RIP Steve Bjork

[JamesAlexander]

Steve Bjork was an avid programmer and enthusiast, predominately in the Tandy Color Basic and 6502 Assembly Language circles. He made many games, and to many, he was a childhood hero. He passed away at age 65:
 
https://www.glensideccc.com/in-memoriam-steve-bjork/
 
https://www.facebook.com/groups/23594626...730632641/

[TerryRitchie]

Steve Bjork was an avid programmer and enthusiast, predominately in the Tandy Color Basic and 6502 Assembly Language circles. He made many games, and to many, he was a childhood hero. He passed away at age 65:
 
https://www.glensideccc.com/in-memoriam-steve-bjork/
 
https://www.facebook.com/groups/23594626...730632641/

I loved his Mega-Bug game for the Tandy CoCo and it was the inspiration for the first game I wrote in QB64, Super Mega-Bug. One of the most vivid childhood memories I have is the Xmas season of 1982, walking up to the local Radio Shack (which I did many times a week), and seeing a CoCo in the window running Mega-Bug, the first time I saw it. My mind was blown.

I played every one of his games back in the day. Sad to see him go at such an early age. RIP.

[SpriggsySpriggs]

I'm too much of a youngster to have heard of this man but I reckon he must have been pretty cool 

[TerryRitchie]

I'm too much of a youngster to have heard of this man but I reckon he must have been pretty cool 

It was always an amazing day when you learned Steve Bjork released another CoCo program!

A list of his games

Strangely, Mega-Bug is not listed. Probably because he was hired to port it from a game called Dung Beetles (which is listed) written on the 6502 processor to the 6809E processor used in the Tandy Color Computer. All assembler code back then, CoCo BASIC had no chance of running games like this.

[Jack]

I remember "Crystal Quest" on the Mac, I used ResEdit to change the number of lives and bombs to a huge number, so when the gremlins got a bit too crowded I would detonate a bomb

[TerryRitchie]

I remember "Crystal Quest" on the Mac, I used ResEdit to change the number of lives and bombs to a huge number, so when the gremlins got a bit too crowded I would detonate a bomb

Yep, I used a crude hex editor on the CoCo to change the number of lives in a lot of Bjork's games. Ah, good times.

[madscijr]

Steve Bjork was an avid programmer and enthusiast, predominately in the Tandy Color Basic and 6502 Assembly Language circles. He made many games, and to many, he was a childhood hero. He passed away at age 65:

I loved his Mega-Bug game for the Tandy CoCo and it was the inspiration for the first game I wrote in QB64, Super Mega-Bug.

Terry is your Super Mega-Bug available to download?
I'm curious!

[Steffan-68]

Yes, he has it here

https://www.qb64tutorial.com/games

[quote pid="21951" dateline="1703089747"]

Terry is your Super Mega-Bug available to download?
I'm curious!
[/quote]

[madscijr]

Terry is your Super Mega-Bug available to download?
I'm curious!

Yes, he has it here
https://www.qb64tutorial.com/games

Thanks @Steffan-68 I probably need to finally catch up on Terry's tutorials too.
Wow, there's a lot of stuff there I haven't seen - very nice! 
Thanks again and Happy Holidays!

[TerryRitchie]

Steve Bjork was an avid programmer and enthusiast, predominately in the Tandy Color Basic and 6502 Assembly Language circles. He made many games, and to many, he was a childhood hero. He passed away at age 65:

I loved his Mega-Bug game for the Tandy CoCo and it was the inspiration for the first game I wrote in QB64, Super Mega-Bug.

Terry is your Super Mega-Bug available to download?
I'm curious!

Thanks Steffan for pointing it out.

Be aware that Super Mega-Bug was written back in 2010 using QB64 .954 (the SDL version). It relies heavily on MIDI music. In modern versions of QB64 the game will sometimes crash at startup. Simply try again and it usually runs fine then. I really need to update this game when I get time.