Pre-internet BBS folks

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FP

Diamond Member
Feb 24, 2005
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This thread was inspired by the other 'What was your first internet experience' thread.

I lived in the Bay Area around 92' and had a few BBSs I would dial-in to but my favorite by far was 'Records Department'. I think it was run out of some guy's basement in Fremont. Anyone remember that one?

Anyway, they had this space game where you traded/fought other players. You could only make so many moves a day and it had a gambling option where you could win more money. I discovered one day that if you wagered a negative amount and lost the game would give you that amount. I kept it a secret for a while but eventually my empire became too big too fast and the sysop figured it out.

They also had a files area that had random pictures in it and I remember every so often someone would upload a picture of Cindy Crawford and I would spend the next 4 hours downloading it.
 
KLin

KLin

Lifer
Feb 29, 2000
30,426
745
126
Originally posted by: binister
This thread was inspired by the other 'What was your first internet experience' thread.

I lived in the Bay Area around 92' and had a few BBSs I would dial-in to but my favorite by far was 'Records Department'. I think it was run out of some guy's basement in Fremont. Anyone remember that one?

Anyway, they had this space game where you traded/fought other players. You could only make so many moves a day and it had a gambling option where you could win more money. I discovered one day that if you wagered a negative amount and lost the game would give you that amount. I kept it a secret for a while but eventually my empire became too big too fast and the sysop figured it out.

They also had a files area that had random pictures in it and I remember every so often someone would upload a picture of Cindy Crawford and I would spend the next 4 hours downloading it.
Click to expand...

Tradewars 2002? Barren Realms Elite? The Pit? LORD? Good times :thumbsup:
 
Jadow

Jadow

Diamond Member
Feb 12, 2003
5,962
2
0
There were a couple local BBS' I dialed into. One was called "Rude Dog BBS" owned by a guy named Mike Rudie.

That was a cool BBS, they had a campout / cookout one time that I went too when I was like 13.

It was a good group of people, I remember that Rudie had this awesome car with a HUD, it was like 1991 and this guy had a HUD that displayed the speed and stuff ON THE WINDSHIELD like it was an F-15 Eagle.

Anyways, his BBS was good, it had Usurper and Red Dragon, 2 games that I loved. I loggged in once a day to play my turns then logged out.
 
Fingolfin269

Fingolfin269

Lifer
Feb 28, 2003
17,948
34
91
Empire/Tradewars 0.98-1.03 or so

Things were different back then too. We used to get all of our Commodore 64s together to go have a software 'swap' meet. The location? A courthouse......

I can't remember what year this was. I want to say like mid 80's - early 90's because I was really young and had a C64 with 300 baud modem. When I picked up that 1200 baud I was in heaven. :)
 
43st

43st

Diamond Member
Nov 7, 2001
3,197
0
0
First year of college, about 92' also. VAX mainframe, Gother, Galatic Trader and a few MUDs. I had a monochrome monitor and everyone on my floor liked me because they didn't have to go to the computer lab to use a PC. The first picture I downloaded was of Jimi Hendrix and Roy Buchanan. I remember printing it also and thinking "wow, I better save this! I wonder how many other pictures I can find and print?" :p
 
Fullmetal Chocobo

Fullmetal Chocobo

Moderator<br>Distributed Computing
Moderator
May 13, 2003
13,704
7
81
Originally posted by: kinev
Five words: Legend Of the Red Dragon
Click to expand...

Oh man I miss that game. I've actually tried to setup a BBS just to play it again... :)
 
B

bennylong

Platinum Member
Apr 20, 2006
2,493
0
0
I paid $299 for a lifetime membership for this porno BBS back in 1992. Talk about a bad investment
 
Jadow

Jadow

Diamond Member
Feb 12, 2003
5,962
2
0
LOL

My parents paid about $200 in long distance charges for a BBS I was dloading porn GIFS on.

When they got the bill, they flipped, I had now idea it would cost $.

I told them I was playing GAMES!

LOL
 
F

FP

Diamond Member
Feb 24, 2005
4,568
0
0
Originally posted by: KLin
Originally posted by: binister
This thread was inspired by the other 'What was your first internet experience' thread.

I lived in the Bay Area around 92' and had a few BBSs I would dial-in to but my favorite by far was 'Records Department'. I think it was run out of some guy's basement in Fremont. Anyone remember that one?

Anyway, they had this space game where you traded/fought other players. You could only make so many moves a day and it had a gambling option where you could win more money. I discovered one day that if you wagered a negative amount and lost the game would give you that amount. I kept it a secret for a while but eventually my empire became too big too fast and the sysop figured it out.

They also had a files area that had random pictures in it and I remember every so often someone would upload a picture of Cindy Crawford and I would spend the next 4 hours downloading it.
Click to expand...

Tradewars 2002? Barren Realms Elite? The Pit? LORD? Good times :thumbsup:
Click to expand...

Tradewars! I think that was it. That was a great game.

I never had the phone bill problems since all of the BBSs were a city away but I did get in trouble for keeping the phone lines tied up all day.
 
M

MulLa

Golden Member
Jun 20, 2000
1,755
0
0
Originally posted by: Jadow
LOL

My parents paid about $200 in long distance charges for a BBS I was dloading porn GIFS on.

When they got the bill, they flipped, I had now idea it would cost $.

I told them I was playing GAMES!

LOL
Click to expand...

ROFL... that's a classic... Remember the floppy disk swapping session at school afterwards too :eek:
 
P

pulse8

Lifer
May 3, 2000
20,860
1
81
I don't remember much, but I do remember one was called "Masturbation Station".

I also remember having a HUGE list of BBS numbers I would try and call, but most I couldn't get into and a fair amount were wrong numbers.
 
effowe

effowe

Diamond Member
Nov 1, 2004
6,012
18
81
I ran a BBS in the Chicagoland area called EMI. It was running on the Renegade BBS software. It was mostly a scene BBS which had demo's, music (s3m's, it's, xm's), and ANSI art (from groups such as ACiD, SKiSM and others.) I was also a part of some of the 'elite' boards where we would trade around 3.5" disk size files of random progs/games. Of course you can't forget the board games, LORD, Usurper, and other out there games like Studs. Those were my heydays of computer use.
 
R

reverend boltron

Senior member
Nov 18, 2004
945
0
76
Originally posted by: effowe
I ran a BBS in the Chicagoland area called EMI. It was running on the Renegade BBS software. It was mostly a scene BBS which had demo's, music (s3m's, it's, xm's), and ANSI art (from groups such as ACiD, SKiSM and others.) I was also a part of some of the 'elite' boards where we would trade around 3.5" disk size files of random progs/games. Of course you can't forget the board games, LORD, Usurper, and other out there games like Studs. Those were my heydays of computer use.
Click to expand...

You DA MAN Effowe!!
 
D

dmcowen674

No Lifer
Oct 13, 1999
54,889
47
91
www.alienbabeltech.com
Worked at Hayes Modems

I used to set up the scripts for not just Hayes Modems but all brands to negotiate.

Also did the scripts for Prodigy and AOL.

Ran many test BBS's to test new Modems.
 
R

rgwalt

Diamond Member
Apr 22, 2000
7,393
0
0
When I was 8 or 9, I asked my dad for a modem for my birthday so I could dial in to BBS systems. This was back in 87 or 88, and my dad bought the top of the line modem, which was a 2400bps model for something like $200 or $300. I'd dial in from our old IBM XT and download games.

R
 
Iron Woode

Iron Woode

Elite Member
Super Moderator
Oct 10, 1999
31,294
12,817
136
the last time I dialed into a BBS was back in 1985 on my C64 with a 300 baud modem that was overclocked to 450 baud. I was bad ass even back then.
 
S

spidey07

No Lifer
Aug 4, 2000
65,469
5
76
man it was rough.

You had to get the phone number, then you had to work your way in by contributing, and then finally you could download games and porn.

tough times.

then you would copy it to floppy so you wouldn't lose it. Copying a floppy took like, what? 10 minutes? doin't copy that floppy.

tough times.

exchanging files was similar to copy a cassette. you'd exchange magnetic media.
 
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