THE PAGE WITH ALL THINGS COUPÉ!

SAM CO GET COUPÉ RIGHTS

Alan Miles and Bruce Gordon, ex-directors of MGT plc, who now run Sam Computers Ltd have bought the rights to produce the Coupé themselves. There are plenty of Coupés already in stock and SAM Co aim to distribute 10,000 through the Christmas period. With SAM Coupé software getting more support by the day, the computer that appeared to be condemned to an early grave is now well back on the road to recovery. Additionally, SAM Co has decided that SAM Coupés will now be sold with a disk drive as part of the package — finally an end to those tape player blues!

SAM Co has moved into MGT plc’s old offices at Swansea and the whole operation should be up and running now.

COUPÉ PRICES GET THE CHOP

SAM Co has released the new prices for the Coupé packs, and jolly competitive they are too! The now-standard SAM Coupé with one disk drive retails for £199.95 — which is a reduction of £50! As the Coupé can take two internal drives a SAM drive can still be bought separately — £10 has been knocked off the original price, bringing it down to £79.95! Should you want to buy the complete set, a Coupé with two on-board drives, the total price is now £275, a reduction in price of £45. Bargains a plenty, or what?!

TENGEN TITLES, AHOY!

Domark’s collection of Tengen coin-op titles are currently up for conversion to the Coupé, which is good news for all you arcade addicts out there! Enigma Variations, publishers of most Coupé software are handling the production and distribution for the three titles, which are: Escape from the Planet of the Robot Monsters (the crazy isometric exploration/shoot-’em’-up game, Speccy review CRASH 78), Klax (the fiendish puzzle game, Speccy review CRASH 77) and Xybots (two-player 3D chase and blast game, Speccy review CRASH 65). Also up for conversion to the Coupé is Domark’s biggest selling title Trivial Pursuit. The Speccy version was a massive hit a few years bock and is likely to be a bit of a smash on the Coupé too as it’s the Coupé’s big Christmas release; out December.

SAM’S PIPING HOT!

Pipe Mania, the most addictive puzzle game ever, originally published by Empire is soon for release on the Coupé. The conversion, like Domark’s titles, is being handled by Enigma Variations (what a busy lot!) who are currently implementing the graphics which should make the Coupé version look almost identical to the Atari ST version.

MORE BRAIN BLENDERS!

This page is rapidly turning into the Enigma Variations page! Not only is EV converting smash hits to the Coupé, but it’s also continuing to publish. Mind Games 2 is set to be the big Christmas compilation for the Coupé and contains another four games to stretch your grey matter! The pack consists of more traditional games, which are: Poker, 3D Noughts and Crosses, a sliding puzzle game and a version of the tough board game Othello. Look out for the review next issue!

FAIR PRICE FOR SOFTWARE

Prices for SAM Coupé software look set to stay at the price initiated by Enigma Variations when it released Defenders of the Earth, that’s £11.99 on cassette and £14.99 on disk. ‘It would be easy to charge a lot more for SAM Software,’ commented an Enigma spokesman, ‘but we feel that people who bought the Coupé were looking for 16-bit computing power and graphics without the high cost of software at £25 a shot — we have to offer them power and performance at a fair price.’ Bravo! The only known exception to the £11.99/£14.99 price rule is Trivial Pursuit which has always sold at £15 on cassette and £20 on disk.

SAM PD

A public domain library catering specially for Sam Coupé software has been set up by David Cowell of CMS PD. As the library has just got going, CMS’s shelves are not exactly bulging with Coupé software as yet but CMS PD is willing to take a look at any games, demos or utilities Coupé owners send in. At the moment three pieces of software are available, and they are: Soccer Challenge — a soccer management game featuring full colour mode four graphics, sound fx and music; Satellite ’90 is a space target shoot-’em-up, similar to Operation Wolf, again with mode four graphics, music and sound fx. The third piece of software is Sprite Editor which features easy editing facilities. Two demo disks are also available. The PD disks cost £1.50 each and you can get full details and a catalogue, if you enclose a stamped addressed envelope, by writing to: CMS SAM Coupé PD.

Q: What exactly is a public domain library?

A: Right ho, first of all you need to understand what public domain software is. It’s software, which can be a game, a utility or simply a graphics and sonix demo, which the author has given up their copyright on. This means that anyone is free to copy and distribute it, without profiting from it. A PD library basically keeps a stock of software from which you can choose what you want. Cost is very low — you simply pay the price of a disk, post and packaging and a small handling charge. In CMS’s case it’s just £1.50. Often it’s the best way of getting software and if you’re a programmer it’ll get you noticed. Check it out!

QUICKSHOT TIP

EB Evans dropped the SAM desk a line to pass on this tip: If you’re having problems with software when using a Quickshot II joystick on the SAM Coupé try disconnecting the red wire in the joystick. The red wire is the autofire connection but Mr Evans found it was simply causing chaos and games continually crashed. So you’ll be without autofire, but the crashing problem should be cured. The outputs on the ’stick are 0 for fire and 6789 for directional control.

WHO DREW THAT?

The screen shot published here last month of a spiffy sports car was created by DA Tattersall. The caption fell off somewhere, but he deserves a big hurrah for his efforts! HURRAH!

SAM’s alive and well, so keep your letters coming! Send them to Newsfield, LM’s SAM Forum, CRASH.