Greetings readers! Kick open the virtual doors of “The Fair Shake” and come inside. Our sodium enhanced character above now has a name: Carl. I thank all of you for your name ideas. Sam almost won out, but I felt that Carl was unexpected, so I invite everyone to say hello to Carl, the gaming salt shaker. The Fair Shake is not bound to console games, but will also cover computer games, as in this week’s choice.
The Atari 8 bit computer line was introduced with the Atari 400 in 1979. Initially, specifications for the system was not available to the public. Atari had never intended to release this information as they wished to be the sole provider of software. Over a period of months and years, programmers, both professional and amateur programmers learned how to write on the Atari systems. In 1981, Atari provided a service, known as the Atari Program Exchange (APX), which was a win/win for both Atari and programmers, as programmers now had an official distribution channel to sell their programs and Atari received a small portion of each sale. The most popular title to come out of the APX is this weeks game, Caverns of Mars. Caverns of Mars was programmed by a high school student, Greg Christensen. This game was so well received that a few years later it was released as an actual cartridge game for the 8 bit family.
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