Author Archives: Mike Maginnis

About Mike Maginnis

Vintage computing junkie, Apple II fanatic, bad photographer and all-around nerd.

Unboxing Apple /// Pascal

Posted on February 4, 2012 by Mike Maginnis

I recently acquired a still-factory sealed copy of Apple /// Pascal and thought it might be fun to do an unboxing and maybe record the process.  Unfortunately, the video didn’t turn out; somewhere in the transfer process between the camera … Continue reading →

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Blogging Infocom: Zork I

Posted on January 25, 2012 by Mike Maginnis

I finally sat down and finished Zork I last night.  It was a terrific game, and I was going to do a little write-up but really, there’s nothing I can say that hasn’t already been covered in great detail over … Continue reading →

Posted in Gaming, Interactive Fiction | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

RetroChallenge Update

Posted on January 16, 2012 by Mike Maginnis

A week or so ago, I signed up for the Winter RetroChallenge Warmup in the hopes that setting a goal by participating would spur me into action, and it has… Sort of.  I picked “an Apple III programming project” for … Continue reading →

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Blogging Infocom – Zork I (part I)

Posted on January 5, 2012 by Mike Maginnis

My memories of the first title in the Zork series are largely centered around wandering about in the forest for a few minutes before being overcome by boredom and wondering what all the hype was about.  It’s now more than … Continue reading →

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Blogging Infocom 2.0 – Zork I (Take 2)

Posted on January 5, 2012 by Mike Maginnis

Rather than try to “live-blog” my play experience with the Infocom titles, I’ve decided to wait to post an entry here until I’ve finished a game and let it digest for a while as a whole entity.  That way, I … Continue reading →

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Blogging Infocom, Day 0.5: Opening Credits

Posted on January 4, 2012 by Mike Maginnis

Coincidental to my previous post, Jimmy Maher, who writes excellent stuff and is generally awesome over at The Digital Antiquarian blog, put up an in-depth piece about Zork on the PDP-10.  It’s great stuff.  Be sure to check it out … Continue reading →

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Blogging Infocom–Day 0

Posted on January 1, 2012 by Mike Maginnis

In the spirit of John Cage’s excellent Blogging Ultima, I’ve decided to play through every Infocom game from beginning to end, in the order that they were published.   This product announcement for ZORK, which ran in the September 1980 … Continue reading →

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Season’s Greetings

Posted on December 9, 2011 by Mike Maginnis

    Happy holidays, everyone!  Yes, that’s me and yes, I wrote the AppleSoft BASIC program that rendered the “Merry Christmas” on the screen.  The white sleeve on the left edge of the card belongs to the blouse my sister … Continue reading →

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And the Winner is…

Posted on November 9, 2011 by Mike Maginnis

I figured this would be an easy one, and it was.  I consider this a good thing, as it encourages participation (and adding a prize didn’t hurt either, I’m sure).  I had seven entrants, all of whom correctly guessed that … Continue reading →

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Trivia Contest Prize

Posted on November 6, 2011 by Mike Maginnis

Found it! Here’s what the trivia contest winner gets to take home:     It’s a box of 3.5” 800K Apple-branded floppy disks, still sealed.  As I said, nothing major but hopefully not complete crap, either.  Perfect for use with … Continue reading →

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