Sydney Life

So I read a vicious (but well deserved) takedown of a creepypasta today and it reminded me of a game that's always in the back of my mind but I can never find any details for. Maybe you know something.



So, quick background, it'll be from the mid to late 80s, PC game. Back then as a pre-double digits kid, I'd take games anywhere and everywhere I could. Sure, there were the professionally boxed ones, with manuals and working copy protection and stuff, but I'd only get one or two of those a year. The vast majority of games I got were giveaways, either in the paper or from school friends, or bought from market stalls, mail aways (only did that once though), and Tandy Electronics.

For any non-Australians who've wandered in, that is the Australian equivalent of Radio Shack, I believe. As a kid, it was just where I got my games.

Back then, when they existed, they had three small sections of games.

There was the shelves with the good boxed stuff, your King's Quest, your Leisure Suit Larry, your Zork.

Then there was a rotating rack thing with games in plastic sleeves, your Zork ripoffs, your Dangerous Dave, your Captain Comic.

And then there was the bargain bin.

Now, I don't know for sure, but in hindsight I wonder how many of the 3.5 inch disks in little paper envelopes were pirated, certainly sometimes you'd see older games in there. But also the occasional Australian game, since they never had boxes or slips. I remember a cricket game that wasn't too bad, a Bushranger Quest, I'm not sure about that name, but one day I found a game in there with the title 'Sydney Life' on it, for 2 bucks.

The idea of a game based where I lived was a novelty, so I bought it, took it home. But upon opening it, trouble began.

The label being handwritten in felt tip pen, that didn't bother me. But the cover was jammed open.

For those of a younger disposition, look at a save icon, the smaller box on the edge of the disk represents a metal cover that slid back when the disc was in use, since the disc was a easily ruined bit of flimsy plastic stuff.

Now this being jammed open shouldn't have been a problem, as such, it should still have worked, but I tried to close it, and it snapped back on my finger, cutting it open. I still have the scar.

But at the time I just ran to Mum, she washed and bandaged it, and I came back. I'd somehow avoided getting any blood on the disc, despite it being right under my cut finger, but it looked clean, so I shoved it in, booted it up (despite being like 6 years old I'd learned how to use DOS enough to run DIR and RUN commands), and away I went.

I've wasted enough time to avoid trolls and idiots, so let's get to the actual gameplay, or at least what I remember of it. I only really played it once, so I'm going on hazy memory here.

It started with a "Insert your age" screen, and I remember, as someone who'd played Leisure Suit Larry, I tried to put in that I was born in the 50s, but it just wouldn't advance, but when I put in my actual birthday it worked, so maybe it was a kid's game?

It was a CGA graphic game, I'm fairly sure, the opening screen showed a pretty decent image of the Sydney Opera House and Harbour Bridge, albeit in blocky colors. The title card said it was 'Sydney Life, by Lifesoft Inc', so maybe it was part of a series? That company name only hits a company in Canada that's far too young to have made this.

Part of the reason I remember this game so well was because despite the graphics and the scoring system (0 out of 999) being Sierra style, it had a sort of point and click control scheme, and this was a few months before Maniac Mansion came out, I'm sure.

But I don't think it counts, because you'd click with the cursor, which was a cardinal cross thing with an elongated top, the help menu called it a 'mark', I think. You click with it, and the main character, for lack of a better term, just a black circle thing with like a trailing tail thing, like ghost Isaac from Binding of Isaac, it would move over to where you clicked, then a text box opened, but you had no verbs to choose from. So I guess Maniac Mansion still counts as the first, but still.

Anyway, it opened with the character, didn't explain who it was, but it opened with them at Central Station, and despite the graphic limitations, it was a pretty decent copy. I often went there with my mother, so I knew it well, and it was a decent recreation.

After I left the station, which scored 8 points, I remember, it switched to like an overhead view of the city, and it was a pretty decent map of Sydney. Sydney's a mess of a city, but this game got it pretty spot on.

And it had a bunch of locations, pretty much everywhere young me knew, although a bunch were greyed out, maybe they unlocked later? I went to a few places, the ones I'd been to, and again they looked as good as you'd expect with the graphics. You could click on a bunch of stuff and get little text boxes about them, which further makes me think it was an educational game.

But the map was huge, it went across multiple screens worth, I decided to look for my home, especially when the score went up the more I got close, although it glitched out, it started showing like upside down 4s and such.

And the area around where I lived had lots of places, none of them greyed out, including my home. I assume maybe it was procedurally generated, because it had a house there, looked like mine, but my house wasn't weird or anything. But I was able to move into the house, then up to my room, which was reproduced in crappy CGA art, and then I clicked on the figure in front of the computer.

Then the character on screen changed, from that black circle to a small boy, who started jumping, text boxes opening, saying stuff like "Help" and "Let me out" and calling for Mum.

So, of course, I shut the game down, took the disc out, took it to the garage, grabbed a hammer and smashed it up. My Mum smoked, so I could get one of her lighters and melt the thing a bit too. I'd waited far too long for a body, I wasn't letting him out again, obviously.

So anyway, you know anyone who might have a copy? I have a hobby of finding and smashing any copies I find, just in case he's in it. He shouldn't be, pre Internet and all, but you can't be too careful, you know?