The Packard Bell/Windows 95 software bundle - hang on to your hats, it's a wild ride!

Since I wrote THIS post, I find myself becoming a bit obsessed with my old Packard Bell computer; more specifically, the software bundle it came with. So I did a bit of digging, and I think I have enough memories to write a post, with a bit of help from Google.

Since my mind is now so old and flea bitten, I’ll probably miss out huge pieces of these games, like how to actually play them. Just try and humour me – I’m doing the best I can.

As I mentioned in the earlier post, I spent a huge amount of time as a teenager dicking about with the CD-Roms that came free with our computer. This was because I was a bit weird and didn’t have stuff like friends or a life. We had roughly a dozen free CDs - some of them were shit and uninteresting to me, like Elle 2000 Recipes and Telepower Pro, but some of them became my very best friends. Admittedly, I think these games were mostly for five year olds, but when you’re a sad lonely 13 year old and you have no money, car or boyfriend, you must improvise in order to entertain yourself.

Let me take you through the glorious world of software from the mid-90s that probably no one would have bought, so they had to give it away for free. I bet you can’t wait to get started.

1. Batman Cartoon Maker -

This was weird, and I never really got the hang of using it properly, so all my cartoons were odd, disjointed affairs with tinny, distorted voiceovers and about a million Batmans (Batmen?) on the screen all at once. The workings of it were pretty similar to lots of animation games out there – you create your scene, then pick a character, and draw a line for them to follow. The idea is that your characters walk or run around, going from scene to scene, and some kind of story happens –

You could also add speech bubbles that would contain text, if you wanted your characters to talk to each other, and not just stand there. But also – and this was the really exciting bit – if you had your own microphone, you could add your own voiceovers!

Now that I think back, I did actually have one friend at the time. She’d come over to my house and we’d mess about with Batman, making incredibly rude, sweary cartoons. I think one of them was just a hundred Batmans (Batmen?) filling the screen, all shouting “bastard!” and “fuck!” Those were the days.

2. Casper Brainy Book

I always felt so sorry for Casper. He was just a little boy who wanted some friends. Not only did he have to put up with everyone running from him in horror, he also had to put up with his three gigantic bastard uncles, who these days would be locked up in ghost prison for the way they treated him. I don’t know what ghost prison is exactly, but it’s probably something like this

This was an interactive story book starring – yep, you guessed it – Casper the friendly ghost. I think it was pretty much just the plot of the movie, only in cartoon form. Embedded within the story were side games; I can’t remember if you had to win at them to continue with the story, but judging by my skill with computer games, it’s probably safe to say you didn’t.

Here is one of the mini games – I think the general idea was that the letters fell down, and you had to make words with them. Also you got burned with chillies or something. We both know I’ve only really picked this screenshot because it has the word ‘ass’ in it.

3. Sammy's Science House/Trudy's Time and Place House

These were perfect for my mental age at the time – that is to say they were aimed at ages 3 – 7. Sammy was a snake/worm thing who lived in a house full of science -

While Trudy was a crocodile in a frightening pink dress who lived in a house full of geography and time –

I don’t remember too much about every game, but there are a few I remember messing about with out of sheer boredom. Firstly, over at Sammy’s, there was a game where you had to assemble things like ships and helicopters that had been split into three parts. If you got it right (and let’s face it, you did), then a bee would come and ride on whatever you’d just built. Anyone who's played Richard Scarry's Busytown will be familiar with this concept. 

Over at Trudy’s there was a game where you played as an ant, and you moved around a map trying to find jellybeans –

I always found every single jellybean, and I felt so accomplished.

4. Thinkin' Things 2

This was the previously mentioned “pre-school collection of weird interactive games” from my last computer post. Normally, I hate to use such clichés as “it’s like X on acid”, but this software is like being on acid, while being on more acid. It certainly did make me start 'thinkin’ things'.

First up was a bizarre art/animation studio, where you could control the direction of some kind of worm made of dots. You could change the size, shape and colour of the dots, but essentially it was just a worm guiding game.

Stuck on where to make your worm go? Never fear, there is plenty of help at hand with the ‘ideas’ bank. Simply click the ‘ideas’ button so see a weird montage of assorted worms in assorted scenarios. Looking back, some of the ideas were actually quite groovy. For example, you could draw a slalom and have your worm ski down it. Or you could have your worm as water dripping from a tap –

I never really noticed before, but it looks like the artist spent about eight seconds drawing that sink in MS Paint.

Accompanying every clip was a different piece of music, ranging from cheery doo-wop sung by electronic voices, to sad pan pipe music that could be used in a Princess Diana memorial video.

Another ‘game’ was this –

Some type of bird playing a xylophone. Or should I say, you are the bird playing the xylophone. Of course, if you were tone deaf, there was always another trusty ‘ideas’ button, which would play well known nursery rhymes for you. Or, depending on the instrument, it would play terrifying, unholy and wrong things, like this –

Creepyness aside, this set up was always great fun-

Well, that’s the last of the tat for this post. I might write more as I dredge up more memories of old software. Or I might spend my time investigating my ‘Price-Drop TV are trying to kill me’ theory.

7 computer and internet things I miss (no porn or cats involved)

I swear, the world of computers and the internet is the one place where people regularly say “Oh, I really miss the slow, clunking systems we used to have. Why don’t they bring them back?”, and really mean it.

I am one of the nutters who says this, although I wouldn’t really want to go back to the days of dial up – having to wait for your sister to get off the phone so you can view one grainy image of Radiohead, on a website that runs at approximately 1KB per year due to all the fucking clip art it contains.

But there are a few things I’d like to see again, purely for nostalgia’s sake.

Our first computer (VIC-20 etc aside) was a Packard Bell desktop with Windows 95. I’d spend hours bathing in the glow of its monitor as a lonely, friendless child. I’d draw crappy pictures of stars and flowers in Paint, write even crappier poetry (even back then I had an inflated and wrong sense that my writing was good), and spend hours dicking about with the bundle of CD-ROMs that came with the computer. Greeting card making software, although our family never made any greeting cards, ever, a weird Batman animation thing, and a pre-school collection of weird interactive ‘games’ (I use the term loosely), that I wish to god I could remember the name of.

When I am rich I’m going to buy a Packard Bell desktop, complete with Windows 95, and track down all my long lost software. But for now, telling you guys about the things I miss will have to do.

1. The dial-up music -

Everyone misses this a bit, and those who don’t are liars. This is probably on every single ‘things I miss’ list that anyone has ever written, and with good reason.

The internet just doesn’t have that sense of ceremony anymore. The dial-up music was essential for creating that build up of tension and excitement you experienced when about to be launched into an electronic world of wonder.

I know it’s not technically music, but it feels wrong to just call it a noise, it deserves more than that. I’ve included a clip below, so your ears can listen to it –

Dial up sound - uploaded by cdoamh -

2. Packard bell Navigator -

I’m not sure if this was ever intended to be a full operating system anywhere, or just a whimsical optional extra. It was a graphical user interface, replacing the standard desktop layout with the interior of a house, with different rooms for different functions. For example, the study contained all your office programmes, the Hi-Fi area in the lounge stored all your media, or you could click on the skylight, which would take you to the dizzying heights of the internet.

I think one of the reasons I loved Navigator so much was that it gave me a feeling, albeit slight, of having my own house, where I was free to come and go as I pleased. This feeling was reinforced by one of the upstairs rooms – a hangout for teens called MySpace (no, not that Myspace, I’ll get to that later).

MySpace was the cool and groovy hangout for losers like me. It contained a filing cabinet that could store various files, including your homework (like kids back then ever did any homework on the computer), some other stuff, and a weird pairs matching game, which would sometimes reward a winning round by showing you a short clip of Nosferatu (I swear I am not making this up). There were also links to all your cool, teenage software which, if you were me, was the word processor, Paint, and the aforementioned weird pre-school software.

3. Microsoft Entertainment Pack -

I know all computers are pre loaded with games, but these days they tend to be the all singing, all dancing, ‘connect to the internet and pay us money’ kind of thing. I just bought a new laptop with Windows 8, and I don’t even know what games I have on here, that’s how bothered I’m not.

Back in 1995, Windows came pre loaded with a varying assortment of small games, which could include, but were not limited to –

Freecell –

I was a goddamn expert at Freecell – I’d spend hours up in the spare room playing it, when I wasn’t writing shit poetry or trying to find pictures of Thom Yorke to swoon over (I was a weird kid).

Microsoft Golf –

I was a bit shit at this. I’d normally score about 4000 over par at any given hole, and the computer would encourage me to kill myself since I was such a failure. Still, like a woman who is convinced she can change her drug taking, layabout boyfriend, I kept playing.

Rodent’s Revenge –

Rodent’s Revenge was a puzzle game in which you had to move blocks in order to trap a cat, so he wouldn’t eat the mouse (you). I was ok at this, but tired of it quite quickly, and always buggered off to play Freecell instead.

Minesweeper –

I never played Minesweeper, but you all know what it’s about. It was always there, like the can of soup you have at the back of your cupboard that you’ll never eat, but is nice to have in case of a power cut, or Armageddon or something.

Ski Free –

Forget it. I am only good at games where you need no hand/eye co-ordination whatsoever.

Sim City –

This was definitely the game I played most. I don’t know if my version of Sim City was the very first, but it was definitely a very early one. It was a 2D, birds eye view of your Utopia (I always gave my city a name like like ‘Jennyville’, which might give you a clue as to how shit my poetry was).

You could place, roads, parks, or commercial, industrial or residential areas by “plopping” them onto the map, using the “plop” button. Occasionally, a Godzilla or an earthquake would devastate the town, at which point I normally lost. But I kept plodding, or ‘plopping’ on. I wonder if the residents of my various cities are doing well these days? Probably not. I bet Godzilla has eaten them.

4. Geocities -

I never had my own Geocities site (my connection was far too slow and haphazard to allow this), but back in the day these were the sites I visited most. They were normally pages about someone’s obsession – everything from Chesney Hawkes to rare specimens of beetle. But more often than not, it was clear (in retrospect) that Blogger and LiveJournal would eventually take up where GeoCities left off. Thanks to Geocities, every stroppy teenage girl and her dog had the chance to feel like a public figure by spouting their shit out there for everyone to see. Now this trend is carried on by blogs. For examples of self indulgent crap-mongering in a blog, see THIS example.

But I loved it, like I love reading random blogs now. And sometimes, by searching on ‘Ask Jeeves’, I would happen upon a site of interest to me. Usually these were things like ‘TaMSinS RAdiohEaD SiTE’, and ‘Broken BUtterFly – whY my lIFE is HorRible BecAUSe my paRentS won’t Let ME stay Out pAst 10.pm’

5. Floppy disks -

The reason I loved floppy disks so much is that they made me feel like I really had something to contribute to the world. They really made me feel like a somebody. Nowadays, when I occasionally do write something that a couple of psychos on the internet want to read, I save it online, or on my hard drive, or on a USB stick. None of these methods give me the sense of importance that floppy disks gave me for this reason – on a floppy disk, you could write what it was, in pen, on the label, for everyone to see. For example, I could leave a disk named ‘Jenny’s poetry’ on the table, and my family would see it and think “god, another disk full already? She must be a creative genius!” Or, more likely, they would think “She’s wasted another one of my disks. We’re going to have to start locking them away Ann.”

If only there was some easy, free way to show people how much of an artistic genius I am nowadays. Oh wait…

6. Myspace customisation -

Technically this hasn’t become obsolete, but it has really. How many people do you know with a personal, active Myspace? That’s not to whore out their band or their deluded ‘modelling’ career? Yet a few short years ago, it was de rigueur to adorn your Myspace page with all kinds of sparkly shit like this –

And like this -

Can you imagine going onto someone’s Facebook profile, then waiting ten minutes for all that tat to load up? Me neither. I do miss being able to add such a personal touch by fannying about with my layout, but that’s a small price to pay for not having to wait for a page like this –

7. Encarta Encyclopedia -

Before Wikipedia became the go-to source for plagiarism, Encarta was there, quietly helping us with our homework, and helping us bone up on important topics such as the length of the river Ouze, or one song by David Bowie. Encarta was a proper, old school encyclopedia (as old school as it can be without being in actual book form), with the one drawback that it didn’t contain any content that the makers didn’t class as worthy, or that they’d never heard of. As such, the articles were limited. But to a 13 year old me, it was the font of all knowledge. Plus, there was a groovy little add-on game called MindMaze –

MindMaze was a bit like Knightmare, only without the mortal peril, and you had to answer general knowledge questions.  If I remember correctly, a jester guided you through the various rooms of the general knowledge castle. I think I might have completed it once, although that might be my overinflated ego, again.

So, that was my little reminiscing session through the annals of time. All I can say now is that it makes me feel old. Now I’m going to go watch Antiques Roadshow, while wearing one of those big single slippers that you buy from the advert pages of TV guide magazines.