Multi-load games

Multi-load games were games developed for 8-bit computers (for example, the ZX Spectrum, Atari, and Commodore 64) that got around memory constraints through designs that loaded up only portions of the game.

Due to the limited memory of these computers, games were initially fairly simple, in order to keep the size of the program code as small as possible, as games would be loaded into memory in their entirety. In time, however, developers began creating games that loaded in only the parts of the game that could be accommodated by the memory constraints (typically 48 or 64K of RAM). This multi-load approach allowed much larger and complex games to be created, and also allowed games to be created as a series of smaller games (such as RoboCop.^[1]) The user would usually be prompted to stop the tape when the section had loaded, then prompted to "Press play on tape" when the next section was required (the 8-bit music tribute band Press Play On Tape uses this phrase as its name).

With the advent of the 128K versions of the Spectrum and Commodore, many games that would previously have required multi-loading could be loaded into memory in their entirety.^[2]

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