Fairlight an Interview - A talk with Bo Jangeborg - ZX Spectrum
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 11 ม.ค. 2018
- An interview with the creator of Fairlight I and II (ZX Spectrum) : Bo Jangeborg.
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Hi, it was me that did the port to the C64. So thanks for the kind words Bo! It didn't use sprites as there were not enough of them and they were too small. It was fun times. Happy days. No idea why there was no C64 version of F2, I was never asked about it. I did plenty of other ports for the publisher (incl the Amstrad version of Fairlight) so I'm almost certain one was never attempted.
Glad to see you here, Trevor! Its always fun when devs find their way to the comment section! So you did use sprites or did you make a typo? I have always wondered how useful the C64 sprites were in high res mode. I am not a coder, so I have no idea if they even works in that res....
@@gearsofgames Yes I meant I didn't use sprites. Now edited my note above! I also remember that they not many of them could appear in the same section of the screen. Nightmare! Processing power was a problem which Bo pointed out.
The C64 version certainly seems to struggle more than the Speccy one. Can imagine it must have been a challenge, good work! Did you have enough time to optimize the code or was the Edge pushing you to finish ASAP?
@@gearsofgames Time was always essential, even to me as got paid when it was completed! There was not a lot of optimisation that could be done, and it's all written in machine code anyway. The only material optimisation could have been to use sprites, but, for reasons already said, it was a non-starter - well not unless the graphics were resigned and maybe some rooms too - and there wasn't enough time or money for that!
Correct Trevor, as you found F1 was hard enough to convert to the C64, but with the improvements Bo made to F2 it made a C64 version impractical. Good to 'see' you here after all these years! Still greatly appreciate everything you did for Edge
I looked him up about 20 years ago and found he worked for a company and it had his email listed - I sent off an email saying how much I loved Fairlight and asked him why fairlight 3 was never released - was so pleased when he responded very graciously answering my questions! Top bloke!
He is indeed! We had a fun time doing the interview!
I was amazed by knight lore but Fairlight just took it to another level, absolutely loved it, still makes me smile when I see it!
Feel pretty much the same! :)
Bo was the stuff of legend back in the day, how did he fit so much game into the spectrum. Brilliant interview with a really nice guy, thank you.
Glad you enjoyed! It was definitely one of the biggest games around with unique locations. I was completely fascinated by it, but never really got anywhere. Was happy just wandering about, exploring... 😁
As I kid, I looked at his name. Even today I still say "Bo Jang-Borg" lol
Fairlight was incredible. I don't think I ever completed it though but it proved what the Speccy could knock out. Watching right now - so far this is superb!!!! :)
Same here. His name was sort of mystical back then, as was the game. Fantastic.
It was indeed, it was amazing how many locations Bo managed to cram into the humble Speccy memory! Never finished it myself, but loved to explore the game and search for new rooms and locations. It was pretty damn hard, even Bo admitted he couldn't finish it! :D
Most specy games were essentially impossible. I remember the reading Crash page where kids would list their competency at games. It was completed, completed, completed, etc. Call me Mr cynical pants but I've just recently started to doubt they were altogether telling the truth
Yeah, probably healthy to be a bit sceptical about certain claims when it comes to completing old Speccy games back in the day :D ! Some of them weren't even possible to finish due to bugs; like Jet Set Willy and Fairlight II ... sure there are plenty more!
Watched this video again today, still love it, and Fairlight of course.
RIchard, I know we have connected with you elsewhere about this. But just to clarify for the folks reading these comments, we never made any claim about your code. We have only ever said that Edge owns the copyright in Fairlight and so even though your code is of course your own, it cannot be used to create a version of Fairlight that you sell or distribute rather than us. And, for the record, Tim Langdell never did any trademark trolling antics and its sad that people are still spreading those falsehoods given that by 2019 he was finally cleared of all those accusations. FYI it is actually impossible to be a trademark troll, so of course the accusations were invented fake news just to try to make him and Edge look bad.
@@edgegames2651 Are you the same person that also claimed to have created the Edge magazine logo and got found out for submitting a doctored disk , created in Win 95, to court?
No, we’re the Edge Games who were unlucky enough to have a judge that didn’t technology and a forensic ‘expert’ who was an idiot. We supplied a disc we said dated from 1995 but which we believed had copies of 1991 files on it. We were right. But our foolish forensic expert said it was an actual 1991 disc. The other side’s forensic expert said it was made using Windows 95 so much be a fake. We said what?!?! We said it was a 1995 disc! But the judge got it into her head it was fake. We found the actual 1991 disc and both experts agreed it was genuine, but the judge couldn’t shake her foolish idea the first disc was a fake. And we didn’t invent the Future logo, we invented our own logo that was similar and they copied us. They license the mark EDGE from us to this day.
@@timlangdell8146 stop talking and go copyright claim someone, washed up
@@timlangdell8146 Didn't you also accuse Mirror's Edge for copyright infringement? And didn't you try to block other games that used this common English word in their title? If so, are you for real? I'm really curious what makes you think you could trademark 'edge'?
Absolute legend, and also looks like he's got some Ikea furniture for double Swedish XP.
Excellent again review and... Bo, huh? :) Something to remember. Cheers...
Fantastic game. Never realised the rendering was based on his self-created Grax engine!
It is! The Grax engine is a really clever piece of software, that allowed Bo to cram a ton of rooms into the game :) ... and I especially loved exploring for new rooms in the game!
For me Fairlight was at the time, and remains to this day one of the best arcade adventures to use isometric perspective and I always thought of it as a magical bit of software and an example that stood out from most of its contemporaries.
There's only three superstar programmers from the Spectrum whose games sold on the strength of their names, who are still revered after 40 years. Bo, Matthew Smith, and Raffaele Cecco.
Great interview, couple of years late to this, but superb stuff, nice chap.
Glad you enjoyed the interview! Bo is truly a very nice chap! Had a great time doing the interview and chatting with him afterwards!
@@gearsofgames The Swedes... snoose & booze... lots of fun!
I had and still have this for Commodore 64 (the same cassette version and even the instructions booklet is still there). Immersive atmosphere was what made me love the game, but also graphics in general, music, and the fact that player can pile up objects! It was truly something else back in the day. The sad thing is, that the game has a bug that stops player from completing it...
Also a sad thing, that that The Edge didn't approve that modern version of the game! Well, money rules the world I guess...
By the way, Spectrum's Fairlight's ditty was later used on Commodore 64 game called 'Wizardry', also by The Edge, among 7 others tracks. Exactly one minute long in all its glory! These two games made The Edge one of my favourite publishers. Admittedly, they did put out some less good titles, too.
Still got my Speccy version of Fairlight too! Was amazed by this game back in the day. 😁 Yeah, there is a bug in Fairlight II, that prevents you from finishing it. It's possible that The Edge did release the fixed version, but Bo was uncertain about this.
Yeah, I think the ditty originated on the C64 version of "Wizardry". If I remember correctly...
Thank you so much for this awesome interview! Very good questions, and very interesting answers from Bo. Of all the videos I've watched on TH-cam, this is definitely one of my absolute favourites.
Working as a programmer myself, I'm very impressed of how you can create a game like Fairlight in machine code, especially on a computer like the ZX Spectrum, with it's extremely limited memory size and colour clash. Bo is nothing short of a genius in my view.
I wrote to him over 20 years ago, not expecting an answer. Imagine my surprise when he wrote back! Judging by this interview, he seems to be a real nice guy.
Thanks, glad you enjoyed it! He was a super nice and humble guy and we had a lot of fun doing the interview.
I loved Fairlight 1 and 2 on the ZX Spectrum. Was great watching an interview with the author 30 years later. Thanks! :)
Good to hear you enjoyed the interview! :)
Some real bangers on that boardgame shelf...Dune, Kingmaker & Titan !!!
Yupp, a very respectable boardgame shelf! 😁
An excellent interview. The most thorough I've found. Just one thing, and this was addressed very briefly near the end, I would have liked to have learned more about what he thought about the video game piracy that was so prevalent back in those days?
Thank you, kindly! I am trying to remember if we talked more about it in the cut-outs, but can't quite remember. There is some additional footage that I chose not to include. Been considering to make a Blu-ray and include it as extra material. But not entirely sure I could sell enough copies to make it worth the work ...
@@gearsofgames I think the interview on its own could be used as a bonus feature on a Blu-Ray & DVD but it could most certainly be used interspersed throughout a documentary about the game (ie. 'Fairlight'). Bo and 'Fairlight' makes a great subject for a documentary - the story itself is 'a pinnacle' tackling some of the big issues of the gaming industry from the time (technical programming efficiency, exploitation, piracy, etc). I think your interview would make great meat for a documentary - it's been recorded beautifully, but bring in some of the other guys who worked on the game (from 'The Edge' - including the company head) and get their pov across, and also the fans of the game - magazine reviewers, those who played pirated, 'playground' versions of the games and then became programmers themselves - there must be BIG NAMES out there who look back at 'Fairlight' with all their childhood admiration for the game intact. Dude, you're on a winner with this but there's a lot of work involved! ;-)
I would love to do that! But that would require quite a substantial budget :). Would be great fun to have a talk to the other guys involved, have found most of them and of course trying to find Jack Wilkes. I gave it a try, but he seems to have been out of the gaming industry since the late 90s. My budget for this production was just my own money and I won't make it back. So couldn't spend as much time on research as I wanted. I need a producer :)
Superb interview with great production values, Bo seems like a top bloke too!
Thanks, glad you enjoyed! And yes, Bo is indeed a top bloke, had a great time doing the interview!
Awesome interview and very informative and although I personally never owned a ZX Spectrum or this title. It was a fascinating history and interview with a legendary figure of that time and really enjoy the professional production values and execution of this type of thing. Puts many channels to God dam shame. Thanks for pointing this my way 👍
Thanks! :)
He's very charitable towards the infamous Tim Langdell, all things considered. He probably doesn't want to provoke one of Dr Langdell's trademark nuisance lawsuits.
I got the feeling that he was just tired of talking about the entire Edge thing and it wasn't something I was interested in focusing on. So we ended up not talking too much about it, instead just focusing on the game and the people behind it...
Hi Bo (if you read this), I work in the games industry and I know what you mean by the "too much work". I've since gone back to the retro scene for my fun. Check out the ZX Spectrum Next and come join the community! There's a "ZX Spectrum Next" group on Facebook.
Don't think Bo checks the messages here, but you can find him on Twitter :). Would be awesome if he could be convinced to have a look at the Next!
Awesome interview always wondered who created these masterpieces. From the loading screen it looked like BoJack - have you seen him on Netflix. Seriously though, great to see Bo for the first time!!
Thanks, glad you enjoyed! Wonder if BoJack would have done as great a job with the games as Bo?! 😁
This was my childhood hero. hes basically the reason i picked up digital painting :) Fairlight was insane
It was! I bought it straight away after seeing the preview article in Your Sinclair. Loved exploring the game, was enough motivation finding a new screen, to keep playing! :)
@@gearsofgames what a time trip friend :)
@@gearsofgames seen a couple of interviews with Matthew Smith, ( manic miner) so tragic.. :(
Not seen the recent ones, but saw one from when they managed to locate him, that was very interesting. Shame he doens't seem to have been able to get back into game design.
I think the music editor used in fairlight was a commercial package called 'Music Box'.
Somehow the programmers managed to get the spectrum to play two voices at the same time.
Pretty sure there was a feature which enabled you to insert your music into a game.
Also I think the music in Spectrum version of 'Marble Madness' used 'Music Box' too.
There are probably others, it was a popular music editor, there wasn't many around at that time.
It was a very basic music editor, but if you took your time with it, you could produce decent music.
I thought the same, but I think Bo said it was proprietary software that was used. But I can't quite remember and not sure I got that part recorded.
I remember trying to make music in the Music Box too, was really easy to use. Shame I wasn't much of a composer! 😁
@@gearsofgames We have our answer I have just watched a YT video entitled 'Gyroscope title music zx spectrum'.
It was Gyroscope and not Marble Madness as stated. I knew it was one of them.
Also Gyroscope was produced by Melbourne House, and I'm pretty sure Melbourne House produced 'The Music Box'.
And if you view the video above, I'll leave a link if YT allow it.
If you read the description you'll see the following text.
"Fresh from his success with Fairlight, Mark Alexander went on to use The Music Box to produce not one but three brilliant mini-tunes for the intro screen of Melbourne House's "not Marble Madness, honest" Gyroscope.".
Later on I know David Whittaker wrote his own music editor to enable the speccy to play multi voices too, but that was later.
Here is the YT link.
th-cam.com/video/SJXVRhiH1ho/w-d-xo.html
Aaah, thanks for the info! I always thought it sounded like Music Box.
Remember being very impressed with the music in Gyroscope. Game was quite fun too, if a bit infuriating! 😁
@@gearsofgames No probs. To be honest with you I needed clarification myself - lol
fantastic. i loved fairlight and had the artist 2 package complete with mouse. was a great place to start!
I had Artist 1, but sadly no mouse. I wanted one really badly, but they were pretty damn pricey over here.
massive content, tnx a lot!
Glad you enjoyed!
Would you mind telling how you organized this interview? The history of gaming is so interesting. Anything like this so valuable.
Well... not exactly sure what you want to know :) ... But the whole thing started when I met Bo at Retrogathering in late 2015 (I think). I asked him if he was up for an video interview and he was happy to oblige. The interview didn't happen until summer the next year. I spent that time researching the game and trying to put together some questions that maybe hadn't been asked in previous interviews. Also looked for visual assets online and went through what I had myself; like magazine articles etc. Also started writing the voice over for the intro, which I of course ended up rewriting in the end :).
The work was spread out over a long time, since I didn't have the time to finish everything in one go. Was a bit frustrating with the stop and go and there could be months between me working on the interview. So coming back would often mean I had to spend some time re-familiarising myself with my research and assets. So it felt go when I finally got finish this one.
I would have liked to have more live action sequences in the video, like old 80s TV commercials etc. But its really hard finding video material in high enough quality without having to spend a ton of licensing money for worldwide distribution ...
Good job. This game really blew my mind when I young. Never had a clue what to do but that was part of it's magic - a mysterious beautiful world that I didn't understand. It's great to put a personality to the name and hear how it all came about. Really good video as well. I had all the Crash magazines and think I remember that photo. Keep up the good work!
Even with the manual the game was quite mysterious and I loved exploring that world too! :)
great interview.
Thanks, glad to hear! :)
Legend.
Fairlight was my first game on the spectrum and I was blow away with the graphics.
An amazing start of your Spectrum experience! 😄
THE GRANDMASTER PROGRAMER BO JAN BORG FAIR LIGHT 🔥🔥🔥🔥
The funny thing about Fairlight: released game contained some assembly source code. )))
I am absolute rubbish at coding :), how did that work? I thought once assembler code was compiled the source code would be gone ...
@@gearsofgames You're absolutely right: in theory, released game must contain only *compiled* code. In practice --- various things could happen. )))
I always thought, how hard it must be: developing computer game only on Spectrum (especially, when game was as big and complex, as "Fairlight" was!) At some stage of work -- memory must contain assembler itself, assembly source code, and compiled code -- and all of this must fit in 48 Kb (no, even 42 Kb, with video RAM excluded!) This is hard task to do -- at least, without some tricks.
I suggest, first Bo Jangeborg loaded assembler, then source code of game into assembler, and then compiled it into vacant RAM. Afterwards, he loaded game data (mostly graphics) from other source (maybe, ZX microdrive) to replace assemler and assembler source (which weren't needed anymore). Obviously, the replacement process was not so accurate -- some fragments of ZX source even survived! Can't blame him hard, though. ))))
@@gearsofgames and here is, how it all looks:
Ю? LD A,239
и? CALL INPUT
т? RRA
ь? JR NC,STAR2
@ BIT 1,B
@ RET NZ
@STAR2 AND 12
$@ JR Z,ST20
.@ LD H,255
8@ LD L,(IY+30)
B@ LD E,(HL)
L@ INC HL
V@ LD D,(HL)
`@ PUSH DE
j@ POP IX
t@ LD A,(IX+12)
~@ AND 15
€@ CP 9
’@ JR NZ,USE6
њ@ LD (IY+52),30
¦@ LD B,0
°@ LD (HL),B
є@ DEC HL
Д@ LD (HL),B
О@ CALL EEN
Ш@ POP HL
в@ JP TELE
м@USE6 CP 6
ц@ JR NZ,USE5
A LD DE,2313
A LD (V+21),DE
A JR ST22
AUSE5 CP 5
(A JR NZ,USE4
2A SET 7,(IY+23)
It is really impressive how they manage to cram everything into the memory of a humble Spectrum! :) I think Bo coded the entire game on a 48K Spectrum, without the help of a separate dev system, if I remember correctly!
Fairlight I think is one of the best looking speccy games....the graphics have so much character
I was immediately captured by the amazing screen shots in that preview article in Your Spectrum and put down an order straight away! As you say so much character and atmosphere!
Gears of Games mind you I could never get very far in it....really good to see Bo Jangeborg....some developers from back in the day seem to have disappeared - Mervyn estcourt, the reidy's from microsphere, follis & carter from gargoyle
Same here! I just enjoyed exploring it, never got even close to the ending! Yeah, many are impossible to find any information about at all. And even more hopeless trying to locate them. I would love to do more interviews like this one. It does take some time and effort though, especially the research.
Gears of Games how about costa panayi? Fairly sure I saw him comment on a few posts on world of spectrum a few years back
I know someone over at Atari forums got a reply from him when he asked for permission to publish the unreleased version of Highway Encounter on the Atari ST.
Programmers were much more creative and ingenious in the 80s than they are today. They had to be. Squeezing the most out of every byte available to them to create something new. The industry has changed, and not for the better.
Yeah, its troublesome to see a modern game that runs like an old ZX Spectrum game on hardware that is a gazillion times faster in comparison!
Anyone else notice the Bo jack on the loading screen?
They wern't horsing around were they?!
Hehe... I see what you did there! 😃
Errr, errr, errr... I'm certain there's an interview in here.
Any chance of a remake for the ZX Spectrum Next?
That is pretty unlikely, the rights holder would probably want a boatload of money to give permission :(
the man with the cool name
I managed to crash the game. I played it for the best part of 18 hours, and at about 8am in the morning, after many, many hours of piling soldiers into one of the chambers, the game gave up. I can't remember the number I managed to cram into one room, but the frame updates got really slow, and then no more.
I think that could have been one of my first all-night gaming sessions I ever had.
Ha, just got to the part of the interview where he mentioned someone else doing that.
I gave up at five helmets! But the game wisely refuses to spawn more than four soldiers in a room :D. But I suspected, as you say, that one could crash the game by simply bringing more helmets into a room.
Did you ever finish the game?
I don't believe I did. That didn't dampen my enjoyment though, it was perhaps the first graphical digital world I got lost in and proved to me that you move beyond text and visualise rich interactive spaces. So I mostly treated the game as a sandbox to have my own adventures in, such as the aforementioned how many soldiers could you fit in a single room?
Thanks for making the video.
My feelings exactly! Exploring the game was my main enjoyment, never got very far in solving the actual puzzles but that was no problem.
Glad you enjoyed the video! :)
1411 views for a legend you must be Joking. Tack Bo
Sadly it's hard to get noticed on big old TH-cam these days... Glad you found it though, thanks for the view!
Please Bo Jangeborg do a remake of Fairlight 1+2 for steam. There is so much potential in it. It would be amazing to have a remake versiion where you can switch to the original new game...
Sadly the rights to Fairlight still belongs to The Edge, at least as far as Bo knows. Richard Jordan attempted a remake of Fairlight 1 for the PC some years ago, but was shut down by The Edge. You can see more of the remake here : th-cam.com/video/5j1gQLX375A/w-d-xo.html
As far as I know; still Tim Langdell.
@@gearsofgames Ah yes. Litigation Langdell. No chance of any remakes seeing the light of day, even non-profit.
As fantastic of an interview about on old favorite game of mine as this video was, one of the main bits of info I was hoping to hear about was not mentioned at all. Why is there no mention of the amazingly awesome sound track of the C64 version?! That is probably one of the main reason I played the game as long as I did, and it's weird to not see it come up in the interview. Check it out for those who never heard it:
th-cam.com/video/swYBSHtuhGY/w-d-xo.html
Thank you and sorry for not including more about the C64 version. The video is centered around Bo and since he wasn't at all involved with the C64 version, I ended up not focusing very much on it. I have managed to locate the coder who converted the game though, so there is the possibilty of making another interview. We will se what happens 😃
Spectrum's Fairlight's ditty was later used on Commodore 64 game called 'Wizardry', also by The Edge.
Would have been worth watching if it wasn't for the distracting background music. It does nothing but detract. What a shame.
Can anyone help us to contact Gears of Games who did this interview? We had hoped they would talk to us (Edge Games) before releasing it, to get the real facts about certain things. For instance, what really happened regarding Fairlight 2 and 3. While Bo is an amazing guy, really bright, he has selective memory about crucial events. For instance, while he admits that he accepted a one-off payment from us to buy him out for Fairlight 1 and 2, he forgets how this came about. After he completed Fairlight I, he signed a contract with us for F2 and F3. When F2 was at least 6 months late, and WH Smith were screaming at us for not delivering it on time, we hit a point where Bo should have delivered Fairlight 3 and he still hadnt done F2. It was he who withheld his code for F2 (as he admits in the interview at around 40:00) to force us to renegotiate his contract so that he would be cashed out for F1 and F2, and would be freed of any obligation to complete F3 (as he admits at 34:00). To get F2 launched we had to agree to his demands and paid him off as he requested. We never had any beta code, so most certainly did not release a beta copy of F2. We released the copy of the game he delivered to us as completed after we paid him and he stopped withholding the code. Then we got reports of bugs in the release version and had to go back to him to get him to fix the bugs and supply the 128k version. It took about 6 months of asking him, but he eventually did come through (as he admits at around 40:00).
you screwed him Tim, simple as that, you're a pariah in the games industry and you earned that with your own actions, go away, just... go away.
@@BrianBeuken No Brian, we did not "screw" him, in fact he screwed us. We have all the documents to prove it if anyone really wishes to know the actual truth. Bo signed a contract with us (Softek/EDGE) for create Fairlight 2 & 3 . He was running incredibly late completing Fairlight II, and getting us into trouble with WH Smith with which we had done a special promotion to launch Fairlight II. Bo did not like to be told he was missing deadlines, and told us he didn't care what deadline he had agreed to, the game would be done when it is done. Unfortunately, the game industry doesnt work that way since you have to do deals with major high street stores like WH Smith months in advance. And no, you can't wait til the game is complete to do a High Street store deal as they demand they have advance sales at launch and no one in the industry can afford to complete a game and then wait a year to launch it. So, yes, we got into an argument with Bo about him not getting FII finished on time, it was months late. But we did NOT withhold his royalties on Fairlight I, as tempting as that might have been we never did it. Eventually, Bo announced that he was tired of programming games (he did virtually no more after FII), and refused to do Fairlight 3 even though contractually obliged to do it. We negotiated amicably, and the deal we cut was that we paid him a large amount of money to buy him out entirely on the Fairlight franchise (we took over ownership of all copyright etc), in return he was to give us the final tested, working code for FII, and we would cancel his contract to do Fairlight 3. He handed over the claimed bug-free F2 code, we paid him the large sum and cancelled all his future commitments to us. THEN we discovered the F2 code had bugs in it after we had launched on his say-so that the code was bug free. And NO he did not give us a Beta version that we published, he said it was a tested final version. Eventually he did supply corrected F2 code that we published so there should be bug-free versions out there that can be completed. But it is unfair to say we treated him badly in any way -- about half way through this video interview (around 34:00?) he admits he got a lot of money from us in exchange for the rights to Fairlight. So her recalls this key part of the deal, whilst rather conveniently not recalling the rest of what happened. And by the way, the buy-out of Fairlight we did also was instead of him getting royalties on either F1 or F2, so no royalties were withheld from him. That just didn't happen. We most certainly did not 'screw' him.
@@edgegames2651 the entire games industry knows what you are Tim, you're not worth a longer reply..
@@BrianBeuken here here