Moonlander.bas

Posted3 months agoActive3 months ago

ibobev

56 points

16 comments

basic-code.bearblog.devOtherstory

calmpositive

Debate

20/100

RetrocomputingNostalgiaBasic

Key topics

Retrocomputing

Nostalgia

Basic

The post shares a nostalgic link to a BASIC implementation of the classic 'Moonlander' game, sparking fond memories and discussions about retrocomputing and old programming experiences.

Snapshot generated from the HN discussion

Discussion Activity

Moderate engagement

First comment

14h

Peak period

144-156h

Avg / period

Comment distribution16 data points

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Based on 16 loaded comments

Key moments

01Story posted
Oct 12, 2025 at 4:05 PM EDT
3 months ago
Step 01
02First comment
Oct 13, 2025 at 5:55 AM EDT
14h after posting
Step 02
03Peak activity
8 comments in 144-156h
Hottest window of the conversation
Step 03
04Latest activity
Oct 19, 2025 at 5:49 PM EDT
3 months ago
Step 04

Generating AI Summary...

Analyzing up to 500 comments to identify key contributors and discussion patterns

Discussion (16 comments)

Showing 16 comments

anonzzzies

3 months ago

2 replies

If there is anything that really gives me the nostalgia vibes, it's basic listings. So many good memories typing over listings and changing them to enhance or cheat. It was very educational as a child. Mags like this [0] fill me with joy even though it makes no more sense. At least I got to live it fully (my nostalgia vibes go from 1980-1988 around; after that it was more study/work; I was 14 in 1988 and teaching the computer classes at my high school as the teachers didn't understand anything).

[0] https://archive.org/details/msx-gids-nr.-08/mode/2up

citbl

3 months ago

1 reply

I used to load up tapes for 15' on my spectrum and then poke around trying to understand what was under the hood.

All I had was a thick book in a language I didn't speak yet.

No internet, no friends to bounce it with. Infinite time.

Good times.

1313ed01

3 months ago

Some commercial MS-DOS games were written in GW-BASIC. Infuriatingly it was not possible to list the code for those. I could not figure it out at the time.

Almost 40 years later, in 2025, I learned about the "protected" save format in GW-BASIC, and that there are tools to open those files and allow you to list the code.

https://retrocomputing.stackexchange.com/questions/7104/how-...

dahart

3 months ago

Typing in BASIC programs from magazines… brings back memories. Remember the Mad Magazine that had a program to draw Alfred E. Neumann? Here I just found it: https://meatfighter.com/mad/

That and going to the weird room at the dept. of education across from the library that kept drawers full of floppies and sifting through all the random public domain code & shareware.

Tepix

3 months ago

1 reply

So, neither Claude nor ChatGPT were able to write a little javascript program to provide an optimal solution for a suicide burn. Did anyone else have more luck?

sgentle

3 months ago

It's a bit tricky because velocity and altitude are floored every step, and you can only burn on whole timesteps so you can't necessarily hit the target velocity and altitude in a single burn.

I'm not sure if it's optimal, but this is a 2-burn solution that does 1 burn to hit x=20 and another to hit v>=-14 right afterwards: https://gist.github.com/sgentle/d88dd6fe37e76f9167db24379dc7...

iconjack

3 months ago

1 reply

You can get more fuel by entering a negative Thrust value.

JKCalhoun

3 months ago

1 reply

You should file bug, open an issue.

drob518

3 months ago

2 replies

Better yet, submit a PR.