My undying love for the painfully uncool Amiga(theguardian.com)
theguardian.com
My undying love for the painfully uncool Amiga
https://www.theguardian.com/games/2024/apr/26/my-undying-love-for-the-painfully-uncool-amiga
17 comments
This thing could run video games that looked almost exactly like the arcade versions - at the time this was absolute proof of coolness
Indeed. I thought they were damned cool.
The only thing I didn't like was that I couldn't afford one.
The only thing I didn't like was that I couldn't afford one.
Yes. The Amigas were not at the C64-level of home computing affordability while, at the same time, being quite a bit more expensive than the Atari ST's. Unless one needed the features (arcade-like games, multitasking), it was not a great choice.
The Amiga was never uncool - it startled the entire industry with it unbelievable graphics and sound far, far ahead of the rest.
I had undying love for vintage computers for a long time and have accumulated so many of them I literally don't know how many I own. I bought them from eBay for a long time and never even opened the boxes. Thus my garage has lots of unopened boxes in it sent from eBay sellers with unknown vintage machines in them.
I have found however that my urge to collect them was very different to my desire to own them. I loved finding and buying them and never used any of my vintage machines except for I used one once.
I now plan to sell them all. Vintage machines need to be cared for, loved and recapped and I can't be bothered to do that.
I had undying love for vintage computers for a long time and have accumulated so many of them I literally don't know how many I own. I bought them from eBay for a long time and never even opened the boxes. Thus my garage has lots of unopened boxes in it sent from eBay sellers with unknown vintage machines in them.
I have found however that my urge to collect them was very different to my desire to own them. I loved finding and buying them and never used any of my vintage machines except for I used one once.
I now plan to sell them all. Vintage machines need to be cared for, loved and recapped and I can't be bothered to do that.
I have lots of Amigas I bought about 10-15 years ago too in my basement. Just not being used nowadays. Cost 50 quid each back in the day.
"squid". It's pronounced "squid".
The author, Dominik Diamond, was the presenter of the UK Channel 4's legendary 90s video games TV show "GamesMaster". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GamesMaster
I remember the Amiga 500 being extremely cool in the UK, the essential gift for teens in xmas 89/90. So I'm curious about the context where for Dominik Diamond it was uncool.
Dominik was a games journalist back then (still is now to be fair). Back then games consoles were the cool thing and home computers weren’t exactly uncool but definitely a slightly adjacent scene. A little like PlayStation vs PC gaming in the 00s to present day.
You also have to bare in mind that home computers are more likely to have been “cool” (which, after all, is a subjective term) to people within the HN echo chamber than it would have been to the average person.
It’s also very likely that Dominik is talking about the Amiga being uncool just to wind a few people up. He is infamous for being a windup merchant. You only have to watch a few episodes of 90s Gamesmaster to see that.
You also have to bare in mind that home computers are more likely to have been “cool” (which, after all, is a subjective term) to people within the HN echo chamber than it would have been to the average person.
It’s also very likely that Dominik is talking about the Amiga being uncool just to wind a few people up. He is infamous for being a windup merchant. You only have to watch a few episodes of 90s Gamesmaster to see that.
Somewhat related: a few weeks ago the "Amigo" software sampler plugin was released and it has been a minor hit among music producers. It has nostalgic 8-bit graphics and it emulate's the Amiga's sound pretty well. If you're into music production, it might be worth checking out:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sT4V4dhef64
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sT4V4dhef64
> Like the Spectrum before it, the Amiga allowed people who couldn’t afford a PC to play games on a computer. Then the PC killed it: microchips got cheaper, Amiga didn’t move fast enough, and it seemed to die really quickly.
TFA's author must be from a parallel world. I remember actual businessmen (friend's father and friends of him) having "PC"s at home. Monochrome piece of mediocre underperforming slow pieces of shit they were. 286 crap.
While us on our Amiga could run typesetting programs, edit videos (try that on a PC from back then), "digitize" audio samples (we had "digitizer" allowing to transform an analog audio source into digital files), run countless intros and demos and games as good as those in the arcades.
Games on the PC back then were pieces of turd written in BASIC.
> uncool
Yeah. But no. Not in this world. In this world the Commodore Amiga was one of the most badass, coolest, machine ever which was half a fucking decade ahead of its time. It was the coolest thing around and it deserves the scene and following it still enjoys.
P.S: I don't always flag submissions, but I do I do it about obvious pieces of trolling
TFA's author must be from a parallel world. I remember actual businessmen (friend's father and friends of him) having "PC"s at home. Monochrome piece of mediocre underperforming slow pieces of shit they were. 286 crap.
While us on our Amiga could run typesetting programs, edit videos (try that on a PC from back then), "digitize" audio samples (we had "digitizer" allowing to transform an analog audio source into digital files), run countless intros and demos and games as good as those in the arcades.
Games on the PC back then were pieces of turd written in BASIC.
> uncool
Yeah. But no. Not in this world. In this world the Commodore Amiga was one of the most badass, coolest, machine ever which was half a fucking decade ahead of its time. It was the coolest thing around and it deserves the scene and following it still enjoys.
P.S: I don't always flag submissions, but I do I do it about obvious pieces of trolling
He is comparing the Amiga to popular games consoles of that era. There has always been a home computer vs games console divide.
Sure if you compare the Amiga to the PC the Amiga was cool. But PC gaming has also always been seen as uncool too.
(I’ve always owned both, but I’m part of the same “uncool” crowd as the others in this echo chamber in that I’ve enjoyed home computers too)
Sure if you compare the Amiga to the PC the Amiga was cool. But PC gaming has also always been seen as uncool too.
(I’ve always owned both, but I’m part of the same “uncool” crowd as the others in this echo chamber in that I’ve enjoyed home computers too)
I will always respect Amiga computers. When I went to college in the fall of 1989, I brought my beloved Apple IIc and 9" green screen. The day after moving in to the dorm, I discovered that one of my fellow students on the floor had an Amiga and I was absolutely floored by the color graphics and performance.
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When it was released, it had some of the most sophisticated graphics of any personal computer twice its price. At that time, PCs had 286s and EGA graphics at best (and most had CGA, or the little better Tandy models).