Cafeman

I remember that Jaggi scaring the crap out of me a few times, too, but on the 8bit version! You sit there as he runs up to your ship's door, and you wait with bated breath for the knock-knock-knock which signals its a friendly pilot who needs help .. the second lasts an eternity ... and then AGHHHHHHHHH!! HE'S ON THE WINDOW! FRY HIM!! FRY HIM!!! At least, that is how I recall it.

Ah, more Berzerk fans! I really feel it is one of the top 5 or so must-have 5200 games. The game plays excellently, and the voice synthesis is freaky! Mrs Cafeman told me that when she heard the voice in Berzerk at her cousin's house, when she was younger, it scared her! I always loved 5200 Pac-Man. I like it more than Ms Pac Man, which plays slower and unfortunately has some flicker issues (in all fairness, it would have been tough NOT to have the flicker). Do you want to know what my favorite thing about 5200 Pac-Man is? The loud arcade-like sound when you eat a blue ghost! It's just so awesome, loud, and satisfying! "BWOOOIIINK!" I haven't actually played my system for a few weeks! Talking about it makes me itchy to play it again though!

Looking forward to your next project!

I like the info in this thread so I'm just adding this to it. Okay, after several attempts, I finally ahve successfully implemented a jump in my display display list to cross the memory boundard at $3000. However , some of the talk of crossing 1K and 4K boundaries has confused me a bit. I'm in Antic E which has 192 rows of screen lines. Each line takes 40 bytes. Screen Memory starts at $2000. Now, I had a problem right around line 102 or so, where it simply would stop displaying my stored graphics. I assumed this is a 4K boundary problem because it would cross $3000 on this line. After all, #$1000 bytes = 4096 decimal, which sounds like 4k to me. So, I calculated that in the middle of line 103 is where the boundary would occur -- line 103 starts at memory location $2ff0 and would end at $3017. So what I did was to put a #$4e jump instruction after line 102 in my display list. However, line 102 ends at $2fef, so I programmed the jump to go to $3000. I assume i have just lost the ability to use $2ff0 thru $2fff by doing this? Correct? I also must note that if 1k = 1024 decimal, then I should get about 25 lines before I cross a '1k boundary' at $2400. I've done nothing to deal with this, nor have I even noticed any problem at all here. My display list looks like this at this point: dlist .byte $70,$70,$70 ;24 blank scanlines .byte $4E,$00,$20 ;Mode E and Load memory scan $2000 .byte $0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E ; 10 up to here .byte $0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E .byte $0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E .byte $0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E .byte $0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E .byte $0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E .byte $0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E .byte $0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E .byte $0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E .byte $0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0e,$0e,$0e,$0e,$0e ; 100 .byte $0e,$0e ; 102nd line -- put jump next .byte $4e,$00,$30 ; start line 103 at #$3000 .byte $0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E,$0E ; lines 103 thru 110 .byte $41,$00,$10 ;Jump back to start at $1000 -------------------------- Then in my screen draw code, I start drawing from line 103 at location $3000. Note that the 'jump' is in reality another LMS instruction. I did NOT find this to be documented, instead online documentation seems to just say to put in a 'jump' ; well, the JMP instruction is $4C and $41 is also a kind of Display list jump. It took me a few tries to realize it is another LMS. Bottom line -- it appears I have finally SUCCEEDED. Whew, I'm going to bed! [ 09-03-2001: Message edited by: Cafeman ]

The Atari 2600 did indeed have an aura about it, but I prefer the Atari 5200 over it. It's games were just so advance in their day, and I can still play and enjoy many of them. The 2600, I can only really enjoy a few of those games anymore. I really loved my Sega Genesis and Sega Saturn too, and I love my Sega Dreamcast now too. It's hard to really rate favorites.

See? [ 08-31-2001: Message edited by: Cafeman ]

What if, when wyou whit 1,000 posts, wit caused wa wripple win wthe wspace-time continuum, wand wyou noticed that sthe wenglish language whad wshifted?

Why exactly doesn't Sean put some additional games, like Super Pac, on the multi-cart? How many more games will fit on it?

Or was it Super Pac Man that was not on there? Crap! Crap Crap! Curse this swiss cheese memory and my quick mail-deleting fingers!

He did send me a list of games, and I accidentally deleted the email a few days later while cleaning up my mail. Crap! I do distinctly remember that Jr Pac Man is NOT on there.

I recently emailed Sean asking what games are on it and price. I really want one too, to get Stargate and Xevious and some others! Once you get it (2 weeks waiting period I think?) post back here. I didn't order it yet because I've been blowing to much $$$ on other games (as usual) and the wife would ruin the fun once she noticed a $125+ withdrawal for an 'old game'. Perhaps I should start embezzling funds from crib fare...

Rhindle is correct, I talked to a long-time Hasbro guy at the Philly Classic show and he told me that all those games except Missile Command sold quite well. Anyway, I thought the screenshots showed promise, but I can't imagine playing Pong without a paddle so I didn't buy it.

I saw one of this guy's posts over at AGH. NO. I can't imagine anyone loving an antique game series so much to even suggest such a thing. He should just ignore your efforts. What I do want is to see a screen shot or two! Come on! Give us an idea of where you are going with the game on the 5200!

Ha! That was enjoyable! Thanks for the link.

I can confirm that ANTIC E's pixels are not squares but are wider rectangle shaped pixels. I just learned this, after mapping out graphics on graph paper and then typing it into my ANTIC E game .. everything looked wider and more squashed than I had wanted. But then again, E is not a character mode so why would you wish to do text in ANTIC E? Or are you redefining Graphics0 character sets for bg graphics or something? [ 08-29-2001: Message edited by: Cafeman ]

OOO! OOOO! I did not know that Flashback was available for the jag!! I must get it! any advice as to where?!

It's the Sears version of the Atari 2600. Atari sold the VCS and Sears called it something else,but it's the same thing, a 2600.

So, I want bit 5 to be set to give me 3 colors for a combo of Player0 and Player1. I also want bit 0 to be set to give player 0 & 1 priority over the bg graphics. Hence, my prior register (which is $c01b on the 5200) is 0010 0001. Correct? Which, to me is the same as loading PRIOR with a value of #$21. This is the value I am loading, but with no success as far as getting 3 colors. So I'm stuck.

I changed my memory addresses and got Player0 and Player1 to display as one sprite. On my title screen, I have my title character controllable. He'll have to fly off the screen to start the game. Anyway , if you go here .. http://cafeman.www9.50megs.com/atari/5200d...offiKopter.html .. you will see that I only have two colors. You see, the eyes are supposed to be a combination of Player0's color with Player1's color overlayed. However, Player0's yellow color covers over Player1's blue color when I attempt to fill the same pixel with both players. I know it was probably stated before, but could somebody explicitly tell me again how to get Player0 and Player1 to overlap colors for a 3rd color?

Tempest, I used to get that far on my Atari 8bit version, too, but I don't on the 5200 version. THe firing just kills my hands and I die a lot more. Strange enough, the analog stick gives me NO probs at all on the 5200. I'm trying to play the VSS emu of Zaxxon to get up to the robot and snag a picture of it; but using keys to control isn't too easy and I can't get there!

First of all, here is my new feature on 5200 Zaxxon: http://cafeman.www9.50megs.com/atari/5200zaxxon.html I've hunted for more info to put into that article, but there really wasn't much to be found. Anyway, as this review relates, there was both an identical 16K version of Zaxxon for the 8bit, often found on cassette, and also a disk version which was 32K which had more stuff. Has anybody here actually played the 32K 8bit version, and tell me a few things about the differences? I've read about the differences in older 80's mags, but I'd still appreciate hearing about 'em since I never played that version myself. Also, Ron Fortier kind of disappeared off the videogame map in the mid 80's; anybody ever meet him or know him? Just curious. There is a Ron Fortier in New England who is part of a 2-man "Those Wine Guys" thing on TV, they are wine experts; I don't think it's the same guy. FYI. [ 08-23-2001: Message edited by: Cafeman ]

There was always this rumor that you could get 3 or more ships at the bottom of the screen on Galaga. I always assumed it was kids telling tall tales, but when I saw Gaplus I realized there was some truth to it, only a different game. I used to skip 1st period at high school to play Galaga (and Mr. Do) at the local Sheetz store's arcade. Sheetz is like a 7-11 or CoGo's, btw.

So are you in this picture JOel? Your bud is...

NE146 -- yes, you hit the nail on the head. No closure, no defeated DK was lame. It was corporate $ales mentality at its (dr evil imitation) Most EEEEEVILLLL. Rush the game out with the smallest k cart and it'll surely sell. Anyway, both coin-op games are equal and both Atari 8bit versions are equal in my mind. I was always in awe at how good DKjr really was, without being a me-too kind effort in any way. The 2600 versions both bite for many reasons. Donkey Kong is my all time favorite platformer. I play it on Mame, I play it on N64's DK64 cart, I play it on my Atari 8bit. When you think about how ingenious its design, art, and concept and playability all are ... it's easy to see Miyamoto's worth to the big N.

The 5200 is my personal favorite Atari system, and I have this ever-growing page to explain why & convince the rest of you: http://cafeman.www9.50megs.com/atari/atari5200.html