The technicians Watch - New watch repair line
I finally found out who created the mysterious machinery of racing arcade 3D I've seen in my childhood And apparently, he even invented in 1975, the German forerunner of what was later copied by Atari as Night Driver - the first in the world training gaming arcade 3 dimensions ever.
In my childhood ca 1982 I've seen in two shopping centers Hertie and Karstadt in the German city of Bremen a strange 3D car racing arcade machine name N rburg Ring Karstadt He stood in a teen fashion department which called Follow me; the department was decorated with fake air conditioning pipes on the ceiling and also in many videogame consoles Atari VCS2600, Intellivision, Philips G7000 etc. Have been installed here for the kids to play Perhaps a ring machine N may also have been in the basement of the shopping district Horten center for a short time, but I'm not sure.
The wardrobe was quite strange, the red signal edges completely vertical rectangular box covered in protective metal edges money with a steering wheel in front and a small color monitor 17 inch There was also a seat mounted the front of the machine, there was an accelerator pedal and I'm not sure a gearshift lever There were written white letters ring N on the sides of the cabinet may also drawings checkered flags with white there was.
I do not remember the seat; it may be either a black plastic or metal chair was hard and uncomfortable or just a plain, rectangular box with a black top used to sit I only remember that I sometimes sit on it in Meanwhile the video game consoles at home in the department Follow me Karstadt for unoccupied or to dial by staff.
The screen shown in 3D raster graphics max 4 or 8 colors per scan line of a road dark blue with stripes yellow center you can see the cover as Oldtimer red Rolls-Royce car there and background there was a cloudy sky and a landscape similar 2D Pole Position as crossing a horizontal scroll curves there were no other cars on the road and I do not remember also objects left or right.
Below the graphic was a black, high-ca 4cm area with very stocky figures and a horizontal bar as a speedometer showed through several rectangular holes in a red top, like plain, opaque screen overlay with written white describing the number of fields on the fact there is no logos title or copyright notices or other writings on the screen, things number below the graphs similar to some of the first Atari 2600 carts today I think it was a timed game that played like a very similar arcade night the driver of the Atari version of MAME.
Below the display cabinet was a line of about 4 small buttons who are allowed to pass between a mountain and a flat landscape can be selected by draw mode; the screen view instantly changed by pressing the buttons The mountain scenery was curved several curves in the road, but there was no top-down effects unlike Outrun in the charts of the road, I remember clearly that there were small brown huts visible green background panorama of flat landscape Perhaps another button chose between good and bad weather was rain or ice and snow There was also a button to choose between a sober driver and drunk caused a harder direction of behavior, I think to remember that each selected button is lit yellow each button has a light bulb in it, but they may also have been clear white with a yellow LED nearly all of them.
Here are two pictures drawn by hand; however I remember the graphics looked very much like that.
It could be that one of the N rings machines I saw a blue monitoring device BW, but maybe I mis- remember I do not remember if I put coins in the machine ; if so, then I played two or three times in my life I believe to remember that the machine had a single coin slot on a small metal plate money as known to the little chewing gum or vending machines condoms, but I'm not sure what detail.
Anyone remember side of this machine, it may be a Germany-only output or the name of this game may be different in other countries, because the ring N is the name of a track German formula 1 race, although the graphics of the game didn t look in any way like formula 1 in all I believe also remember that at the beginning of the 80th, I saw on the TV news simulator to conduct research purposes these graphics looked very similar to the game.
N Ring game machine must have been something really old like Speed Freak and I want to know if this was a Germany-disclose, or is something more commonly known in the world, I also enjoy see an emulation of it, although I think this game would not be a lot of fun today.
Some kind people I emailed an eBay photo and a French language brochure on another version of the machine The German machine on eBay was offered Formel 1 N rnburgring - made by Germany's Rainer Foerst GmbH in Gummersbach And the great thing is that the company still exists, and now produces nothing but driving simulators real scientists.
On The Arcade Flyer Archive I found additional German language leaflets machines N rburgring 1, 2 and 3 You can download high-resolution versions of the flyers here as prospectuses, the distributor of the German arcade machine company was named SPOBAG Sportst tten- Betriebs-AG.
According to this flyer N rburgring February 1, there were a large number of impressive electronics inside, mounted on 28 cards in a rack.
The graphics strongly resembled Night Driver that Atari had apparently copied from it the English translation for 5 displays the number is.
N 1 Nürburgring was very similar, as the night driver's machine by Atari; it appears some messages from the white road on a black background to approach a size 3 drive Nürburgring N 2 was essentially the same game with the handle motor cycle instead of a steering wheel According to the pamphlet, the vehicle simulated had speedometer, kilometer against an automatic gearshift 4 the game is over, or after 90 or driving in order the game into account the conduct of accidents and mistakes punished them with the pain of the good time players can win a free game by reaching the objective over the machine also has sound effects Dr. Ing Rainer Foerst wrote on his company's history page, its N rburgring 1 simulation arcade machine driving 1975 was quickly copied by the US game industry, so it was apparently the true inventor of the night driver concept and thus created the first 3-dimensional race car video game.
The N successor rburgring 3 still had 25 cards in it.
There are in fact the control panel buttons; Unfortunately I can not see color.
Capturing reworked screen shows the barrier brightest white Security This may have been the BW version of the machine with red bezel to the graphics of the probable dashboard that capture screen brochure was made when the software was still unfinished, because the display numbers correspond to the previous folder.
The successor rburgring N 3 already had a view of a day with the most realistic road and the white security fence According to the pamphlet, the simulated car has had a change of speed, acceleration 7s from 0 to 100 km h maximum speed 220 km h the player could choose with automatic shift between button and manual and between an easy and most dangerous race track to race track could be changed by the technician by exchanging one component which was probably a ROM or map ROM drive across goal played a short melody calm beating a predefined time won a free game and played a melody more I believe to remember that it was the German leben wir alle March Then the rest of the game Tage apparently corresponds to N 1 Nürburgring it is interesting that the lower screen area was unused and apparently covered by the bezel, which makes me conclude that the program necessary play time of the remaining scan lines for the internal calculation, which was also a common technique in Atari VCS2600 g ames may draw even mess pixel on the area covered when abused graphics memory or registers for web other calculations by the lack of RAM videogames 1970th often contain only a few dozen bytes of RAM, which made those dirty hacks needed to run them at all.
Probably other versions of the arcade machine were released over time, since the versions on the photo and don t really Match brochure my memories, but the video graphics, a large lever wheel speed and steering correspond, and the brochure says the machine can be optionally controlled with side stickers those that may have shown white checkered flags stored seat I remember may even have been a seat of the wide saddle tractor bicycle blackplate bolted to the door of the coin of this amount N rburgring 3 machine Although the graphics of the display on the flyer is BW, the colors of the background picture flyer yellow stripes, red hoodie with tank cover, etc. . Match my memories of the colors of the screen in the color version and a successor to color CRT apparently used the same colors but the flyer shows no mountain horizon, I apparently saw in another version.
This was apparently a successor named Formel 1 N Nürburgring I reworked the screenshot to improve visibility.
According to eBay this photo, the machine with mountains was probably named Formel 1 N rburgring ie Formula 1 It is also interesting that this chart of the screen are already a car window frame, which was then also implemented in the polygon based arcade game from Atari Hard Drivin and as with N also rburgring Hard Drivin claimed to be derived from a professional driving simulation machine so it may be that the company Reiner Foerst either had to do with its development or its simulators have been imitated again by Atari.
Unfortunately, no game in the series N Nürburgring was revived again on MAME Although modern measures, they were probably pretty boring to play, especially N rburgring 1 would be of historic significance as to imitate because he was apparently the world's first 3-dimensional race car videogame ever made, I would also like to see the other games N rburgring emulated Although they were probably less advanced than any car Pole Position opponent on the road, so they are probably earlier and thus were the first 3D car racing games posting a road in several - raster graphics color.
Reiner Foerst N Nürburgring The world's first arcade racing game 3D made in Germany!, Reiner, Foerst, Nürburgring.