EACA Software
The Demo tape
Left: The original EACA demo tape sleeve
Here are some examples of software written specifically for the EACA machine, contributed to this site by Simon N. Goodwin (U.K.). The first five programs listed here were primarily used to demonstrate the Video Genie by Lowe Electronics and associated distributors in Britain. They came bundled with the machine on an official demo tape, made by EACA in Hong Kong.
Four of these were also included in a demo tape for the System 80. The latter tape contained a BASIC program which drew an image of Dick Smith replacing the one which drew the Video Genie logo as described below!
The EACA demo programs were simple and unsophisticated. A few (Star War and perhaps Biorhythms) were very close to TRS-80 versions of the same thing! One thing that sets them apart from TRS-80 programs is the mention of pressing <NEW LINE> in the prompt messages rather than the usual <RETURN>.
The cassette files for these programs
can be downloaded from the Cassette
Image Archive.
Biorhythms
I particularly remember Biorhythms gracing the odd System-80 in my local store. This was a useful program for showing off the graphics capability of the machines.
Not Y2K compatible by the way!
Graphics
A screen saver that showed a Video Genie logo (of sorts).
This logo can be seen in the advertisement for the French-distributed Video Genie in the "Other Guises" section of this site.
Statistics
This calculates a bar graph using up to 12 data points.
Other software on the demo tape included Cost Analysis and Star War, a "Star-Trek"- type game.
Troll Crusher
Finally, this last program is NOT part of the official EACA demo tape and is a lot more sophisticated than the software above. It's written for and on a 32k+ Video Genie (but probably ok on the TRS-80 as well) but never actually published until now. This is a "dungeon-type" adventure game called "Troll Crusher" written by Simon Goodwin, U.K.
From Simon's own documentation for the game..."If you've ever been frustrated by 'adventure' programs which seem more like vocabulary tests than games, or you're bored by graphic programs which test the reflexes of your hands rather than your brain, TROLLCRUSHER may be the game for you. "
Simon's inspiration for this game was Computing Today's listing 'Cells and Serpents' for Nascom (by G. Lovell, first published December 1980). That lead to a PDP-11 version of Trollcrusher, and the Video Genie version was adapted in turn from that.
Check it out at the Cassette Image Archive!