This week isn’t just the 40th anniversary of the first moon landings, it’s also the 40th anniversary of the video game Lunar Lander.

Having a go at this excellent remake (for Windows), I learnt an important lesson that one can use in real life:

Try pressing Shift to start if nothing else seems to work No, that’s not it.

Don’t go for the bigger fuel tank. Upgrading to the more efficient engine is a better buy.

Actually that’s got a fairly narrow application, hasn’t it.

Oh well, the game was fun.

heh. Living with First-Person Shooter Disease:

I’ve been trying out Oolite, the open-source Elite clone.

It’s got its niggles, but it’s a very good copy of the BBC Micro original — I took a look at that again to compare. I’ve found myself wanting the original keyboard controls, and may go ahead and reconfigure it to match.

While playing around with the BBC version (actually the slightly-enhanced Master version) I refreshed my memory of how to dock without using a docking computer. I was a bit rusty, but managed to do it without too much trouble. (Well, okay, it was actually my second attempt — BeebEm includes an option to record output to an AVI.)

If you want to play a Gamecube game on the Wii, you need a Gamecube controller. Nintendo’s Classic Controller won’t do it. (Makes me wonder why they bothered releasing it, since you can use a Gamecube controller for Virtual Console classic games.)

Anyway, the youngest wanted one to play some Gamecube games, so we went hunting (in Melbourne). You can’t buy original Nintendo controllers retail now (might find them on ebay I suppose), but the (clone) options we found were:

Harvey Norman — corded, $30.
KMart — had nothing.
Dick Smith — cordless, $40.
EB Games — corded, $30 (not listed on their web site).
Game — corded, normally $24, on sale for $19.
JB Hifi — same as Dick Smith.
Big W — corded plus a Gamecube memory card (needed for Gamecube saves) $29.

As he wanted a memory card, and they appear to be pretty scarce, we ended up with the latter, which works well, though it would have been nice with a slightly longer cord.

It’s nice to know that (for the moment) you can still buy these things and play the old games. Viva la backwards compatibility.

Back before Christmas, I had pondered getting an XBox 360. Hey, it would let me play the new Pacman, and that Braid game sounds really good.

Then I discovered according to Wikipedia and Microsoft, there are a number of XBox games we have at home that can’t be played on the 360.

So I’d have to keep the old XBox going to play them. That sucks.

And at least one of them is a Microsoft game.

• Midtown Madness 3
• Shrek 2
• Wallace and Gromit
• Midway Arcade Classics
• Pro Evolution Soccer 4

Evidently each game needs an emulation profile. Which means I suppose that alas the XBox 360 is not sufficiently advanced as to be able to fully and properly emulate the original XBox, which is why each game needs to be made compatible individually.

We ended up getting a Wii for Christmas. Admittedly the old XBox hasn’t been switched-on since.

At least Nintendo do their backward compatibility properly. Having seen how Microsoft’s dealt half-heartedly with the old XBox, I wouldn’t have wanted to buy into another technological dead-end.

I might see what’s out there to turn it into a Media Centre instead.

Over the weekend the Byte Back retro-gaming event was on in Stoke-on-Trent, UK. Here’s a set of pictures from it, and there’s also some video. Check the Stormtroopers queuing up to play the Star Wars game!

(Click through to watch in HD; lots of detail to be seen.)

Guitar Hero/Rock Band compatibility: For those looking at the options for Guitar Hero and Rock Band (insert grumble about RB2 not yet being available in Australia), check Joystiq’s instrument compatibility chart to see which instruments work with which games.

OpenID: Ooh, this I like: Jeff Atwood on how to use your own URL for your OpenID.

Unix quick reference: Here

heh.

The Game On exhibition, which recently showed in Melbourne, has recently opened in Brisbane, and new retro/indie gaming blog Just One More Game has an extensive review of it (in three parts).

State Library of Queensland: Game On!

Game On from GameOn Slq on Vimeo.

Even though the official Scrabble isn’t available outside North America, Scrabulous has disappeared for all Facebook users.

The Scrabulous guys have thrown the game through the mixer and come up with WordScraper… which, to be honest, looks pretty similar, and may be almost as much fun.

Back when it was announced, it sounded like Nintendo’s WiiWare would let bedroom coders get their games into their Wiis, just like Microsoft XNA lets anybody write for the XBox 360.

Not so. Apparently all the usual NDAs and licence fees apply. The difference is the games can be developed by small teams (within licenced developers) and the games are distributed via Nintendo’s online service.

Nintendo snubbing small developers for WiiWare

WiiWare is a lie

I know I was never going to get around to coding any more games, not with my current workload, but all the same, I liked the idea, and it was helping leaning me towards buying a Wii.

Microsoft has dropped the price of XBox 360 in Australia, to $349 for the base-level Arcade (note, it doesn’t run old XBox games because it has no hard drive, and won’t provide HD video), $499 for the Pro (what should be called the standard model), and $649 for the XBox 360 Elite.

XBoxWorld reports the Arcade can be got from BigW for just $278 at the moment.

Hmmm. $278 to play Pacman Championship Edition. Am I enough of a sucker to buy it?

Comparative RRPs: Nintendo Wii $399.95; PS3 $699.95. (Why does Nintendo’s web site include no price information?!)