[FEELING very misleaded by nintendo doing such thing???]

The more the internet generation grows, the less ludicrous TNG gets.

[FEELING very misleaded by nintendo doing such thing???]

Forget DKC for GBC, the real misleading comes from Hideo Kojima and the GBA game Boktai: The Sun is in Your Hand. First, the Sun wasn’t in my hand. Secondly, I live in a cave above the Artic Circle. The game’s difficulty is grueling without access to the Sun for 3 months per year. The back of the box does say Only For Gameboy Advance in the normal place, but Nintendo didn’t train me to spot the Requires Sunlight to Play tag near the Publisher. Why should I be forced to play a much harder game than people who live at the equator? It’s blatant Polar Circle discrimination.

 

 

[Do you prefer the recharged games or the original version's ?]

Centipede Recharged is free with Prime (if you link to your Epic Games account).

If the leak can be believed, Black Widow and Caverns of Mars are upcoming.

 

November 23 Black Widow: Recharged [Epic Games Store]

November 30 Caverns of Mars: Recharged [Epic Games Store]

[FEELING very misleaded by nintendo doing such thing???]

No one tell him about Kirby Tilt-n-Tumble.

 

[Off-Topic / Dumping Thread]

45 minutes ago, OLD CS1 said:

I am looking for an episode of "The X-Files" in which a man has the ability to project ideas into people's minds.  In one scene he has intruded into a facility, a hospital I believe, wearing a badge which says nothing more than a simple phrase like "ID badge."  As I do not have the series and only watched it here-and-there, I am hoping someone can point me to this episode as my Google-fu has turned up little of anything helpful.  Another important aspect is he consumes a lot of energy drinks/snacks to power his brain for these projections.

I find Chat GPT to be good at these sorts of questions. Let me know if it got it correct.

 

“It sounds like you're describing an episode of "The Mentalist." In Season 2, Episode 8 titled "His Red Right Hand," Patrick Jane uses his observational skills to manipulate others, including the hospital badge trick you mentioned.”

[FEELING very misleaded by nintendo doing such thing???]

You certainly need to hire a lawyer.

 

 

 

[Gamestation Pro]

@Atari_Warlord make sure your HDMI TV is in Game Mode if it has one. Haven’t had a chance to try the 2600+, but I have experienced lag with other game consoles when the TV wasn’t in game mode.

[Atari/Legends Flashback Expansion Builds]

Sonic required the [Start] button to begin the game. Perhaps it is mapped to the Menu button or Game Select (or difficultly AB)

[Atari/Legends Flashback Expansion Builds]

@Batchman not sure I can help with the AFB 9 / X / 50th and getting games other than 1-button games to work on them. I believe that one user created a thread about a custom controller that they built to work on the AFB, that used impossible joystick combinations as additional button inputs. For my AFB X, I only installed the emulation cores for a2600, a800, a5200, etc. that were 1-button systems.

 

For other consoles, I got a Flashback Legends which has a clone Genesis 6-button controller. 

[What's your journey with gaming been like?]

1977: Pong, Video Pinball

1977-1979: VCS

1980-84: Atari 800, Bally Astrocade

1988-92: NES

1990-94: Genesis

1992-94: SNES

1993-96: Windows 3.1 / DOS

1997-05: PSX

2000-05: Dreamcast

1999-05: Saturn

1999-??: N64

1999-??: SMS

2001-??: Xbox

2002-05: PS2

2002-??: GameCube 

2002-??: WinXP

2006-??: PSP

2008-??: Wii

2019-??: Xbox 360, PS3

My earliest memories are video games are from when I was probably 5 yo. We had a home pong clone (not sure if the model, but likely from Radio Shack with 4 “paddles” with sliders and a futuristic light gun.) We also had a C380 Video Pinball / Breakaway console from Sears.

 

At some point a friend of my fathers brought over a Magnavox Odyssey2 and what was probably Quest for the Ring. I was fascinated by the game having never played anything beyond Pong/Video Pinball.

Soon after, the family won a free VCS 2600 system from Sears. We played that thing to death on our 11” Black & White TV, and eventually the parents had to get a brand new 13” COLOR TV so they could actually watch something. For a while the kids were demoted to using that B&W TV, but eventually we were allowed to hook up the VCS to color, as long as no one was watching TV. (BitD, the parents were super Christian, and only allowed the kids to watch Little House on the Prairie, the local news, and PBS / Sesame Street et Al).

We didn’t have many games originally, but the 1983 NA video game crash hit and we eventually ended up with just over 100 unique games.
 

The Computer price wars between Commodore / Atari / Radio Shack was about to hit. My older brother bought an Atari 800 months/years earlier at full price, and I think my parent bought before the huge price crash (seem to remember the 1050 disk drive was more expensive than the Atari 800 XL/XE) and ended up paying over $1,000. Played lots on those systems for years, especially due to a local computer club that allowed you to bring in blank disks and make game copies for $1 a disk (dirty pirates). Played lots of MULE, Star Raiders, Bruce Lee, Ultima 1/2, Alley Cat … . Played a lot of Infocom text adventures (Suspended, Planetfall, THHGttG) and dreamed of getting a PC or a Tandy so I could play Kings Quest 1. Probably was around this time I first saw a devoted arcade riom. Arcades were seedy places that high school kids and underage drinkers/smokers hung out at, and I wasn’t even in middle school yet. I remember going with my older brother and seeing Pengo, Joust, and Defender and probably a host of others (but those caught my eye).

 

Sometime around 1986/1987 got to use an Apple IIe at school. Loved playing the Oregon Trail and writing drawing programs in LOGO. Also started seeing NES demo units popping up in department stores. Me and my brothers were nagging our parents to get one, but they said we already had 100s of games at home. We argued we had already beat/mastered most of the games we owned, and the NES games were totally different. I think the nagging eventuality got to them and they bought us an NES with SMB/ Duck Hunt in 1988 (or so). Games were too expensive though, so we didn’t really buy any other games. We also picked up a Nintendo Power subscription (with free Dragon Warrior 1 game only $15). Luckily family rental shops were popping up all over the place, and a local rental shop offered a wide selection of NES games for $2 for 2 day rentals. My brother and I would rent a couple games Friday after school and have all weekend to beat them. Probably completed over 100+ NES games this way.

 

A couple years later the Super Famicom was announced (1991) and Super Mario World looked amazing, but the games and the system were going to be too expensive. We opted to get a used Sega Genesis with 3-5 games since a local used video game mom n pop store was selling a bundle for less than the cost of a new SNES (think we got Sonic 1, LHX Attack Helicopter (bleh), Star Control). The mom n pop video game rentals were all closing down, but Blockbuster videos

were popping up everywhere, and had a huge selection of Genesis games to rent. Eventually we did get a used SNES a year or so later with a similar bundle (SM World, Legend of Zelda LttP, Arthur’s World (think Lemmings, sort of))

 

For the next few years, it was just renting games. Then around 1993/1994 while visiting my older sibling in collage, I got to play X-wing.

I had a subscription to Video Games & Computer Entertainment, and I desperately wanted a PC to play the radically different game types that PCs supported. At that point, PC CD-rom came out for relatively cheap prices. We got a x486, with 8 MB of RAM, a CD-rom, a 80 MB hard-drive, a DAT tape backup, Windows 3.1, and 9600 Baud modem for about $2,000. Played a lot of DOS games in those days. Learned to fiddle with AutoExec.bat files, IRQ settings for sound blaster, High Memory, etc. I was finally able to play the Kings Quest games. The best in the series KQVI talkie had been released on CD-rom. Got D!Zone and hundreds of WAD files for Doom II. Got to play Sim City, Civilization, Warcraft, Laser Squad, X-com and other strategy classics. Sometime in 1994 we also got free access to the internet, although this was mainly just AOL (AOL chatrooms, some MUDs, etc). My father was a teacher and AOL was giving away access to all the school districts. Months before I was paying $5 a month for maybe 30 mins of access to a local BBS. I did pickup the Street Fighter 2 arcade bug. I was playing a lot of that game and others when the arcade resurgence happened. Got pretty decent at SF2 through SF2 Turbo and Tekken 1,2,3, but never went to any tournaments. Also caught the pinball bug due to tables like Theatre of Magic and Tales of the Arabian Nights. Had a fondness for Capcom System 1/2 boards too.

 

Later on AOL added access to the broader internet. I was probably starting college about now. The college computer labs had NeXT systems, Macintosh, and Unix dumb terminals. I kind of remember buying Netscape Navigator  for home use, just so I could browse GameFAQs and other video game related sites. Soon after the WWW was opened up from just the universities, porn sites were springing up. You cannot imagine how long it took to download a 256K pinup girl with a 9.6 Kbps modem. At some point we upgraded to a 56Kbps modem.

 

College life left little time for gaming. Did find out about Nesticle, MAME, and ROM sites. Did most of my gaming through emulation of all the games I didn’t get to play bitd. I did buy a PS1 to play Final Fantasy VII. Didn’t play much of anything else on the system, until….I picked up a part time job at GameStop near my junior/senior year. They had a policy that you could checkout new/used games from the store. This lead to me being able to play almost anything. GameStop also renewed my interest in classic video games. I picked up several games/systems that the company wouldn’t buy back because they were too old (this was before GameStop acquired Funcoland). I remember reserving a PS2, but GameStop made all employees wait to receive theirs when Sony cut the USA shipment to half of what they promised. I think I eventually bought an Xbox and Halo before I bought a PS2. Used to love playing Halo 1/2 Lan parties with co-workers. Never did get around to hacking it, maybe will some day as I hear they are good emulation machines. Probably worked 3-4 years at GameStop and was able to grow my retro collection by a huge amount (SMS, Genesis games galore, Saturn, Dreamcast (when they were $50 brand new), PSOne, PS2, N64, GameCube)

 

Finally got a real job. Got a WinXP machine and did a bit of gaming on that. Mostly strategy games HoMM 2/3, Diablo 1/2, Age of Empires, CC Red Alert, The Sims, Roller Coster Tycoon, etc. 

 

Got a Wii a couple of years after they came out and we’re actually available. But mostly play Wii Resort and Wii Sports. Also picked up an PSP, which I immediately turned into an emulation device. And finally picked up an Xbox 360 and PS3 in the last couple of years. Don’t really play them much, but I got them cheap, used with about 10-20 games ($50). Also picked up various handhelds over the years, GBA SP, Game Gear, DS Lite, but never played them much.

[What's your journey with gaming been like?]

9 hours ago, Clint Thompson said:

I've always felt a large part of the experience and deeper-rooted connection was playing on the original hardware.

It’s mostly just the controller, everything tells is just a black box. There is a small amount of atmosphere from the cart art (box / instructions), and pushing the cart into the connectors (but then there is the hassle of blowing on the cart, or making the pins hit just right), but those are minor.

 

As for the instant gratification of ROMs I heartily agree. People appreciate things they have to work for so much more than things that are just gifted to them.

[Walls of Nibiru]

Why start the walls halfway down the screen? If you move the horizon up to the top 20% of the screen, you will give more reaction time for the player.

Additionally, the top of the screen provides no gameplay information, it is just good looking.

[Am I too old for ASM?]

https://www.randomterrain.com/atari-2600-memories-batari-basic-commands.html
 

Quote

What is batari Basic?

The amazing batari Basic (bB) is a BASIC-like language for creating Atari 2600 games. The original beta version was released in 2005. Version 1.0 was released in 2007.

 

The average person who wants to make an Atari 2600 game no longer has to spend years trying to figure out assembly language thanks to batari Basic.

 

[Season 14 ~ Minor League Tournament!]

Congratulations Evandro. Had lots of fun playing the HSC and Minor Tournament this year. Catch everyone in season 15

[Am I too old for ASM?]

Yes bB could technically display the 6 dice sprites on a line, but the flicker would be annoying as the flicker is shared between P1 and the virtual sprites. So, P0 would be solid, and P1 -P5 would flicker on for 1/5th the time, and off for 4/5th the time.

 

I understand your question then. I also unfortunately like the 2600 over other systems, which makes it difficult to port games or game concepts to the limited hardware. The problem I keep having with the 2600 is hitting those limits so early that my pie-in-the-sky game never even gets to alpha complete. Definitely understand embracing hardware limits though. If you allow yourself additional hardware, what seemed impossible before might become doable, and you start having to become fluent in some other hardware/framework. That’s probably why it is best to start with the base hardware for your first game.

[Am I too old for ASM?]

48 minutes ago, MrTrust said:

is learning ASM really enabling me to do anything to that end that a high-level language like bB does not?

Learning ASM will give you greater control of what is being drawn each line. I was working on a proof of concept for a game in bB, but hit a snag when I wanted to display multiple sets of 6 dice sprites per line. bB uses P0, and P1 and the virtual sprites P2-P9, but the display engine has to flicker the virtual sprites so that something is displayed (at 30Hz or 25Hz, etc). 8-bit workshop (6-digit score) has an example program to show you how to update the P0 and P1 sprites so that independent graphics can be displayed on the triplicated sprites.

 

On the opposing side, bB has some great predefined kernels that allow access to additional RAM. Another game I was working on I started using ASM, but quickly ran out of the 128 bytes of ram. bB on the other hand allowed me a bunch of bonus ram that I needed for turning on/off playfield pixels (24x40). I’m sure I could have continued in ASM, but then I would have to figure out writing bank-switching that supports extra ram.
 

Quote

if you were starting out on Atari today, and you only had novice/intermediate general chops to rely on, which tools/language(s) would you choose to focus on?

I would start out on an Atari 800. The 2600 is brutal if you want to get something displayed on the screen with minimal effort. I read Andrew Davie’s and Spiceware’s tutorials, as well as other tutorials for bB, and all helped me learn a little. It definitely helps to read and follow along with building the code samples and making the changes yourself. I would probably start with bB since it is much easier to make incremental progress and see the results. Just keep your expectations low for your first game, the smaller it is, the more likely are are to finish it. I have 3 games in various states of alpha completion, and none are close to being finished.
 

Quote

If you are an ASM-all-the-way guy, what do you think is the primary benefit of it for someone who is more interested in game design as it works within the constraints of the system?

(Not sure I caught your meaning in the question) If you are interested in game design, just choose an easier system. I have been dabbling in Pico-8 (free education edition) and I have made much more progress quicker on that fantasy console than trying to make something on the 2600 in ASM / bB. If you want to design a game because you want to make something fun for lots of people to enjoy, Pico-8 is probably an easier way to create something and have even more people see it.
 

Quote

What would I be missing out on if I decided to focus on learning something else instead related to programming for Atari systems? 

Everything is a trade off. Even deciding to do nothing has an opportunity cost.

Quote

What is something you wish you had learned early on that night have made mastering the system easier for you?

I wish 8bit workshop was available when I first started learning. it has lots of sample programs ready to run or modify so you can see how something can be accomplished in code. I also wish that Atari Dev Studio was available. Anything you can do to make the code-build-launch Stella-test cycle quicker and easier will make you want to work on your game more. Before ADS was released I had to have a cmd prompt open to compile the bB code, then assemble it with DASM, then launch Stella and open the newly created BIN file. It was tedious. With ADS (or any other modern IDE), you can just click a button and it automatically builds, links, and launches Stella for you, so you can see your changes immediately.

[SEASON 15 ~ Starts January 11, 2024 ~ Suggestions]

If you are interested in a list of titles by publisher, you can sort the Wikipedia table by Publisher. (They also have Atari/Telegames tables if the focus is an all Atari HSC, perhaps with an AtariAge published Bonus games each week since it’s all one big company now)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Atari_2600_games#Games_published_by_third_parties

[Gamestation Pro vs 2600+]

I was speaking of used prices on ShopGoodwill, which is Goodwills fake auction house site for selling their more expensive and collectible donations.

 

If you want new, Springfield Distribution is selling new stock for $45 with free Prime shipping.

https://www.amazon.com/At-Games-Legends-Flashback-Boom-electronic/dp/B07FK2GQFY

[Are there any good wrestling games available on any of Atari's systems ?]

No

 

 

[Gamestation Pro vs 2600+]

What you are missing is that there are different products to solve different peoples problems.

 

The Atari2600+ is a product designed for people who what to push a 2600/7800 cartridge into a slot, and the game displays on HDMI television.

 

The GameStation Pro is designed for people who don’t want to buy physical carts, but want to play a limited number (200+) of 2600 / 5200 / 7800 / Arcade (and others) already built into the console and displays on an HDMI television.

 

It’s clear that the Atari2600+ isn’t for you, because you don’t care about the cart dumping capability. Between the two, the GameStation is probably much better for you.

As for hacking a system to play other game systems, there is a much smaller percentage of customers who are willing to do that (I would guess it is less than 10%). I don’t think either device is that useful for hackers currently. It seems as if the GameStation Pro doesn’t support folders, so if you put 1000s of games on it, it will take forever to find the one you want.

 

Currently the best device for playing lots of different games from different systems on you HDMI tv is the Legends Flashback.

 

The ARM processor on this is capable of emulating everything up to about the 16-bit generation. These are easily hackable, have 6-button controllers, and can be found used for about $20-$40. Other good choices are a Nintendo Wii ($40-$60) (or WiiU $100), an Original Xbox ($30-$40), a PlayStation Classic $20-$40) (or PlayStation TV ($100)), a Win7 / Win10 computer (???) with HDMI out, or the dozens of Chinese set top boxes out there.

 

I don’t think Jaguar emulators are fast enough for any of these devices.

[If Atari should make a new Adventure, what would you like it to be like?]

What AI thinks it should look like.

[SEASON 15 ~ Starts January 11, 2024 ~ Suggestions]

Alphabetical Gamelist (last 3 seasons)

 

Aardvark

Air Sea Battle

Alien

Amoeba Jump

Assembloids

Asteroids

Barnstorming

Battlezone

Beamrider

Boom!

Burgertime

Carnival

Combat

Conquest of Mars

Cosmic Mutants from Outer Space

Crazy Balloon

Crazy Climber

Crystal Castles

Defender

Demons to Diamonds

Dodge 'Em

Elevators Amiss

Encounter at L5

Entombed

Escape from the Mastermind

ET

Fast Food

Fatal Run

Fishing Derby

Flash Gordon

Freeway

Frostbite

Galaxian

Gravitar

Gremlins

Guardian

Gyruss

HERO

Joust

Killer Satellites

Klax

Lady Bug

Lost Luggage

Lucky chase

M.A.D.

Megamania

Midnight Magic

Miner 2049er

Missile Command

Mr. Do!

Mr. Yo-Yo

Ms Pacman

Name This Game

Night Driver

Off the Wall

Official Frogger (Starpath)

Pengo

Popeye

Pressure Cooker

Q*Bert

Rabbit Transit

Raft Rider

Raptor

Reactor

RealSports Boxing

Revenge Beefsteak Tomatoes

Road Runner

Room of Doom

Seaquest

Sheep it Up

Skiing

Sky Diver

Sky Jinxs

Slalom (Winter Games)

Smurfs: Rescue in Gargamel's Castle

Space Invaders

Stampede

Star Castle Arcade

Stay Frosty 2

Stratovox

Street Racer

Suicide Mission

Super Breakout

Tapper

Thunderground

Vanguard

Venture Reloaded

Wizard of Wor

Xenophobe

Yars Revenge

[Excluding Pac-Man and ET, which is the worst game?]

3 hours ago, Mr Oni said:

Even with a big loss it does not mean gaming was dead.  Which is what they always claim about the Nes saving video gaming.  That did not happen gaming was alive and well.

No, big losses absolutely mean gaming is dead. I keep hearing stories like this trying to rewrite history, that don’t seem to understand that Atari was the video game market in NA. It was 80% of the entire market, so if it died, the whole market died. 15 million 2600s were sold by 1982, but that market boom that every company was raking in cash in 1983 came to an end by 1986. Revenue for Activision, Atari’s chief rival dropped by 90%, as did most other companies making console games that weren’t already bankrupt.

 

The C64 had a home computer market share of 40% at its peak. It sold 8 million by 1988, with 1984 being its big year with over 3 million sold. So at most only half the 2600 moved onto the best selling 8-bit home computer (even including Atari 800s only bumps it 2 million or so, and a large percentage of Apple IIe sales were to schools)

 

Quote

One computer gaming executive stated that the Nintendo Entertainment System's enormous popularity – seven million sold in 1988, almost as many as the number of C64s sold in its first five years – had stopped the C64's growth.

The NES didn’t save video games, but it did make them popular again. Everyone wanted to play SMB1 at home. And rest assured it was dead or on life-support from 1983-1986. Sure, they were unscrupulous with their business practices, but their games created a genre shift in the type of games people wanted to buy.

[I wonder, how many of you STILL play the OG 1981 2600 Asteroids - even 42 years later???]

Yeah, without vector graphics, games like Asteroids and Star Wars don’t feel right. I wouldn’t play them on the 2600 if given a choice.

I do prefer Space Invaders on the 2600 to the Arcade, a800, or other version though. (Although I am also a dirty cheater and like using the 2-shot bug)

[Intellevision dungeons and dragons]

As I mentioned above, you can update the Atari 50th Anniversary with CFW. After you do that you can install an Intellivision emulator (Atari/Legends Nexus), and game roms.

 

You don’t need to spend any additional money.other than an OTG USB Y-cable.