cimg09 The Patcher Pitcher

October 2013, by La Mimita Chiquita



The story of a community coder!









'I wasn't allowed to touch his computer at all'



We're of course talking about patch packs, mostly sharing the common denominator of generally being a one man development process. In other words, they are usually designed and constructed by one person to be used by anyone who wants a little bit more challenging games than what the more or less "official" versions are able to offer. But none of this is obviously done in a jiffy! It requires some extraordinary skills and ideally also a design that appeals to a larger group of users, which in the end increases the responsiveness and motivation to both continue and further improve what is already done. So with that said, what is the recipe for a successful patch pack concept? Well, one person that obviously should know is ChillCore, up to this point serving version 14.7 of his rather huge patch pack, released earlier this year and consisting of nearly 50 other smaller patches and game scripts developed by other devoted fans in the community.



Starting his career at early ages ChillCore became very impressed by his fathers Spectrum ZX81, a device produced by Sinclair Research, which he wasn't allowed to touch at all as ChillCore explains;



-"Those machines used to be quite expensive, but I settled down with the manual instead, reading it from the first page to the last over and over again. The device itself contained a little slalom game, nothing fancy graphical wise, but it was awesome to view text you entered on the screen performing certain tasks such as speeding up the game and making it harder as you added more and more obstacles to it"!



His father later on got a VIC-20, a less expensive 8-bit home computer released by Commodore, but things Unlike Chris Sawyer's original version of Transport Tycoon Deluxe, todays range is considerably greater for those who wants to go ahead as a successful CEO of a fictitious company in the freight and passenger transportation industry. And while a few still chooses Josef Drexler's TTDPatch for their ultimate gaming experience, a vast majority nowadays leans towards the open source version, OpenTTD, both of them offering far more than what the original game ever touched. But there is always that clique of users who aren't satisfied with these options at all, instead eager to try out even greater challenges - or rather more specific solutions for their ultimate gaming experience. The more complicated, the better it may seem! And if you happen to be one of those preferring the latter there are a number of choices out there, all thanks to some especially devoted and diehard fans in the Transport Tycoon community.We're of course talking about patch packs, mostly sharing the common denominator of generally being a one man development process. In other words, they are usually designed and constructed by one person to be used by anyone who wants a little bit more challenging games than what the more or less "official" versions are able to offer. But none of this is obviously done in a jiffy! It requires some extraordinary skills and ideally also a design that appeals to a larger group of users, which in the end increases the responsiveness and motivation to both continue and further improve what is already done. So with that said, what is the recipe for a successful patch pack concept? Well, one person that obviously should know is ChillCore, up to this point serving version 14.7 of his rather huge patch pack, released earlier this year and consisting of nearly 50 other smaller patches and game scripts developed by other devoted fans in the community.Starting his career at early ages ChillCore became very impressed by his fathers Spectrum ZX81, a device produced by Sinclair Research, which he wasn't allowed to touch at all as ChillCore explains;His father later on got a VIC-20, a less expensive 8-bit home computer released by Commodore, but things





'I learned where my limitations are'



-"I kept reading books by the masses and had various consoles, most of them ending up with a burnt graphics processor as I pushed the limits in every game possible. But I still couldn't compile programs until I found JavaScript, which allowed me to continue from where I left off back in the days of BASIC".



He also messed around with different freeware programs as well as a few paid softwares, trying to learn the ins and out of creating graphics, music and everything else that is needed to actually make a site. But facing a lack of interesting content he eventually turned it into a HTML/DHTML/JavaScript tutorial with links to a help page, explaining how things that is seen on a screen, the working code, is actually done without having to view the source code in a separate window. He also aquired the skills to make flash movies, as well as director applications, although most of it currently in a rather unfinished state and not likely to ever get completed. ChillCore continues;



-"I borrowed every single book I could find on programming in the local library, which I read front to back. This proved that nearly every programming has the same principals, only the things you can do in some of them is easier then in others. One language stood out and that was C++, it allows you to do everything while keeping fast execution of the code at the small cost of having to type more code to make it run on all platforms. By that I mean that Java will run on all machines, but at the cost of losing execution speed because of the virtual machine it runs on".



started to change when he finally invested in a Commodore 64, a home computer that still remains the highest selling computer of all time. Having full access to the VIC-20 ChillCore got himself going by typing in example codes he found in manuals and other various litteratures his father used to buy, basically wherever he was able to find code examples. He also took a weeks worth of BASIC classes that didn't provide any significant new learnings, except perhaps how to draw schemes. And when the time eventually came for his father to purchase an Amiga, Commodores high-end family of personal computers, ChillCores life unfortunately took some turns and twists based on bad decisions and choices at the age of 16, taking him away from the coding interest for awhile. A few years later, having his life back together in one piece and at the same time getting his brothers older PC, ChillCore was back again;He also messed around with different freeware programs as well as a few paid softwares, trying to learn the ins and out of creating graphics, music and everything else that is needed to actually make a site. But facing a lack of interesting content he eventually turned it into a HTML/DHTML/JavaScript tutorial with links to a help page, explaining how things that is seen on a screen, the working code, is actually done without having to view the source code in a separate window. He also aquired the skills to make flash movies, as well as director applications, although most of it currently in a rather unfinished state and not likely to ever get completed. ChillCore continues;

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