That Brøderbund triple crown never fails to bring me back to the half-underground computer software shop on the Main Street in my town some time in the early 1990s. I would read about upcoming games in PC Magazine, and visit almost daily when a new game came out to see if they had it in stock yet.
Either that shop was pretty casual about staying on the cutting edge, or release dates were fuzzier back then, because it would often be months of agonized visits before the game showed up on shelves. By then, of course, I’d have gotten another PCMag, and my attention had leapt to a different — clearly far more advanced and interesting — game that was “only days” from launch.
Anyway, during one of my Saturday morning visits to the musty-smelling and over-dehumidified shop, I ended up idly browsing through the Borland section and a Turbo C box caught my eye. My dad was incredibly pumped that I was showing an interest in something that could actually be productive and creative, so he bought it for me.
Unfortunately, nine-year-old me did not turn out to be a natural prodigy. My dad’s coding experience stopped somewhere south of FORTRAN (he had juggled some accounting systems for ABC in the early 1980s) so he tried his best but couldn’t really make it click for me.
So Turbo C went back on the shelf. Dark Forces was coming out next month, and I didn’t have time for twiddling with incomprehensible runes when there were stormtroopers to kill.
What could have been.
I tried Turbo C as an 8 year old and got as far as printf hello world and scanf. The pointer stuff seemed obtuse to me (coming from BASIC) and it was strange it didn’t have automatically sized string types (it was char[7] or something). In retrospect I should have gone the Turbo Pascal route as an 8 year old.
I like turbo pascal and still run its bridge for fun. But I wonder if you go this route would it be a dead end, unlike c. Pascal is very strong that era. Apple use it a lot. Still. Not much pascal these days. For a reason.
When I was around 12 years old I convinced one of my parents to buy a little book about C++ for me. I read the first chapter with great interest and wrote variations of input and output things with pen and paper.
Then I tried to follow the instructions on how to build and run a program on a computer.
I managed to install the IDE they recommended; one called Bloodshed Dev-C++. I managed to type the code for hello world into the IDE, and I managed to compile the program.
It produced an exe file that had a black terminal icon.
I double clicked the exe and it opened and closed very quickly.
It would only be several years later, when I started at the university, that this confusing interaction made sense to me.
At the time I thought I had made some mistake and I didn’t understand what or why.
But what happened of course was that the program started, printed its output and exited, and it all happened so fast that I just saw a window open and quickly close.
Fortunately I did eventually get better introductions to programming. But that first experience was a bit unfortunate heh.
So funny! I too was nostalgically brought back seeing that logo again - I literally stopped and evaluated it for a good moment, letting memories wash in.
Also, I suck at LodeRunner.
This is how symbols an Reservoirs will work in AI for behavioral function.
Omnious crow much.
(I am serious - we will see some upcoming shifts in the way black boxes interpret.
Distribution was pretty fuzzy back then.
I did have IBM's C compiler and a full set of printed manuals. Never clicked for me. I did however get turbo pascal, it was amazing. Compile/edit/run cycles measured in seconds. Online docs/examples, etc.
Ended up reading PC Tech journal, wrote an EGA driver for Turbo pascal, and even a few games. Had some silly mine based game written in Turbo Pascal that showed how many mines were adjacent, with the revolutionary idea that you didn't have to hit enter after every move. It floated around as shareware on BBSs, someone even binary edited it make amusing changes to the text when you died. I allowed mines to cause chain reactions, people were amused that past a certain point increasing mine density made the game easier since the chain reactions got larger.
Certainly a different world back then.
Hey dark forces was my introduction to modern 3D first person shooter level design - I played it before I played quake, before I even played DOOM. I made handfuls of custom levels for it over my childhood years, before moving up to half life / source. Still have a very strong nostalgia for Dark Forces.
If it makes you feel any better, I was (am) a game-addicted kid who did indeed pick up Borland C++ and coded a graphical DOS version of hangman alongside my older brother when I was 12, and made a tank game with a map editor solo when I was comfortable with pointers before I was 14 — it hasn't made me a prodigal pioneer of computer programming or a wildly successful silicon valley C[E/T]O. While I do still enjoy coding/gamedev and earn a modest living from it, as a more evenly matured adult I have other interests that I care about just as much and keeps me occupied instead of poring over the latest and greatest in tech or gamedev.
I guess what I'm saying is that being interested enough to become competent at a young age doesn't necessarily equate to becoming an industry-leading savant by age 34...nor is it a prerequisite. If you are passionate today, I bet you could still level up to the forefront of whatever niche you care about with enough commitment.