Picking up #basic again really is like riding a bike.
It's not the prettiest #programming language, or the most elegant - not by a long shot, but working in it again I'm reminded of what an incredible gateway drug it was for so many of us to a life long love of computing.
There's something super powerful at play here beyond #retro. I do think there are things we could learn from it in modern designs.
Just a tiny teaser example. I wrote this ugly bugger simple drawing program in < 10m:
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My question is "Is it BASIC, or is it such direct access to the hardware?"
For example, if Lua had been an option, would that have done the same?
@emacsen It's a valid question. I think the answer is: maybe? Like I said in a previous reply to someone else, part of BASIC's charm is its REPL. I guess you could easily create a REPL in Lua as well.
So yeah, if you gave me a Lua REPL with direct hardware access to an architecture simple enough to fit in my brain, then I'd probably love it just as much if not more.
Got such a thing lying around? :)
@emacsen HA! Too funny we both arrived at the same place at the same time in different replies :) Totally agree.
I love tic-80 and have a game I started in it that I SWEAR I will finish one day! :)
