ProcTech SOL & Trek80

In my recollection, Trek80 was one of the earliest "arcade" style games - certainly the earliest "real time" version of Star Trek of which I am aware. (BTW, the copyright dates on Trek80 and Target are both 1977.) I remember a BASIC implementation of Star Trek available on time sharing computers several years earlier. And IIRC, David Ahl's book "101 BASIC Computer Games" had a listing of it, and that must have been published around 1975 or 1976. But these BASIC versions all gave you as much time as you wanted to make your move. Trek80 and Target may have been among the earliest "real time" games programmed in assembler for the speed you needed for decent response from a 2 MHz 8080, and even then were specific to the memory-mapped VDM display. Perhaps other members of this list are aware of earlier arcade style games. There could not have been too many earlier attempts given the speed of output devices at the time. It wasn't until Microsoft came out with their BASIC compiler (19??) that I recall seeing games like PacMan and Ladders for serial terminals. And, Bob, if you start falling in love with the SOL, a friend is compiling an audio CD-ROM of all available PT cassette software - just substitute a portable CD player in place of the cassette recorder, and your SOL will be among the first vintage computers with a CD interface (sort of)! When he has the final version ready, I'll post how to get in touch with him. Bob Stek bobstek(a)ix.netcom.com