Simulation / Simulation - Space · 1985

Orbit - A Trip to the Moon

Published by Antic Software

atarimania.com — atari-400-800-xl-xe-games-orbit-a-trip-to-the-moon-3815

Information

Rating: 7.0/10 · Votes: 17 · Downloads: 1,468 · Hits: 6,605

Many thanks to the author for sending the full instructions!

Vic DeCarlo — 8 Sept 2011
Yes, it must have been a tedious task going to ASM. I would say out of the 50+ Atari games, this was tops. Second was Way down, compared. Was watching a space special on the moon landings.It was as if I was part of the program. The joy to land safely, for real (almost) was unexplainable. Wish you'd convert it to Windows/Mac/?... Or have someone do it. I'm a retired programmer and wish I was up to date. Well, thanks very very much for the wonderful job. Hope you got a good commision :{)
John Reagh — 27 Apr 2005
This started as an exercise to simulate orbital mechanics. First, I just messed around with the algebra, then I started to write this game in Atari Basic. (remember the Basic language in an 8K ROM cartridge? Wow.) It ran way too slow, mostly because of the many trig functions. I tried writing fast trig functions in Assembler but it took too long to call them from Basic. Eventually the whole thing was in Assembler. I'm amazed and pleased that some people are still enjoying these old games.