Posted by Devin de Gruyl on Oct 7th, 2009
Growing up as a user and a fan of Commodore computers, one of the coolest things I remember wasn’t necessarily the great games the C64 could play. Nor was it the 64’s superb (for its time) graphics and sound capabilities. It wasn’t the ability to program your own games and utilities in (relatively) simple and easy to learn BASIC, or even the outstanding tutorials (mostly by the late and sorely missed Jim Butterfield) that introduced you to the arcane and mysterious realm of 6502 assembly language. And it wasn’t the fact that the 64 eventually acquired a complete GUI (GEOS) that was easily on par with anything the Macintosh had at the time, despite the 64’s obvious memory and processing-horespower weaknesses. (You could even get a full desktop publishing package for it, which when connected to an Apple LaserWriter could produce output that rivaled that of Aldus Pagemaker, the then-current DTP champion… and at a fraction of the cost of a Mac!)
All of this was great, don’t get me wrong. But for some reason, whenever I think back to those glory days of yesteryear, one of the first things that always springs to mind is the magazine rack.
This was always my first destination whenever I was in a computer shop or bookstore. In those pre-Internet days, magazines were your primary source for news and information regarding what was going on behind the scenes at Commodore (always something entertainingly frustrating, or frustratingly entertaining), the latest developments in hardware and software, what games were coming soon, fun and useful how-to articles that would make your 64 jump, roll over, beg, and play dead on command… and, of course, tons of mail-order ads so you could send away for anything that you couldn’t find in your local reseller.
Since Commodore was the #1 brand of home computer at the time, there was never a shortage of magazines for the VIC/C64/C128/Amiga back in the day. COMPUTE!’s Gazette, with its plethora of type-in programs and wide circulation, was probably the best-known at the time, though it was never my favorite. I always felt it was a bit too “corporate” for my taste, and I never did much care for extremely long type-in program listings (especially the ones that were merely pages and pages of hexadecimal code you couldn’t learn from, which the Gazette always featured in abundance). I instead gravitated towards Ahoy!, which was a bit more down-to-earth (and featured far more BASIC games and utilities, though there was still plenty of hex code), and Run, which specialized in what were called “Magic Tricks” (short programs that did something cool, or revealed a useful undocumented feature or two) and new-product reviews. For a time, while I could still find it, I even enjoyed Loadstar, which was one of the very first “virtual” magazines that existed solely on disk; each issue always featured a cornucopia of fun software and good writing, including at least one commercial-quality game or application per issue.
But whenever I think of Commodore magazines, there is one and only one name that stands head and shoulders above the rest: INFO.
Chances are, even if you were a C64 or Amiga user in the ’80s, you might not remember INFO (or INFO-64 or .info, depending on the era of its publication). Compared to the big guns I mentioned above, it never had the largest circulation, the highest profile, or the longest run. It only lasted a total of 49 issues, produced (sometimes irregularly and with an occasional hiatus) between 1983 and 1992. But if you ever had the good fortune to read an issue or two of this feisty little mag back in the day, you’ll very likely never forget it. I know I certainly never will, and to a very large degree, its style and unique voice has continued to influence my writing and reviewing style to this day.
Read on for more…
If you liked that, try...
- Retro-Active: The Nine Biggest Mistakes of Commodore
- Retro-Active: The Ten Worst Home Computers of All Time
- Retro-Active: Super Pitfall
- Retro-Active: Alley Cat
- Retro-Active: Dragon Warrior
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Just in case anyone is wondering about the URL for this article, and just who the heck this “Arby Fuller” guy is anyway…
As mentioned in the man text of the article, the very first issue of INFO-64 was a one-man operation pretty much exclusively… but you can imagine how amateurish that might look even in 1983. So, Benn Dunnington got the idea to use some pseudonyms in a few of his reviews, to at least make it look like there was more than just the one writer on staff, when in fact it was just him for the most part. “Arby Fuller” was one that stuck around for several years, long after INFO had hired a legitimate staff of in-house writers and pundits, to the point it became something of an inside joke. (And I’m not speaking out of turn to say this, because Benn himself as much as admitted it several times during the magazine’s run.)
So the URL is just a little acknowledgment of perhaps the world’s first vaporware Commodore reviewer. By which I mean, the reviewer himself was the one who didn’t really exist!