Comment by kilbuz
4 years ago
I have been thinking about GORILLA.BAS this entire thread. I don't remember playing Scorched Earth as a kid, but somehow must have been exposed to it to make that connection 30 years later.
My middle school offered a BASIC class in the early 90s, which was my first experience with programming (besides LOGO in elementary school). In hindsight, the teacher was a complete blessing to us, as he 'let' us modify and play GORILLA.BAS and similar BASIC games during our time in class. We thought we were getting away with playing video games in school, but those experiences were setting the seeds for some of our future careers.
Great memories.
I remember seeing the source code way too young to really understand any of it, but working out enough to flip a single boolean that controlled the sun. Usually the sun had a happy face, and if you hit the sun with a banana it turned surprised. I was very pleased that I was able to change it so that the surprised and happy faces were flipped.