PC-SIG: World of Games/PC-SIG World of Games (CDRM1080710) (1993).iso/1282/SILLY.LST

File List | 1989-03-06 | 12KB | 257 lines

          SOME OF THE SILLY QUESTIONS WE GET AT TOMMY'S TOYS

1. Why are your toys programmed by aliens from outer space?
     We were apartment hunting and the rent seemed cheap enough.
Tommy felt sorry for primitive earthling IBM PC owners, so...

2. What is a gorilla ball?
     IBM PC ASCII character codes 1 and 2 are cute little happy
face characters that remind Tommy of his travels, hence we make
extensive use of them in the text mode toys.

3. Why only text mode programs?
     Because that is what everybody can run right now (the lowest
common denominator for the PCs installed on planet Earth).  We
have CGA graphics mode, EGA, and PS/2 products in development for
1989 and beyond.  But text mode works great for the toys we chose
for it, classics all.  (The CGA toys will not replace the text
mode toys, they will have different titles.)

4. Why are some of your programs similar to shareware/P.D. ones
available from other companies?
     Some are takeoffs on such, but the comparison ends there.
Ours WORK, the usual earthling limitations on performance,
display, exiting, sound effects, speed, etc., have been removed,
and they have all the reliable trademark features of a Tommy's
Toy including all that advanced alien engineering behind the
screen.  Like typical aliens, we take an idea and then make it
better and cheaper.  Of course, as a galactic toy store outpost
in a ragtag fugitive fleet we have to have be self-sufficient
and have a version of everything, earthling included.

5. Where did you get your logo?
     This might be Tommy himself.  No, we don't sell baby food.

6. Why don't you copy-protect your disks?
     For the same reason we didn't copy-protect AIDS.

7. Why no chess and checkers playing algorithms, only board
management systems?
     We can't sell them for $3-$6 yet.  But we're working on it.

8. How do you support your programs?
     We aliens from outer space like to get letters from
earthlings.  If you find any defects in our toys then write
our Bug Hunt department and tell us the program name, DOS date,
and what seems to be wrong (no we don't check to see if you are
on our official customer list): if you are the first earthling to
report a given bug in a released product, we will gladly send you
a free Toy Pak of your choice (please specify desired Toy Pak at
time of bug report or it becomes our choice); if you are the 2nd
through 10th person to report the bug, we will send you a Toy
Disk of our choice.  Even if you don't win a free prize, we still
might send you, at our option, a free update (we can't guarantee
it or we'd have to raise prices).  Sometimes we send you free
updates without asking!  And you can always order an update of
any toy which you have previously purchased for only $3 (further
details come with purchase).  Compare this with other companies
who charge you $50 for the toy, then another $5, $10, or $15 for
an update to correct THEIR bugs.

9. Why don't I see any of your advertisements in the trade
magazines?  You have more to offer at a lower price than every-
body else I've seen.
     We're a poor little company that can't afford magazine
advertising, and even if we could, we wouldn't want to raise
prices on you to cover it.  Besides, there are no neat buttons to
push in a magazine.  Instead we drum up new business by giving
away complete, unretouched, royalty-free working copies of
selected toys through several shareware copying companies (if you
want authorization just write) to lucky earthlings, who then pick
whom to share us with; currently about 10% of our products are
authorized for shareware distribution under certain conditions.
(Of course we retain the copyrights.)

10. Do you accept dealer inquiries?
     Yes, send for info.  We sell to computer, software, game,
toy, and bookstores.  P.S. to customers: tell your favorite
store about us, chances are they haven't heard of us yet.  Tell
them you want equal time for aliens from outer space on their
shelves.

11. Why don't you modify (the shareware version she received of)
Tommy's Wheel of Misfortune to ask for donations or (a)
registration fee?
    Because people don't usually pay the movie attendant on the
way out (registration makes sense for tools not toys).  The
exposure we get from royalty-free distribution of our toys nets
us new customers who soon start ordering, directly from us, the
gobs of neat toys we haven't authorized for shareware distri-
bution.

12. If you're from outer space as you claim, why do you work so
hard to make such silly programs (instead of solving all the
world's problems)?
     We dynamited our planet for laughs long ago so we don't have
any reason to be serious, but we have to work to keep fit.  As
Captain Kirk put it, "The more complex the mind, the greater need
for the simplicity of play"  ("Shore Leave" episode).  We leave
seriousness to earthlings, we grew out of it long long ago in a
galaxy far far away.

13. Why are your instruction files in plain DOS text format?
Can't people alter them?
     We purposely left the instruction files in this form so you
can add notes to yourself.  To be sure you have the original
instruction file you have to buy your toys from us and not rely
on a copy pirated by a friend (tsk tsk).

14. Can I get the source code for some of your toys?
     We sold source code at one time, but no more.  A good
magician doesn't explain his tricks.

15. How can you sell your toys so cheap?  I just paid $39.95 for
[an earthling] video game that wasn't half as good as your Poker
Parlor.
     Aren't you complaining to the wrong company?  You can have
15 of ours for the same price as 1 or 2 of theirs.  If you think
you paid too little, send us a love offering to ease your
conscience (we'll take stocks, bonds, cash, gold, jewels, real
estate or Reese's Pieces -- ha ha, just kidding).

16. Why do you sell all your toys for the same price?  It seems
to me that such masterpieces as Tommy's Trek, Tommy's Trivia,
etc., should be priced much higher than such infantile amusements
as the Gorilla Ball programs, Tommy's Stompers, Tommy's Cat &
Mouse, etc. ... but even they are priced too low.
     In the best alien tradition, all the rides in our amusement
park cost the same: there is no "best" product as everybody has
a different taste, and we don't want to use prices to steer you
to our prejudices.  If we charged a more earthling-like $$price
for each toy, the Toy Chest would run in the thousands of dollars
and only the rich could afford it, so hurry up and order one
before we get greedy and change our minds.  Not to mention that
every toy is really an open-ended project, so that the more
popular a toy gets, the more we add to it.

17. I recently purchased just 3 toys and have spent over a month
obsessed with them, missing many of my favorite TV shows to spend
more time on them.  There must be many more like me.  Are we
[earthlings] supposed to get hypnotised by your large line of
neat inexpensive toys and spend all our time playing with them?
Is this a sneaky alien plot to take over our planet like the
Greeks did with the Trojans?
     Please, aliens just like to have fun.

18. If you are really from outer space, how come you aren't rich?
     Like many aliens we arrived on your teeming shores broke
and looking to work cheap.  Tommy really appreciates your
business as toys are his only income and Reese's Pieces aren't
free.

19. Are you really a bunch of earthlings pretending to be aliens
like Keebler and its "elves"?
    If we are, why aren't we more greedy?  Next thing you
skeptics will be telling us there was no Clark Kent.

20. If I don't have the $324.95 for the Toy Chest right now, can
I make payments?
     You can get credit for any products purchased in the 12
months before your Toy Chest purchase, just enter your purchase
total on the credit line of the order form.

21. Why do you say your toys are only for kids?  I have a masters
in English and was stymied by some of your crossword puzzles.
     If you're younger than 250 or so you're still a kid where we
come from; some younger earthlings who play grownup still have to
work a long ways up a corporate ladder to realize that their boss
in the top office has been playing with our toys all along.  Why
do you think our toys only work on IBM style PCs?

22. How am I supposed to choose from the long list of toys when I
just want to sample your line?
     That's really a tough problem, Earthling.  You'll just have
to make some silly decision.  Why not start with catalog number 1
and work your way up?  Or try your lucky numbers, birthdate, or
measurements.  At our prices you can afford to experiment so why
not buy a toy you really think you'll >not< like?  We get some of
our best customers that way.

23. Why only programs for the IBM PC?  Why not for Macintosh and
Atari as well?
     After scouting your situation, we went where we were needed
the most.  Now, we don't have the hands to spare.

24. How could you learn to speak English so well if you're not
from this planet?
     TV carries a long ways in space.

25. I was playing your shareware version of Tommy's Wheel of
Misfortune with my children when the phrase "shit a brick" came
up.  How can you use such language?
     Shit, we don't know; the alien working on that game didn't
appreciate your earthling word taboos.  The 1987 shareware
version, which we released as a lark, can't be recalled now, but
our present version has been sanitized to remove it from the
raging infernos of controversy.

26. Do any of your programs accept signals from a joystick?
     No, but after we get enough requests we'll consider
enhancing them; since they were designed for the plain vanilla
PC with standard keyboard, and since joystick adapters cost so
much, you'd be better off buying more toys instead.

27. Why are the descriptions of the toys in your catalog so
short?
     They are just the right length.  Cleverly describing 100,000
bytes of code in a few words is an alien pastime.  Compare to the
multi-page brochures describing an earthling software product and
see why we're from an advanced civilization.  Besides, describing
too much takes all the fun away of discovering it yourself.

28. Do you really believe in New Age mysticism, and, if not, why
do you carry tarot, horoscopes, I Ching, etc.?
    Get silly!  You can play with these neat toys without
believing in anything.

29. How many are you?  Are there female as well as male aliens in
your band?
     We're naturally shy to discuss such things with outworlders.

30. How come the government still says there aren't any extrater-
restrials?
     Government officials can't be caught playing with toys or
they'd be discharged.

31. Did you have anything to do with the TV series "Alf", the
movie "Alien Nation", or did the writers hear about you first?
    Those are typical village earthling shows that don't know
the first thing about what it's really like off the block.
Dissolve in sea water?  Fricasee cats?

32. Will playing with your toys cause my kids to lose interest in
academic studies?
    No, probably the opposite, although they may have trouble
getting into graduate school before puberty.  The more you know
and the greater your intellect the more fun our toys become.

33. Why do you put loose playing cards, play money, etc., in with
your disks?
    One reason is to remind you that our toys don't get broken,
worn, or lost like the primitive physical earthling kind (especi-
ally if you make backup copies and/or have a hard disk).  We
won't admit to any other reasons right now, like secret alien
messages from outer space, psychic predictions of the stock
market, or any other theories.

34. How can I meet Tommy?  I think I'm in love.
     Tommy is a recluse and doesn't grant interviews.  But he
says thanks for the compliment, he loves you too.

35. Prove you're really aliens from outer space.
     Show us yours first.  Another day, earthling.

"Always Buy Alien -- Beam Up Some Tommy's Toys"

(c) Copyright 1989 by Tommy's Toys, Box 11261, Denver, CO 80211 USA