Oh, I can cheat. I can open MAME and sort by year.

Galaxy Game 1971 is the first actually working game in MAME. That doesn't mean it's the first game, it means it's the first that can be emulated by MAME. There are a few earlier machines, but they a) don't work, and b) aren't games. MAME doesn't have speedway or spacewar! at all though.

I don't know which was first, but Spacewar! and maybe more came before Pong. I think Pong was just the first to actually be successful, rather than the first to be commercial.

The Skyrack, in the Shadow of Rombald, in the Great Jorvik Empire.

Or, in less poetic language, Wharfedale. Technically Leeds, but closer to York.

valerie wrote:
So it is interesting to note that some of these games today, were actually in existence before the
internet or at the extreme earliest of the internet, before all the game stations.

I'm trying to decide which came first - the internet or the computer game.

Like most things, it gets really fuzzy at the edges when you try to decide which was the first anything.

I believe Bertie the Brain was made in 1950, but you wouldn't recognise it as a computer game today. OXO in 1952 could probably just about pass as a computer game as you know it.

It wasn't until 1972, Hunt The Wumpus and Pong were made.

The internet is easier. DARPA in 1962. Not the internet as you know it, but the internet. Packet networking already existed, but nothing you could really see the internet growing out of before then.

So, probably the computer game, but it depends on your point of view as to what counts as the first computer game.

Also, don't quote me on the years. I know OXO and Pong were 20 years apart, but it might not be 52 and 72.

Take any situation that can exist. Add one me.

That's your recipe for disaster.

Tetris is a weird one.

I was addicted to it as everyone on the GameBoy, but it had existed for years before that, and I had loads of copies, many with their own unique twists, and others exactly the same, just with more colour (or exactly the same in every way if you had a green screen). Hell, I've written about a dozen versions of it myself as coursework and interview tasks.

But it was only any good on the GameBoy. I'm not sure why, but the hardware mattered much more than the software.

Maybe we could give them a cut of all of our earnings every day for a year...

And also...

I hate it when I say "And also..". And furthermore, and in conjunction, I don't know why I started doing it, but I hate it, and I can't stop doing it.

You can check PayPal's service status pages for yourself.

The masspay problem is fixed, but things were still broken for us (UK) last time I checked. Loooong delays between making a payment and that payment clearing. That's what all the "on hold" and "pending" stuff is - PayPal issues.

Yip, got a retropie that'll play pretty much anything from the 70's to the 90's.

Sorcery Plus, Super Sam, Jet Set Willy, Rik Dangerous, Prehistoric, Killer Gorilla, Bomber, Everyone's A Wally, Sabre Wulf, Gauntlet, Golden Axe, Altered Beast, all the classics. But the classic of all classics is Chuckie Egg.

I spend most time playing Collosal Cavern/Adventure/Advent/whatevernameyouknowitas though, because that ships with Emacs, so you accidentally play it all the time when you're supposed to be working.

I hate basically anything anyone says about anything, really.

Sometimes, I think it might be for the best to just lock every thread.

I read the comics as far as about half way through last weeks episodes. It's vaguely interesting that I got bored of both media after Negan came along, but before he was resolved.

Round here, frig is to predict - as in Frigg. "I frigged Red Rum for the Grand National".

If I was born in Devon, my username might be Bould Frig. Or Bold Frig. I might drop the U too.

I suppose it depends where you come from.

I know it can mean the other F word, but I don't know anyone who wouldn't just say the other word. This isn't the Victorian age.

I just want to be feared.

Postage is so expensive these days though, isn't it.

I mean, you take a letter to the postbox, a man collects it, drives it a few miles to a sorting office, the sorting office workers sort it into piles, these piles are driven or freighted hundreds of miles to a local sorting office, where they're sorted again by another team of workers to match the delivery rounds, the postman collects it from his personal pile, and walks miles to put it through your letter box.

That's all they do, it's not much to ask - but they charge sixty four pence!

I lived in many different countries, mostly just one at a time. But for about a year, I spent an equal amount of time in two countries. I used planes like most people used trains (with Wizzair, it was actually cheaper than the train, and even Eurolines - wouldn't have been possible paying BA prices).

I hated it to though. I never got used to flying either.

nursemorph wrote: @Valerie: The site I was referring to wasn't a PTC to begin with...it started life as a GPT site and still is a GPT and has never had PTC....

It didn't though. It started life as a reward club for purchasing celebrity merchandise. That's much bigger business than GPT sites. It's present form might technically be a new site, but they already had the members before it even began. They didn't even change the name of the virtual currency.

They're where they are because celebrity.

People complain about this, but it's actually really awesome.

They're not taking you for every single penny. This isn't British Airways where flights are three times more expensive than everywhere else, but that's okay because luggage is free.

Where British Airways automatically charges you for services you might not want, the budget airlines only charge you for what you actually use. It's the non-budget airlines that are taking you for a ride.

My grandad.

He used to play Cricket for Yorkshire.

Or, so he told us when I was about five. I believed him until I was about 16, when I finally realised he wasn't actually any good at cricket at all.