Hi. This is quite a coincidence - I am the original coder of games 26 and 40, which I wrote in 1983 when I was 16! I live in Scotland, and Knight's Computers there sold lots of MZ-700s. We had a strong relationship with Sharp Japan and we coded up the character set ROM for them which include these ghosts, etc, and 4 characters which when put together make a knight. I was googling around to see if I could find any of my old games to show my son, who is now learning programming. It's great to see these up here!
I had an MZ-700 in 1983 and had some of your games, Stuart. I would have been 11 at the time and due to the lack of games and software on the market, used to write a lot of my own stuff. I did programming until I was around 19 years old. I’m 50 now, and still work in IT.
GREAT FUN! THX! Those are REAL games on the 700 (or 711...)! Now on a modern big television screen you have pixels as big as a pack of cigatettes... lol... but those were the games! I thank you so much!
Yes it is. I had to carefully check every game for the fact that it is really an MZ-700. This video contains games that really use only the standard Japan & Europe MZ-700 character sets. To understand this was very interesting. Now the next in line is the MZ-800.
I recall we had this one when we were younger (circa 1985+). My dad worked for a company in Brussels which was an official Sharp retailer. Our parents refused to buy us any of the Nintendo and Sega of the time so we ended up playing the hell out of some of the games featured here, to the point that some 40 years later I still vividly recall these games and the often annoying sounds. It was also the first computer my dad brought to our school and I'll always remember that he had installed one in our principal's office and our class was invited in pair to play a game of Cannon Ball, featured in this video. Maybe why I always remained a pc gamer rather than console. At a school fair, he had brought one of the first Sharp video tape player at the amazement of the crowd. With the years, I started using the basic tape that would take forever to load and started coding my own school programs, one of which was the 'world capitals'.
My first computer was the older MZ80A. Apart from the bundled software, I only ever bought one game for it, a poor version of Defender. I'd have killed to have had something like the last 3 games, Cannon Ball, Qixi, and Vicious Vipers! I remember seeing the MZ700 in a computer shop in Wimbledon, which previously sold Tandy systems, but I went to the VIC-20 instead.
It's really cool to see the creative ways developers worked with the severe limitations, but it's still kind of crazy that they introduced a computer in 1983 with only ROM character graphics. Here in the USA, some notable computers with only ROM character graphics were the PET, Timex-Sinclair ZX-81, and TRS-80 Model III. But there were all older models, and none of them had color graphics. I don't think any game software on any of these systems reached the sorts of creative solutions seen here on the Sharp MZ-700. In recent years, though, there has been a lot of interesting stuff on the Commodore 64 using PETSCII (the ROM character graphics). The C64 had advanced graphics capabilities, so PETSCII graphics was looked down upon as crude and cheap. But retro enthusiasts have come to embrace the challenge and distinctive brutalistic look of PETSCII. These Sharp MZ-700 games can serve as great inspiration for C64 PETSCII stuff.
These look like the storyboard versions of games. But some, like the space shooters, look fairly decent anyway. I imagine you could make some rather long games without having to take up memory with graphics.
I wonder if anybody remembers a game called Conflict of the Vortex for the MZ700 I've never found anything about this game since i played it all those many years ago.
Games list:
1. 0:04 - Donkey Gorilla (19xx) (Tecmo Soft)
2. 0:48 - Metro Cross (1989) (Kazuhiro Furuhata)
3. 1:46 - Xevious (19xx) (Kazuhiro Furuhata)
4. 2:30 - Submarine Shooter (1983) (Hudson Soft)
5. 3:11 - Sharptris (2019)
6. 3:50 - Building Hopper (1983) (PSK)
7. 4:41 - Side Roll - F (1988) (Kazuhiro Furuhata)
8. 5:41 - Snake & Snake (19xx)
9. 6:12 - Eugea (1989) (Kazuhiro Furuhata)
10. 7:28 - Circus Star (1983)
11. 8:32 - Arkanoid (19xx) (Kazuhiro Furuhata)
12. 9:11 - Blizzard (19xx)
13. 9:55 - Zelbus (1985) (Yauyuki Suzuki)
14. 10:30 - Astro Battler (19xx) (Zat Soft)
15. 11:06 - Nibbler (1984) (BBG Software)
16. 11:33 - Space Bluster FX (19xx) (Kazuhiro Furuhata)
17. 12:08 - Gunman (1983) (Hudson Soft)
18. 12:47 - Rope Runner (19xx) (Neil Roberts)
19. 13:26 - Blast Off (198x)
20. 14:00 - Galactic Invaders (1983) (Neil Roberts)
21. 14:20 - Zeldis (1986) (Yauyuki Suzuki)
22. 15:04 - Cosmic Smash (19xx) (Solo Software)
23. 15:41 - Zeplis (1984) (Yauyuki Suzuki)
24. 16:07 - Zeplis 2 (1985) (Yauyuki Suzuki)
25. 16:50 - Zeplis 3 (1986) (Yauyuki Suzuki)
26. 17:30 - Greedy Gremlins (19xx)
27. 18:03 - Galaxian (19xx) (Dempa)
28. 18:28 - Space Bluster GX (1987) (Kazuhiro Furuhata)
29. 19:02 - Mac Pac (1983) (Devil Soft)
30. 19:49 - Broad Sword (1987) (K. Kawano)
31. 20:47 - Hell Diver (19xx)
32. 21:06 - Sos Island (19xx)
33. 21:45 - Maze Pack Man (19xx)
34. 22:23 - Knight's Castle (19xx)
35. 22:58 - Laser Command (19xx)
36. 23:33 - Red Balloon (1982) (Zat Soft)
37. 24:13 - Orochi (19xx) (Mildsoft)
38. 24:54 - Cannon Ball (19xx) (Hudson Soft)
39. 25:36 - Qixi (1984) (BBG Software)
40. 26:03 - Vicious Viper (198x)
Hi. This is quite a coincidence - I am the original coder of games 26 and 40, which I wrote in 1983 when I was 16! I live in Scotland, and Knight's Computers there sold lots of MZ-700s. We had a strong relationship with Sharp Japan and we coded up the character set ROM for them which include these ghosts, etc, and 4 characters which when put together make a knight. I was googling around to see if I could find any of my old games to show my son, who is now learning programming. It's great to see these up here!
I am very pleased to receive such a comment!
@Stuart Pirie Wow, The original coder of these games saw this video of some of his old games, It's great to see that the programmer is still alive!
OMG! I can't believe to see the original progammer of MZ machine. YOU GREAT!
I had an MZ-700 in 1983 and had some of your games, Stuart. I would have been 11 at the time and due to the lack of games and software on the market, used to write a lot of my own stuff.
I did programming until I was around 19 years old. I’m 50 now, and still work in IT.
I have a lot of your games :) I should hopefully be making videos again soon so I'm sure they'll come up.
当時Oh!X買って読んでたけどあのゼビウスは個人制作。よく作ったなぁ。MZ-700とPC-6001はユーザーを育てるハード！
5:02 I saw this game for the first time in this video. The explosion effect is artistic and mesmerizing.
メトロクロスの出来が凄いですね、ちゃんとメトロクロスに見える。
改めてファミコンの偉大さがわかる…
It's amazing what they managed to pull off given the limited graphics. The in-game "music" on the other hand is definitely less amazing.
GREAT FUN! THX! Those are REAL games on the 700 (or 711...)! Now on a modern big television screen you have pixels as big as a pack of cigatettes... lol... but those were the games! I thank you so much!
Cool idea, as the Sharp MZ-700 is one of the more obscure gaming systems.
Yes it is. I had to carefully check every game for the fact that it is really an MZ-700. This video contains games that really use only the standard Japan & Europe MZ-700 character sets. To understand this was very interesting. Now the next in line is the MZ-800.
Well calling it a gaming system is hardly the right description. It was not a dedicated game system but it did enable you to play games
Thanks for the flashback! My first home computer was a MZ-721 :)
I recall we had this one when we were younger (circa 1985+). My dad worked for a company in Brussels which was an official Sharp retailer. Our parents refused to buy us any of the Nintendo and Sega of the time so we ended up playing the hell out of some of the games featured here, to the point that some 40 years later I still vividly recall these games and the often annoying sounds. It was also the first computer my dad brought to our school and I'll always remember that he had installed one in our principal's office and our class was invited in pair to play a game of Cannon Ball, featured in this video. Maybe why I always remained a pc gamer rather than console. At a school fair, he had brought one of the first Sharp video tape player at the amazement of the crowd.
With the years, I started using the basic tape that would take forever to load and started coding my own school programs, one of which was the 'world capitals'.
What a great collection! Big like!
No Sharpworks games :( No matter, this is a great collection :)
I can't tell whether or not Metro Cross's music is music, or just a bunch of random high pitched beeps in random order
I played SEND-1 a lot!
My first computer was the older MZ80A. Apart from the bundled software, I only ever bought one game for it, a poor version of Defender. I'd have killed to have had something like the last 3 games, Cannon Ball, Qixi, and Vicious Vipers! I remember seeing the MZ700 in a computer shop in Wimbledon, which previously sold Tandy systems, but I went to the VIC-20 instead.
It's really cool to see the creative ways developers worked with the severe limitations, but it's still kind of crazy that they introduced a computer in 1983 with only ROM character graphics.
Here in the USA, some notable computers with only ROM character graphics were the PET, Timex-Sinclair ZX-81, and TRS-80 Model III. But there were all older models, and none of them had color graphics. I don't think any game software on any of these systems reached the sorts of creative solutions seen here on the Sharp MZ-700.
In recent years, though, there has been a lot of interesting stuff on the Commodore 64 using PETSCII (the ROM character graphics). The C64 had advanced graphics capabilities, so PETSCII graphics was looked down upon as crude and cheap. But retro enthusiasts have come to embrace the challenge and distinctive brutalistic look of PETSCII.
These Sharp MZ-700 games can serve as great inspiration for C64 PETSCII stuff.
120%
Ciao, complimenti, bel video! Dove posso trovare questi giochi? Grazie
Excellent Job!
Where is Mappy? i Can't find it!
My condolances to anyone that actually was fooled into buying this machine to play games. It was a funeral party from the start until the end.
このころってゲームをカセットテープに入れて売ってた時代。たしか3800円ぐらいだったと思う。今考えると高すぎるけどw
Building Hopper for MZ-700 is pretty good.
So this is what a hybrid of the Sharp X1 and Commodore PET would look like.
降籏氏って今どうされてんでしょうね・・・
個人的にはタイムシークレットやタイムトンネル等ネコジャラ氏のAVGが印象に深いです
These look like the storyboard versions of games. But some, like the space shooters, look fairly decent anyway. I imagine you could make some rather long games without having to take up memory with graphics.
Love this video I subscribe
So that's where the origins are!
ビルディングホッパーが最高です
I would have never ever forgiven my parents for buying this system when even something as awful as the Spectrum blew this thing away.
The second game sound made my dog’s ears bleed...
I wonder if anybody remembers a game called Conflict of the Vortex for the MZ700 I've never found anything about this game since i played it all those many years ago.
Yep, I have the tape. Not done a video on it yet. Perhaps it'll be my next video.
This has a better graphics than Free Fire.
Space Bluster has some sussy bakas
Space Bluster FX is sus
レトロ
Best Games but Awful Music
donkey gorilla? its donkey kong and dk does not look like a gorrila in that version he looks like a human lol
Yes, the game title is Donkey Gorilla.
うわぁドンキー‥
げぇむうぉっちかな？？
Thanks for subscribe in my youtube chanell