda from different machines at different schools instead of drugs.
My "fun fact" that I always tell is that I got my start by reading the manual of my TI-83+
I spent most of my 9th grade making a stick figure clone of Street Fighter, using TI-BASIC and graphing functions.
Eventually I switched to coding with pencil and paper because the calculator screen can only show you 8 lines at a time. No idea how I made something that could support 2 players playing on the same calculator, all with GOTOs and LABELs.
My favorite optimization of all time was turning their heads into hexagons instead of circles since drawing 6 lines was so much faster.
For my birthday in 7th grade, I wanted a TI-86 calculator because I could program on it. And maybe because a classmate showed me ASM games on their TI-83+.
In 9th grade, I wrote programs to solve specific kinds of algebra problems while showing the step-by-step "work" on screen. I remember realizing a critical bug in the code during an exam, which surprised me because it worked perfectly for all the homework and study questions.
I ended up spending more time trying to fix it than working on the test! I now realize that it was my first experience with a P1 production bug. In a way, it was my math teacher's fault for not providing sufficient acceptance criteria. I was supposed to learn about polynomials, but I (also) ended up learning about edge cases.
Same here, got started via the TI-83+ manual, started out building simple menu based games & homework helpers. Eventually moved on to learn z80 assembly and build a few simple games. Interestingly now I focus on mobile development. I always loved having the ability to take something I built and carry it around in my pocket.
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[ 2.2 ms ] story [ 100 ms ] threadHand typing sheets that my buddy printed because we didnt own a transfer cable.
I'm so happy to see this pop up here! :)
https://ascii.textfiles.com/archives/899
I loved programming my TI-81 my freshman year of high school. Having a programmable computer on my person-- even one as weak as the '81-- was so cool. I made a bunch of crappy games and graphical "demos", but being that the '81 didn't have a link cable I couldn't pass them around.
I got my '85 my freshman year of college but, by that time, I had a laptop and was much less interested in programming a calculator. I ended up misplacing my '85 in a move. Now that my daughter is old enough to appreciate it I wish I still had it.
I didn't have a Ti-83 so had to ask my friend for his once he got bored with the game.
There was a moment in 2011 I started writing it in "pure" SQL (MySQL) as a joke, but gave up, I'll have to find my DrugQL repo.
But discovering z80 assembly was like magic. It was incredibly exciting to go to my dad's office at the university where he worked (where computers had 2 T1 internet lines) to download and try assembly games when they first burst on the scene (I was in 8th grade). Bill Nagel blew my mind with Turbo Breakout and Snake, and later AShell, Penguins, and grayscale Mario... but the best executed and most replayable games I think were Sqrxz and ZTetris on the TI-86 by Jimmy Mardell. Honorable mention to Galaxian and Falldown. I once downloaded the z80 assembly source for a game, printed it to about an inch of paper, and carried it around for weeks trying to understand it...
It was also really cool for some reason (and would often brick the calculator until you took the batteries out) to type random hex pairs into a program and execute it as assembly. "C063" run as assembly - syntax was the random looking Send(9PrgmA where PrgmA is where you typed the hex code - on a TI-83 would scroll tons of random text in an infinite loop.
Does anyone remember the TI website wars? TI Files (later TI Philes) was "so much more awesome" than "the lowly weak ticalc.org"... but look which one is still around :-)
now there's a name that inspired awe in my 12 year old mind.
i didn't know at first how he was able to make those incredible games, only understanding TI Basic myself. mindblowing stuff.
That opened my eyes to the world of Assembly, which in turn turned me on to the demoscene, and off I went into a truly magical subculture!
I spent most of my 9th grade making a stick figure clone of Street Fighter, using TI-BASIC and graphing functions.
Eventually I switched to coding with pencil and paper because the calculator screen can only show you 8 lines at a time. No idea how I made something that could support 2 players playing on the same calculator, all with GOTOs and LABELs.
My favorite optimization of all time was turning their heads into hexagons instead of circles since drawing 6 lines was so much faster.
In 9th grade, I wrote programs to solve specific kinds of algebra problems while showing the step-by-step "work" on screen. I remember realizing a critical bug in the code during an exam, which surprised me because it worked perfectly for all the homework and study questions.
I ended up spending more time trying to fix it than working on the test! I now realize that it was my first experience with a P1 production bug. In a way, it was my math teacher's fault for not providing sufficient acceptance criteria. I was supposed to learn about polynomials, but I (also) ended up learning about edge cases.
MirageOS was the iPhone Home Screen of that time.
https://detachedsolutions.com/main/
Also, I'm glad this website is still up :-)