I was in the middle of a larger project and waiting on parts, so I went ahead and spent some time with the TRS-80 Color Computer 3 instead. The setup used the CoCo 3 with its matching RGB monitor, and I captured the video through the RGB to HDMI board I sell on my website. Before getting into the games, I showed the two common joystick styles for the machine: the original black non-centering stick with one button, and the later deluxe Tandy joystick with self-centering action, trim controls, and two buttons.
I had planned to start with The Castle of Tharogad, which followed Dungeons of Daggorath, but that cartridge never cooperated. When I powered the machine up with it installed, I got graphical garbage on the screen. I spent about an hour cleaning and retrying it, but while the other cartridges worked, that one never did, so I set it aside and moved on.
The first game that did work was Springster. Right away it showed itself as a Color Computer 3 title by asking whether I was using an RGB monitor. Even though it looked at first glance like it might be another Q*bert-style game, it turned out to be its own thing, with a playfield that looked more like a Mahjong table and a purple slinky-like character moving through a layered maze.
The goal in Springster was to work down through 32 levels of the maze, find the maze melon, and bring it back to the top. Along the way I had to collect a pot of gold to open the purple square that dropped me to the next level. The game also used different colored blocks and collectible items with special effects, so it was one of those cartridges where the manual really helped. There was a timer in the upper left along with item counts and inventory, and overall I liked it a lot more than I expected to. I ended up liking it better than Q*bert and thought it was one of the better CoCo 3 games.
Next up was Rad Warrior, a 1987 release that also ran on a CoCo 2 with 128K or more. It had a side-scrolling presentation and supported RGB, so it was clearly built with the CoCo 3 in mind as well. When it first loaded, it dropped into a demo mode and I had to figure out which joystick port it expected before I could actually control it.
Once I got into the game, it turned out to be the TRS-80 Color Computer port of a title first released in the UK as The Sacred Armour of Antiriad. The setting was the year 3088 after an apocalypse, and the basic idea was to recover your power armor, charge it up, and fight through mutants. At the beginning I could only throw rocks, so progress was slow until I found the suit and started looking for energy cells. I did like the dashboard panel at the bottom of the screen, which reported suit status and messages such as gravity preventing takeoff.
The one thing that held Rad Warrior back for me was the control feel. Jumping onto platforms and attacking just didn’t feel very intuitive in this version, and I got frustrated with it pretty quickly. It had some neat ideas and good presentation, but I didn’t enjoy playing it as much as Springster.
I wrapped up with Thexder, the Sierra cartridge version for the Color Computer. In that game I controlled a transforming robot that switched between humanoid and jet forms. On foot, Thexder could run, jump, and fire heat-seeking lasers, while jet mode allowed flight but only straight-ahead shots. The game ran across 16 side-scrolling levels, with energy management, enemies, and a temporary shield all factoring into survival.
Thexder held up well, and I had a good time revisiting all three cartridges, even if one of them never loaded and another didn’t quite click for me.
— Aaron
Links
Timestamps
00:00 – Intro
02:42 – Springster
05:13 – Rad Warrior
08:02 – Thexder
10:07 – Wrap Up