WARAJEVO: The ZX Spectrum Emulator That Gave People Hope | Kim Justice

[@Kim_Justice]

Hopefully you enjoyed this story. Did you have any experience of using Warajevo back in the day? Have a shout in the comments.

[@alanalan-de6to]

Love the video's Kim, I've never used a spectrum emulator, much less warajevo but I'd like to try it one day, any suggestions?

[@Kim_Justice]

@@alanalan-de6to Fuse and Spectaculator are the best ones available nowadays. I use Spectaculator myself but it's not a free program, while Fuse is. There's also versions of Fuse for just about every desktop/mobile operating system going.

[@alanalan-de6to]

Cool, gonna look into fuse, I always wanted to try out the spectrum version of renegade among others but never had the chance, cheers Kim.

[@svensvlinken7583]

​@@alanalan-de6toTarget Renegade even better👌🏼

[@fnjesusfreak]

I used it a bit, considered it my definitive Speccy emu around the turn of the century.

[@samirribic1855]

Thank you very much for this video. In the meantime, Željko and I have become full professors at the university, we are 55 years old and have families. Although, of course, I teach about modern operating systems, CPUs and concepts of programming languages ​​and compilers (while Željko teaches C++ and discrete mathematics), I am still a retro computing fan. Sometimes I tell students about programming in wartime when they complain about computer resources, and that's how I found this video today by searching. I am overjoyed that there is still interest in our work today after thirty years.

[@Kim_Justice]

Wow, thank you very much Samir - I really appreciate this comment, the work you and Zeljko did was incredible!

[@mucy2807]

Just found you and am watching your speccy stuff. 50 odd year old bloke enjoying the nostalgia. Thank you 👍🏻

[@JamesChatting]

This guy/woman didn't even have a spectrum back in the day, it was broken. Total poser 😂

[@coolore]

I was a child during the siege of Sarajevo, in the rare moments when there was electricity, I would play ZX Spektrum games with my brother to separate myself from reality. Years later, I came across the Warajevo emulator, heard that some of our people made it. Only a years later, when I entered the faculty, I found out that my professor from "Programming Techniques", Željko Jurić, was one of the creators. Željko and Samir thank you very much for the emulator, for the C++ education, and also to you @Kim_Justice for recording this video.

[@gjergjaurelius9798]

@@coolore Kosovo war child.

[@endymallorn]

It’s so amazing that this program exists. It’s a testament to hope in the face of unspeakable and unthinkable horror. With the conflict going on in so many places in the world today, this story means so much. We have to try and protect peace and lives across the world. This story happened only by a miracle, how many miracles are we missing today due to conflict and death?

[@RajelAran]

Oh my gosh this unlocked core childhood memories. Hearing the name Samir Ribic immediately took me back to early experiences with Warajevo as one of my first emulators

[@themidcentrist]

The ZX Spectrum 48K is the first piece of computer or videogame hardware that I ever emulated despite being a Yank and having no idea what a ZX Spectrum was. This was probably late 1990s early 2000s. I frequented a Neverending Story fan page and they had a list of videogames that were based on the movie, one of them being a ZX Spectrum text adventure. I downloaded an emulator (no idea which one), the rom, and possibly a bios and got it working. This sent me down the rabbit hole of downloading a bunch of games for the spectrum and trying them out. The whole color clash thing was really weird and I had no idea what the actual computer itself even looked like, but it sure had a shit ton of games. Eventually I figured out there was a 128k version of the spectrum with better graphics. I did find some games that were quite enjoyable (I don't recall which), but with my new found appreciation for emulation I soon moved onto emulating NES games. Good times.

[@saszab]

Sorry, but the 128K ZX Spectrum has exactly the same graphics as the 48K version: 256x192 pixels (6K) plus 32x24 bytes for the colour attributes (0,75K), totalling 6912 bytes (6.75K).

[@Yesterzine]

As someone with friends and colleagues in Kyiv this is awfully close to home right now. I don’t know how they do it either.

[@TheCaffeineKid]

Zeljko Juric made a map and solution to my one Spectrum game, a GAC adventure called Timewise. It made me very proud that he had played and although I don't know for sure I hope it kept the guys entertained and distracted at least a little bit while they were playing it. Warejevo was and still is a great emulator. Thanks for this video Kim.

[@bradyobrien5544]

This story is incredible and told beautifully! It's reached me on a day where I needed something inspirational like this. Fantastic video, Kim!

[@rob1969in]

Kim , what an amazing story(so far,I'm 17 mins in), thank you for telling it, what an amazing pair of brave blokes, your channel is so good, Happy New Year

[@Waccoon]

Such a wonderful idea for a video. It's stuff like this that reminds you just what can be accomplished with enough drive and optimism for the future, but also that you should never take what you have for granted. Living in the USA, I never used any Sinclair products (let alone had bombs going off outside my windows), but I've always had a lot of respect for emulation developers. I help work on a few emulation projects these days, and it's a great community with a lot of really cool people. Cheers.

[@mariobrito427]

Hi, this sure brought back memories! I did play a bit with Warajevo back in the day, it was (and still is) a great piece of software. I did run into it a bit late into my time playing with ZX Spectrum emulators, my earliest recollection of a ZX Spectrum is spectrum.exe from Pedro Gimeno, which was able to load from real tape if you made the appropriate Tape-to-LPT cable yourself. That just blew away my 12 year old self, which was i believe before i had a Sound Blaster card. When Warajevo came along, the things that stuck to my mind were (in no particular order): 1) you could just connect it to the SB audio in (which was a change from using the LPT port to load real tapes from), 2) the story of the conditions in which the software was developed, and 3) it had this ability to invoke real x86 code using special z80 instructions, which opened some neat possibilities, and well, always seemed like wizardry to me back then :) Thanks for the story, it definitely took me back!

[@РусланЗаурбеков-з6е]

Feature #3 was cool, yes. But dangerous as hell. Hopefully, it did not catch up -- and now we do not have a swarm of DOS viruses disguised as ZX games...

[@markwrightrf]

I grew up on ZXAM for my Amiga A1200 which finally became usable when I got an 030 accelerator in about 93. The magazines were full of adverts for “PD” CD ROMS full of Spectrum games. I think this what gave me the idea to start LAZARUS - the Amiga emulation site (of champions) in 1997 when I had to let my Amiga set-up go. Happy and sad times. Great video.

[@tommylakindasorta3068]

Really cool story and emulator. Love your writing.

[@ScottsGameAsylum]

I love this, also i love the little editing flourishes

[@wisteela]

Absolutely superb video. I first experienced Z80. I now use the excellent Spectaculator, which was well worth buying.

[@zvonimirkomar2309]

What a wonderful video and tribute, Kim. Thank you for making this. All the best.

[@anactualmotherbear]

Thank you for telling this very important story!

[@nigelhall6714]

Well played Kim...really great story and well told...great to see a different angle to the loved ZX Spectrum. 🙂

[@bigfatpandalaktana2747]

I had the personal pleasure of being a student on courses that prof Juric and Ribic hold. They are both ecstatic teachers, thank you for platforming their work!

[@MarJay1980]

Kim, I highly recommend the documentary "Scream for me Sarajevo" which depicts the trip Bruce Dickinson (at the time formerly of Iron Maiden) and his band made into beseiged Sarajevo to do a concert. The emotional and morale effect the concert had on the young residents of the city is extremely moving, along with heartbreaking depictions of the brutality of the seige. It's one of those life changing films in my opinion.

[@gordonwalker1975]

Great video about a fascinating and inspiring story, Kim - I wonder if Sir Clive could ever have envisaged his humble machine being a source of escape and comfort during such horrible times.

[@tonyp3824]

Thanks for the video Kim- I love anything ZX Spectrum. Pure nostalgia! Keep up the good work.

[@SmoMo_]

What a great video, a real gem. Thanks for making it!

[@TwinOpinion]

🤯Thanks, Kim. We were completely unaware of this story!

[@Realmasterorder]

Very nice Video m8 the info,narration and overall montage are really great. Love the Legendary Speccy from my childhood years,thanks for this awesome story and for sharing your experiences of this wonderfull machine and the good old times of the Golden era of gaming.

[@picahudsoniaunflocked5426]

This is an amazing story. Thank you for bringing it to us. I remember the shock of that war, that it was on TV so much, & Sarajevo's alleys where snipers operated.

[@RetroReaktor]

Amazing piece of gaming history. Thank you for making the video!

[@goranisacson2502]

I have no experience with the ZX Spectrum or war... save that I followed it on the news back then, and it was some of the first times I encountered anxiety for something I barely understood (considering I was about 5-9 when the war happened)- so knowing that there was someone in those conditions hammering away at an emulator just to keep themselves sane during hard times... it is inspirational. And I dearly hope they celebrate each year that passies with a pizza, and that they have many more pizzas left to go.

[@greenhowie]

This is an amazing story and the documentary itself is really good as well, hope this gains a bit of traction because more people should know about this.

[@hashidashifunubashi]

What a brilliant story. Thanks for making this one Kim

[@porkyrider]

Poor Kim, you had troubles with Samir on the audio 😁 Thanks for this video !

[@EvanCWaters]

The sound distortion on Warajevo's beeper is actually kind of an interesting effect, like playing on a TV with a slightly busted speaker.

[@jaethemanchild]

Well, there’s a Speccy related tale I had no idea about. Sterling effort again!

[@milesbancroft]

Thankyou Kim, interesting and insightful as always.

[@bufordmaddogtannen]

I remember downloading and using this emulator back in the days. There was a readme file (as seen in the video) that detailed its sad and inspiring development journey, and I remember all the facts recapped in this video.

[@Skaera75b]

Awesome video, Kim. Thank you :)

[@stephenwhite506]

A similar thing is currently happening with the guy in Ukraine developing the Saturn core for MiSTer.

[@KeritechElectronics]

(War... War never changes. It fills you with determination.)

[@MagicGreenSquid]

One of your best, mate.

[@jasonrockley3724]

Great stuff Kim and an heartfelt ode to first wave nostalgia.

[@wibbiddywoo]

Ahhhh the good old Speccy! I have never heard this story. I haven't even emulated the Speccy so....... 😁💜

[@speakertreatz]

one of your best Kim

[@BinnisRetro]

Very interesting video! Thank you

[@ErectedGasCan]

A very interesting story, never knew about the work of Zeljko and SAMIR. 😄

[@bigrathole]

fantastically told story

[@whatamalike]

Fascinating subject. And one that i knew absolutely nothing about! It makes me wonder if there are any whizzkids currently writing code in Ukraine and/or Gaza? Not to mention countless other places where lives are turned upside down because of religion, politics and/or sectarian hatred. We will never learn 😢

[@spidervenom14]

Sergiy Dvodnenko (aka SRG320), the developer of the Sega Saturn core for MiSTer FPGA, is located in Ukraine.

[@whatamalike]

@@spidervenom14 hope they're keeping safe ✌️

[@gjergjaurelius9798]

I'm from Montenegro yugoslavia. I remember electronics being a hot commodity in the black market.

[@bluebull399]

This is the sort of story that movies are made of. You should contact some move production companies and see if you get any interest. I'm sure the movie would mainly be focused on the war, but the retro coolness and 80's nostalgia associated with the spectrum are the secret ingredients movie directors look for.

[@andrewdunbar828]

Sounds like there was a first draft and you found out you had horribly mispronounced Samir's name throughout - but you want back through and fixed every occurrence. Respect!

[@CoolDudeClem]

Didn't this emulator also have a feature that converted 48k snapshots into exe files so they could be run directly? I'm sure I remember being able to do that with some emulator back in the day and I have some vague memories of using this one.

[@fnjesusfreak]

I believe it did.

[@gwishart]

Sort of. The Spectrum games weren't converted as such, Warejevo just had an option to save a copy of the entire emulator with a single snapshot file hard-coded into the exe file. It essentially made a dedicated Spectrum emulator that was only capable of playing one game.

[@mattsword41]

one of the first emulators I came across too. Remember it well :)

[@belstar1128]

Never underestimate eastern European coders

[@medes5597]

Never over estimate them either. There's a reason slavjank exists as a term. Their ability to cut every corner and still have it sort of work is admirable.

[@apppc.celulares6808]

Boa tarde amigo. Meu nome é Roberto. Eu sou do Brasil. Curto muito o TK90X da Microdigital. Onde posso baixar esse emulador do ZX Spectrum ? Abraços.

[@andreash.2336]

Could you name the magazines you mention in your post. Would help me a lot as I am also researching the evolution of emulators.

[@mmpsp693]

Great video

[@paulleach225]

Great doc as always! Don’t think I haven’t noticed the overdub 😜. What were you saying before?

[@sydneymeanstreet]

FIFA 98 commentary vibes.

[@Kim_Justice]

I realised at the last minute I'd called Samir 'Sabir' for the whole vid.

[@neat3468]

@@Kim_Justice Don't worry, the video is still fantastic!

[@paulleach225]

@@Kim_Justice Still excellent content. Best on KZbin! The fact you took the time to correct the mistake is testament to that.

[@paulleach225]

@@sydneymeanstreetSOUTHGATE. Clears the ball.

[@Feenix102]

Just thinking - are there emulators for the old Dragon computers? The Dragon 32 was fun. :)

[@emmetcassidy]

mind boggling

[@Err0r415]

Scream for me Sarajevo

[@thegreatshamalamadingdong9788]

Still amazes me that some games for the speccy the makers won't release as freeware. At this stage I don't think there's any point to this as where else you going to play these or buy them to play.

[@SmoMo_]

So, what was that strange game that seemed like you were controlling the disembodied head of Clive Sinclair?

[@Kim_Justice]

That's 'A Day In The Life'. Odd one that I kinda dig.

[@sambagogo777]

Its timing seems grimly appropriate given that the Speccy itself was launched during a time of war. (The Falklands War, 2/4/82 - 14/6/82. Speccy launched on 23/4/82, according to Wikipedia)

[@lilacfloyd]

2/4/82 - 14/6/82. ;)

[@sambagogo777]

@@lilacfloyd typo error already spotted and corrected

[@belstar1128]

Yea but imagine if the spectrum was design in the Falkland's during that time .

[@billybollockhead5628]

an here was me thinking this would be about a new mario kart character

[@Antireality]

Well that makes me feel crappy about the emulator I started coding many moons ago and never finished - comparatively speaking I have bugger all excuses...

[@alecaquino4306]

How come you STILL don't even have 100K subscribers after 10+ years?

[@spayseghost]

fasinating

[@wizofssp]

Isn't there any way to switch the patreon KZbin Video link to be listed and public ? Otherwise patreon user comments are lost and that sucks.

[@Kim_Justice]

Sadly not really if I want to keep the Patreon uploads free of ad breaks. :/

[@tommylakindasorta3068]

@@Kim_Justice I've learned to not comment on the Patreon version and just wait for the public one. Not a big deal.

[@health_doc]

❤

[@jamesmcgeachy5433]

🎉

[@JennyTheNerdBat]

The lines with Samir would be better off fully redubbed to be honest - the partial inserts are very distracting

[@ErectedGasCan]

I had a hard time listening to the video as i started to chuckle every time i heard "SAMIR". 😅

[@DarkBaconPlays]

I guess you got Sameer's name wrong in the voice over and had to replace, all I could get from this vid was a odd Sameer dub lol

[@georgeprout42]

0:05 of course it's an emulator, no one uses windows anymore.

[@dilbertfish]

Bloody rats get everywhere.

[@defwarge6359]

"SAMIRRRRR"

[@parameter303]

Stick me!

[@jameslangley2196]

First comment

[@kajsagauza]

It's a great story, but your strange SAMIR pronunciation, almost robotic, was challenging to listen to.

[@EEPfehAGG]

ZED-SNES... not ZEE-SNES. Sellout!

[@williamRE]

An emulator of one of the most horrific gaming ststems to ever exist. Lucky us.

[@TimChuma]

Echoes of this with the current Ukraine conflict with the soliders playing World of Tanks in their breaks to let off steam. Also a bunch of gamers are involved in fighting and relief efforts from abroad. Some of their friends they play with went missing and they wanted to help

[@belstar1128]

Maybe one of them is making a ps4 emulator now