BBC Micro game Frak

Run like the wind, my little hairy, Neanderthal friend...

[@pappachook]

The version on the electron also had a screen editor if i remember right, which was great fun. I also remember playing the Captain pugwash tune which sounded brilliant on the electron, i never knew it was possible!! Thanks for the memory's i am away for a little weep now.

[@clarkthesuperhero]

Man, this takes me back. Could never get past the upside down level. How I loved my BBC Micro. Repton, Jet Set Willy, Arkanoid, Knightlore, Grannys Garden. Superb games. I could never part with it when I got my Gameboy, so hence I still have it ^^

[@baffy2000]

If you get past the upside downs, it goes black and white - i.e. all colours other than black turn white, so it’s a lot of outlines. Then you have to play that upside down, too. I seem to remember after that the screen flashes on and off intermittently, so you have to time your jumps pretty well. Can’t remember anything else.

[@ScoopDogg]

Chuckle egg n elite were my fave been games. I remember when the TV show micro sent a programming through the airwaves and I received it. Took me an hour of load rewind load rewind till it loaded in but I was well impressed. Wish I had kept it.....

[@ScoopDogg]

Chuckie egg hate spell checkers

[@sailingwinifred]

I still have my BBC in a box at my parents home! That thing taught my to program, and is the main reason I have a great career in IT! Amazing to think that the BBC taught me BASIC programming and french!

[@jajlegend]

ha! in this one video, you have literally brought back so many of my childhood memories! None of my friends had ever heard of Frak until i told them about it, and they were surprised that I knew of such a thing as the BBC Micro!

[@m0nk3yl0v3r]

was obsessed with this game as a 6 year old!

[@MrBern91]

hahahah! This video takes me back! I've never been able to finish the 2:nd map :D I sure love this game :)

[@stelley08]

i remember playing this in the 80s. used to think it was quite cheeky when FRAK! appeared on the screen when Trogg died

[@Wobb1y1210]

that is sooo kwl reminds me of my childhood thx for uploading :D

[@Neil_Gibson]

Thanks for posting this. For some reason I found myself humming that tune. Wow the things we keep in our heads!! Brings it all back :-)

[@varisonik]

I loved this game, and Repton on the BBC B

[@spannamatronic]

This game looked fantastic, but man the controls were a nightmare.

[@cpmisalive]

Even more amazing when you consider that the BBC Micro has no hardware sprite capabilities, unlike the Commodore 64. The level design like FRAK! is a nice touch, another classic game from Orlando who also brought us Arcadians and Firetrack.

[@eabnamoliben1598]

Hello

[@Squab1972]

Used to play this in my secondary school...lol

[@autoforthepeople]

Hahahahaaaaa I love it when you passed all three levels and then level 4 was upside down which would totally throw you and you'd lose and have to start from the beginning!!! Those were the days!!! :- D

[@lammy1234567890]

I used to play this all the time, but the preview window that appears when you hover the mouse over the timeline has made me realise for the first time that the layout spells out FRAK

[@TheButlerNZ]

I was just about to post the same thing (4 years later). I made a program called hassler.. It could send codes to other BBC's in the (wellington college NZ) computer room.. I would send the code that locked the screen, push code that would send back their password, then unlock the screen... If I was really vendictive, I'd send a program to any unlocked BBC that would randomly raise/lower a sound on all 3 audio channels that sounded like a wailing woman.... x 3.... x as many machines as I could send to... Ahhh the BBC... didn't you loose everything when you hit break, and had to do something to bring your program back.... so I'd send a break and something else that cleared the other persons lunchtime worth of programming... Man... I was a prat!

[@DVDfeverGames]

​@@TheButlerNZ PMSL! I was stunned that The Hobbit somehow disabled BREAK, so you couldn't reset the machine while playing it, and had to switch off.

[@TheButlerNZ]

@@DVDfeverGames I still can't understand the mentality around the BBC micro erasing everything at a keystroke... That was one of the text combo's I could send from my program... so long ago I can't remember the exact details but I think there was a way to erase the back buffer so once it ran, the BBC was a blank canvas and you wondered what had happened... I also had a script that would inject a cut down send to the other machine, it would pull the stored password and send it back to me... then erase itself... all with only a few lines of code... I guess this was back before life had beaten the will to do anything out of me... Now I sit typing in KZbin and fighting "the Algorithm' . Today KZbin thinks I need someone to manslpain Ghost in the machine' to me... At least the sun has come out, winter is fading... and I fixed my bike.. (hmm better finish that Gear Failure vid im making on VSDC...

[@baffy2000]

@@TheButlerNZBreak reset the machine, so LIST wouldn’t display your program anymore. But it didn’t clear memory, and you could type OLD to get your program back, as long as you didn’t do anything else first.

[@TheButlerNZ]

@@DVDfeverGames I only had 'The Hobbit' on my Speccy. Used to play Frak most of the time on the BBC, or made our own driving games (scroll down road side that slowly got tighter, or a sideways version that looked like a ... well college kids version of scramble

[@El_Smeghead]

"Grandmaster Frak and the Furious Five" How 80s was THAT!!?

[@ramdor72]

Yes, I think somewhere along the way home computers lost their way. Loads of great games could fit in 32k ram, now we need gigs of the stuff. Must dig out my old beeb from storage. Thanks for putting up these vids too, brings back the memories. :)

[@downformaintenance]

...that's so much further than I ever got :)

[@SquidInkUK]

You may not think it today but these sprites were ground breaking. I remember thinking it was a nice when I realised the pattern of the platforms in the first level spelt FRAK!

[@cpmisalive]

The music is in the original Aardvark version but hidden is the Superior Software version, that has also been patched to allow it to run on the Master. Yep, those were the days when your computer started instantly and a decent game was easily less than 10k!

[@cyprianni]

Memories! LOL

[@puregd]

Found this game frustratingly hard

[@Foebane72]

The caveman is obviously a descendant of the Colonials from Battlestar Galactica.

[@ramdor72]

If you look at the source for the loading screen you'll find some code in there that isnt used. If you figure it out you can get it to play the captain pugwash theme music :) Friend and I found this so long ago. Those were the days :)

[@cpmisalive]

I don't know about red monsters, perhaps the Electron version? The music is in the original Aardvark release of the game. This is a Superior Software re-release that works on the BBC Master. Copy protection? Perhaps, but it's long gone now. ;)

[@zaikoji]

Remember the mucky version where Frak’s manhood was on display?

[@sdht6107]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/iKmalnyLgLWimKc

[@boo23uk]

i loved this game

[@BongoBaggins]

The version we had at our school - Frak Fuck - had been hacked so Trogg said 'Fuck' when he got hit. He got hit a lot

[@cpmisalive]

"You've fucked it!" - made me smile all afternoon - kzbin.info/www/bejne/iKmalnyLgLWimKc

[@anonymoushuman8962]

Jetpac!

[@grimTales1]

I remember this game, but the monsters were yellow for some reason? Maybe my BBC had its colours changed as it was 2nd hand.

[@jamesbaskerville9800]

Nice looking game and some thinking required to get through the levels. Could easily be in BASIC though it's so slow.

[@boo23uk]

i was looking for planetoid

[@AlexeyFilippenkoPlummet]

Hot dog, I'm hit! Frak! Frak!

[@Nommicus]

HA! wow I used to play this back at school, I remember a guy in the year above me altered the code to make his name from Frack to something rude and made his yo yo into a pink sausage thing roflmao

[@DDMT_Development]

That was a mod - the monsters were changed to naked women and the yoyo was his... Someone altered the bitmaps for the monsters

[@Nommicus]

@@DDMT_Development Thats Familiar =D

[@LeShark75]

Could have been the Electron version, that had monochrome graphics.

[@sinclairbrett]

I had this hahaha

[@JBWalton03]

I remember creaming about the graphics on this!!!! Games don't really have "graphics" anymore...... I'm off to play citadel till my eyes bleed

[@TheUnnamedGent]

I have a distinct memory of a teacher at my primary school showing me his name of the credits of this game. I don't remember his name, but is there any evidence of an australian being involved in producing this game? I'm starting to wonder if he just hacked the game to put his name in the credits.

[@mojo6825]

Game was developed by aardvark software who were in hornchurch essex UK, I used to work there, and no there weren't any Australians working on it with us

[@annaking5010]

Fantastic graphics for the time, absolutely awful controls though.

[@dowling1981]

I was always shit at this game