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Shareware: Floppy Disks & Free(ish) Games
60 Plays10 months ago
Before the App Store, before Steam, and long before anyone had heard of “indie devs,” there was shareware — a scrappy, trust-based model that had kids loading mysterious floppy disks into family computers and hoping for the best.
In this episode, we boot up a deep dive into the weird, wonderful world of shareware gaming. From Commander Keen to Duke Nukem, we explore how these games spread through schoolyards and office cubicles, passed from person to person like digital contraband. We look at what made them so unique, and how they reflected a moment in time when technology felt community based, magical and mysterious.
Credits
Created, hosted, written, produced and edited by Sabrina Hilton & Genevieve Teasdale Artwork by Sabrina Hilton
This podcast includes music and sound effects that are licensed for use through Epidemic Sound
Theme and transition music: Soft Sphere by Dovetail https://www.epidemicsound.com/track/iddduboNjy/
Additional Music:
HeartBIT by Rocket Jr Rocket Jr - HeartBIT | Epidemic Sound
"Light District" by Lee Jackson and Bobby Prince, Duke Nukem 3D Soundtrack
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Liminal Queens Podcast
00:00:20
Speaker
Hi friend, I'm Sabrina. Welcome to Liminal Queens, a podcast where my sister Genevieve and I revisit weird, wonderful, and oddly specific cultural moments that shaped us as millennials.
00:00:32
Speaker
Each episode, we explore one topic from 90s, or early 2000s culture. It could be a phenomenon, a toy, movie, a book, or even just a moment in time. We generally start by sharing our own memories, and then we unpack where it came from and the context behind it.
00:00:49
Speaker
And finally, we dig into the psychology behind why these things were so powerful at the time and why they stick with us to this day. My sister Jen is going to join us in a moment.
00:01:00
Speaker
She is the psychologist and she brings that lens of expertise to the discussion. i bring the cultural references and a lot of the weird memories. We both have families and careers that we nurture in addition to this little podcast. This is really our labor of love that we make in our non-existent spare time that we've created because frankly, we just all deserve a bit more nostalgia and fun, don't we?
Nostalgia of Shareware Games
00:01:27
Speaker
So if you are one of those people who is going through their regular day and is all of a sudden tripped up by some very specific memory from the movie, The Land Before Time, then you are in the right place. You are one of us.
00:01:42
Speaker
So let's step back into the liminal space that is childhood memory and talk about shareware computer games.
00:01:53
Speaker
Imagine this, listener. It's Saturday morning. Cartoons are playing in the background. You've already downed your morning dose of sugary cereal. And it's time to move on to the real deal.
00:02:04
Speaker
The boxy beige rectangle humming in the family's study. IBM, Compact, Amiga, whatever it's called, it's the future. You slide that 3.5-inch floppy disk into the drive with a satisfying clunk, watching the screen pulse to life.
00:02:21
Speaker
It's not long before the green on black DOS prompt blinked at you like a secret code. The screen flashes, and there she is. Jill. Blonde.
00:02:32
Speaker
Pixel perfect. Fierce. She runs, leaps and slashes her way across a jungle so green it buzzes, transforming into different animals and fighting off snakes, giant ants and firebirds.
00:02:45
Speaker
There is no tutorial. No handholding. Just you, Jill and a jungle that has more mysteries than your suburban street ever will. This isn't just a game, it's a portal.
00:02:59
Speaker
Jill doesn't need rescuing. She doesn't need to wait for a knight in shining armour. She climbs vines, tosses daggers and transforms into a fish without asking permission.
00:03:10
Speaker
She does things and you're doing them with her. But suddenly, just as it's getting good, you reach the last level of the free episode and hit a bright screen telling you to order now for more.
The Thrill of Discovering Shareware
00:03:24
Speaker
As if the jungle has been fenced off by some invisible capitalist wall. But that was shareware games for you. Independent gaming studios giving away enough of a game to get you hooked so you'd buy the rest.
00:03:37
Speaker
And somehow, that made it even more thrilling. These games weren't handed to you polished and complete. They were discovered, like buried treasure on a floppy disk.
00:03:48
Speaker
They were weird, wild, and a little bit out of bounds. And long before we had online stores or indie showcases, this was how you found the magic. One borrowed disk, one blinking cursor, one pixelated adventure at a time.
00:04:06
Speaker
Hey, Jen. How are you going? I'm all right. How are you, Sissy? I'm good. I'm good. And I'm super excited and energized to talk about this stuff because it's it's my jam. And the whole time that I was researching or watching back old games, I was just noticing that I was sitting on my laptop with like this grin on my face the whole time. ha It's hard not to watch this shareware content and not have like flashbacks to just...
00:04:36
Speaker
pure joy hey or like all frustration like when you I recall times where I just couldn't get through a level or just yeah couldn't find what I needed to get to move on into the next level or whatever it might be but yeah it's just so awesome so nostalgic yes and felt like we had endless time just to indulge in these things as well We did.
00:04:57
Speaker
I mean, compared to now, i don't have time to scratch my ass, let alone play a game like this. Yeah. Forget about it. Maybe someday in the future, might be able to do that.
Community and Indie Nature of Shareware
00:05:06
Speaker
But at the very least, watching watching game playback is is something.
00:05:10
Speaker
Yes, yes. Some people have retirement dreams of doing um luxury riverboat cruises, and mine will just be catching up on an endless backlog of games, starting with all the old DOS ones, I think.
00:05:23
Speaker
Can we do both? Is it possible? Can we play the games on a river cruise? Yeah. Yes. Yes, we can. Yeah. I think I want to do Yeah. I don't see how I can't. If I can, you know, make it happen, I'll make it happen.
00:05:37
Speaker
Okay, so how about we start by talking bit about what we mean by shareware because ah feel like we're familiar with the concept but perhaps others might not be. But I think when we what I describe what it is, it may actually ring some bells for you in terms of your memory for this time. so yeah I think it'll educate some people, actually.
00:05:57
Speaker
Yeah. So, okay. So, Shareware itself, it wasn't just a type of game. It was a whole way of making and distributing them in the 80s and 90s. So, it was a model where developers, usually really small teams or just even one person, would make the first part of a game and release it for free.
00:06:15
Speaker
So you were encouraged to copy it, hand it to a friend, or in later years you maybe find it in a CD stuck and on the front of a magazine. It was actually designed to be shared, hence shareware. So that makes sense so far, right?
00:06:27
Speaker
If you liked what you played, then you were encouraged to pay for the full version, usually by literally mailing in a cheque or a money order and waiting for the floppy disks to arrive in the post. So real old school. Yeah.
00:06:39
Speaker
So why do we care about the development and distribution model? Because it's actually the birth of indie game development. The games themselves were different. They were wider, more innovative, and arguably better because they didn't go through the big corporate commercial channels. So there were no executives to please, no shareholders to answer to. So real creative freedom for developers, which was really awesome and really fun.
Challenges and Problem-Solving in Gaming
00:07:01
Speaker
And the experience of acquiring and navigating them was unique too. So like they didn't come in nice packaging, as you recall, c Sissy. There was no manual, no instructions. There was lots of discovery involved in figuring out how to install the game.
00:07:15
Speaker
So what are you putting into DOS to actually make the game come to life? It could be quite anxiety-provoking when you were loading the games because, as I can recall, ah sometimes it might not work.
00:07:27
Speaker
I do recall actually being disappointed on many occasions when I'd be so excited that ah to start a game and then I'd go to try and execute it in DOS and it wouldn't load. because Because there was no packaging as there is for games that you buy in the store that says, these are the requirements of your PC if you want to play this game. It was just kind of like, roll the dice.
00:07:46
Speaker
Yeah. Yep, exactly. You had to figure out how to play them. There was no in-depth tutorials, no hand-holding. And I'd say there was probably a little bit of vindictiveness from the developers in the lack of guidance they gave you. It's like you really have to work hard for everything to to play what they created for you.
00:08:04
Speaker
And you certainly couldn't Google what to do because that was obviously not around. So if you were lucky, you might know someone at school who might have the answer or you might be stuck for weeks, months.
00:08:16
Speaker
years maybe if you were persistent enough ultimately if it was beyond your capability then too bad you know it was free don't buy the rest of the game just forget about it And I think this attitude actually encouraged perseverance and problem solving.
00:08:32
Speaker
When you actually figured something out, you felt amazing. Yes. You understood of the mechanics, how it worked, how to beat a boss or how to find a secret room without help.
00:08:43
Speaker
That in itself was just like the dopamine hit, I reckon. I was just about to say, i was about to say dopamine as well.
00:08:53
Speaker
Yeah, it's totally, totally like in a very different way to like the tech we have nowadays. It was just like the joy of actually figuring something out. Something else to note as well, these shareware games weren't subject to media standards. There was no parental advisory because there was no packaging. was nothing, just a floppy disk.
00:09:10
Speaker
No content classifications. So that meant they were often weird and wonderful but also could be super violent, a bit sexual times and definitely shouldn't have been played by children.
00:09:21
Speaker
That was not to say that they weren't because we played some of these games. I think a really good example from when we were kids was ah when Duke Nukem evolved into the 3D first player shooter.
00:09:33
Speaker
And it was just like the haughtiest, inappropriate game. Yeah. Like level one was like, had a porn cinema. ah Level two had a red light district. There was like a, you know, like a strippers club. I just remember that music so vividly.
00:09:47
Speaker
And like strippers dancing in like, you know, in like little cages and stuff. ah They flashed their tits for money. Like it was just really inappropriate. But then again, ah certainly can't get that out of my memory. It's just like ingrained in there forever.
90s Gaming Memories and Bonding
00:10:01
Speaker
Yes, yes. Okay, so now that we've covered what we mean by shareware, we're going to delve into some of the core memories from our childhood. Then we'll have a look at the socio-cultural context that led to shareware's existence, and then the psychology behind how they've stuck with us into adulthood.
00:10:20
Speaker
So, Sam, do you want to start us off with some of your core memories around shareware? Yes, I do. i definitely do. And I have too many. And this might be 20 minutes long or we might have to edit the crap out of it.
00:10:34
Speaker
That's true, that's true. And I'm sure, like, I'm probably going to resonate with most of your memories because I feel like, again, we share a brain. And I'll jump in if I've got some thoughts here and there. Yes, please do. um So my first memory is actually of our family PC itself because, of course, it couldn't just be normal.
00:10:54
Speaker
And whenever I ask other people what their PC was as a kid, they're like, oh, it was an IBM or something adjacent. And we just had... this particular type of PC that when I ask people, they've not heard of it.
00:11:06
Speaker
So what we had was a PC called Poro, P-O-R-R-O. So Poro Technologies. um And it had a logo of a kookaburra. And as I mentioned, no one else had this. And so when I mentioned to people, they say, I don't know what you're talking about. I start getting gas lit.
00:11:25
Speaker
Like like maybe maybe I didn't have a computer that was called, that was a brand of Poro with a kookaburra on it, even though I spent like hours, hundreds of hours sitting in front of it. yeah And so I went the other day to finally put this to bed and look it up. Oh, wow.
00:11:41
Speaker
And it wasn't, actually very easy to find. But there was a company called Poro Technologies. It was a Hong Kong-based company that attempted to enter the Australian PC market in the early nineteen ninety s Right. So they were IBM-compatible computers under the Poro brand.
00:11:57
Speaker
But they didn't last here very long. Which explains why no one else knows what I'm talking about. Hey, but I wouldn't doubt your memories is though, Sissy. You have like steel trap memory for that stuff.
00:12:10
Speaker
And I went with dad to get that computer from some random place and you just picked up the pieces from some random room and took them home. What, it wasn't a shop?
00:12:21
Speaker
It wasn't like a proper shop. It was like sort of like a pop-up type of thing even before before that that concept existed it was not it didn't seem legit yeah you just picked up the tower that you wanted which for i don't know younger people is like the big tower that's basically your hard drive has all of the components in it you pick up your display and then the keyboard and the mouse and off you go Yeah. It was pretty commonplace for people to build computers for you um rather than just buying them in a store as well.
00:12:55
Speaker
ah So look, this definitely was a thing. I actually found the original advertisement for it as well. Oh, cool. Just so I could prove I'm not insane. Can we put that on Insta or something? That would be so fun. Yes, definitely. And it's the stupidest ad because it's like,
00:13:11
Speaker
yeah I don't know, Poro is going to disrupt the market or something. And then it's got two computers and they explode. Like they've got dynamite around them and explode. And I'm like, wait, are you exploding your own computers or are you exploding the competition's computers? I don't know because all the computers look the same. Like they're all just beige cubes. Oh my gosh. Anyway, was very stupid.
00:13:30
Speaker
So we have that computer. It lived in our computer room because... Anyone who was lucky enough to have a computer at home, you only had one. Yes. You had the family computer and then it it had its own room that it lived in.
00:13:44
Speaker
And our computer room was called the den because it was so cold and dark in there. And I think that was really appropriate. Totally. So my first cold memory is just the computer itself. ah my second core memory is dad bringing home doom yes the game that i'm sure many people have played first person shooter so dad worked on a trading desk with a guy who was i'll just say a computer nerd which is what i used to say back then um and he
00:14:15
Speaker
gave this game to Dad and he gave it to him on a nondescript floppy disk. So the three and I think it's three and a quarter inch floppy disks, which were actually hard by the time they got to that stage. They weren't floppy disks anymore. And that as a kid, I was always like, what? This isn't floppy because kids are so literal.
00:14:31
Speaker
um but but anyway i digress so just this naked floppy disk it had just a plain label on it like as in just handwritten and it definitely was the fourth label that had been stuck over all sorts of old labels on there so it's not like the this floppy disk had already lived a thousand lives before it was holding this game yeah totally rewritten rewritten and things rewritten over the top of it yeah Yeah. And that as a concept, like I didn't understand that as a child either.
00:15:00
Speaker
So no case, no manual, just the label stuck on there. And I really wouldn't understand why this was so for years, but I was just like, ah, magical. Anyway, so the game loads up.
00:15:11
Speaker
and it's Doom, and you get this very iconic title screen set to heavy metal music. It's a guy. He's in full-body armour, and I looked at the picture the other day, and it's like the armour covers his whole body except doesn't cover his abs.
00:15:25
Speaker
It's like, ooh, cut. You still see his abs. It's just real 80s, like 80s, though, like fashion. Like he's got a crop top on basically of armour. It's so weird.
00:15:36
Speaker
Exactly, but you're sort of thinking like, oh, games designed by men for men. And then I'm like, wait, what? You guys want to look at the guy's abs or is this for me? Or who's this for? Anyway, what's the deal? I was seven, so it wasn't for me, just to answer that question.
00:15:53
Speaker
Um, And he's standing in his artwork, he's standing on top of a mountain and he's shooting down at a horde of demons. And then that's a really iconic image. And then they would copy that for the Duke Nukem 3D imagery as well, which is very cool. um So basically you've got this start screen, then you drop right into the game.
00:16:11
Speaker
I don't recall there being a tutorial or anything. You're all of a sudden just in a room. ah You can see your gun. You can see your hand and a but bunch of stats and stuff down the bottom. and you can immediately see a mutilated corpse on the floor, which is great.
00:16:26
Speaker
And then you just start killing things. There's no story arc. It's kill things, collect things, defeat bosses, and basically work your way through this maze-like level design till you get to, i don't know, the, the,
00:16:40
Speaker
center of hell or something and defeat the game and first i would just watch dad play yeah and so by the way that means that there was a parent an adult there who was just like you can watch this it's fun which is great it's great i love it um and then eventually i would play with dad and so this is just a uh a single player computer game it's not like a two player game so dad and i would divide duties so i would have the left side of the keyboard so i would have all of the number buttons which was all the weapons so i would do the weapons changing and i would do the shooting so that's the control button and then dad oh my god i don't remember this at all don't think i got to do this why did you get these special duties i'm sorry i was crap at it or something probably Too scared. I was really too scared to play it, to be honest. I reckon it was really terrifying.
00:17:33
Speaker
You probably had correct child interests and like you were doing something intellectual or homework and I wasn't doing it. I hadn't thought so. And Dad had the right side of the keyboard, so he was doing all of the movement. And you might be like, oh, that's dumb. But actually, in Doom, the movement was really important. You were often trying to like set off one action, which would open a secret door somewhere else, and you had to piss bolt to get there. Yes, that's right. You had to be very good at doing straffing, which is like sort of just moving left to right.
00:18:07
Speaker
and just jumping and getting to things on time. So that was quite complicated and needed more dexterity and dad would do that. And that is ah probably my fondest memory of me and dad. um That is like my daddy-daughter time. I loved it. I think that's so great.
00:18:23
Speaker
ah Yeah, that I mean, I have lots of memories of of Dad playing Doom. There are a couple of things I'll add to this. First of all, one of the key sort of monsters you had to play against, what we called, they were these demon men with spikes on their back.
00:18:37
Speaker
They were like prolific in the game. Mm-hmm. We called them Spiky Men. You remember? That's what they were. And that's what we called the guy at Dad's trading desk that gave him the game. We used to call him Spiky Man. Yep.
00:18:50
Speaker
So, you know, because we just connected him with this game so strongly. Well, he's the dealer of Spiky Men. Dealer Spiking Man, exactly. He's the guy who got these games out of who knows where. We didn't ask questions, like you said, about where they came from. We just played the games.
00:19:05
Speaker
Another thing I want to just, an interesting fact that's connecting back to the here and now and this concept of liminality. Liminality and falling into liminal spaces, people often call within that law, no clipping out of reality.
00:19:21
Speaker
And the concept of no clipping comes from the game Doom. And it's when you found a password that would allow you to move through walls and no clip through walls into another space.
00:19:33
Speaker
And I just think I couldn't go without bringing that connection back because it's so cool and it is really related directly to this game. That is awesome. ah Yeah. So I think that's just a nice little bit of trivia there.
00:19:44
Speaker
Yeah, I love that. I didn't know it was called that. Oh, that's amazing, Sissy. Then my next fondest memory is playing Commander Keen and Duke Nukem with you. And I think something that's part and parcel of playing these games, like, look, these are all single player games, but i you would never play these things alone because you would always have at least one other kid hanging out over your shoulder. Yes.
00:20:09
Speaker
Watching you play. Yeah, it was like being at the arcade. It was like being at the arcade, but just stand there and watch and then wait for your turn. but Yeah, definitely. Well, and like backseat drive, backseat gaming and shouting and getting annoyed together.
00:20:22
Speaker
um And so Duke Nukem and Commander Keen, these are both 2D side scrolling sci-fi platform games that really colourful and cartoonish style. um You and I would take turns.
00:20:34
Speaker
We'd backseat game. We'd help each other solve levels. um We would fight amongst ourselves as well when we disagreed on strategies. Of course you have to um And I especially remember in like Duke Nukem when it was just the 2D side scroll, just being obsessed with that grapple hook capability.
00:20:51
Speaker
ah the best. And we were always like grapple hook, grapple hook. There's just something about a grapple hook, whether it's in a game or reality. They're just like the coolest bit of kit, right? Yeah. Like just being able to shoot a gun off a hook and then just get up to somewhere.
00:21:05
Speaker
Yeah, it never gets old, never goes out of style. I think I also really liked the sound design of it as well. Yeah. It was very satisfying and crunchy. Definitely. um And you and I also made up our own lore.
00:21:18
Speaker
we We believed that Commander Keen was Duke Nukem's little brother. Which I think is cute because it's like Commander Keen was an eight-year-old hero. He had like a pogo stick and little BB gun thing and Duke Nukem was this cool guy with big guns and like cool glasses and they really did have that kind of 80s like cool old brother, dorky younger brother vibe.
00:21:40
Speaker
But that story about them being brothers is not true because they were from competing game developers.
Empowerment in Gaming
00:21:45
Speaker
Oh, well, I like it. We're keeping it anyway. Yeah. It made sense at the time. It made sense at the time. And a lot of these games, even if they came from different developers, they would actually reference each other.
00:21:56
Speaker
That's true. i do recall, like, there was some there was some method to the madness in us creating that story. And I think just because of that, you know, we talked i talked about earlier, like, shareware being so that in initial or the start of indie gaming, it wasn't big thing.
00:22:12
Speaker
pool of people that were making these games so i think they imagine there was like quite a bit of camaraderie between developers not a lot of actual competitiveness again because it wasn't super commercial it was about the games so it was yeah yeah it was mostly just so apogee id and epic games i think that the three main and when we say like studios yes we're just talking about some guys yeah actual companies yeah at the time um And then, well, speaking of epic games, my next memory is playing Jill of the Jungle at our friend Hannah's house. ah And I remember that so well because that was my first experience of playing as a female protagonist in a game.
00:22:53
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And she was fucking cool, man. she was so cool. she had the ability to turn into all these different animals and oh the best the best and i was thinking the other day the ability to to transform into animals for me feels like such a feminine power and i don't know if i thought that before drill of the jungle or after but there's something so connected to nature within that game that i was like yes women witchiness yeah yeah mysterious powers i think that's a really good point i just thought it was the coolest power to have uh so much freedom in it as well yeah like when you were one of those random fire births um flying and it could and it could shoot out these fireballs and it was just fly you could fly to anywhere if you were a frog you could go and swim in the water without drowning because she would drown in a human form yes i think being the fish was my favorite
00:23:47
Speaker
Oh, was it a fish? Was there a fish and a frog? I feel like there was both. There was a fish and a frog and a firebird and I can't remember what else. Okay, okay. Anyway, it was a beautiful game. It really was.
00:24:00
Speaker
Very vibrant in the colours. She was very strong. ah ah She was really beautiful, like subjectively beautiful. And um it was it was good gameplay. Yes.
00:24:13
Speaker
My next, this is, look, this is my second, second last memory. I'll stop having memories soon. Second last? Third last? But I have to get this one in. Second last. Oh, second last, yeah.
00:24:23
Speaker
Second last, the game Jazz Jackrabbit, which was a fast-paced side-scrolling platformer. Starter Green Rabbit who had sunglasses and he had like a blaster and he would just sprint through neon-coloured chaos. He was a little bit, it was a little bit like Sonic the Hedgehog. um yep It was very bright, had a 90s energy.
00:24:41
Speaker
And apparently it also had an amazing soundtrack, but Jen, you and I wouldn't really know this because like a lot of games back then, um it was really common to discover your computer didn't have the right sound or graphics card to run things properly. yeah So when it came to Jazz Jackrabbit, we had the graphics, but we didn't have a sound card.
00:25:01
Speaker
So we were playing this amazing game in total silence to start with. ah No sound effects, no music. ah But what we actually did have in our computer room was our parents' LP player,
00:25:16
Speaker
and a stack of ABBA records so we would play this game to the amazing sounds of ABBA um so when I think about playing Jazz Jackrabbit I'm seeing the game play out but I am hearing Dancing Queen yeah I am hearing Money Money Money yeah and it's it's beautiful because that was actually my first exposure to ABBA as well Yeah, same.
00:25:42
Speaker
And it's actually quite well suited to the game as much as it doesn't sound like they would mix. Yeah. ah In terms of just the the era that they're from, it was actually a really great soundtrack for that game because it was just really fun and poppy and I loved it.
00:25:57
Speaker
And look, my last one is just like a little bit of a a snippet that's come to my brain, which was I remember there being just like this really intense period of every kid talking about Wolfenstein 3D.
00:26:10
Speaker
And it felt to me like every single kid had it. And I was too scared to play it. But I watched other kids play yeah? I don't think I got a chance to watch anyone play it, but I definitely remember hearing about it. It's just not something we got our hands on. I don't i don't know how or why, because we certainly knew other kids that were playing this these shareware games.
00:26:32
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. That one was just a very popular and intense kind of obsession. So... That's all my memories. That's too many memories. it's But it's a really big part of yeah childhood, so it takes up a lot of space. We we really did.
00:26:46
Speaker
I mean, I think I should caveat with this. We did actually play outside as well, truly. somehow we managed this balance between playing video games and being outside. Like it wasn't like us being all the time in the den. We did play a decent amount of time stuff on on the computer, but we did play actual outdoor games as well.
00:27:04
Speaker
So just in case anyone's... Yes, we did. That's
Cultural Influences in 90s Games
00:27:08
Speaker
true. We were in the pool all the time. But it's just when you're a kid and you have summer holidays and summer holidays feel like they last 10 years or something when you're a kid. And so there's no there's no pressing obligations.
00:27:20
Speaker
You've got time to play outside and on the computer for hours. Hey, can I add one more ah memory we might need to put back into the Duke Newcomb section? ah yeah please One thing that stands out for me in Duke Nukem was just this proliferation of like nuclear waste.
00:27:39
Speaker
then it makes me think about in the late 80s and 90s, like nuclear waste was like this really big thing. Like it was everywhere. And um it might be something we explore in another episode.
00:27:51
Speaker
But I remember being in like Captain Planet. There were like four episodes of Captain Planet, if anyone recalls that, the cartoon Captain Planet, which was very much a staple on ah in our household around that time.
00:28:03
Speaker
And there were like four episodes about like nuclear waste, toxic waste is often how it was described. And it was always, yeah it was a big part of that Duke Nukem story because I think actually he was exposed to it or, and that's how it became how he was. I can't remember.
00:28:19
Speaker
But like. Oh, he was just in a dystopian future that contained a lot of that. so there though. You are right. There were always cans of it. I think that's what like I always like because I think you could pick up the cans and throw them.
00:28:30
Speaker
or you had to like avoid them. Like they were just there everywhere in this, like you say, dystopian future. just something that really I just remember so fondly and very strongly as well.
00:28:40
Speaker
Yeah, all of the, yeah, you're right. All the media made you think that when you were a grown-up, toxic waste was something you were going to have to worry about heaps and heaps. Like, yeah, ninja turtles, boys who touch to get exposed to toxic waste to turn into into turtle ninjas.
00:28:56
Speaker
Yeah. Hang on, they're turtles that get exposed. What? Yeah, what? They're turtles? Oh, thats and then they turn into men? They just turn into giant turtles. weren't boys to start with. They were turtles in a lab and then they got exposed to a weird, like, yeah, radioactive substance and they turn into giant turtles in the sewer because they get washed into there.
00:29:23
Speaker
yeah. I think I just must be um merging something. But, like, what's the difference? Like, if you're a boy that touched toxic waste, turn into ah a turtle human mutant or start as a turtle and turn into a human mutant?
00:29:39
Speaker
Well, you've got to have some kind of engagement or interaction with a turtle to become a giant turtle, don't you, though? Like, I mean, you could go, like, the Spider-Man route and be, like, bitten by a turtle and then and they've become a turtle person. But I don't think that's...
00:29:52
Speaker
Were you just going to be radioactive then turn it into a turtle person? Like, um i don't I don't know. don't know. Like, I guess we do need to do an entire episode on this. I think so. But there was that. There was, like, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, like, dipping that shoe in a barrel of toxic waste or Robocop where that guy touches the toxic waste becomes, like, a weird mutant thing.
00:30:13
Speaker
It was everywhere. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Yes. I love that. Nice digression. Okay. That's enough memories for me. Okay. Okay.
Rise of Independent Game Development
00:30:23
Speaker
So the question is, you know, why and how did this model of game development and distribution even exist and what does it tell us about the time that we were living in? I'll break it down into three chunks.
00:30:36
Speaker
So first there was the DIY tech revolution. So in the late 80s and 90s, personal computers became more affordable and suddenly regular people, not just companies, had access to technology to build and share computers.
00:30:50
Speaker
Software. So technology had previously been a barrier to entry, right? It wasn't, if you wanted a computer, they used to be, but before this leap in personal computing technology, they were massive.
00:31:04
Speaker
And they were largely preserved for commercial use because they would have been massively unaffordable. So where virtually all games had come from big studios before now games could be made by one person or a couple of mates coding in their bedrooms it was all very do-it-yourself you made a game zipped it onto a floppy disk and then put it out into the world you would just basically say try it for free and if you like it send me some money and that was a business model it's pretty simple a bit risky but like quite brilliant and we'll talk about you know
00:31:38
Speaker
the risk involved in it a bit later on. um But basically this was the beginning of indie game culture before we had a name for Yeah, so The second factor was about community, how community-driven this was. And I don't mean community in the way we might think about it today. So you might think about online communities or online forums when I say that, but I don't ah to really mean that because the internet as we know it simply didn't yeah exist yet.
00:32:04
Speaker
Back then, community-driven meant your community, like your neighbourhood, your school, your dad's workplace. It made meant like the community that you had physical proximity to basically.
00:32:16
Speaker
I feel like when you're saying this, it's like, sorry, but like, are we saying that the default is on the internet? Because it it was, I i appreciate it's sort of like a very, very much a part of our life nowadays, but traditional communities.
00:32:30
Speaker
are in-person communities. Yeah. it Well, yeah, and it's a little bit sad, but if i think if I think of the term gaming community, I'm automatically thinking of an online community. Yeah, okay.
00:32:42
Speaker
Of global scale. And that wasn't the case. um It was your local community. And even if you were doing a little bit of um like multiplayer PC gaming, that required you to pack up your entire PC and take it to your friend's house and set it up and then connect via physical wires to just this yeah network of like four guys playing a game or, you know, four people playing a game.
00:33:07
Speaker
So it was, there's a very physical element to it that I want to point out. ah So these shareware games were, had to spread hand to hand. So it's through floppy disks passed around at school or traded with your cousins or shared by a workmate who got it off some other guy.
00:33:23
Speaker
Look, maybe later down the line it was pretty common to a CD stuck to the front of a PC magazine that had like a bunch of demo games on it, but early on it was really just like these hand-to-hand floppy disks.
00:33:38
Speaker
um And you had to discover them through people you actually knew. Can imagine that? You actually have to know people. Not just, you know bit torrenting from some stranger's computer and then that computer gives your computer aids or whatever. This was just very different. Oh, dear.
00:33:55
Speaker
um And so it made it feel... more intimate, I think, and more secret. You didn't really, and you couldn't really browse for shareware. You had to receive it. You had to have it bestowed upon you.
00:34:07
Speaker
um It felt like you were being let in on a secret, I reckon. And so that kind of discovery, that personal and physical and unexpected vibe, but ah I feel like it's something that's vanished from how we from how we find games today, from how we access games today, and really how we live.
00:34:25
Speaker
As we said before, there's not that sort of sense of community in the way that we live today. it's definitely changed in the way that, yeah, it kind of, I guess, that the internet kind of removes a bit of the scarcity concept around the game and that exclusivity. Yeah, or or the need the need to depend on the people who are in direct proximity to yeah So anyway, that's depressing.
00:34:50
Speaker
So the third factor here that was part of the conditions for this whole model to work is ah was that piracy hadn't really taken hold yet, not in the way that we think about it.
Trust and Decline of Shareware
00:35:00
Speaker
That this system, the shareware system of distribution was really built on trust.
00:35:05
Speaker
So the idea that if you liked what you played, that you would then pay for the rest. And although you could and should copy and share the demo, it was that was encouraged because that was part of the model, there was a trust that if you bought the full game that you wouldn't copy and share that.
00:35:25
Speaker
And that was really made possible by the fact that the average person wasn't really capable of ripping a whole game and copying it. We didn't have CD burners yet.
00:35:36
Speaker
um You had to have a certain level of tech understanding that a lot of us didn't. And, you know, Napster and LimeWire torrenting didn't exist because we didn't have internet in that way yet. So if you wanted the whole game, you really had to you really had to buy it.
00:35:50
Speaker
Legitimately. But as you would have guessed, this model eventually faded because... of the way piracy evolved and also there was pretty low conversion rates from someone playing the demo to actually buying the game.
00:36:04
Speaker
oh yeah. We weren't adults at the time that we were playing this, so we would have been conversion rate of zero because we didn't have any money and therefore couldn't send away for things. don't recall our parents ever agreeing to to sending money away to some rando, most likely in the States, right? Like they weren't actually based here as developers.
00:36:26
Speaker
So you're sending money in USD, like sort of, and Lord knows what that looked like. There's no way you're sending it. You might get it back. You might not.
00:36:37
Speaker
So you're kind of stuck with what you have, really. Like you've got stuck with the few levels that you might get on the floppy disk. Yeah. Yeah. I don't even think I thought to ask as a kid. Probably because you knew my parents would say no. So silly.
00:36:50
Speaker
Yeah, probably, yeah. And so, you know, there was this brief but magical ah period of time that was Shareware. It came to an end, but it did tell us that software could be shared and played with and even made by people like us, like normie people.
00:37:06
Speaker
And I think that's a legacy that continues in how we make and share things online today. Really, in summary, i think shareware reflects this really unique point in time where the technology was accessible enough to allow independent game development, but not advanced enough to distribute digitally at large scale like we today, and also not advanced enough to allow people to do piracy in the way we experienced it when we were, like, teenagers, early Yeah.
00:37:40
Speaker
um But somehow the games still made
Psychological Impact of Gaming
00:37:44
Speaker
around. Yeah, they did. Because local communities were engaged enough to share things handto hand to hand. So you had to have this you had to have this combination of certain factors. And so it was those were there but for a limited time.
00:37:55
Speaker
Yeah, it a special, special time. It was. And so now we've done Cool Memories and we've done Social and Cultural Context. Please, c Sissy, tell us about the psychology side of shareware.
00:38:16
Speaker
Okay. If we're thinking about shareware from a psychological perspective and why it was so enticing for us as children, why we have vivid memories today, and of course, you know, as listeners, your memories are going to be different from ours, but hopefully they're as vivid as ours.
00:38:33
Speaker
There's lots of different combination of of factors that sort of feed into why it was why it was a thing at the time. And so I'm just going to dive into a few of those, the kind of the key things, I think, to be exploring.
00:38:48
Speaker
So I'll start off with that concept of sort of critical period of cognitive development. So the children who played shareware games in the late 80s, early 90s, such as ourselves, were typically in middle childhood to early adolescence.
00:39:03
Speaker
And this is sort of a stage that's marked by rapid cognitive, emotional and neurological development. And So our brains, if you've heard of the concept of neuroplasticity, our brains are really receptive to new experiences and they change with these experiences and the novelty of computing game was encoded quite deeply into our experiences, right? Because it was really new, like we've talked about already.
00:39:25
Speaker
And of course, in that period of time, these are formative experiences, right? There are first encounters with interactivity, agency, consequences, problem solving, right? in ah in digital worlds that just essentially create these enduring memory traces because of their significance, their salience, how engaging they were.
00:39:46
Speaker
The next one I'll talk about is around agency, right, and that concept of mastery and being able to do something. So these shareware games, as we've talked about before, gave feeling of control and competency, or maybe initially not competency,
00:40:00
Speaker
But when you're really actually working through it, like we talked about before, persisting in it, you're developing that that sense of agency and a self-efficacy in that actually i can solve these problems independently. Look at that. I found the room where all of the loot was. i did it.
00:40:16
Speaker
I persisted. I got there. ah These games like Commander Keen or Jill of the Jungle sort of really reinforce that belief of I can figure things out. So it boosts that intrinsic motivation, so in internal rather than someone saying you have to do this and get here.
00:40:30
Speaker
You know, you feel motivated to try and keep doing it because it's important to you. Yeah, yeah. and And like we said, like there were no online tutorials, et cetera. So every achievement was earned through persistence, not walkthroughs, not passwords to get to another another level, no kind of shortcuts.
00:40:47
Speaker
So that those mastery experiences are really important because they teach us and they sit with us as ah as a point in time where we've actually done something self- self-directed and actually worked through something and and actually...
00:41:02
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's and really important important for kids to learn. I can do hard things. And also the point that you make of control. and You and I have spoken about this a lot.
00:41:14
Speaker
Just observing our own kids, like it's hard to be a kid because you actually don't have control over a lot of things in your life. I love that. I'm not sure who the comedian was. We'll have to find who it was, who was saying being a kid is a bit like being in a hostage situation.
00:41:29
Speaker
yeah They'll be like, get in the car. The kid's like, where are we going? And it's like, doesn't matter. Just get in the car. It's like you're being, it's like you're being kidnapped every day. And so it's so That's right.
00:41:41
Speaker
That's the brilliant Tom Papa. Yeah. So having control over something is just, it feels great when you're that age. It does. It does. It's it's it's really important and the and the ability to persist at something, make mistakes, try things out is actually really important for building your self-confidence and that sense of agency. Absolutely.
00:42:06
Speaker
The other factor is novelty and emotional salience. So these games were radically new, as you've mentioned already. There was nothing like books, TV, toys that we had around the time.
00:42:17
Speaker
They were interactive, immersive, and we were in control, as I mentioned before. And we've talked about this previously, but that novelty triggers dopamine, and that actually enhances memory formation in our brains. Well, it does it?
00:42:30
Speaker
Yeah, it does. Yeah, absolutely. So emotional emotional intensity... usually makes things more memorable, both both both positive and negative, right? So dopamine is connected to that. But on the flip side, you know, when we have emotional intensely negative emotional reactions, or that they'll actually help those memories embed as well. And they're usually a bit stronger. But in the context of these positive games, like the dopamine creates stronger memory formation.
00:42:58
Speaker
I cut you off when you were starting to speak about music in relation to that. Oh, so I was going to say the music, the sound effects and the pixel graphics were intense sensory inputs, right?
00:43:10
Speaker
And all at once as as well. So terms thinking about the why this makes this game sticks, like the emotionally intense or boundary-pushing content is prioritised by the amygdala.
00:43:21
Speaker
Remember that's sort of our fight-flight centre and also the hippocampus, which is our memory centre in our brain that sits really close to the amygdala. So those two parts of the brain really help with that encoding of long-term memory.
Sensory Anchors in Gaming
00:43:33
Speaker
That explains lot of things for me. but like Yeah? Like what? Well, why my memory around these sorts of things is really good. And then when someone asks me at my paid job to like answer a basic question about a financials or something i can't remember a number because it's like so boring i can't remember it and how as a kid the only way to get me to learn my times tables was for mom and dad to buy me like these songs of times tables so i would remember the tune and the music and i was just wrote learning a song and that's how i knew them and that's how i still do them today
00:44:16
Speaker
And and look at that, you know, those sorts of memnonics and like ah little shortcuts we use for encoding, um whether it's a song or it's like a little ah poem we sing to ourselves, like these things that have a bit of more emotional connection.
00:44:32
Speaker
sort of stick in the memory more so. The last one i'm going to talk about is sensory anchoring and flashbulb memory. So the these shareware games had distinctive visuals, soundtracks and controls. So, you know, we've talked about DOS props, arrow keys, sound blaster effects.
00:44:50
Speaker
These created multisensory experiences that act as memory anchors. So the music and the sound effect trigger autobiographical recall more effectively than words. So you're just talking about before your um use of music to encode the times tables.
00:45:06
Speaker
It's a similar thing. You know, we actually encode better through music, sound, you know, visual stimulation than just words spoken at us, right, or saying words. Mm-hmm.
00:45:19
Speaker
Also, those pixelated visuals that made up so many of these games became icons over time and placed that in your in your own child life, like in your memory. They're just like these images that will come to mind, which I know I've definitely got.
00:45:32
Speaker
So the sensory rich information is actually easier to retrieve and more emotionally immersive when recalled. Which definitely, again, for me, like when I think about these games, there's very often positive emotions that are connected to those, the fun and the joy that we experienced.
Emotional Significance of Gaming Memories
00:45:48
Speaker
Playing them, talking about them, it's just really awesome. So all of, you know, these components I've talked about just really... served make this experience of shareware and that period of our time just really emotionally salient and memorable. And that's why we can still recall them to this day.
00:46:12
Speaker
Okay, so we've delved into some of our core memories around shareware from our childhood. We've had a look at the socio-cultural context that led to shareware's existence and also the psychology behind how they've stuck with us into adulthood.
00:46:27
Speaker
So to wrap up, we're just going to have a think about what are some sort of core reflections or sort of themes that we've got out of this discussion today. Sab, I'm going to hand over to you to start.
00:46:39
Speaker
I feel really privileged that this was a part, a really big part of our childhood. It's nothing but fond memories for me. And when we look back at the factors and context that needed to be in place for shareware to exist and thrive for that limited time, it feels like a very precious moment in time for the world.
00:47:05
Speaker
And You know, we have to appreciate that it's the foundation of indie gaming that we have today, ah which is really important to me. And also, I had never considered the factors that you shared with us in terms of how the sense how the sensory input from these games led to such strong...
00:47:25
Speaker
vivid memories that makes a lot of sense to me because i'll i'll go back in my head thinking about childhood and yes you're right we did go outside we did do a lot of other things but for some reason these just these dominate these memories dominate a lot of my other childhood memories and so that makes a lot of sense to me now thank you for explaining that That's fine. It was actually really fun to delve into that. Obviously, it's fun to delve into the games themselves and see these visuals and graphics from a time where, you know, yeah, it was, you know, we were ah ah in a really significant developmental period
00:48:00
Speaker
You know, it was really interesting to hear about the context as well, which, again, like as kids, you're not really aware of. So it was really lovely to hear you talk about why it kind of existed and how precious it was in terms of just really dependent on those human interactions.
00:48:17
Speaker
you know, those connections that you had within your direct community to actually get access to this content and a really great time for, you know, those developers to actually just be creative and innovative and share their creations with others. And, yeah, i definitely ah definitely really appreciate having very salient memories of these games and being able to recall them with such joy. It's really lovely. It feels like a very special, special time. Yeah.
00:48:46
Speaker
It does, and a big appreciation to those developers who really pioneered yeah stuff. And I wonder what it's like to be those people and to know that um you are in the childhood memories
Encouragement to Relive Nostalgia
00:48:59
Speaker
of millions.
00:48:59
Speaker
Millions of people must be so strange. um But, yeah, I mean, I would just say look, if you played Shareware Games as kid and – never finished one, you've always been thinking about it, like go back, grab it.
00:49:17
Speaker
They're not expensive. You can, you can close that loop for yourself or even just go back and watch people do playthroughs now on YouTube. Like it's, it's fun. Like it's so much fun to go back. And also you'll, you'll be like, Oh God,
00:49:30
Speaker
at wo i sorry And see what people got away with in this space. It was like pre-content ratings and, um you know, no parental guidance on these things. And, um yeah, it's really fun. yeah Do enjoy. And we'll put a couple of clips up on our on the socials as well so you can find us at Liminal Queens on Instagram and Instagram.
00:49:53
Speaker
liminalqueenspod at gmail.com if you wanted to email us or you've got any ideas for things that we should cover. You know, as always, I'm sure we made errors in a what we've stated here today.
00:50:06
Speaker
So don't fact check us, please, because I don't have time to correct things. Thanks. Cool beans. Well, back to the grind, I think, Sissy. Yeah, sounds good. Thanks so much for joining us today, listeners. Talk to you soon.
00:50:19
Speaker
Bye. Bye.