There was a time when games were delivered in 'radio broadcasting'

by Heissenstein

In recent years, game download distribution service widely spread, and there are not many people who do not buy packaged versions of games. However, there was the fact that download distribution of games was done several decades ago, at that time it seems that the game was distributed using "radio broadcasting".

How People Used to Download Games From the Radio | Kotaku UK
http://www.kotaku.co.uk/2014/10/13/people-used-download-games-radio

In 1983, the first attempt in the UK was to "broadcast computer programs with radio broadcasts" on a radio program broadcasted by local radio stations in Bristol , a port town in the western United Kingdom. Joe Tozer, who held this experimental show, was an early adopter of home computers, who had purchased the computer " Sinclair ZX 80 " released in 1980 and was programming.

Mr. Tozer who worked at a radio station named Radio West which is based in Bristol in 1981 launched a project "Deliver program codes by radio broadcast for home computer owners" . Eventually Mr. Tozer said that he actually started broadcasting the program code, starting with the radio program "Datarama" and the fourth broadcast received from the British independent broadcasting association permission to radio broadcast the computer program.

At that time, the computer used the same cassette tape as the audio recording medium as the program recording medium. "When everyone notices that the home computer's program is just a cassette audio, everyone thinks that it should be able to transmit through the air like a radio," Tozer says.

First of all, it was a picture of American popular actress Cheryl Ladd that was delivered on the first broadcast. Mr. Tozer himself wrote the image code of Rudd for BBC Micro and Sinclair ZX 81 in radio, on two patterns. Mr. Tozer said he remembered the excitement of the night at the first broadcast clearly even after several decades that day.

An image of 40 × 80 pixels was surprisingly easily distributed by radio broadcasting, and it was able to send images properly even at the cassette tape at the time that only hundreds of bits per second could be transmitted. The left picture is the pixel art that Mr. Tozer wrote the code, the right is the picture of the real lad. Mr. Tozer continued to stream the computer program's keyboard input converted to Morse code on the radio and distributed mini-games and applications.

In addition, a few months after the attempt by Mr. Tozer, a person named Simon N. Goodwin tried to deliver computer programs by radio in the city of Worcester , also in the UK. Mr. Goodwin, a writer for home computers and games, programmed the animation of "Christmas card" at BASIC in December 1983 and distributed it on the radio.

The program where music and reindeer animation were combined was said that two patterns for TRS - 80 and ZX Spectrum were delivered. However, not all listeners were able to download this animation card, especially on the TRS - 80 it seems that many listeners have failed to download. Also, Mr. Goodwin has found a difference that high bandwidth is easier to transmit than lower bandwidth, FM is easier to transmit than AM.

Before the attempt in the UK, a radio program named "Hobbyscoop" was also sending computer programs in the Netherlands. Even though the computer at that time adopted the same BASIC language, there was a problem that "dialect" exists for each computer and it is difficult to share programs. Hobbyscoop developed a code translation application called " BASICODE ". If you install the application on a home computer using the BASIC language, we devised a solution to convert the program sent by Hobbyscoop into the code of each computer. With this, it seems that it became possible to send programs with one broadcast without sending individual programs for each computer.

Also, in countries other than the UK and the Netherlands, the transmission of computer programs by radio broadcasting was actively performed. In the radio program called Ventilator 202 broadcasted in Serbia , it was said that about 150 computer programs were delivered from 1983 to 1986. Programs broadcast through radio broadcasts, such as mini encyclopedia, simple games, and even flight simulators, are diverse.

Mr. Zolan · モ ド リ said at the time the broadcast began, "Our team was very excited and the engineer who worked at the radio station said," I hear only a strange sound for several minutes from now. " People who are not familiar with computers do not understand the meaning, they would have thought "What are they doing?" But I have a household computer From the listener, I heard that the message "Successfully downloaded the program!" Arrived. "

Ultimately, distribution of programs via radio broadcasting was replaced by media such as floppy disks. The cassette tape as a recording medium has become a thing of the past, and the amount of data such as a game has become enormous. Goodwin said, "If you played the game for PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360 in a radio broadcast as well as when you turned it to TRS-80 in 1983, it will take four years to send all the data." It was.

In Japan, an attempt was also being made to distribute the program data of the personal computer by sub-audio of the TV program " PC Sunday ". Users are able to use the program by recording sounds flowing in the sub audio on a cassette tape and reading the tape so that the program can be used, and the effort of "distributing the program" attracts engineers regardless of Waza or Ocean It seems to be.