ANTIC Episode 124 - Atari 8-bit - The Computer of Love
Release Date: 01/12/2026
ANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
ANTIC Episode 131 - Brad’s 30K Brain In this episode of ANTIC The Atari 8-Bit Computer Podcast… we discuss the newly announced THE ATARI800XL and give our opinions, we talk about Hamster power, and Brad now has only 30K for his brain, plus a whole lot more! READY! Recurring Links Interview index: What we’ve been up to FujiGrid - Newsbytes - Updated , , VCF Midwest - Jeri Ellsworth - 1027 printer ribbon - Atari BBS - Thom and Fujinet team - Jason Moore - ...
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John Victor, Program Design Inc. John Victor was founder and president of Program Design Inc., one of the earliest publishers of educational software. Based in Greenwich CT, PDI created dozens of educational software titles and a few not-so-educational games for Atari 8-bit, Commodore PET and 64, TRS-80, Apple II, and Texas Instruments computers. Software marketed by PDI included Moonbase IO, Sammy the Sea Serpent, and Preparing for the SAT (which was probably the first SAT prep software for any home computer). PDI also created "An Invitation to Programming", the casette-based...
info_outlineANTIC The Atari 8-bit Podcast
Vince Wu, The Learning Phone (Atari PLATO Terminal) Vince Wu worked at Atari for about two and a half years. He was the programmer of The Learning Phone, the PLATO terminal for Atari 8-bit computers. Before that, he worked with PLATO at the University of Illinois, then in California for Control Data Corporation. PLATO was the first generalized computer-assisted instruction system, a groundbreaking graphical client-server computer system aimed at education. To assist in this interview, I was joined by Thomas Cherryhomes and Michael Sternberg, who were on a road trip to a Vintage...
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Walt Klappert, Atari Advanced Development Group/WCI Labs Walt Klappert worked at Atari's Advanced Development Group/WCI Labs in New York, and later at Take One Enterprises in California. He worked with Nancy and Steve Mayer on a variety of projects with a concentration on creating software for girls. He is credited as Director of "Fisher Price Dance Fantasy", a dance choreography game for small children. He also worked on a system for authoring CD+G, an enhancement to the compact disc spec that allowed graphics and lyrics to be displayed synchronized with music. This interview took place on...
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ANTIC Episode 130 - The Tongue-Twister Episode In this episode of ANTIC The Atari 8-Bit Computer Podcast… We trip all over our own tongues trying to bring you all the news fit to print in the Atari 8-bit computer world… READY! Recurring Links Interview index: What we’ve been up to Diskmenu manual - 30th anniversary of Classic Computer Magazine Archive - : Discussion - Atari Yahoo Groups archives: Atari Usenet group archive additions - MPP MicroportXL board manual -...
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Steve Bryson, game programmer Steve Bryson was a programmer for EPYX and The Connelley Group, where he ported many games to various 8-bit systems. He ported Dragonriders of Pern, an action/strategy game based on the Anne McCaffrey novels, to Atari and Commodore 64. He ported Jumpman to the Apple II, and Lower Reaches of Apshai, Upper Reaches of Apshai, and Temple of Ra to the C64. This interview took place on August 5, 2026. Video version of this interview: Steve's personal web site: Randy Glover, Jumpman interview: Tom Zimmerman, AMY chip interview: Jon Freeman, Freefall...
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Bob Fraser, APX Insomnia, Supersort, De Re Atari Bob Fraser worked at Atari for four years: he worked on the early CX70 light pen, helped write the specs for an unreleased database manager for the Atari 8-bits. and later moved into Atari's Games Design Research Group under Alan Kay, where he experimented with 3-D graphics. He wrote a chapter of De Re Atari — chapter 7, all about sound — and two applications that were published by Atari Program Exchange: Supersort, a data sorting routine; and Insomnia, a sound editor. Supersort was APX catalog number 20030, and was for sale starting...
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James W. Burley, APX Data Base/Report System James W. Burley is the programmer of Data Base/Report System, which was sold by Atari Program Exchange beginning with the Summer 1982 APX catalog. It was catalog number 20134 with a price of $22.95. APX sold it for about a year, through the Summer 1983 catalog. APX awarded Data Base/Report System first prize for new software in the "Business & Professional Applications/Personal Finance & Record Keeping" category: for that, James was awarded an Atari Star plaque and $2000 prize. (He received the plaque, but says he never received the...
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Tim Jenkins, Cheating at Roulette with an Atari Computer Tim Jenkins is the author of several humorous memoirs: "Missions Accomplished: And some funny business along the way", "More Missions Accomplished: And a lot more funny business", and "Business Missions Accomplished: Silly travel tales on the corporate dime". I wanted to talk to Tim about one chapter in his 2018 book More Missions Accomplished: the chapter is titled "Gaming the System" and it tells the tale of him trying to cheat a roulette using his Atari 800 computer. A brief excerpt from that chapter: "Las Vegas — 1989. Shortly...
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Mike Lorenzen: Atari Program-Text Editor, Pitfall II Mike Lorenzen worked at Atari, Activision, and Accolade, creating games for the Atari 2600, Atari 8-bit, and Commodore 64 computers. At Atari, Mike coded Golf and Circus Atari for the Atari 2600. For the 8-bit computers, he wrote MEDIT (which he told me stands for Mike’s EDITor.) Atari got a lot of mileage from MEDIT, using versions of that text editor in several products: first, in Atari Program-Text Editor (which was bundled with Atari's Macro Assembler), and in two Atari Program Exchange products: APX 20075, Atari Program-Text Editor;...
info_outlineANTIC Episode 124
In this episode of ANTIC The Atari 8-Bit Computer Podcast… We have lots of game news and emulator updates, Brad imitates a pirate, and Kay tells us that the Atari 8-bit is the “Computer of Love”!
READY!
Recurring Links
New Atari books scans at archive.org
Atari interview discussion thread on AtariAge
Interview index: here
What we’ve been up to
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Kay’s 2025 Wrapped - https://www.patreon.com/posts/kays-2025-147182056
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Support Kay’s Patreon and support ANTIC! - https://www.patreon.com/savetz
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Annual posting of older articles:
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Interim Computer Museum - https://icm.museum
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Events at https://icm.museum/?events
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Repairing The Atari 8 Bit Astra Big D Disk Drive! by Paul Westphal - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIZPgYxfrAU
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Fujisan:
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Fujinet Lobby games - http://fujinet.online:8080/
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FastBASIC - https://github.com/dmsc/fastbasic
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Video from Paul Garcia showing Fujinet-PC integration - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kwd0wwFohso
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Indy Vintage Computer Club -
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XF551 drive - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atari_XF551
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Commodore 64 Ultimate - https://www.commodore.net
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RM 800XL - https://revive-machines.com/index-en.html
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Stan Veit Podcast:
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David Greelish and Randy read Chapter 13 (“The Atari Story”) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLCoJ-oA_V0
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Stan Veit @ wikipedia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stan_Veit
New and Updated Games
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Ultimate Atari Games Database by Philippe Lafortune:
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https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1JaKMQio82/?mibextid=wwXIfr
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Invite link - https://airtable.com/invite/r/rhutWb7a
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Atari Party Panic v1.2 by Andy Diller:
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New game: Carcer from h4plo:
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You can get it from here - https://h4plo.itch.io/carcer
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Discussion - https://forums.atariage.com/topic/386514-new-game-carcer/
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Overflow Santa - New Christmas game from A/W/A:
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https://forums.atariage.com/topic/386809-overflow-santa-new-christmas-game-from-awa/
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Overflow Santa 8bit.xex(Atari 8-bit binary file)
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Overflow Santa 8bit.rom(Atari 8-bit cartridge)
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KillZone: First Real-Time Multiplayer Gaming - https://www.atariorbit.org/2025/12/13/killzone-v-1-2/
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Street Fighter II Released!:
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Pole Position Now Saves Tracks Over FujiNet (Thom Cherryhomes):
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Discussion - https://forums.atariage.com/topic/387116-sharing-pole-position-race-designer-tracks-over-fujinet/
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Atari 8-Bit/5200 Homebrew Games Released/Completed/WIP in 2025 - https://forums.atariage.com/topic/378311-atari-8-bit5200-homebrew-games-releasedcompletedwip-in-2025/
New and Updated Software
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News Years Disk 2026 - https://demozoo.org/productions/384184/
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Altirra 4.40 released from Phaeron:
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New version 7.0 of ASAP, Another Slight Atari Player, the most accurate Atari 8-bit computers tunes player for modern computers and mobile devices - https://asap.sourceforge.net
Publications
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December, 2025 Compute’s Gazette with ANTIC article written by Brian Cox - https://shop.computesgazette.com/product/computes-gazette-issue-6-digital-edition/
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AtariProjects - https://atariprojects.org/
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Atari Insights January 2026:
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Newsletters - https://ataribasics.com/newsletter-hub/
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YouTube channel - https://www.youtube.com/@AtariBasics
New and Updated Hardware
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Atari SX212 WiFi Retromodem - https://tempestfpga.com/sx212/
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XL-Expander, a prototype add-on for Atari 800XL machines - https://bsky.app/profile/philsan.bsky.social/post/3ma6ybpxd6s2j
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Custom Casing for the 130XE Pixel Perfect Motherboard - https://forums.atariage.com/topic/383379-new-11-1000dpi-replica-of-atari-xe-motherboard-%E2%80%93-interest-check/page/10/#comment-5772225
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3D printed joystick Atari XL computers style - https://makerworld.com/en/models/2108894-atari-xl-style-joystick#profileId-2281361
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Atari 400 mini at Atari.com - https://atari.com/products/atari-400-mini-1
Other
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The Magic Room film ebay - https://www.ebay.com/itm/116928122102
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A 'Playable' Atari-Themed Hotel Is Coming - https://people.com/atari-hotel-planned-for-phoenix-interactive-esports-venue-photos-11871760
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Stewart Cheifet died:
Upcoming Shows
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Vintage Computer Festival Montreal - Jan. 24-25, 2026 - Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, QC - https://vcfed.org/vcf-montreal/
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Vintage Electronics Expo - Jan. 31, 2026 - Oakland Expo Center, Waterford, MI - https://www.thevee.org/
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Vintage Computer Festival SoCal - February 14-15, 2026 - Hotel Fera Events Center, Orange, CA - vcfsocal.com
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Indy Classic Computer and Video Game Expo - March 20-22 - Wyndham Indianapolis Airport Hotel, Indianapolis, IN - https://indyclassic.org/
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VCF East - April 17-19 2026 - InfoAge Science and History Museums, Wall, NJ - https://vcfed.org/events/vintage-computer-festival-east/
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Midwest Gaming Classic - April 24-26 - Baird Center, Milwaukee, WI - https://www.midwestgamingclassic.com/
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VCF Europe - May 1-3 - Munich, Germany - https://vcfe.org/E/
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Vintage Computer Festival Pacific Northwest 2026 - May 2-3 - Tukwila Community Center, South Tukwila, WA - https://vcfpnw.org
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VCF Southwest - May 29-31, 2026 - Westin Dallas Ft. Worth Airport - https://www.vcfsw.org/
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Retrofest 2026 - May 30-31 - Steam Museum of the Great Western Railway, Swindon, UK - https://retrofest.uk/
YouTube Videos
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FujiNet Battleship now for Atari 8-bit, Apple II, CoCo, and MS-DOS - Thom Cherryhomes - https://www.youtube.com/shorts/3BQc3zVl8qk
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How I made an Atari 130XE Laptop Using Original Hardware - Sideburn Studios - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAKrEe_ttOE
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The Atari 8-Bit Second Maturity (A 2025 Deep Dive) - AtariBasics with John Zielke - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5d3JgZMFZIo
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FujiNet-RetroMate: Online Chess with Atari 8-bit Computers - Greg Gallardo - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H53JR2-PBQE
New at Github
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