| Hit Squad |
Chris Bourne digs into the past of ZX-81 specialist, Julian Chappell
MAKING a living out of the ZX-81 seems an odd thing to attempt in times when most software houses treat the machine as if it were carrying typhoid bacteria. Some retailers would prefer to see a rabid dog on their premises than a ZX-81 game. But such has been the success of Julian Chappell's Software Farm that not only is the company a going concern but it is even planning to expand into new and bigger offices.
Julian was born in Hounslow of nomadic parents in 1956. "My father was an oil depot manager, so we kept moving to new depots. Eventually he retired to Weston-super-Mare and ran a sub-post office. I started work behind the counter when I was eighteen."
Julian had an older brother, Paul, who was an electronics graduate. Paul was setting up his own business constructing control devices for industrial processes. Julian was dragooned into learning machine-code programming in order to help write the routines to control the chips.
"Eventually we went high-falutin' and did a control system for the local nuclear power station. Unfortunately, we couldn't throw it into critical to test the system. I don't know whether they used it in the end."
Before you heave a sigh of relief at the thought that nuclear devastation may after all not be under the control of the undoubtedly zany Julian, it is certainly true that a British Steel blast furnace is being monitored by bits of an old ZX-81, courtesy of the Chappell brothers.
"It provides a printout of the temperature," says Julian, "monitoring safety levels. Of course, it doesn't look like a ZX-81. We put it in a fancy box to make sure of that."
Machine-code expertise came haphazardly. "Paul would say, 'I've got this cheap chip we could bung in it' and half the time I had to hunt through the libraries for a list of mnemonics to program it. Sometimes there were only two registers and an accumulator."
Eventually, the brothers fell out. "I wanted to do something on my own," Julian admits. "The business was unsteady, so I left him to go bust on his own. It was all very friendly."
Having drifted almost by chance into the world of micro-electronics, Julian had already acquired a ZX-81 of his own. "I was mildly interested in the ZX-80," he says, "but it was almost as crude as what I was doing myself at the time. Only nutcases had ZX-80s. When the '81 came out I thought I'd find out about this wonderful Basic language."
His first impression of wonderful Basic was that it was painfully slow, even when number-crunching. He wrote some games for it in code, a Pacman and Asteroids game, which were later marketed as Asteroids and Gobblers.
"I wrote them for fun. It was a busman's holiday really. Then I bought Sinclair User and saw that only about 10 per cent of the ads were for machine-code games. They talked about it as if it was something amazing and mysterious. I realised that I might as well jump on the bandwagon."
Together with his girlfriend Sarah Green, Julian took out a quarter-page ad in Sinclair User and began to sell his games. The two of them worked from a back bedroom, saving the games directly from the machine and doing the labels themselves. Sarah herself is far from being just a convenient envelope-licker, but a business programmer in her own right, having written for the Sirius, Apricot, "and IBM, yeuckk!"
"The response kept us up at night," Julian continues, "and we started making money. The problem, which still exists, was that the business side interferes with programming time."
Thus the Software Farm was born. Julian's parents had left the post office by now and had bought a small farm in South Wales, which became the business address, as Julian and Sarah were living in rented accommodation and could not use it commercially.
"We were aware of the general attitude of fear towards computers, particularly among older people, so we thought calling the company a farm might help them relate to us. Originally we had a vegetable Pacman but eventually we decided on the cosmic cockerel."
In between long bouts of duplicating and letter posting Julian finally managed to write a new program, Super-Scramble. Instead of the usual missiles and neutron bombs Julian used bats and a witch at the end.
"It has very imaginative graphics even though they are not hi-res," interjects Sarah, supportively. The game was released for Christmas 1982 but the manual duplicating was becoming a major problem.
"At that time all the support agencies were in their infancy," says Julian, "but then we started getting information through the post. It was a godsend to us, even though it was still tape-to-tape. Only now, and only with big companies, can you get loop bin duplication systems."
Julian and Sarah took Super-Scramble to the very first ZX-Microfair just in time to see Spectrum fever hit the trade. "We were deserted," says Julian. "We sold enough to break even, but it was a great disappointment. We made no trade contacts. Everyone wanted Spectrum games, and that has continued ever since."
Being left out in the cold did, however, give Julian a different perspective on what was happening. "We could see everybody was going bonkers. The software was all rubbish, with ten new companies a day. It was blatantly obvious that the market was flooded from day one."
Eventually Software Farm decided what few software companies dared to consider: to remain with the ZX-81 in spite of the new machine.
"Although everyone was going stir-crazy, all those ZX-81s were not going to evaporate. We thought, let's do something clever and different with it. With any luck everybody else will leave us with the ZX-81 on our own."
For six months Software Farm lived off the dwindling profits from the original games, while Julian set himself to work out how to turn the ZX-81 screen into high resolution.
"It took six months to develop the system and three months to write the first program, Forty Niner. All the while the money was getting less. There was a sense of risk. If we had it wrong and the ZX-81s really were gathering dust then we would go bust."
The crunch came at the Your Computer Christmas Fair in 1983. At that time, the company was at rock-bottom. Forty Niner was launched, and took off. The gamble had worked.
Forty Niner was designed as a showpiece for the new graphics which give the same resolution as on the Spectrum. It is a digging game in which you must persuade the snakes to eat the giant rats or some such nonsense. Julian hit on the idea of projecting it as the first in a series of hi-res games, each one of which is to be on a distinct theme.
"It's like free wotsits in cornflakes packets," says Julian. "If you get one then you want the whole set."
The second game, Rocket Man, is a levels and ladders game in which you must collect diamonds while avoiding the man eating bubloid. If you get past the third level you become a vulture and must eat legs of lamb to keep your strength up.
Selling the games to retailers was difficult.
"You could hear the voice at the other end of the phone drop as soon as they realised it was a ZX-81 game" says Julian. "We had to offer them sale or return terms, but once the media was on our side it changed. Now they keep badgering us for more."
The new game will be called Z-Xtricator, and will be of the Defender type. "It's not a vehicle for the graphics, otherwise we would have done it first. We are also going to do a hi-res utility, so people can design their own games."
Z-Xtricator is not intended to be the last in the Software Farm hi-res series, but one thing you should not expect is any form of adventure game. Julian hates them.
"Normal adventures bore me to tears. You are in a dark hole. Something ferocious is approaching. Then you wait for twenty minutes while nothing happens ... On the other hand, I have a hankering for a truly animated adventure, not a pretend one. If we did it, it would probably have to be on the Spectrum. The Software Farm," he adds, portentously, "being innovatory, will do it properly."
Sarah is anxious to dispel ideas that a Spectrum game would mean leaving the ZX-81. "Every letter we get says keep up the good work. We got one cute one which said the writer had written to Jim'll Fix It because he wanted to meet Julian."
Software Farm is certainly proud of its following. "As long as consumers continue to buy the product we are not going to drop the ZX-81," says Julian. "We'd get lynched if we did."
The company even runs a software club for enthusiasts with a regular newsletter containing letters, hints and tips, program listings and a series of articles by Julian on machine-code.
Perhaps it is the company's recognition of the importance of maintaining a loyal and friendly customer base which ensures its success more than anything else. Selling a ZX-81 game is quite a different proposition from selling for the Spectrum.
"All the support industries base prices on what the source industry can afford," says Julian, "which means Spectrum prices. A ZX-81 program has to be a hit or it won't make any money, at all."
The problem is simple, that although ZX-81 games tend to be cheaper than Spectrum games in the shops, because the ZX-81 itself is cheaper, the cassettes, labels, duplication and so on all cost just as much, so the profit margins are much lower. Unfortunately, many of the enthusiastic programmers who send material to Software Farm do not realise that fact.
"Out of the thousands we are sent lots are no good and many are just not commercial propositions", Julian explains. "The rest have ideas based on the Spectrum market. But you won't get £40,000 for a Spectrum game, yet they think they can make that on the ZX-81. A hit is vital, and even then it is not big money. Then they think they are being ripped off."
With the hi-res series of games, Julian and Sarah appear to have got the business about right. Rocket Man reached 28 in a Gallup survey of top games, which is extraordinary, for a market dominated by the Spectrum and Commodore 64. But determination and nerve have been as much a factor in their success as excellence of programming or games design.
Perhaps a clue to Julian's character can be found in his hobby, an esoteric form of karate known as Tang Soo Do, which is concerned with demolishing opponents wearing full body armour with your bare hands. "Our instructor is the World Champion of All Martial Arts" says Julian. Apparently the man has beaten judo, kung-fu, and karate experts into the ground with his skills. "If you turn up late for a class, you have to spar with him," Julian grimaces.
It certainly sounds like good preparation for taking on the equally well-armoured hordes of Spectrum games producers, and winning shelfspace and ratings up there with the best of them. One thing is for sure - there is no room for turkeys on Julian's farm.