Memories of FM-TOWNS

During my undergrad, I was writing freeware programs almost every day.  I had very few days that I did not look at C or assembler code.

(Link)
FM-TOWNS Emulator UNZ  developed by Kasanova

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This program was published on a magazine called Computer Fan.  There's a simple campaign mode.  I think this was the best program I wrote for FM-TOWNS.

At that time, floating point processing was extremely slow.  I had to use 16bit/16bit fixed-point processing for calculating aerodynamics.

Some techniques learned in this program is still used in YSFLIGHT.  I'm not using fixed-point processing any longer though.  Nowadays, the FPU is fast enough.

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The problem of a flight simulator with a certain level of fidelity aerodynamics computation is its difficulty of flying.  Because I wrote a 3D graphics engine for Air Raider, I tried to make an easier 3D flying game, and made this one.

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Similar concept to Tactical Air Wing.  I made a flying game dedicated to the ground attack.

You fly F-117 and A-10 and destroy ground targets.  There is some anti-air artillery fire from the ground.

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When I was in a chat room for FM-TOWNS users, I talked with friends about good old simple games.  The computer games became too complex.  We were missing simple games.

So, I made it.  It's simple.  It's simple.  There's no gravity.  Just fly and shoot the enemies.

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[DOWNLOAD MAP EDITOR]
[DOWNLOAD SPRITE EDITOR]

If you think it is "Dragon Buster," it is.  Sort of.  When namco released Dragon Buster, I thought that sword-swing games will break.  I was apparently wrong though.  But, I liked sword-swing type of games a lot, and I ended up with writing my own.

Actually, I ported this program to Windows.  You can download the Windows version from here.

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I wrote this 360 degree 3D maze long before Doom came out....

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Although I believe FM-TOWNS was the best PC of 80486DX era, it was minor.  It was before people realized the importance of computer industry.  So, many necessary tools were not available.  In particular, I wanted use my FM-TOWNS for drawing diagrams, but there was no drawing tool.

So, I made by myself.  In fact, my first attempt was a miserable failure, and I learned the power of object-oriented programming through the failure.  I took the concept of data encapsulation in the second attempt, and worked pretty well.  Now I can tell you why experiencing failure is good for learning.

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When Fujitsu released FM-TOWNS, a music editor called "Music Pro Towns" was supposed to be available.  I was waiting for that program because it allows to edit music scores directly and play it.  However, the software was delayed.

So, I developed it.  It's written in BASIC, and you can edit music score on the program, and the program plays it.

I received a 2nd place award of Japan High School PC Software contest when I was a junior of my high school.

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When FM-TOWNS came out, it was only one PC that could run a ported version of SEGA Afterburner II.  However, due to a bad design of joy-pad, it was virtually unplayable.  So, I reverse engineered the program and made modifications to make it easier to play.  This program patches the executable of Afterburner II for FM-TOWNS.  Of course, you need to have Afterburner II for FM-TOWNS CD-ROM.  I don't know if you can buy it now.

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I used the same 3D maze engine used in YSDEMO, and made this 3D maze program.  It's purely a 3D maze game.  Only thing you need to do is to walk to the exit.