Iniquity BBS creator Mike Fricker, who is now a technical director at Epic Games working on Unreal Engine 4, mentions his BBS history during a Twitch stream reddit / bbs ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Idoiocracy · 2014-04-04 04:50 Epic Games recently had a [Twitch video stream](http://www.twitch.tv/unrealengine/b/516752235?t=5m30s) with their technical director, Mike Fricker, talking about Unreal Engine 4 updates. He mentions on stream twice his BBS history and having created Iniquity BBS: [33:30](http://www.twitch.tv/unrealengine/b/516752235?t=33m30s) - When asked about his early start in programming, he says, *"I started when I was just a kid, trying to make games. But I released this product when I was 16 called, it was a BBS software. Using Turbo Pascal, called Iniquity BBS. But since then, since I was able to get a 286 with a good enough processor that I could actually run stuff, I've been trying to do this."* [51:10](http://www.twitch.tv/unrealengine/b/516752235?t=51m10s) - When talking about Mike's past using IRC, he says, *"I worked on BBS software, right? I was building what I thought was the most powerful, best BBS software of all time, and the internet came along and basically clobbered it. Like, oh yeah, btw this whole thing you've been doing for the last three years, as a teenager... obsolete. (chuckles)* **Instantly** *obsolete."* Iniquity BBS is the same software that [joet3ch posted about last week ](http://www.reddit.com/r/bbs/comments/21dy6r/my_iniquity_board_in_199 4/) and one that I dabbled with back in the day as well. It had the most 'l33t' look and theme out of the box with a default config than any other BBS software, as you can see here: **[Iniquity BBS screenshot gallery](http://imgur.com/a/41phq)** This made it a trendy choice in the warez and art scene bulletin boards, as Mike Fricker says himself on his [personal website](http://mikefricker.com/): *"This is a bulletin board system that I wrote when I was a kid, before the internet blew up and BBS dial-ups went extinct. I released Iniquity BBS for free during its development and it gained a lot of popularity, but it never really made it out of beta. Iniquity was especially popular with the [art scene](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_art_scene) sysops, and it was generally known for being the most* **visually configurable** *BBS software out there. It had a lot of neat gimmicky graphics features like built-in Tetris, robust light-bar menus and a text-mode graphics protocol ([TextFX](http://gtermix.sourceforge.net/textfx/)) that allowed for some fancy visual effects. I created a pretty bad-ass script language (IPL) that made it [easy to modify](http://www.demonic.net/files.php?id=14) just about every aspect of the software, too.* *You can [download Iniquity](http://mikefricker.com/files/iq1a25r2.zip) and try it yourself if you want (I recommend using the [DOSBox](http://dosbox.sourceforge.net/) emulator to host it.) These days no one really maintains the software, but the Pascal [source code](http://mikefricker.com/files/iq1a25r2_source.zip) is freely available. There are also a few [forked versions of Iniquity](http://iniquitybbs.com/) that other developers have extended with new features.* *Here are some screen shots! (By the way, nearly all of the [ANSI](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ANSI_art) artwork bundled with Iniquity was my own handy work. I had quite the passion for text mode art!)"* ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Idoiocracy · 2014-04-04 04:56 The BBS Documentary site says this about [Iniquity's development history](http://software.bbsdocumentary.com/IBM/DOS/INIQUITY/): **Author:** *Michael Friker (Original Author), Michael Pike (Purchased Rights), dedchylde/Nathan Hyatt (Version from leaked Source Code)* **Additional Notes:** From the readme version of Iniquity 1.00 Alpha 26r4: *"For those that do not know iniquity was first started by Michael Friker, it was then sold to Michael Pike after Friker no longer had the time and energy that was needed to continue the project. With the comming of Pike we all hoped that iniquity would once again develop into the software it was in the past."* *"Things did not go as planned and as we had hoped, Pike was lacking one key that he would need to develop iniquity, he could not code pascal. After we releazed this things turned ugly after our devotion and commitment had been played apon my Pike, and eventually the source code itself was leaked to the public. Comatose suggested too iniquity's die hard supporters that the development should now be run by the iniquity sysops themselves and form a type of group or team of system operators that wish too continue the development and yet respect its original founders work and credits where they are due."* ---------------------------------------------------------------------- lurkastan · 2014-04-04 05:17 I wonder why more boards don't run Iniquity today (do ANY?). BBS software that's actively updated is of course going to have the edge in popularity, but it's not that hard to find boards running Telegard or Renegade. Maybe it's the combination of Iniquity not being the most well known software to begin with (there's a larger pool of returning sysops with experience running other software) and former Iniquity sysops running Mystic now, which is still being updated and is similar in some respects to Iniquity. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Idoiocracy · 2014-04-04 05:37 Just speaking anecdotally, Iniquity had sort of a 'flash in the pan' feeling to me. It came late towards the last few years of BBS popularity, well after Renegade and WWIV. So even though it became popular among some for its cutting-edge feel and art scene look, it was a minority compared to Renegade's large and established userbase. The support and updates then died shortly after, reinforcing the flash-in-the-pan feeling. But perhaps someone who knows more could provide a better answer. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- UnaClocker · 2014-04-04 19:16 I ran the original Telegard. Then went to Renegade when that came along. Iniquity came next and I ran that. Finally , Telegard came back with a major rewrite but wasn't quite on par with Iniquity's graphics. That said, I always assumed the 3 were started off the same codebase. Having seen the source to the original Telegard (Telegard went open source before Renegade came out) and Iniquity, I don't think it was based on it. But I'm almost certain Renegade was. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- mro_1337 · 2014-04-12 18:52 iniquity had a lot of bugs, and it was quite slow in a few aspects. it looked great, but not so great under the hood ---------------------------------------------------------------------- mro_1337 · 2014-04-12 18:53 btw, iniquitybbs.com needs to be redirected to my new server. jack phlash never got around to it. the files are here http://bbses.info/mirrors/iniquitybbs.com/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- mro_1337 · 2014-04-12 18:58 telegard and renegade were based on wwiv sourcecode. i'm not sure about iniquity. the superior bbs software out of the 3 was most certainly telegard. renegade was more of a bbs that was for sysops starting out, and iniquity was a step above that, for people that were into the k-rad lifestyle. all bbs sofwares are good, though. sadly iniquity had more bugs. all these bbs softwares support ansi [and some of them RIP], and you can change the look quite extensively. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-06-01 08:40 [deleted] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [deleted] · 2014-06-01 08:41 Renegade was very dorky in comparison though. And WWIV? That was one of my least favorite, and far dorkier than most. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Linophryne · 2023-12-02 02:34 I ran this and renegade back in the day. Hope Mike is doing well. It's been a very long time since i've seen him.