I saw the “TRON” teaser trailer. And I was completely underwhelmed.

Actually, more than completely underwhelmed. I thought it was cheesy. Perfunctory. Uninspired. Wipe the tears from your eyes, my friends, or let them flow and have them wash away the retro-nostalgic blindness which has clouded your eyes.

This couch is INSIDE your computer. Also, it cost 500 Linden Dollars.

I loved the original “TRON.” The art direction was never-before-seen, and the idea was fresh. It was a stunning movie.

But it was made during a particular time period: A time when we were all in awe of computers’ potential. When they were mysterious devices only reclusive techno wizards could command in cryptic languages not spoken outside of dimly-lit labs. It was a time when you could almost believe that little sentient programs roamed the silicon highways, and controlling programs lorded over the tiny subroutines with benign neglect.

Today, though, a computer is an appliance. Much like a refrigerator or a stove, most people use them as avenues to a different goal. Having a microwave isn’t the end achievement — it’s ability to heat the chili-cheese burrito from last night. Likewise, for the vast majority of people, a computer is a means by which to update your Facebook status, play Bejeweled, or video chat with your aunt.

The “TRON” franchise has stepped out of its realm. It doesn’t belong in the world of today, and lacks the magic of the time period that made it special.

And it occurred to me that it’s not the first movie to go down this road. There were a handful of other movies that made attempts to move into a new time or bend genres. Some have succeeded, but most have failed. A few that came to mind:

“Blues Brothers” to “Blues Brothers 2000.”

The original “Blues Brothers” was an irreverant 80s romp through rust belt America, and a sort of imagined sequel in its own right. Jake and Elwood try to relive their glory days “on a mission from God” by getting the band back toegether.

The sequel, produced nearly 20 years later, was a kinder, gentler movie. Although the script tried to poke a little fun at that pretense, “Blues Brothers 2000″ comes off as a dull clone of the first film. Also, it suffers from “add a precocious kid” syndrome, which should have been the first clue this movie was going to suck.

“Star Wars Trilogy” to “Prequel Trilogy.”

What else can be said about the tale of these two trilogies? The first movie was a comparatively low-budget affair, and while the money steadily increased, “Return of the Jedi” seems like an art-house flick when compared with the CGI-mega-seizure-fest that was the prequel trilogy. In stepping into the modern era, Lucas was like a kid in a candy store, forgetting that story (which may have wavered at times) was the key driver of the first trilogy.

“Indiana Jones Trilogy” to “Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.”

Studios, take note: When the main character gets so old that you have to play the “let’s bring in the son/daughter to be the next generation” card, you’re just asking for trouble. The Indiana Jones movies were three delightful 80s romps. It wasn’t that the fourth movie was so horrible as to wind up in bargain bins… it’s just that there was a 20-year gap between filming.

“Friday the 13th” to “Jason X”

The “Friday the 13th” movies are an example of a humble 80s slasher franchise trying to rise above its caste. The first movie was a creepy, if perfunctory, summer camp horror flick that’s become cliche today. The series continued on, elevating Jason Voorhees’ boogeyman status. Note that the series’ ridiculousness increased with every iteration, seeing the summer camp setting give way to Manhattan, Hell itself, and eventually the final frontier.

In “Jason X,” the final nail in the coffin (pre-reboot), Jason is thawed out of cryogenic stasis in the distant future, where he proceeds to go about teenager killing until somebody finally kills him for what is potentially, really probably the last time. For reals.

“National Lampoon’s Vacation” to “Christmas Vacation 2: Cousin Eddie’s Island Adventure.”

“Vacation” was a timeless American-family road trip movie, but it was also firmly entrenched in a different era of film-making. The movie poured on some thick adult themes — enough to earn it a hard R rating (admittedly, that was in pre-PG13 times). It was also a huge box office hit, causing several increasingly watered down spinoffs to be produced.

By the time the franchise had worn out its welcome, the focus had gone to family-friendly direct-to-DVD releases not even Chevy Chase would touch. When that guy that starred in “Cops and Robbersons” is too good for your franchise, maybe it’s time to call it a day.

We all shifted nervously, the kid-sized Lazer Tag vests bungee corded around our grown-up bellies feeling uncomfortably tight.

The hooch’s presumed owner spoke up. “It’s not mine, officer,” he stammered, attempting to sound plausibly innocent. “My older brother had the car last night, and he must have put that back there.”

“‘Zat so?” the deputy loudly mused with textbook authoritarianism as he looked to his partner. The gravel crunched as he walked back to his patrol car, sidestepping the pile of 10-year old ray guns. “You were just out here playing ‘guns,’ and not drinking?”

He didn’t wait for an answer, carrying on as he rummaged through his patrol car’s trunk, emerging with a small plastic box. “This here is a breathalyzer,” he said, slowly waving it in front of our blushing faces. “If one of you so much blows one thousandth of one percent on this device, you are ALL coming back to the station with us.”

“You sure you want to make that deal?” He smirked and looked to his partner.

Eight hours earlier…

The gear was splayed across the floor of one of my friends’ dorm rooms. There were six of us gathered there under the florescent lights. We bent low to examine the goods available to us.

“We have 6 pistols, all in decent shape,” the guns’ owner said, straightening a pistol in the line. “The seventh is bad — probably a faulty emitter. We have 6 working sensor packages, but only 3 vests — we’re going to have to improvise. The primo piece, though, is this,” he pointed to a tall, awkard hat. “This is a sensor helmet. Whoever blocks their chest sensor repeatedly has to wear this.”

We didn’t have much for way of entertainment in this small town. A mostly abandoned shopping mall and a 3-movie theater were the best things within 30 miles. And, seeing as how must of us weren’t yet 21, we couldn’t even avail ourselves of the town’s measly bar offering. So we had to make our own entertainment.

And tonight’s entertainment-in-question was a supply of 80s-era Lazer Tag guns, discovered by his parents earlier in the week. The weapons cache was in great shape for being more than 10 years old, and after a day of duct taping the things back into working order, we were itching to try them out.

That night, we suited up in black attire, and tried as best as we could to shoehorn our post-freshman-15 frames into shiny vests made for kids more than half our age.

It was dark when the six of us drove separate cars out to the battleground — a park on the outskirts of our rural college town which had plenty of hills and trees — both rarities in that part of the country. We parked in a gravel enclave and divvied up the teams.

How we thought we looked.

As we ran through the forest, diving for cover and gesturing to each other with hand signals, we were all 9 again. We crawled through the bushes, imaginarily recreating our favorite sci-fi scenes, and pretending that the person next to us didn’t look completely ridiculous in that tiny silver vest, expanded through the creative use of bungee cords.

We were having so much fun that we didn’t hear the anxious shouts from one of the players. “Guys!” he said. “You better come out here.”

One by one, we emerged from the forest, stealthily moving, our guns held at high port, lest it be an ambush.

It was.

As one squadmate emerged from the trees in camoflauge, brandishing the weapon in his hand, he heard a crisp shout. The kind of shout that emanates from only one type of person. “What’s in your hand! Drop it! DROP IT NOW.”

Two officers from the Adams County Sheriff’s Department were standing there, the bright glare of their headlights blinding us as we emerged back to reality.

“Whoawhoawhoawhoa… it’s a toy gun!” my squadmate shouted, throwing it to the ground. I remember wincing as the gorgeous relic hit the gravel, the battery cover heaving open like a burst corset, brittle plastic shooting one way as the battery flew the other.

Nearly an hour later, after an interrogation rigamarole that would have made The Dark Knight proud, we were all done wheezing into the breathalyzer and minus one albatrossy case of light beer. Apparently, the whole incident became a big deal when residents called in sounds of “sheep in the woods,” (most likely the vest sensors registering a hit) and were afraid a bunch of satanists were sacrificing animals.

The worst part about the whole event wasn’t that we were accosted by the deputies, or that we were found with beer in the car…. It was that we were found not drinking it.

The officers were dubious of our joint claim of sobriety, but were actually more embarrassed for us when we all blew .000 on the breathalyzer. That a group of college kids would be out in the woods on a Friday night with a 24-pack of beer, but would rather play with toy laser guns, was an act unheard of in this small town.

Epilogue

Pay no attention to the apparent ages of the children on the box.

That night was as hard on the ancient technology as it was our pride. Without enough functioning guns to field a good game, our short-lived joy seemed like a one-time affair.

Until, one day, while ambling through Wal-Mart (I said we needed to be creative about our entertainment), we saw boxes on the shelves proclaiming “New! Laser Challenge!” sets.

That weekend, we began again, a fresh supply of technology at our disposal. We collected the goods like crazy ladies collect cats, and kept them in “go-lockers” (an empty nook by the front door of our apartment). A few of our geekier allies on campus security even cleared the way for us to play around the campus late at night.

A place, evidently, where sheep were common and satanists were rare, because our games never encountered trouble from the law again.

They’ve already given every franchise possible a gritty reboot, and they’ve milked every video game franchise to boot.

So what’s left?

What about making movies out of games that were based on movies? Take all the joy of a reboot and add in pre-packaged brand appeal, and voila! Instant blockbuster.

The only problem is that some of those game-movie tie-ins were pretty tenuous and cryptic. But don’t worry, Hollywood — we’ve done all the work for you! We’ve replayed some of the 80s’ hottest titles, and jotted down what we thought the plot was based on the gameplay. We think you’ll be pretty happy with what we’ve gleaned.

Howard the Duck

The pitch: “It’s like Buffy the Vampire Slayer meets Milo & Otis!”

Plot synopsis: This green-suited duck won’t swim, but he’ll shuffle his way into your heart! When a mad scientist comes calling, it’s up to Howard to storm his island, pathetically swatting at the scientist’s army of encephalitic vampires, despite the bazooka he’s packing. When he eventually reaches the lair, will he be able to bazooka down the scientist and escape from the volcano without ruffling his tail feathers?

Spoiler alert: The movie is only 10 minutes long. 11 if we include the credits at the end.

E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial

The pitch: “It’s like Cable Guy meets Citizen Kane!”

Plot synopsis: It’s just not E.T.’s day. After his only friend busted his telephone up into half a dozen components, E.T. has to pick up the pieces… literally! The phone parts are scattered all over the valley, and he’ll have to climb every hill and drop down every well in town to find them all. If that weren’t enough, he’s being pursued by a mysterious man in black whose lithe figure belies secrecy and evil.

Spoiler alert: E.T. manages to find the parts for his phone, but only after falling down numerous pits and getting stuck in them for hours. Plea for a PG-13 rating with the MPAA, due to only limited psychological trauma on children.

Raiders of the Lost Ark

The pitch: “It’s like Memento meets National Treasure!”

And you thought we were kidding.

Plot synopsis: Cairo. 1936. It was the last great country in the last great time of men. One man, Indiana Jones, must reclaim the … glowing pants of power, we think, from … somebody. Or something. Probably snakes. We see plenty of them. After robbing a middle eastern bazaar blind, Jones travels from mesa to mesa, looking for the clues that will let him into a hallway with.. with a rug and… oh, fuck it. Let’s just call Michael Bay, have him CGI some big explosions in, yeah?

Spoiler alert: For crossover appeal, Indiana Jones is relentlessly pursued by E.T. from that movie-game adaptation above.

Friday the 13th

The pitch: “It’s like Naked Lunch meets Robocop!”

Just got real, y'all.

Plot Synopsis: The Summer Camp is in danger! Six camp counselors must navigate a dystopian summer camp, trying to save the hapless campers from the evil Jason. Armed with only their wits and a rock, each one must attempt to kill Jason before he kills them.

Spoiler alert: None of them do. The movie ends with Jason triumphantly slaughtering the counselers every time. No matter how many times you watch it.

Back to the Future

The pitch: “It’s like Monk meets Pleasantville!”

Plot synopsis: This is Marty. Marty has an unhealthy obsession with clocks. He roams the streets of Hill Valley, a quintessential look at 1950s America, trying to steal as many timepieces as he can from the hapless citizens. His fixation is so intense that he doesn’t even notice the romantic advances of local resident Lorraine Baines.

Spoiler alert: In a genre-bending climax, Marty kicks his obsession through repeated electro-shock therapy visits while fleeing Lorraine in his car.

If you were playing adventure games in the 80s, you’ve likely seen some of David Fox’s handiwork. Most programmers back then went uncredited, and household names were still a rarity, but the products he put time into spoke volumes. David worked on many of LucasArts’ early smash hits: “Rescue on Fractalus,” “Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders,” “Maniac Mansion” and others.

Geek6 was able to take up some of David’s time to get his thoughts on the past and future of gaming, as well as the changes that have taken place in the industry over 30 years.

You were in on the computer revolution from the get-go. What was the first home machine you owned?

That’s a tough one…. Since Annie (my wife) and I started the Marin Computer Center in 1977, I guess we ‘owned’ a bunch of computers, though we didn’t have one at home for a few more years (no need, since we were always at the Center).

I guess it would have be a Processor Technology Sol 20, since those were our first computers at the Center. Later we added Apple IIs, Atari 400 & 800s, a Commodore Pet and TRS-80.

How did you get involved with LucasArts?

The second book I wrote was Computer Animation Primer (co-authored with Mitch Waite). My part of the book had a series of tutorials on the Atari 800, but I also wanted to show what the state of the art was at the time (1981). I spent some time with the fledgling Lucasfilm Computer Division.

That was great! They gave me several photos to use in the book, and Alvy Ray Smith (one of the founders of the Computer Division and its Director of Computer Graphics Research) even offered to read our sections on high-end computer animation for accuracy. I also spent some time with Loren Carpenter, one of their programmers, who first animated fractal landscapes in Vol Libre, and then at Lucasfilm with the terraforming scene of the Genesis Planet in “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.”

A year later, I heard from one of our regular Computer Center visitors (who also happened to work at ILM), that Lucasfilm was starting a new games group. I called Ed Catmul, head of the Computer Division, and got an interview set up.

I was the first person Peter Langston, head of the new games group, hired, and I got to share an office with Loren Carpenter! Out of that office sharing arrangement came the first game I worked on, “Rescue on Fractalus.” I’m still amazed out how serendipitous it all was.

The LucasArts Games Division in 1984. L-R, Charlie Kellner, David Levine (seated), Peter Langston, David Fox, Loren Carpenter, Gary Winnick. (Image courtesy Starwars.com)

What was it like working for LucasArts in the early days?

It was great! Being a part of the Computer Division at first meant we had a very research oriented focus. Our first two games were intended as “throw away” experiments. Only if we thought they were good would we show them to Atari. A few years later, we became much more of a production-focused organization, but we never lost that “research” heritage while I was there.

You actually worked at the Skywalker Ranch, right?

Yes, we were there for 4 years, from 1985 to 1989. We started there with 15 people, and gradually grew to about 65, outgrowing the space.

I loved working there! Amazing scenery, a fireplace right outside my office in the common area, a brook running by outside my office window, amazing meals. On the other hand, when I was crunching on a game, it was hard to enjoy the environment — I probably could have been in a closet and wouldn’t have noticed.

David in Zak McKracken gear, complete with nose glasses. Those of you who played the game are enjoying a good chuckle.

Making games in the 80s was a hugely different affair than it is today. What were the big differences?

Teams were much smaller, and development cycles quite a bit shorter. For example, Zak McKracken took 9 months from concept to completion, with 2 full-time SCUMM scriptors (Matthew Kane and myself), part time support from Ron Gilbert on the SCUMM engine, two artists, plus a team of playtesters.

Many of us did double-duty, taking on roles that might now be shared by multiple people. For example, Matthew also composed all the music, and I also was the project leader/designer. So basically a team of 5-8 people.

Did that make it harder or easier?

I liked having a small team, and having everyone jump in to do whatever it took to complete the game. On the other hand, that also meant I had to do things I really disliked (like scheduling, budgeting, etc.).

I also think that with Facebook games and mobile games, the teams tend to be a lot smaller again, very much like it was in the 80s.

Who do you think had it right, in terms of game development throughout the 80s? Were there any companies that hit it out of the park?

Of course, I’m prejudiced, but I think we did!

The front page of "The National Inquisitor," the clue-laden tabloid that shipped with Zak.

One of our favorite tidbits of early gaming was the schwag that accompanied the software. Zak came with a clue-laden tabloid newspaper, among other things. How did that come about?

It served several purposes… to enrich the gaming experience, provide all those clues so you could more easily make it through the game, and to make it less attractive to pirate the game (since it wouldn’t be as easy to duplicate the newspaper).

Speaking of piracy… Zak’s copy protection was a sheet of codes printed in black ink on dark brown paper that was famously hard to read. I’ve got at least 20 years in optometry bills to forward your way. Was piracy a big problem, even in pre-bittorrent days?

Hah! Sorry about those bills… Yes, absolutely. Even though we didn’t yet have pirate Web sites, we had pirate bulletin board systems. Soon after a game was released, someone would crack whatever copy protection was included and upload the game. They were also traded within some user groups and passed among friends. Unfortunately, I feel we were inconveniencing the honest purchasers of the game by forcing them to enter secret codes while the crackers were able to play through without dealing with them.

We also had a very bad first experience with piracy. A week after we gave beta copies of “Rescue on Fractalus!” and “Ballblazer” to Atari’s marketing department for review, both games were being distributed on those pirate BBSes.

We never found out who did it, and we were naive enough to release those disks without any unique identifying features or copy protection. So by the time the games were actually released, they were already old news, having been played by thousands of people. To this day, people refer to the games by their beta names (Behind Jaggi Lines or Rescue Mission, and Ballblaster).

There were many versions of Zak released for different systems, and all felt a little different — which one, in your mind, is the REAL experience?

The real one is the original, of course! Commodore 64 version.

A comparison of the original C64 version and the enhanced FM-TOWNS version. (Click to enlarge)

A-ha! I knew I chose wisely!

Actually, all of the versions were essentially the same except for graphics and better sound and music. Interestingly, even with the better graphics, we really didn’t add any additional animation, or change the cutscenes. So, the basic experience of playing the game should be the same. I’d recommend the FM-Towns version, which had 256 color images. Check out zak-site.com for some great comparisons of the versions.

Toward the end of your time with LucasArts, you worked on a project called Mirage… what was that about? Why didn’t it take off?

From the time I first started working at Lucasfilm, I really wanted to be doing Location Based Entertainment — essentially interactive Disneyland-type experiences. I was told to hang on, we’d get to it eventually. So in 1990, that time had finally arrived and we created a new, small division called Rebel Arts and Technology.

From David: "The Mirage pod was pretty large, maybe 12' high and 12' in diameter. For scale, notice the full size walk through door on the right with the ramp below it. The large protrusion over the door with the yellow top is the housing for one of the 3 projectors. The screens would be on the far left side."

It wasn’t really part of LucasArts. We partnered with Hughes Simulation to create an immersive multiplayer gaming simulator. RAT was responsible for the creative — game design, sound and music, and the design of the actual 2-person pods — and Hughes would build the imaging system and write the software.

We ended up with an amazing prototype and a kick-ass game, essentially “Rescue on Fractalus!” meets “Star Wars.” You would fly your X-wing (or TIE fighter) through narrow canyons, fight each other, and take on various missions.

It never made it to the public because of the cost of the final systems in the early 90s.

Editor’s note: There’s also Virtual World Entertainment, who made the immersive Tesla Pods for Battletech that I’ve enthused about before.

David in 2005. Wearing the same, decades-old sweatshirt from above.

Do you still play any games today, or have you sworn off of them?

Occasionally I play. Part of the issue for me is I know if I find a great game, my productivity will be shot — I can be compulsive about finishing games and have been known to pull all-nighters. So mostly I stay away from them.

The last one I loved playing was Portal. I tended to get motion sick while playing so I didn’t finish!

Gaming has evolved a lot in the 30 years it’s been around. Have those changes been for the better or worse? If you could take a hatchet and remove one major aspect of today’s gaming experience, what would it be?

All flash and no substance. Not to say that all games are like that, but I think too many resort to better and flashier graphics rather than focusing on great story and gameplay. I just watched “Inglourious Basterds” on DVD and was blown away by its freshness. So given that the film industry is far older than the game industry, I’m truly optimistic that there will always be room for brilliance in games, just as there is in films.

Thirty years is still very young for an entertainment medium, and I know there’s a lot to look forward to.

What have you been up to since your days as a game designer?

David, his wife, Annie and their dog, Josie in the hills of Marin County.

I’ve been working on NewsTrust.net for the past 5 years. It’s a social media site where we rate news stories based on their journalistic quality. Very cool non-profit project. I support my wife, Annie, in her work with kids, parents and educators (Web site, podcats, etc. at http://www.AnnieFox.com).

I’ve also gotten to do some game designs for Disney theme parks, so I’m not totally out of the game industry. And who knows what I might get to work on tomorrow!

And then, during the system’s dying days, you often see some remarkable technical achievements borne out of competition with whatever glitzier progeny has taken its place.

While the effect has paled with each generation of hardware, you can see some great evolution in 20th century stuff. Check out these examples:

The Atari 2600

The Atari 2600 popularized home video gaming, creating an industry that is now rivaling Hollywood in terms of entertainment dollars. The machine’s heyday was from 1978 to 1984, and later games started to develop modern conventions that survived well into the 21st century.

Video Olympics for the Atari 2600. Not pictured: Olympics.

At launch: Most games still followed simple, fixed-screen Pong conventions. There was no “side-scrolling” archetype, and the term “platformer” was a decade away from being used.

Pitfall 2: The Lost Caverns. The game incorporated a lot of modern gaming conventions.

As it matured: Games started to develop depth, multiple (or even scrolling) screens. Engineers were able to dig into the deep color modes of the 2600 to produce some colorful games with striking animation. Pixels bigger than fingernails, though, were still a steady limitation.

The Commodore 64

My childhood love affair for the C64 is well documented. The machine was popular for nearly a decade, and programmers proved the machine had surprising tenacity as a gaming device. The 3-voice sound and 16 color palette was barely used at the beginning of the system’s life; by the end, developers had figured out a number of creative ways to push the system’s limitations.

Tooth Invaders: One of the launch titles for the home computer. The game had about 12 seconds of gameplay and cost around $300.

At launch: Developers were fixated on the concept of “sprites,” which were easily programmable moving objects.

Alien3 for the C64. At the time, reviewers said the parallax scrolling and non-linear gameplay paled in comparison to "Tooth Invaders."

As it matured: The difference between foreground and background elements blurred as the device had to compete with much more advanced systems. Dithering and shading was used to give apparent depth to the color palette.

The Nintendo Entertainment System

After the video game crash of 1984 brought down Atari, Nintendo stepped in with their then-advanced system and recaptured the world’s interest in games. The system was an eponymous staple of 1980s homes, and support for the system lasted nearly a decade.

"Excitebike" for the NES. A classic, but a little light on realism.

At launch: Games were colorful and simple. While the fairly pedestrian sound chip never truly captivated game designers, the 53 color palette was an untapped resource.

The sewers under my city are cavernous places where beefcakes drop from the ceiling. Also, Batman is in them.

As it matured: That color palette became a playground for developers. Artful use of color dithering gave later games a 16-bit feel to compete with the Sega Genesis.

The Sony PlayStation

The PlayStation hit in 1995, and instantly rendered every other console before it child’s play. The system was the first widely successful disc-based machine, and the hardware-accelerated 3D graphics took gaming out of the decade-long glut of side-scrolling games that preceded its launch.

"Resident Evil" for the PlayStation. You can't tell, but this woman is scared. Also, she's a woman.

At launch: 3D games were the big selling point of the system, and games like Resident Evil used creative camera angles and perspectives to their advantages.

"Final Fantasy IX" mixed prerendered backgrounds with overlayed live graphics to create pretty intense graphics for the system.

As it matured: Developers figured out how to artfully blend 2D and 3D backgrounds. Since the color palette was effectively unlimited, programmers could create seamless worlds and “pre-rendered” backgrounds that added depth to the parts of the world gamers could interact with.

The current generation

As realistic graphics become increasingly pedestrian, the life cycle of future consoles may not be marked by changes in visuals, but rather creative gameplay. With the success of the Wii, both Sony and Microsoft are planning motion-sensitive addons for their consoles mid-cycle, and newer peripherals may extend the lives of consoles even further.

Thoughts? Start the conversation below…

In the winter of 1982, my dad and I trekked across the crunchy Michigan snow to our neighbor’s house to see his new toy.

“It’s called a Commodore 64,” he said. “And it’s changed my life.” Over the next few minutes, he demoed a word processor, swapped the discs to show us a database program and, finally, an adventure game.

He waggled the joystick around a little, and the little sprite dutifully complied. I don’t know what game it was that he showed us, but I can remember exactly what it looked like.

My jaw dropped.

And, because dad was a particularly good shoe salesman, we had one less than a month later. I can remember driving all over town to get the pieces, like some crazy scavenger hunt — we picked up the two-tone beige beast from one store, drove for 10 minutes to pick up the printer and a custom soldered cable, and to a final store for the monitor and some software: Dbase64, Easyscript and a little racing game called LeMans. My 7-year-old brain remembers that dad spent thousands of dollars on that state of the art setup, in hopes it would make him a better salesman.

Dad worked out of a home office in the basement — a brown-paneled affair with a homicide-grade metal desk, which now sported this 5-piece technological monument to earth tones. The room smelled strongly of laundry detergent and cigarette ash — not the smell of someone idly smoking, but the ground-in, peppery, nasal-invading heft of an annual 3 months’ worth of off-season nervous smoking. To this day, I can’t smell cigarette smoke without thinking of that home office.

I read this issue. Many times.

Our neighbor moved a couple months later, and willed me his big stack of “Compute’s Gazette” computer magazines. I read each one literally dozens of times, pored over the screen shots, and slowly pecked my way through the programs in the back of each magazine.

I would rush home after school and spend days at a time tapping out the BASIC programs on those pages to create simple programs. One program even created “digitized sound” using the Datasette tape deck — the effect was achieved by rapidly toggling the internal volume control off and on, and you could capture a breathtaking 11-seconds of whisper-quiet digitized audio before the active RAM filled up.

I got pretty good with Commodore BASIC. Good enough to program dozens of games of my own creation — well, to start programming them, anyway, before I moved on to the next big idea. For a couple of years, too, I’d delight in making babysitters nervous by creating fake programs that made it look like I’d hacked into some corporate mainframe somewhere. At the height of “Wargames” and “Tron” paranoia, it seemed like the thing to do at the time.

The Last V-8 was like driving a leaky pinto. Hit a dust bunny and your car would burst into flames. Again.

And the games. Oh, the games. Airborne Ranger, Wasteland, Echelon, Questron, Elite, the Bard’s Tale… the names still roll through my head accompanied not by the graphics, but by the scenes my imagination devised to fill in the gaps around blocks of text and occasional 16-color graphics. The stories that those characters embarked on during the minute-plus load times rival anything coming out of game studios today. When my collection got tired, I’d pedal down to the strip mall and spend an hour staring at every box, before I finally forked over my $7.99 in sweaty bills for the latest budget title from Mastertronic.

Smoked plastic. I miss the 80s.

The printer was a 9-pin dot-matrix Epson, capable of printing custom images, which I would later pen on a shaky touch-tablet plugged into the joystick port. The paper came in those giant stacks of perforated goodness, and I delighted in peeling off the track-fed edges. I ended up taking that same printer to college, where it would faithfully grind out pages of reports hastily finished at 3 a.m.

As I got into junior high school and discovered primitive videography, my C64 doubled as the world’s cheapest video editor. I would connect alligator clips to the audio and video ports, and use it to create title sequences and simple sound transition tracks. I remember doing a 5 minute adventure movie consisting of limited live action, and “special effects” sequences which were, in truth, recorded scenes from the “Test Drive” game, set to my “Top Gun” soundtrack.

Same computer, less beige.

And, when the heart of the beige beast died more than 7 years later, I remember driving to the local Toys R’ Us with mom to get a replacement Commodore 64. This new one was whiter, slimmer… and retailed for $199. At a toy store. A far cry from the thousands of dollars in high-tech hardware spent back in 1982.

The machine grew with me as I did. I graduated from BASIC to machine language. I added a software speech synthesizer and a primitive MIDI setup for computer music. It was my toy as a kid, my escape during cruel junior high years, and my creative outlet well into high school. I never once thought it lacked style or class… until I graduated in 1993 and got a brand new computer: A custom 386-16 with a VGA monitor. It’s 256 colors and potential for a 16-voice sound card (if I saved enough that summer), made my pokey Commodore seem positively neanderthal.

But I still didn’t have the heart to throw it away. The machine followed me into adulthood, and continued to follow me around the nation, albeit in rarely unpacked boxes. Its final night with me was in the summer of 2003, more than 20 years after I’d first set eyes on it. The computer had been a part of my home longer than my children, spouse, even parents.

“It’s time,” my wife said, noting the upcoming community garage sale, and correctly pointing that it hadn’t been plugged in for years. “It’s just sitting in the attic. I know you love it, but maybe it’s time to quit dragging it around the country.”

I pulled down the shoe boxes containing thick spiral-bound owner’s manuals, their weight and density something from a different era. I opened the plastic disk boxes, thumbing through my hand-drawn game labels from my brief time in the primitive hacking scene. Bits of paper fell out, corners of notepads scribbled with game codes, notes from adventures, doodles done during level loads.

And the hardware. The two-tone brown 1541 disk drive (if I ran my hand over the vents in the back just right, it would make a whistling sound), Sakata monitor and computer itself. I hauled them all down from the attic and packaged them up. I created a sign on my noisy-yet-zippy Windows computer. “Commodore 64 — collector’s item loved by owner! Dozens of games, all in working order! $100.”

After more than 20 years, that handful of words didn’t do it justice.

The day of the garage sale, I set up the machine, arrayed the manuals out, displayed a handful of the disks. People came and went, not batting an eye. I dropped the price to $50. Not a nibble, or so much as a glance. One 8-year-old stopped to touch the Quickshot joystick, but his mother kept dragging him on. I watched people troll by with used bicycles, worn clothing, tattered couches. But no takers for this cornerstone of my life.

Not even for $20.

At the end of the day, my heart sunk. I knew that I couldn’t take it back to the attic. By dragging it out to this parking lot, I’d already taken the first step to separation.

There was a trailer there, like a little modular shed, for donatable items if they didn’t sell. “Maybe a school will get it,” I thought to myself, “maybe it’ll find a good home,” I hoped, with all the lost consolation of someone dropping off a pet at the local pound.

One heavy piece at a time, I set the rounded, beige pieces of my childhood in the back of the trailer. I snuggled the boxes of disks in as close as I could, lest they be piled over with unwanted clothes and busted toys. I made sure the cables were wrapped neatly and tight — if just one got lost, it wouldn’t run. I hoped that, wherever this trailer was going, somebody there would know that the fragile soldered cable dad paid $100 for back in 1982 was an RS-232 cable, and it was needed to hook the computer’s serial port up to a printer too far ahead of its time.

But, as someone dragged a broken lawn mower into the trailer, I knew that wasn’t likely to happen.

I turned to leave, but momentarily paused. I lifted the flap on one of the boxes, and reached in. My hands found one game box — Wasteland, one of my favorites — and pulled it out. I opened the lid, and smelled the faint tinge of cigarette smoke, still there after all these years.

I left the trailer and walked into Midwest maroon sunset, one small memento of my past saved in my fingers.

Disneyland announced that Honey I Shrunk the Audience will be closing to make way for a limited engagement of Captain EO, opening in February.

Here’s the best Captain EO I’ve met.  Nicely done Bryan.  And yes, those are Tic Tac containers.  I heard a rumor that Bryan smelled like oranges for weeks.

A lesson on Bumpits.

The King of Cartoons stops by.

Yes Pee-Wee, take a bow.

And just because I love Large Marge!

So THIS is why they turn vigilante

The best part of the evening was when my youngest nephew – who’s name starts with an “S” protested that his name was spelled wrong on his manila envelope, an envelope that read “Top Secret.”  Ah, to laugh at youth.

My sister Apryl has templates of all the paperwork for the Superhero Kit on her blog.  It’s a good read (my favorite line item -  “communications with sea lions in order to create an aquatic army.”  So true, so true.)

This magical wand learns directly from your current remote control and “maps them to particular magical motions.”  For example, waving the wand from side to side will change the channel.

I plan to order it now and then when I eventually have children I will only change the TV volume, channel, etc with this.  Just so they know that I really do have magical powers.  Mwuahaha.  As a side note, I was deceived on a regular basis as a child so I feel good about perpetuating the cycle.  For instance, there was that one year when I was 7 where my Dad told me that he had programmed the Christmas tree lights to be voice activated.  All I needed to do was say the alphabet clearly and distinctly into the leaves of the tree.  There was a lot of repositioning so that the tree could “hear me.”  By the time I had completed reciting the alphabet, my face was pretty much buried in the branches almost touching the trunk.   The tree would then obey my on/off commands.  Which it did.  I even recruited my sibling to “programme” their voices.  About an hour into our game I saw my Dad clicking the remote that the lights were plugged into.  Still makes me smile to this day.