Spin Colors With The Spider

Since our new ATARI 800 has the GTIA chip, we have been experimenting with it. Spider is a little BASIC program that lets you doodle colors with your joystick.

Mode 11 is our choice for this program because it gives 16 different colors in a high-resolution mode (80 pixels horizontally by 192 vertically). When you run the program, a white "spider" appears. The fire button changes the spider's color. As you move the joystick the spider leaves a trail of its color. When the spider is white it can be positioned without leaving a line (it actually draws in background color).

To start a new design, press [RESET] and type RUN.

by John and Mary Harrison

John and Mary Harrison are parents, teachers, and ATARI hobbyists. Mary teaches math and computer science at the high school level. John holds an M.S. degree in computer science and develops educational software. They live in Newport News, VA, and are Contributing Editors to ANTIC's Education Department.

Listing: SPYDER.BAS Download