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Amstrad Action issue 4 cover tape

Started by P5ychoFox, 16:54, 09 December 11

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P5ychoFox

I have the cover tape from Amstrad Action issue 4 (Xmas '85).

This was the first cover tape and featured 2 unreleased CPC games: 'Kung-Fu' & 'Number 1' as a 'Christmas gift from Ocean.'

Is this item rare? My copy is in a clear tape case (no inlay).

tastefulmrship

Amstrad Action Issue 4 Covertape on disk.

Gryzor

Quote from: tastefulmrship on 20:16, 09 December 11
Amstrad Action Issue 4 Covertape on disk.

Not what he asked, but thanks :)

tastefulmrship

Quote from: Gryzor on 17:54, 10 December 11
Not what he asked, but thanks :)
I know, but I was bored and decided to convert to disc it for fun!

Ynot.zer0

Quote from: P5ychoFox on 16:54, 09 December 11
I have the cover tape from Amstrad Action issue 4 (Xmas '85).
Me too....

Quote from: P5ychoFox on 16:54, 09 December 11
This was the first cover tape and featured 2 unreleased CPC games: 'Kung-Fu' & 'Number 1' as a 'Christmas gift from Ocean.'
And amusingly I actually remember playing those games over xmas '85....

Quote from: P5ychoFox on 16:54, 09 December 11

Is this item rare? My copy is in a clear tape case (no inlay).

I have 2 or 3 copies (accumulated over time), so I'm not sure it is rare... if it is then that is 'cos I'm hording too many copies :)
I do recall that the tape itself was just cello-taped to the front of the magazine, it was not in a case.
What quite often happened was that when removing from the magazine, the cello-tape would tear the magazine and would often remove the paper/print from the tape itself...

AMSDOS

Quote from: Gryzor on 17:54, 10 December 11

Not what he asked, but thanks :)

I think it's extremely difficult question to answer the rarety of the AA4 Covertape, do they mean if it's rare does it have any value?
One of the other members here was throwing out their collection of AA Christmas/Birthday Covertapes mainly because they have been documented and are available on the Internet. Scale wise AA was published in a number of countries and their audience at in them days would have been in the 10s of thousands.
Value determines the audience - we're the audience, not the guy down the road with his Pawn Shop which will see it as a Tape useful for recording potential!  :o  And as I said if the information is on the Internet in the form of downloads, tape images/disk images for example, it kind of looses some value in that sense!  :(

Some of the tapes I have (unless I've misplaced them) could be considered rare. I've aquired some The Amstrad User tapes, to my knowledge that magazine was only sold here in Australia, though to get the tapes you would have to subscribe to the magazine (which I never did), otherwise the tapes were available through their Mail Order service (they also offered Discs as well, though a Disk would cover a span of issues e.g. 1-12 for example I think). To my knowledge they never had any commercial software on it, though the odd tape might of had something on it that wasn't in the Magazine, though mostly the stuff that was on it was Type-ins from their respected Issues. Given you had to subscribe to the magazine or order the tape plus the magazine was only sold here in Aust I think (maybe NZ), those tapes would be harder to get (rare) and no doubt people would want them, that would pump up the price on those tapes possibly!  :o  Unfortunately I've had problems trying to record stuff to tape and need someone to guide me through making CDTs!  :(
* Using the old Amstrad Languages :D   * with the Firmware :P
* I also like to problem solve code in BASIC :)   * And type-in Type-Ins! :D

Home Computing Weekly Programs
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Updated Other Program Links on Profile Page (Update April 16/15 phew!)
Programs for Turbo Pascal 3

khisanth

I remember that and still have the tape lying around so I doubt it has any rarity value.  It would be rare if it was still attached to the mint condition magazine having never been used.

Nich

Quote from: P5ychoFox on 16:54, 09 December 11
I have the cover tape from Amstrad Action issue 4 (Xmas '85).

Is this item rare? My copy is in a clear tape case (no inlay).

In my opinion, it is not that easy to obtain early Amstrad Action covertapes, which as far as I know did not include inlays, i.e. the cassette only was Sellotaped to the front of the magazine cover. I guess the fact that they came 'loose' means that they were more likely to be lost by their owners. However, the large majority of covertapes released from issue 67 and onwards (which did include cases and inlays) are as common as muck on eBay.

P5ychoFox

I have also just acquired 25 'Computing with the Amstrad' tapes dating from 1986.

These CPC tapes have their own cover inlays (coloured paper with black text) and contain games.

Never heard of these before...or any of the games on them.

If anyone is interested I'll put up a YouTube video of them.

khisanth


P5ychoFox


Johnny Olsen

Or even better, make cdt or dsk files from them.  :D

Gryzor

Were these given with the mag or sold from the publisher?

SyX

I'm interested too, the spanish magazine "Amstrad Semanal" published a lot of programs of "CWTA" (everything legal, they bought the rights), and there is a few ones not preserved, with luck it could have few ones on those tapes.

PD: P5ychoFox, what did it happen with the Mega Twins CPC version???

Gryzor

(Was that really a weekly mag? Cool!!!!)

SyX

(Yes ;) ,  weekly until the number 100, after that, the magazine was monthly and changed the name to "Amstrad Personal")

Gryzor

It would have been really nice to have a weekly mag when I was growing up... *sigh*

SyX


P5ychoFox

Quote from: SyX on 16:11, 16 December 11
I'm interested too, the spanish magazine "Amstrad Semanal" published a lot of programs of "CWTA" (everything legal, they bought the rights), and there is a few ones not preserved, with luck it could have few ones on those tapes.

PD: P5ychoFox, what did it happen with the Mega Twins CPC version???

I'll do a video of the tapes tomorrow.

The Mega Twins CPC Version is still in the process of being recovered from the disk (which was badly corrupted).

The Spectrum version is complete & has been rescued.

Keep an eye on the World of Spectrum forum as all the demos (Speccy & AMstrad) are being restored together - it will take time though. I can't wait to see the final results too.

P5ychoFox

#19
Here's my video showing all 22 tapes and some gameplay of Tronn Cycles & Starfleet:


Computing With The Amstrad Magazine Cover Tapes & Gameplay

I'll be selling this lot of tapes soon on ebay so please keep an eye out.

P5ychoFox

#20
Some screen shots of other games can be seen here:

url fixed

It seems the magazine was also available on tape and it included any type-ins that were in that issue plus bonus material.  This was on a subscriber only basis and the tape was never directly sold with the magazine.

EgoTrip

Are you going to upload .dsk or .cdt images of these tapes, or at least just the bonus programs that were not in the magazines?

P5ychoFox

I would like to be able to upload the files to share but don't have the time or means to do so.

I've put the tapes on ebay as a job lot so hopefully they'll get a new owner with enough time and expertise to share them.

ralferoo

For me, AA4 was pivotal as it marked the transition from only using my Dragon 32 to being allowed to use my Dad's 464 when he wasn't using it.

To be honest, I only bought the magazine because it had 4 free games on it and I couldn't afford anything else and you couldn't buy any games for the Dragon by that point. I played Number 1 for hours and hours. Even now, that tune haunts me!

Reading the magazine got me hooked. Mostly, because I was the only person I knew who was properly "into computers" rather than just playing games. Certainly, the magazine wasn't afraid to venture into techie areas in the early years and I loved it. I must have ended up buying every issue until around '88 when I sold everything and bought an Amiga. Shame really, I only got £50 for everything, yet I lost so much in nostalgia value...

ralferoo

Ooops, sorry, I didn't realise it was an old thread! I opened it when googling to find that digitised speech program on the AA covertape, and then it was just an open tab and assumed it was current... Doh!

Hopefully someone from here bought the covertape collection and can make cdt's of them all. It'd be a shame to lose that whole collection...

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