page updated: June 2001

thanks to:

  • Nathaniel Gibson for the latest SiCoDe site backup
  • ticalc.org for continuing to host a "dead" group
  • all of SiCoDe's fans who have supported SiCoDe through its amazing life
  • all of the programmers who made SiCoDe the legend it is today

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SiCoDe
copyright 2001 SiCoDe Software
HTML by david hall

...in memory of...
SiCoDe

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.

FAQ

SiCoDe?

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 (SiCoDe) 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...

Who was in it?

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.

What did they release?

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?

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.

TBQA?

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?

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?

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

Basicoderz and XCoderz

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.

Why did they break up?

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.

Complete Chronology

  • 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).

Latest Programs

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
TI-83
TI-85
TI-86
TI-89

Basic3D G3 SDK v1.0
Software Development Kit

by David Hall

 

Brick Block v2.2
Puzzle Game

by Brandon Green

 
Expansions:
Brick Block Level Expansion 1
     

Connect 4 v1.0
Puzzle Game

by Douglas O'Brien

 

Exchange v1.0
Currency Converter Utility

by David Hall

 

FourOUT v1.0
Puzzle Game

by Adam Norberg

       

Frogger v1.0
Classic Arcade Game

by Douglas O'Brien

 

Ground Assault v1.3
Turn Based Strategy Game

by Matt Hall

 

Ground Assault 89 v1.5
Turn Based Strategy Game

by Nathaniel Gibson

Lode Runner v1.1.1
Classic Arcade Game

by Brandon Green / Tim Parkin

 

Lords v1.2
Turn Based Strategy Game

by Matt Hall

 

Maze v1.0
Puzzle Game

by Jonathan Capps

       
Expansions:
Maze Level 1
       

Minesweeper v5.0
Puzzle Game

by Brandon Green

 

Nibbles Arcade v1.0
Classic Arcade Game

by Brandon Green

 

ORiON v2.0
Multiplayer Resource Management

by David Hall

 

Pegz v1.0
Puzzle Game

by Brandon Green

 

PieChart v1.51
Math Utility

by Matt Tandy (port: Patrick Gray)

 

Pong Arcade v1.0
Classic Arcade Game

by Devin Symons

 

QPad v1.0
Basic text input program

by David Hall

SiCoDe Security Suite v1.4
Security Suite

by David Hall / Devin Symons

 

TPad v1.4
Intermediate text input program

by David Hall

 

Tron Arcade v1.0
Classic Arcade Game

by Matt Hall

 
Expansions:
Tron Level Pack 1
       

Urban Wars v1.21
3D Shoot-em-up Game

by David Hall

 
Expansions:
The First Directive
       
Quake Clone
       

War v1.0
Original Arcade Game

by Douglas O'Brien

 

Writepad v1.01
Advanced text input program

by Devin Symons

 

Zap! Arcade v1.1
Original Arcade Game

by David Hall

 
Expansions:
Compatible with Tron Level Pack 1
       

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