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page updated: June 2001 thanks to:
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...in memory
of...
1998 - 2001
Download the latest programs without reading the FAQ by clicking here
This page is a tribute to one of the most famous and perhaps one of the greatest TI-BASIC programming groups that the TI Community has ever known. Here you can find information about SiCoDe and download the programs that made it famous.
SiCoDe was founded in 1998 and went on to release some of the best known TI-BASIC programs on the TI-83, and later TI-82, TI-85, TI-86 and TI-89 platforms. It was also founder of some of the more contraversial BASIC programming ideas such as Basmic and "advanced.basic".
The name "SiCoDe" was originally chosen after playing Spaze Invaders for the TI-83, with "(something)code" chosen after Alien Code, the game's makers. This was continued to "Psycode", but we figured that we needed an even number of letters in the name to fit in the centre of the home screen. So it became SiCoDe, sounding like Psycode, but with only 6 letters...
The
SiCoDe logo (
)
started out with this mixture of upper and lower case letters as when
SiCoDe was conceived, David and Matt thought the "S", "C", and "D" could
not be represented in lower case on the TI-83. Later, we were proved wrong
when we "discovered" the "VARS -> Statistics -> EQ" menu...
In no particular chronological order...
Chris Barnes, Matt Kocin, Jamie Pateman, Chase Darden, Stephen Bell (DnK), Patrick Gray, Matt Hall (co-founder), Douglas O'Brien, David Hall (co-founder), Max Seckel, Adam Norberg, Brandon Green, Simon Flannery, Sean Kelly, Matt Moultrie, Devin Symons, Tim Parkin, Chris Brotzman, Philip (Shane) Abernathy, Robert Leggieri, Jonathon Capps, Nathaniel Gibson (ex-admin), Kaivan Khoshroo, Ken Ritzert.
SiCoDe was responsible for some of the highest quality TI-BASIC software, some of which is still leader in its genre even two years after release. Ground-breaking titles such as the colossal Ground Assault, Lords, the technically amazing Nibbles Arcade and the multiplayer resource management of ORiON have ensured that SiCoDe has gone down in the history of the TI Community for ever.
Basmic was the contraversial "Campaign for TI-BASIC equality", founded by SiCoDe and supported at its peak by several major TI Community developers. The word itself is a merge between the words "BASIC" and "ASM". The campaign aimed to get a fairer deal for quality TI-BASIC developers whose games were almost always automatically discounted by even the major TI file sites as being inferior in all ways to the ASM counterparts in their genre, and stirred up an often rabid reaction from anti-BASIC hate groups and some otherwise respected ASM developers who assumed that Basmic was advocating that BASIC as a language was technically as powerful as ASM, which was clearly not the case.
Basmic was eventually discontinued when it was deemed not to have had any lasting effect on the current state of affairs.
The TI-BASIC Quality Alliance was SiCoDe's second attempt at securing a better deal for TI-BASIC programmers. The theory was that the best TI-BASIC groups would join the alliance, and the general public would know that any member of the alliance programmed above-average quality BASIC programs and so perhaps would be more likely to download those groups' programs.
In practice it didn't work quite as well - the alliance was not run directly by SiCoDe, and eventually collapsed. There was also no evidence that it led to more people downloading BASIC programs.
Advanced Basic (or "advanced.basic") was the loose term SiCoDe coined to describe quality BASIC programming - that is efficient, fast code in advanced programs and genuinely fun games.
An Advanced Basic "guide" can be found at Kevtiva Interactive, here.
PsychoCorp was a comedy TI programming group founded by David Hall. In regular updates David, writing as his character "Ken Davis" (a name that was to become famous with SiCoDe fans) posted humorous diary entries about his new company PsychoCorp. Other characters included D00d, the "famous" hacker, Anne Alate, a programmer who never programmed "practical" programs, and Jack Ripper who pirated others' programs and claimed credit for them.
PsychoCorp was satire, which meant it tried to be topical with the events of the day in the TI Community. The formation of Basicoderz and later XCoderz provided ample fodder at one point, as did the whole Basmic campaign and events at the major TI sites.
PsychoCorp is no longer regularly updated but a considerable amount of past entries can be seen at http://psycho.calc.org
Several SiCoDe members left SiCoDe in debatable circumstances and formed Basicoderz, which was later renamed and relaunched as XCoderz after, you guessed it, internal disputes. There was a bitter rivalry between SiCoDe and these groups, with them having the joint "development rights" to some of SiCoDe's programs.
XCoderz has since merged with Cahal Technologies after disbanding due to more internal disputes.
Towards the end of its life, SiCoDe was having problems meeting program deadlines and was collapsing under the weight of internal disputes and pressure from "fans". On February 22nd 2001, Nathaniel Gibson offically dissolved SiCoDe as a programming group, a sad but necessary end to a TI-BASIC legend.
- January - February 2001 - Its downhill from here until on February 22nd 2001, SiCoDe is officially disbanded.
- November - December 2000 - Work continues on projects behind the scenes, but it feels painfully slow to SiCoDe's fans. SiCoDe say goodbye to Matt Moultrie, Devin Symons and Chris Barnes due to inactivity, bringing SiCoDe's membership size back to something more manageable. ProBoards start fishing for money, and by the end of December it looks like SiCoDe will have to find a new web-board (again!). Jonathon releases Maze to luke-warm reception (something about 'not complex enough'), which kicks off another flame war between SiCoDe and its fans.
- September - October 2000 - Phillip Abernathy returns and breathes life back into his pet project, Maskäria, a text-based RPG loosely based on Legend of the Red Dragon, a game from BBS days. SiCoDe makes a major coup in landing Chris Brotzman as a member. Chris brings with him what may be the best RPG written in BASIC on any calculator platform - Dragon Warrior 83. While not an exact duplicate of the original Nintendo game, it shows great promise and could be the most graphical RPG ever on the 83. Ground Assault 89 finally makes it out the door near the end of October, and is coined the "2nd Anniversary Edition" as it mirrors the time frame of the release of the original Ground Assault for the TI-83.
- April - August 2000 - Work slows to an imperceptible crawl, but somehow Lode Runner and PeGz still manage to make it out the door. Somewhere within this mess, Jihad, Golf, and a number of other programs are announced, many never seeing the light of day. Tempers flare within the SiCoDe membership, with most of the finger-pointing aimed sqarely at David. Tim Parkin leaves to start his own group, Basicoderz, taking Brandon Green (who now 'belongs to two groups') and Douglas O'Brien with him. A ridiculous holy war between SiCoDe and Basicoderz ensues, bringing work in both groups to a screeching halt from late May to mid-August. To everyone's shock Matt announces that he's leaving to get on with life (a noble effort), which leaves Evolution hanging out to dry, and fans none to happy about it. The war continues. On August 19, 2000, the remaining co-founder of SiCoDe, David, leaves the group, citing the inevitable movement of life, and a change in the climate of the TI Programming community, as the culprits. This also leaves Jihad way short of expectations (unreleased). The site and leadership of SiCoDe is entrusted to Nathaniel Gibson, who inherits "'the Titanic, after she's hit the iceberg, and the captain's gone off for one last stiff drink.' - Anonymous". This move also means that the website has now moved stateside, crossing the Atlantic to 'start a new life'. Many members leave in the wake of David's departure, and the TI Basic Community begins to write SiCoDe off as lost, and ponders what might have been.
- April 1, 2000 - SiCoDe becomes SiCoDe Pokemon Island for a day, which is too long for some who despite seeing the joke decide to have a go at us for it. TiCalc.org is "hacked" and Dimension TI "isn't hacked".
- March 2000 - An eventful month. Basmic is disbanded after it is thought that the campaign had less chance of meeting its objectives than Half-Life being ported to the TI-82... the TBQA begins discussions on how to reform. We have a short "war" with Novasoft, who at the end of it all go and join the OPA. FourOUT, War, Connect 4, Frogger and Nibbles Arcade are released with the latter securing a lot of publicity - even the neutral Nick D spoke up about it. War and Frogger use a much hyped but nevertheless very "texty" scrolling engine capable of 6 FPS - the TI Community faints in disbelief and awe at our skills (not). The WebBoard gets hectic as it is replaced after frequent misuse, and SiCoDe begins coding another one. Work on Evolution /does/ continue. COM.LINK is deleted and bits moved around. Work in Progress starts to build up again, not in the least due to Devins insistance of working on around 5 projects at once. Planetarion slows right down because of overuse...
- February 2000 - Work starts again. Nathaniel Gibson joins us after deciding starting his own group is too much effort. Douglas O'Brien joins us for perhaps more normal reasons. GA Commando changes to Jihad with a new engine based on B3D G4 (a previously unreleased concept). Much of Work In Progress is canned for one reason or another. We also lose touch with Patrick Gray and Stephen Bell, and Chase Darden leaves. Brandon writes another two tutorials covering very advanced stuff (like scrolling at 4FPS!). OPA accuse us of hacking into their site - fortunately it turns out to be someone else :) Apart from that, Planetarion playing continues...
- January
2000 - The world fails to end! Desert Dry is dropped due to Patrick
Gray disappearing, and Brick Block is released to frantic cries for
help from puzzled players. SiCoDe Tutor is started with Brandon Green
providing all the tips and tricks you could ever need to program "ADVANCeD.BASiC".
SiCoDe's first TI-85 program, QPad, is ported. Various games, including
Final Fantasy and Golf are started and Work In Progress creaks under
the strain. Minesweeper is released towards the end of the month, just
in time for the discovery of Planetarion by the SiCoDe Staff. Work stops...
:)
- December 1999 - Evolution bursts forward into the limelight with quite a lot of progress happening in a short time. A rolling demo and screenshots are released. Maskäria, a full-length text RPG is also announced. Robert Maresh ports Pong Arcade to the 82. However the real argument is again around Basmic. After an obviously flawed representation of the TI Community's views about Basmic, the Quizlet subject has to be changed. Also, the Assembly Coder's Zenith is host to a large discussion on their message board. Four new members join SiCoDe - Matt Moultrie, Philip Abernathy, Brandon Green and Adam Norberg - prompting SiCoDe to look again at membership size...
- November
1999 - The GA Soundtrack finally becomes available in MP3 format, and
the quick and unheralded release of Zap! Arcade and QPad (TPad in just
200 bytes!) livens things up a bit. Not to mention the formation of
Basmic, widely regarded as A Good Move, but surprisingly in some circles
derided (I kid you not). The hits counter goes through the roof (which
is just as well, as we got a new one after Max's Anti-LE slurs!) and
everything's fine, that is until the emails arrive... Meanwhile, SiCoDe
has a laugh with it's "Millenium" Countdown that on the first
attempt counts from Jan '99!... it is fixed by December though. Max
releases his animated gifs (courtesy of TISShot, released this month)
of GA Commando's weapons systems. On a side note, Soulstice is announced
out of the blue by Devin who has been busy it seems :) Two bugs are
found in the previously-considered-to-be-flawless GA - thanks to Jeff
Campbell who maintained he didn't go out looking :) A year after the
release for anyone to notice can't be bad though...
- October
1999 - GA reaches its first anniversary and to celebrate we release
a new version for the 83 and 82 (ported by Robert Maresh). Additionally,
GA becomes the first TI game (to my knowledge) to have a soundtrack
and this is made available (except for the MP3 version which we have
problems finding a host for :( ). ORiON is also released, to much er...
indifference :) After a long running argument with TiCalc.org's staff,
we start work on Nibbles Arcade in attempt to prove that you CAN have
a BASIC Nibbles game :) Solstice is announced, a new RPG with loads
of features. The TI-Files seems to be dropping behind in the archive
matters as they keep forgetting to upload our files. We get two queries
about Spy V Spy in one week - shame no-one's working on it. After many
comments from people wanting ASCII text versions of our programs, we
finally do it. Urban Warrior also becomes GA Commando, with a nice new
spinny rotaty 3D engine and units and enemies from GA.
- September
1999 - Three new releases at the start of this month - TPad is optimised,
SiSecure now includes CODER and WritePad is released. However two of
our members (Matt Kocin and Jamie Pateman) leave, due to other commitments.
At least three programs by SiCoDe appear in TiCalc's POTM (Playmate
of the Month?) nominations, even though they were released ages ago
(this was because we only just got round to uploading them to TiCalc).
We wait with baited breath to see whether we win... ...but we don't
:) Desert Dry Beta 1 is released, with ORiON Beta 4 (are the betas going
to stop?!). The website is constantly reorganised (as usual). Finding
I forgot to put CODER into WritePad, it has to be updated to v1.01 to
include it :) There is a lot of fuss when Matt announces he is going
to drop GA2 - I'm sure he doesn't mean it...
- August
1999 - The website has a bit of an overhaul with Javascript 83Menu-style
index on a brand new frame, and a large advert/logo graphic. Colony
3 changes its name to ORiON while Global Domination changes its name
to Street Wars (just kidding! Wargames, really). Desert Dry is put back
a couple of months as Patrick completes coding, and Ground Assault II
really begins extensive development (most work up to now was on different
ways of doing, and optimising the same thing - namely the graphics engine).
The TBQA really begins to roll, and gets a new website at http://tbqa.calc.org.
SiCoDe Com.Link is started, and gives SiCoDe users a Bulletin Board
and Chat service. SiCoDe Labs is discontinued after we decided we couldn't
remain objective in our reviews. ORiON is released as Beta 1.
- July
1999 - Street Warz is dropped as it is decided it wouldn't meet SiCoDe's
standards. Perhaps there's a moral in there somewhere :) The website
isn't updated all month as the administrator - David - goes off to Peru
for the month.
- June
1999 - Two new programmers join us at the start of the month (Kaivan
Khoshroo and Devin Symons), taking the staff up to 9 people. But it
doesn't stop there! We then gain two more programmers, Matt Kocin and
Patrick Gray who specialise in the TI-86, hopefully allowing SiCoDe
to expand onto that platform. However, growth seems likely to stop as
by common consensus, the whole staff agrees to severly reduce the number
of people we employ, to try to prevent SiCoDe becoming hard to control
and allowing easy communication between members to occur. On the communication
front, AOL Instant Messenger was generally accepted by the staff over
ICQ as their preferred method of "instant" communication but
then was changed in favour of Yahoo! Messenger which didn't put restrictions
on non"AOHell" users. There are now so many projects in the
pipeline that only some of them are listed. Desert Dry, a project of
Patrick Gray before he joined SiCoDe becomes a SiCoDe project ensuring
SiCoDe a top position in TI-86 BASIC gaming when it is released. Pong
Arcade is announced, and within a week completed by SiCoDe's Devin Symons
who seems to have almost unlimited ideas for new games :) Ground Assault
is re-released on the TI-82, securing SiCoDe's position on the TI-82
gaming scene. SiCoDe forms and becomes an affiliate of the TI-BASIC
Quality Alliance, in an attempt to develop BASIC as a popular language
for TI calculators and demonstrate the quality availiable using it.
- May 1999
- TPad v1.3 and SiSecure v1.2 are released. SiCoDe announces Tron, a
conversion of the classic arcade game which promises ASM-style gameplay,
and program size. We recieve a query for the B3D engine so more games
using the format look set to be coming soon. Soon, Tron Arcade, as it
is now known, v1.0 is released and delivers all that it promised. Warzone
is dropped by Matt as he cannot understand his own code when he went
back to finish it! Problems with the bulletin board are finally rectified
by unknown persons. No explanation is recieved from InterNations. SiCoDe
continues to develop and expand. Global Domination and Street Warz are
announced. Towards the end of the month, a new programmer - Chase Darden
- joins SiCoDe to work on Street Warz and Global Domination with Max.
- April
1999 - Out of the blue comes an announcement that SiCoDe's DnK has ported
GA and Lords to the TI-82, a move which satisfies the many 82 owners
who requested this. SiCoDe at last finishes the conversion of all it's
program manuals to HTML format, with the unfortunate consequence that
the program version numbers needed to be updated to vX.X1. Nevertheless,
the program archives were redesigned and a much-needed facility to view
the manuals online was added. The work in progress section is viewed
with some distain as we realise there are enough programs on it to last
us for at least 3 years (exaggeration!) - we fret over which ones to
drop. Meanwhile the situation is further complicated with Matt's desire
to program a Stars! type multiplayer game, with internet compatibility
etc., when he should be doing GA2... naturally we now intend to include
Colony III's functionality in this, possibly dropping Colony III while
we do it. Urban Wars v1.2 is finished as B3D G3 is released, along with
a new sequel campaign. Unfortunately at the end of the month GA82 and
Lords82 have to be recalled to fix an unfortunate error.
- March
1999 - The beginning of this month sees Matt give up Warzone at the
last minute (only temporarily), after numerous problems with neverending
bugs, and start on the much-hyped but nevertheless eagerly awaited Ground
Assault 2. Features of this prove to be astonishing, with 3D terrain
promised - but as such may turn out to be memory hungry. Meanwhile Stephen
starts work on Magica II - hopefully to be a decent RPG. David continues
work on Colony III in between co-ordinating everything and working out
some new B3D campaigns. Speaking of B3D, the development of Generation
3 of the engine means extensive work redesigning our games pages, as
does the porting of our games to the 82 and 86. SiCoDe Arcade and Misc
were also dropped due to the fact that the programs in it were rubbish.
TPad recieves 4 Stars at Dimension TI, and SiSecure and PieChart surprise
us by recieving 4.5 Stars. Towards the end of the month, work is suspended
on Colony III in favour of B3D G3, but after programming hotspots David
runs out of ideas...
- February
1999 - If we thought last month was hectic, we were proved wrong this
month. Two emails are recieved from people wanting to join SiCoDe and
they are promptly accepted. Nathan and Max begin work - Nathan converting
Math and Science programs and Max drawing pics! Ground Assault v1.2
was released pretty low-key, and thus no-one finds out about it for
ages. SiCoDe negotiates an alliance with the TBPA and ends up affiliated
with them. Additionally, in the great Hosting Scramble of Feburary,
TiCalc offer to host our site. Eventually we accept. Matt, seemingly
unable to break away from programming strategy games, starts programming
Warzone, and David starts Colony III - although no-one seems to know
what it's all about. Just before the end of the month, a further programmer,
Stephen, joins and starts to convert our readme files to HTML, as well
as porting our games to the 82 and programming new games.
- January
1999 - Everything starts to roll... Urban Wars v1.0 and Lords v1.0 released
at once. Both games (eventually) recieve 4 stars at Dimension TI. Heartened
by this, Matt starts to convert GA to the Lords engine and David begins
improving B3D - it ends up as B3D G2. A friend of ours at school, Jamie
Pateman joins.
- December
1998 - Development on Urban Wars continues slowly until the viewpoints
were worked out on paper - then it is nearly completed in a week. Matt
starts to develop Lords as a break away from the "modern day"
strategy game. Greatly optimised code and, hopefully, better gameplay
promised.
- November
1998 - SiCoDe Ground Assault v1.1 released, virtually unnoticed, and
now includes the ability to change game parameteres. Urban Wars starts
development with an aim to depose Daniel Simm's (honestly, we don't
have anything against him!) Quake of TiCalc's Top BASIC Game Award.
- October
1998 - SiCoDe releases Ground Assault v1.0 to mixed reception ("Another
Basic game... uh, cool..."). Undetered by this, work continues...
- Summer 1998 - SiCoDe formed by David and Matt in Hertfordshire, UK - Ground Assault to be the first project, designed to better Daniel Simm's Command & Conquer. Both of us had experience programming games in school, and were determined to improve the standard of BASIC games. A website was set up with a view of conquering the world (well, almost).
These are the latest versions of all SiCoDe's programs.
TI-83+
SUPPORT: all TI-83 programs will work fully on a TI-83+
ANIMATED SCREENSHOTS: Click on a program's screenshot or title
screen for an animated screenshot
TEXT VERSIONS: Select the "text" link below "download"
MANUALS: View the manual online using the "manual" link
below "download"
| Program |
TI-82
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TI-83
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TI-85
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TI-86
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TI-89
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Basic3D
G3 SDK v1.0 by David Hall |
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Brick
Block v2.2 by Brandon Green |
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Expansions:
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Brick
Block Level Expansion 1
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Connect
4 v1.0 by Douglas O'Brien |
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Exchange
v1.0 by David Hall |
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FourOUT
v1.0 by Adam Norberg |
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Frogger
v1.0 by Douglas O'Brien |
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Ground
Assault v1.3 by Matt Hall |
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Ground
Assault 89 v1.5 by Nathaniel Gibson |
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Lode
Runner v1.1.1 by Brandon Green / Tim Parkin |
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Lords
v1.2 by Matt Hall |
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Maze
v1.0 by Jonathan Capps |
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Expansions:
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Maze
Level 1
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Minesweeper
v5.0 by Brandon Green |
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Nibbles
Arcade v1.0 by Brandon Green |
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ORiON
v2.0 by David Hall |
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Pegz
v1.0 by Brandon Green |
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PieChart
v1.51 by Matt Tandy (port: Patrick Gray) |
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Pong
Arcade v1.0 by Devin Symons |
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QPad
v1.0 by David Hall |
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SiCoDe
Security Suite v1.4 by David Hall / Devin Symons |
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TPad
v1.4 by David Hall |
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Tron
Arcade v1.0 by Matt Hall |
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Expansions:
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Tron
Level Pack 1
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Urban
Wars v1.21 by David Hall |
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Expansions:
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The
First Directive
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Quake
Clone
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War
v1.0 by Douglas O'Brien |
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Writepad
v1.01 by Devin Symons |
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Zap!
Arcade v1.1 by David Hall |
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Expansions:
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Compatible
with Tron Level Pack 1
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