[Coco] Original Iron Forest...plus other Diecom games? - was: In need of a 1987 GIME

[Andrew]

All,

Splitting this thread now; after following the old thread, I started 
thinking...

There apparently are cracked copies of Iron Forest, and it seems some 
(how many? a couple?) people have original and working copies. There's a 
question of being able to get an original copy of this game...

Someone who owns this original game needs to copy it and put it in an 
archive somewhere so those interested (ahem - myself, but I bet others 
would be too) can download it.

This wouldn't be piracy. Back in ~2004 (damn, has it really been 10 
years?), myself and a few other guys (step forward, guys - if you want - 
you know who you are) worked to "restore" a working copy of Diecom's 
Gates of Delerium, while removing the copy protection. We were 
successful in this, and in the process built up an "archive" of stuff 
for the game. It's floating around out there, I'm sure.

Anyhow, in the process, we got in contact with Dave Dies (who I believe 
I remember has since passed away?); the email "authorizing the release 
and distribution of all Diecom Products software to the Color Computer 
and CoCo emulation community" was included in the archive.

I can dig it out if wanted - but the short of it is that we should be 
able to copy and distribute Iron Forest. Granted, the hardware that went 
along with it isn't available, but IIRC someone in the community managed 
to create an interface for the Sega Light Gun (or the NES Light Gun) and 
published it as well (I am pretty certain I have a copy of this 
schematic somewhere too).

This is just the tip of the iceberg, though - so to speak. We as a 
community need to find and preserve the entire Diecom library, and make 
it available for download for everyone. So - can we do this? I can 
devote some time to the task myself (I'll have to dig out my CoCo stuff 
again, but that's no big deal and I've been meaning to do it for a 
while) - I'm willing to try anything; I have a couple CoCo 3 systems, 
plus a CoCo 2 system - also a DOS "emulator box" with a 5.25 drive in 
it. I can also get MESS going on my Linux system if needed.

I can help with any software or testing needs; I've never done any 
low-level cracking or other RE, so I won't be much help there - but I do 
have a long background in software development, and I have coded in 
assembler in the past (including a bit of 6809) - so that doesn't scare 
me. Hardware doesn't pose problems for me either (I know my way around a 
soldering iron and oscilloscope).

First steps should likely be identifying and creating a list of all the 
Diecom software catalog, then identifying and collecting any and all 
(actual, cracked, etc) copies of the software titles that exist in 
whatever archives we each own or have access to. Maybe we can set up a 
public dropbox or something to keep things in as we organize things. 
Ultimately, we should be able to identify what is missing, and see if we 
can locate it, or put out a plea for it (?) - or at the least, document 
that it doesn't exist to our knowledge.

I think this could be an exciting and useful project. So is anyone 
interested?

-- 
Andrew L. Ayers
Glendale, Arizona
http://www.phoenixgarage.org/