Description

Shareware Heroes is a comprehensive meticulously researched exploration of an important and toolong overlooked chapter in video game history

Shareware Heroes The renegades who redefined gaming at the dawn of the internet takes listeners on a journey from the beginnings of the shareware model in the early 1980s the origins of the concept even the name itself and the rise of sharewares major playersthe likes of id Software Apogee and Epic MegaGamesthrough to the significance of shareware for the forgotten systemsthe Mac Atari ST Amigawhen commercial game publishers turned away from them

This book also charts the emergence of commercial shareware distributors like Educorp and the BBS/newsgroup sharing culture And it explores how shareware developers plugged gaps in the video gaming market by creating games in niche and neglected genres like verticallyscrolling shootemups eg Raptor and Tyrian or racing games eg Wacky Wheels and Skunny Kart or RPGs God of Thunder and Realmz until finally as the video game market again grew and shifted and major publishers took control how the shareware system faded into the background and fell from memory