🏴☠️ Mark’s challenge: Retro Recovery
🗺️ Location: Retro Emporium - Area: retroshop. Coordinates: 3, 6
Dialogue before Finishing ACT I
I am an avid collector of things of the past. I love old technology. I love how it connects us to the past. Some remind me of my dad, who was an engineer on the Apollo 11 mission and helped develop the rendezvous and altimeter radar on the space craft.
If you ever get into collecting things like vintage computers, here is a tip. Never forget to remove the RIFA capacitors from vintage computer power supplies when restoring a system. If not they can pop and fill the room with nasty smoke.
I love vintage computing, it’s the very core of where and when it all began. I still enjoy writing programs in BASIC and have started re-learning Apple II assembly language. I started writing code in 1982 on a Commodore CBM.
Sometimes it is the people no one can imagine anything of who do the things no one can imagine. - Alan Turing
You never forget your first 8-bit system.
There’s something in the works. Come see me later and we’ll talk.
Dialogue after Finishing ACT I
While Kevin and I were cleaning up the Retro Store, we found this FAT12 floppy disk image, must have been under this arcade machine for years. These disks were the heart of machines like the Commodore 64. I am so glad you can still mount them on a modern PC.
When I was a kid we shared warez by hiding things as deleted files.
I remember writing programs in BASIC. So much fun! My favorite was Star Trek.
The beauty of file systems is that ‘deleted’ doesn’t always mean gone forever.
Ready to dive into some digital archaeology and see what secrets this old disk is hiding?
Go to Items in your badge, download the floppy disk image, and see what you can find!
Dialogue after solving the challenge
Excellent work! You’ve successfully recovered that deleted file and decoded the hidden message.
Sometimes the old ways are the best ways. Vintage file systems never truly forget what they’ve seen. Play some Star Trek… it actually works.
Dialogue after completing HHC2025
Excellent! You’ve recovered every secret with vintage precision - you never forget your first challenge victory, just like your first 8-bit system!