Dragon

[garethrichardadams]

Hello,

Have you already done an article on the Dragon? I've just read the Oric article (thanks to eBay) and was fascinated. If there is an article can you tell me which issue it was in? If there isn't, is there any chance there could be??

Thanks

Gareth

[SirClive]

There hasn't been one up to now.

[necronom]

I never had a Dragon, but I'd be interesed in an article. I do know someone who had a Dragon - quite a rare thing!

[felgekarp]

I'd like to see one as well, I think my dad's still got his somewhere and I remember playing a few decent games on it.

[GetDexter]

Seeing as I live in Wales and am, in fact, Welsh, then I would love to see a Dragon article.

My mate had a Dragon in the 80's and the rest of us always felt a little uncomfortable around him as he would talk about games we had never heard of. Games that were never reviewed in C&VG or on display in Martins The Newsagents.

Maybe he was just making it all up...

[NorthWay]

It had a nice cpu at least. Wonder if you can exchange it with the 6309E(?)?

Were the graphics related to the Amstrad or BBC B chips family? They were kinda oddball IIRC.

[RetroRevival]

The Dragon used the Motorolla 6847 whereas the CPC and BBC used the 6845, hence the possible similarity you may have seen.

[NorthWay]

The Dragon used the Motorolla 6847 whereas the CPC and BBC used the 6845, hence the possible similarity you may have seen.

Interesting...
The Dragon had a pretty ugly colour selection IIRC?
Checking up un the 6847 made me confused. I thought the Amstrad only had bitmapped modes? And that the BBC had both bitmap and character based? How come the Amstrad had a 27 colour palette and the BBC 16(?)?

Computer magazines never taught you this properly in the old days. My lovely C= 64 does "320x200 in 16 colours", but that is stretching the truth a bit more than good is. Then again, they all did.

[RetroRevival]

The 27 colur palette on the CPC was in fact just 9 individual colours with bright and pastel variations making up the other 2/3rds.

[Tapey297]

My Dad had a dragon 32 in about 1981 it was the first computer I had ever seen and wanted a go but Dad was having none of it (BOO HISS)

[Collywobbles]

All of this talk of your dads owning Dragons is making me feel old! I owned a Dragon 32 back in the 80's and was very proud of it. My mates had C64s and Spectrums. I learnt my trade as a programmer on the Dragon and it's what I still do today.

It had some pretty good games - some of which were even reviewed in early issues of C&VG! It even got ports of Manic Miner (crap version) and Jet Set Will (excellent version).

Collywobbles

[Antiriad2097]

Hi Colly, long time no see

If it helps, I always quite fancied a Dragon. Being an Oric owner the software companies would often do cross platform stuff, so I'd see Dragon games advertised alongside the Oric games. I seem to recall Severn Software and Microdeal being a couple of the big publishers that served us both. I believe Franklyn's Tomb started ot on the Dragon. Must finish that...

[Collywobbles]

Hi Ant,

Yes, I’m now back from my trip to the US. It’s funny; I always quite fancied having an Oric! I think some of the screenshots of games looked quite tempting. I keep trying to buy one on eBay to add to my retro collection.

Collywobbles

PS: I’ve got my 2 nominations in for Wk7 of the Retroleague. Looking forward to playing again.

[Elgin_McQueen]

Didn't even realise you'd joined this forum till now. Excellent.

[Antiriad2097]

PS: I’ve got my 2 nominations in for Wk7 of the Retroleague. Looking forward to playing again.

Jolly good, look forward to seeing you there. Due to domestic issues, I had to bail out of running things and missed a whole season since you went

Need to squeeze in a game before Sunday to get a score up - meant to do it last night but forgot, got carried away playing with my Wii. Don't want to miss a week this season