do you remember Drive?

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Sumaleth
Techno Teaboy
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Joined: Mon Jul 14, 2008 3:35 pm

do you remember Drive?

Post by Sumaleth »

This question is directed at anyone who worked for Zzap64 just before it closed down (before it came back as Commodore Force).

First, some back-story:

Earlier in the year that Zzap closed, it promoted a "submit a reader game for the cover tape, make some money" thing. I'd moved to the Amiga by then but it sounded like fun so I borrowed my cousin's C64 and worked on a game every night for 7 months.

The game was called Drive (or possibly Over Drive -- not related to the Team17 game) and I excitedly packed it up and mailed it to Zzap.

The response was enthusiastic (the quote I remember and cling onto was something like "the best reader game we've seen"). And then... within about a month Zzap64 was no more.

The game:

Drive was a pipeline-style puzzle game, where you laid down pieces of road as a car drove around. There were ramps, so the car could do these spectacularish jumps across the screen. If the car drove far enough on each level it would move onto the next.

12 levels if I recall correctly.

There was an animated intro, with a car beaming down from space or something, and an animated "you won!" sequence that involved a spaceship I think.

The title page features a giant blinking eye in the middle of DR(o)VE, which I ripped from a demo (acknowledged them in the credits). I didn't know how to program music, so I included another demo on the disk that had music I wanted in the game. I hoped someone at Zzap would know someone who could add it. It was the music from Driller, as it happens.

The question:

Did you work for Zzap64 in the closing months of its life, and remember seeing Drive?

And the long-shot of the year award goes to: do you know anyone who might still have the disks?

I'd love to see it again. I put a lot of work into it, and the only people who ever played it were me and maybe a couple of guys at Zzap. (Spending time on projects that go nowhere is, as it happens, my best skill.)

Thank you for listening.
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