Break Into Chat

Tag: bbs

  • BBS doors: innovative social games?

    I came across a fantastic essay written by Andrew Chen in 2009: BBS door games: Social gaming innovation from the 1980s He makes the case that BBS door games pioneered many techniques used today by social games. I think he’s right on, especially in this passage: You may notice from all of these screenshots that…

  • VT-52 demo: Beat Nick Part 2

    VT-52 demo: Beat Nick Part 2

    Since I began telnetting into Atari ST BBSes again regularly, I’ve gotten interested in VT52 which was the Atari ST’s native terminal mode. The Atari supported 16 colors in low-resolution, and 4 colors in medium-resolution (80 cols). If you know BBSes, you can think of it this way: VT-52 was to the Atari ST what…

  • “Why I love my ATARI Computer”

    “Why I love my ATARI Computer”

    Today I came across a really cool textfile that I wrote near the beginning of my BBSing days. What’s amazing to me is that it gives a date for when I began BBSing, and even explains how I got started (a story I had forgotten).

  • Telnet to a BBS using a terminal program in the Hatari emulator

    Telnet to a BBS using a terminal program in the Hatari emulator

    UPDATE (2020-09-03): In the years since I wrote this blog post, I have found some ways to improve this process. Please read my new tutorial on how to telnet to a BBS using a terminal inside the Hatari emulator. When I was a kid calling BBSes, I used an Atari ST computer. But I seldom…

  • So it begins.

    So it begins.

    Wikipedia deleted Space Empire Elite. Well, they killed the article, anyway.

  • The birth of “Break Into Chat”

    The birth of “Break Into Chat”

    In October 2012 I logged into Wikipedia and found three alerts waiting for me: “Proposed deletion of Space Empire Elite” “Proposed deletion of Space Dynasty” “Proposed deletion of Solar Realms Elite” Not good, I thought.