Bring big imaginations and big keyboards for the latest Retro eXo creation, a breakthrough in modern game dev for the original Sony PlayStation, and new life for old DV camcorders. Plus a holiday photo, a birthday and more in This Week in Retro episode 264!

(PS: Chris is back)
youtu.be/5fl7W43RvDQ

Canst thou draw out the Leviathan?

Taking on a big text adventure collection takes a big man with a big imagination and a big keyboard.

Chris is back! Plus plenty more news this Saturday when This Week in Retro 264 hits your YouTube and podcast feeds.

(Definitely both columns A and B)

Legendary indie RPG author and entrepreneur Jeff Vogel of @spiderwebsoftware.bsky.social executes a sharp takedown of the Macintosh ecosystem as he sees it. (And he's a fan!)

All this and much more coming Saturday to YouTube and podcast platforms.

Latinorum, a 1985 Commodore 64 text adventure refactored for the modern era, is part of The 2026 Spring Thing Festival of Interactive Fiction, playable in both English and Italian.
www.springthing.net/2026/play_on...

Thanks for two years of classic text adventures, conversations, and magazine deep dives. Jason, Nick, and Tim gather to talk about some upcoming new features on the podcast, a lineup change, and a first look at our new hand-crafted show artwork. retroadventurers.podbean.com/e/39

Podcaster-archivist @savetz.bsky.social (ANTIC, Eaten By a Grue) joins for 90s nostalgia, the loss of cover art giant Philip Castle, and the rise-and-fall of Iomega's Zip drives. All this, your picks for a gaming industry legend you'd like to spend an hour with, and more!!
youtu.be/4Q_ODmzynsM

We get @adriansdigitalbasement.com to talk controller standard proliferation solved (possibly) by a new multi-interface project. And the latest from Commodore, recordings from Game Developer Conference 1989, the GBA'a 25th anniversary, plus new temporary "Chris' Corner" segment!
youtu.be/kE8c463aibw

And you've probably heard me say things like this somewhere, but: once (one of the) magazines figured out compact checksums for their listings, any publisher who didn't get onboard deserved to be poked with sharp sticks.

Well well well.
Turn one page past the Dog Star Adventure listing in the May 1979 issue of Softside, and who do we find?

Guest player Tim Gilberts joins for interstellar exploration of two oft-overlooked sci-fi titles of the 1970s: Aldebaran III by Peter Langston, and Dog Star Adventure by Lance Micklus.
retroadventurers.podbean.com/e/38/

Also: Planetfall arguably the first sci-fi text adventure sold at retail at Infocom-scale (not a stripped-down/limited vocab game), and actually good and engaging for a wide audience (Starcross being a bit bland and puzzle-y). SF had been the weak cousin of the fantasy games to this point.

Welcome back @ctrl-alt-rees.com!
youtu.be/kB7aBtWr7mg
News on the Myrient archive, OS pioneer Digital Research, and overdue game ports. Is reviving Cinemaware titles like jury duty? Are there enough good Atari Jaguar games to count on two hands? Find out in Ep 260 of This Week in Retro!

This weekend, Nick connected a group of permacomputing enthusiasts with Adventure (440 point edition) on the ICL 2966 at @tnmoc.bsky.social.
Just about anything can be a platform for retro adventuring if you want it badly enough!

Opinion divided on that point. I wasn't a huge fan but I don't actively warn people away from it. By whatever coincidence we covered both on the same episode of Retro Adventurers: retroadventurers.podbean.com/e/episode-6-...

They don’t want to do me in just yet.

Please play literally any other text adventure.

This week: the controversial Adventure Game Aptitude Test, improved access to Lucasarts classics thanks to a DREAMM emulator upgrade, and an outrageous hack to the infamous Sinclair C5. Plus your top picks in tiny software and an all-new Community Question of the Week.
youtu.be/qm3E_fw7CRE

TWiR covers an unusual global gaming contest and the hosts talk about the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat. Could Book Club be in our future?!

Plus more news for retro Star Wars game fans, an incredible Sinclair C5 hack, and more when This Week in Retro 259 arrives Saturday!

I think Chris should stop encouraging people to mirror his obvious self-loathing behavior.

All the fun you can squeeze into 64k! youtu.be/PM18XTdua8s
We look at the international sensation Jet Set Willy and 1984's explosion of open-world adventure gaming. Plus a full Quake-style FPS in just 64k, and new flow coding and game engines for classic hardware.

>TAKE PITY AND EXAMINE IT.
Nobody's angry with Chris for self-destructive adventure game choices, just worried about him. 1984's hottest adventure titles, up-to-date coding environments for out-of-date platforms, a full 3D FPS in just 64k, and more when This Week in Retro 258 arrives this Saturday!

"Keep a copy of what's important to you."
"Punish your children one day."
youtu.be/N7c_IBMUHws
@ronscompvids.bsky.social helps us look back at Philips CD-i, discuss the Stop Killing Games movement, and dig into physical media ownership.
Plus: What retro technology would you resuscitate with a $1B bu

The PalmOS PACE layer only had to emulate 68K code at the application level, not at the lowest levels of the system needed for a drop-in CPU replacement. Also not immediately clear if PACE is openly available these days. So coming up with a novel 68K/ARM translator isn't in itself strange.

Zarf is being a good sport about his Patreon targets so we'll spell it out: if you care about old text adventures AT ALL, GIVE HIM YOUR MONEY
patreon.com/VisibleZorker

We take another look 260 Weeks Ago in Retro for our Patreon members, including a checkup on the tough-talking Buffee accelerator project for Amiga computers.
www.patreon.com/posts/260-we...

Talking points for Episode 257 include:

(sigh)

It's the history of shoot 'em ups with TWiR and @slopesgameroom.bsky.social. Then we ask whether 1996 changed computing history forever and explore handheld retro tech vs. the doomscrolling scourge. Plus news in classic Z80-based tech from the 80s and 90s on Episode 256!
youtu.be/acI72_99jFQ

The last 8-bit episode: not a misprint! We look at the innovative SCUMM adventure game engine, getting the video doc treatment shortly. We also report on hope for retro users of PowerPC Macs and ancient accounting packages, and sift through the 30 year legacy of Duke Nukem 3D!
youtu.be/9HjHy5m15eQ