Hunchback

Originally, back in 1983, Hunchback was a coin-op by Century Electronics, one of the few UK outfits that manufactured such devices. Soon afterwards, or even parallely, it was converted to most of the platforms popular in the UK at the time. The BBC conversion was made by Superior Software. At the time, Superior Software did not have the stellar reputation they would later acquire with titles like Repton, Thrust, or Exile. Among their early games, Hunchback is remembered as one of the few decent ones.

In general, the BBC remained very much a UK platform, but some machines were exported, for example to Norway. It was there the BBC found one of its biggest fans, Robert Schmidt, who, since 1996, runs the probably most important BBC website, The BBC Lives!

Years before he started that website, he re-created two of his favorite BBC games on the PC, using Turbo Pascal 4.0 and assembly: Space Adventure and Hunchback. Originally shareware, he released them into the public domain at a later point, including the sources. His Hunchback version has proved surprisingly robust, except for the dependence on clock speed for timing. It will run under XP, but far too fast. It runs very well under DOSBox.

Steckbrief

• Author: Robert Schmidt
• Year: 1989
• Country of Origin:

Download

• Hunchback (87kB, ZIP)

Links

• Hunchback screenshots
• Hunchback arcade machine screenshots
• The BBC Lives!