Yes, I have noticed that. That screenshot should be a very old mock-up of the Monkey Island page (the same image appears on the Kickstarter page). The real content is the one in my photo.
From both a content and design point of view I prefer “The story of the Commodore Amiga in Pixels_” but “Commodore Amiga: a visual Commpendium” will be the book to read when I want to focus on Amiga games.
I have the “Commodore Amiga: a visual Commpendium” as well and was a bit dissapointed. It is beautiful but I would have loved for it to have a bit more text to each game. Also, since it was a visual commpendium I understand that the visuals have front stage, I was just puzzled about the choice of most of the pictures - found a lot of them odd since they didn’t reflect my own memories of the particular game.
I have Commodore 64 - a visual compendium. It has a page about Maniac Mansion (with a quote from Ron), a page about Zak McKracken and a two page interview with Gary.
I was tempted to buy that as well but my relationship with the C64 is strangely thin, despite having used it for years. I never liked its graphics or games, except for a handful of them.
Probably I’m biased because it wasn’t for me a “home” computer but something that my father had at work, where I had to go to use it.
The real game changer was Amiga. I started to code in C and Assembly just after a few months after the purchase. And the games were gorgeous. It was 1990.
That´s funny for me it´s the complete opposite, I first played the C64 at my cousins place. He then gave it to my dad because he switched to a PC and my dad had it in his room where we would all play together. That´s why I have the coziest of memories for the C64.
My thoughts exactly. Though on the plus side, of all the Kickstarter projects I’ve backed so far, that one was probably best both in terms of schedule and communication. All things considered, I’m glad to have it.
Speaking of Amiga Kickstarters, the one that I backed reluctantly, but now am glad I did was From Bedrooms to Billions: The Amiga Years. I’m more of a books person, but I think for a fairly short film, it pretty much captures the essence of the Amiga and the masterminds behind it. Also features a short interview with Ron Gilbert (but don’t ask if it’s part of the standard or the special edition).
Now, eagerly waiting for Commodore: The Amiga Years for the ultimate fix. That one is long overdue, but finally nearing completion.
I’ve bought all of Sam Dyer’s books (the visual compendiums).
Those books are about showing off the art. I like them even though I have no real connection to most of those devices.
To me the Amiga book is a revival of those days and that cultural phenomenon that I witnessed and lived within. I don’t buy the book mainly because of the (good) art, I buy it mainly because of the memories.
Last week I received The story of the Commodore Amiga in Pixels_ (hardback). Nice book, I like it, but it is not excellent; some text and graphics not well researched/selected.
For example, on page 116 (Pinball Dreams) there are some small issues.
Two screenshots shows completely wrongs colors. The background of the table Ignition is black and gray but it should be blue and red. Some parts of the table Steel Wheel are black instead of the appropriate colors. Probably the screenshots are NOT from the Amiga version.
The score panel on the top is not a dot-matrix display it is a sixteen-segment display. The dot-matrix display was first introduced with Pinball Fantasies.
21st Century Entertainment was the publisher and Digital Illusions the developer not the publisher. In general all pages always display only the label ‘Publisher’ but shows publisher AND developer.
The picture with the Pinball Dreams front cover is very dark (especially the 21st Century Entertainment logo) probably because of the high contrast.
But I can highly recommend the book for all Amiga fans.
