Jason SnellJust posted on Six Colors: Emulate all the things, Apple
https://sixcolors.com/post/2024/04/emulate-all-the-things-apple/
Gary Hegenbart@jsnell I spent soooo many hours playing Lode Runner, including in the school computer lab. Apple IIe was the first computer my family had, my dad probably still has it in the attic.
@jsnell Now that looks really familiar, and makes feel old.
Clayton Errington 🖥️@jsnell Lode Runner was the best game when I was a kid. Spent many hours playing this. More things like this should be allowed after a given timeframe as well.
bergmayer@jsnell Amiga emulation would be nice, though games requiring mouse control would be challenging. Since you can just boot directly into most Amiga games it seems console-y enough
Chris White finds this vexing@jsnell Please give me an Apple IIe emulator, a C64 emulator, all the emulators. What’s funny is there’s been a ZX81 emulator on the app store for 4 years!
Craig Grannell@stoneymonster @jsnell Albeit (like the similar Jupiter emulator) no loading of external files. I hope the dev tries an update. Best of both worlds: a slew of legal software and the ability to load your own alternatives.
@craiggrannell @jsnell I think it does? There’s a tab in the software panel to open Files…
@stoneymonster @jsnell You’re right. He updated it a few weeks ago but I’d not noticed. (I have it on my iPad but not my iPhone.) Now I want someone to do something like this with the Speccy! (And for Manomio to resurrect their C64 app. I’ve strongly hinted to the dev and he’s mulling it over.)
@craiggrannell @jsnell It’s pretty exciting for retro computing if Apple would just budge a bit more…
@stoneymonster @jsnell Apple needs to get out of its own way. I know for a fact it’s so far at the very least rejected iDOS and MAME4iOS, both of which are great. Yet it’s allowed two stinking C64 emulators on to the App Store.
I need to see if I can find the list of emulator submissions someone was tracking. That had a whole bunch with current statuses – most of which were not great.
@craiggrannell @jsnell I was running iDOS from source for a while, it’s pretty great! Hope they get through sometime.
@stoneymonster @jsnell I still have it on my iPhone. Not sure when I downloaded it, but I’ve long taken to saving favourite apps locally with iMazing and then sideloading them on to new devices if they’ve since been removed from the App Store. Having a pile of my IPAs stretching back years also meant I could do this: https://www.stuff.tv/features/air-today-obsolete-tomorrow-but-my-ancient-ipad-still-has-value/
Grant Me Strength@stoneymonster @jsnell there is an Apple 1 emulator there (shush don’t tell Apple) as part of my 6502 emulator.
Brian Huston@jsnell Where do I plug in my TG Products two-button joystick? It’s the only way I know how to play Lode Runner, Choplifter, Raster Blaster, etc…
@macgnys I played Lode Runner exclusively with keyboard, believe it or not
Bill Lloyd@jsnell Every time I see a Lode Runner screen shot in glorious color I'm reminded of the hundreds of hours I played that game on a Monitor ][ that was green. It's familiar yet strange at the same time.
@wklj I had an RGB monitor for my IIe so it's color for me, always
@jsnell Heh! I said I wanted more in my recent piece: https://www.stuff.tv/features/the-delta-nintendo-emulator-is-finally-on-iphone-but-i-want-more/
But you want MOAR. It’s going to be interesting to see how Apple responds to Mini vMac. My guess is it’ll be rejected on the basis of IP. Apple II would be tougher. Two (terrible) C64 emulators are already on the store, so Apple’s definition of ‘console’ doesn’t appear to be literal.
Although it’s also just as likely Apple review doesn’t know what it’s doing: MAME4iOS got rejected… for spam! :/
Jonathan Dechko@jsnell Of course, if Apple releases macOS for the iPad, then maybe some of this goes away.
Much like people holding out hope for cellular Mac laptops, this is my dream feature.
Michael Hughes@michael8684 @jsnell For reasons today, I plugged my iPhone into my monitor via the Lightning HDMI adapter and was immediately disappointed. Audio still tries to route over HDMI with the phone but not on the iPad. 🤦🏼♂️
Marc Etienne@jsnell I fully agree!
In short, let's recapture the spirit of young Woz instead of being all Jobs worship. Or something like that. The whole "wouldn't it be neat" rekindled without losing respect for user-oriented design.
macfixerThis takes me back to high school, devising all kinds of devious levels with the level editor after school in the Library…