Tatung Einstein Elite Information

One of the systems that Elite was converted to was the Tatung Einstein home computer, this conversion being carried out by Torus, and released by Merlin Software in 1987. As can be seen in the image of the front of the box above, no dedicated boxes were produced for this version, a situation it shared with the PC and MSX versions. Instead, small stickers were strategically placed on the boxes to hide the original artwork, although it can be seen that underneath the white sticker is the wording "Spectrum 48K".
In addition, the game manual and keyboard reference card are also the Spectrum versions, with inserts and stickers detailing the differences.

Since the disc is heavily protected, it is difficult to ascertain which features are present in this version. What is known is that the iconic Fer-De-Lance is included, as are the Python, Krait and Thargoid ships.

The Einstein version of Elite was almost an exact copy of the Spectrum game, and most of the keyboard commands were the same. The four keys which were different on the Einstein were detailed on a sticker on the Quick Key Control Guide.

Page 7 of the Spectrum manual describes the process for loading the game on that machine. This was very different for the Einstein, which only used 3" floppy discs. Therefore, a sticker was placed on this page explaining how to load the game, which worked best by inserting the disc into the drive and pressing the RESET button on the back of the machine.

The player was warned on the manual insert not to write any data to the game disc, a particular risk since it was not copy protected. For this reason, the game was present on both sides of the disc. For a fee of 50p, a replacement disc could be obtained, should the worst happen and the disc become corrupted.

Click on the image to the right to view the complete Tatung Einstein Elite package. As with a number of other Elite releases, the Einstein game came out long after The Elite Competition had concluded. There was therefore no Order Of Elite entry card contained within the retail package. But since the Einstein Elite game was a direct port from the Spectrum version, the game did display the competition entry code on the save game screen, which must have been confusing for anyone not familiar with the earlier versions.

Playing Tatung Einstein Elite on your PC

1. Download the Tatung Einstein emulator, at MAME
2. Follow the instructions at Tatung Einstein Reborn! to download and place the necessary files in the MAME folders
3. Download the game from here and place the zipped file in the roms folder
4. Run MAME, select Einstein TC01 and then scroll down and select Elite from the list of games

Tatung Einstein home computer

The Tatung Einstein was a very capable home computer which never captured the public's imagination in the way that the Sinclair Spectrum or Commodore 64 did, largely due to its hefty £499 price tag.

Elite was released for the Tatung Einstein in June of 1987. Click on the image above to read the complete 2+ page review of Elite in Tatung Einstein User magazine, dated June 1987

Einstein Review magazine was a publication by Merlin Software from the mid-1980's which was printed in A5 size and ran to approximately 14 pages. There was an editorial plus adverts and reviews for games. The hardware adverts are particularly interesting, revealing that a 5¼" disk drive would cost around £200 and a good dot matrix printer in excess of £300!

On page 10 of the February 1987 edition of Einstein Review magazine was an advert for Tatung Einstein Elite. As can be seen above, the main graphic is just a reproduction of how the game box itself appears, plus the publisher's logo and the price of £19.95. This was greater than most games retailed for at the time, the usual range being between £10 and £15. However, as with BBC Elite, the game included a manual and novella which to a degree justified the higher price tag.