top 5 reasons to get a 5200

[phuzaxeman]

no particular order:

 

1) best looking system...big and sleek

2) one of the top atari systems that have one of the best good game to bad game ratios (there isnt a really bad game)...baseball, space dungeon, countermeasure, pengo, are gems on this great system. lynx ties in great titles.

3) dual controllers mode for games like space dungeon and robotron

4) while the controllers are unreliable, when they do work, the 5200 controllers are the best in that era in comparison to the intellivision, colecovision, odyssey, 2600, etc

5) trackball and centipede is amazing. i had it when i was a kid and still have it. awesome....best trackball.

 

what r yours?

[Christophero Sly]

Qix.

[hhwolfman]

Qix.

 

I second that.

[VideoFever1982]

I like the cartridge design, the controllers (when rebuilt), the system design and appearance, and the fact that Kangaroo on the 5200 looks better and the music is longer than the 2600 version. I like its version of pac-man, Rescue on Fractalus, Countermeasure, Defender, plus most other games. Packaging is nice too.

[+swlovinist]

Funny that Qix was brought up. Yesterday I was having a nightmare with my computer with all sorts of problems. So, while my computer was throwing up upon itself, I busted out some 5200 games that I had neglected. Luckily for me, after about 5 minutes of playing some Qix, I forgot all about my problems with my computer.

 

 

A great version of a classic, good times.

 

I also messed with super cobra, which was pretty good as well.

 

 

dont have it yet, I hear Adventure II is the bomb I hear.

Edited October 5, 2008 by swlovinist

[bohoki]

i loved gyruss unfortunatly i was careless and it had dirty contacts and somehow i either jerked it out while the machine was on or pluged it in while the machine was on and my 2 controller unit and gyruss are dead

 

funny how the 2600 adapter still works in the 2 port unit

 

i have a 4 port unit which is what tells me that gyruss is a gonner so sad

 

i love qix too but i found if you split the qix 9 times is goes back to 2x bonus

 

so once you get to the 10x bonus quit splittin the qix

Edited October 29, 2008 by bohoki

[Atari2008]

1. Games: Great ports of classic 80s arcade games.

 

2. Graphics: Games look much closer to their arcade counterparts. Colors are bright and vibrant.

 

3. Sound: Nice audio, capable of voice synthesis.

 

4. Controllers: Unreliable and non-self centering BUT able to accomodate left-handed and right-handed players whereas almost every other controller of the era seems to accomodate right-handed players. Also, one of the first systems (or the first?) to have the pause button on the controllers.

 

5. Sysem Design: The 5200 just looks cool; slick and rather simple design with all major functions on the controller.

[atari_envy]

Missle Command with the trackball

[littleman jack]

The giant and unique appearance.

The games and sounds are excellent.

The start screens look cool.

Adventure II, Beef Drop, and Castle Crisis (the homebrews).

You only need 16K to play its version of Choplifter.

[famicommander]

I plan on getting one simply because it's the only major Atari console I don't own. But it will have to wait, because my Jaguar, Lynx, and 7800 collections are in need of attention.

[2600FunTimes]

I want one so I can play the 5200 Pac-Man cart I've had for nearly five years thats only known how to be a loyal paperweight :*((

 

*wants to play the real deal*

 

because I can't play

pac-man on the CV [or 2600]

[CV Gus]

no particular order:

 

1) best looking system...big and sleek

2) one of the top atari systems that have one of the best good game to bad game ratios (there isnt a really bad game)...baseball, space dungeon, countermeasure, pengo, are gems on this great system. lynx ties in great titles.

3) dual controllers mode for games like space dungeon and robotron

4) while the controllers are unreliable, when they do work, the 5200 controllers are the best in that era in comparison to the intellivision, colecovision, odyssey, 2600, etc

5) trackball and centipede is amazing. i had it when i was a kid and still have it. awesome....best trackball.

 

what r yours?

 

 

Well, first:

 

1) Big and sleek is right...TOO damn big. That thing is so big, I've had trouble storing it. A CV, on the other hand, can go anywhere a 5200 can, plus more. I like the overall CV look better, although the red LED on the 5200 is nifty.

 

2) Ever see Congo Bongo? Bleah. A problem is that some 5200 games are no better than the 2600 versions: Super Breakout and Space Invaders being two examples.

But the 5200 does have a good library. Ms. Pac-Man, Blueprint, and others, like Berzerk and Qix, are strong points. But it never had as many as the CV, esp. Alcazar and Gateway to Apshai (RPGs), Fortune Builder, etc. And I do like Robotron: 2084, and for the 5200, Star Raiders- so far, the CV lacks as good a first-person shooter.

 

3) Any system can do that- but Atari was smart enough to allow both methods of play. Score one for the 5200 here.

 

4) Frankly, except for Missile Command, those controllers were a disaster. Qix and Berzerk especially, but most others, too. The difference between the 5200 standard and a digital controller is like night and day.

A more serious problem was compatibility. The CV used a 9-pin design, so most controllers for the Vic-20, Commodore-64, Atari 2600 or 7800, and even the Genesis, do work on a CV. But a 5200 really needs a 5200 controller, due to that weird analog design. Also, those things break down too easily, and are difficult to repair because in part of those "strips."

I will grant what you didn't mention- when making certain specific "specialty" controllers, such as a light gun or a paddle controller, the 5200 is much easier to design for, assuming you have a 15-wire/pin cord. In fact, since every 5200 controller has TWO potentiometers in it, even a 2-port 5200 can, like the 2600, have four players. This would be much trickier for a CV.

 

5) No better than a CV Roller Controller. That said, if you have one for the 5200, then Centipede for the 5200 is so much better than the 7800 version. In fact, it has all of that "something" from the arcade version.

 

 

 

The best reasons for a 5200? Well, the reasons I picked up one a decade ago at a townwide garage sale, and after hours of effort, was able to fix it:

 

Nostalgia for a happier time.

 

When, during a test- did I get it running?-..."CHICKEN! FIGHT LIKE A ROBOT!" Berzerk. Defender. Qix. Star Raiders. Ms. Pac-Man and Pac-Man, the latter somehow better-playing than the NES version. Blueprint, and now, with my paddle controller, Super Breakout.

 

I do prefer it to my 7800, overall.

Edited November 4, 2008 by CV Gus

[phuzaxeman]

1) looks are relative. you cannot deny that the system itself looks sleeker with the gloss black and less busy curves. the system is big but you rarely heard people complain about the size.

 

2) some games aren't that great but look at the great libray of games the 5200 has...other than the lynx, the 5200 has one of the best rated to crap rated games percentage. look at all the pityful jag and 7800 games (both which i owned when they came out and admit there are some great games)

 

3) any system could do that, but when i was a kid, playing my favorite robotron game with the dual sticks on the coupler and playing centipede on a trackball was revolutionary at the time. to say any system could do that is hindsight.

 

4) complain about the controllers...no one can deny that. the controllers were fine for me. reliabilty was a huge issue. but i've got 3 great working controllers today. i dont think the intellivision, 7800, colecovision were better. i can compete against wico or dreamcast or whatever joystick u choose...5200 sticks work great for the most part if they work.

 

you'd think atari would learn with the next systems....

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CV GUS:

 

Well, first:

 

1) Big and sleek is right...TOO damn big. That thing is so big, I've had trouble storing it. A CV, on the other hand, can go anywhere a 5200 can, plus more. I like the overall CV look better, although the red LED on the 5200 is nifty.

 

2) Ever see Congo Bongo? Bleah. A problem is that some 5200 games are no better than the 2600 versions: Super Breakout and Space Invaders being two examples.

But the 5200 does have a good library. Ms. Pac-Man, Blueprint, and others, like Berzerk and Qix, are strong points. But it never had as many as the CV, esp. Alcazar and Gateway to Apshai (RPGs), Fortune Builder, etc. And I do like Robotron: 2084, and for the 5200, Star Raiders- so far, the CV lacks as good a first-person shooter.

 

3) Any system can do that- but Atari was smart enough to allow both methods of play. Score one for the 5200 here.

 

4) Frankly, except for Missile Command, those controllers were a disaster. Qix and Berzerk especially, but most others, too. The difference between the 5200 standard and a digital controller is like night and day.

A more serious problem was compatibility. The CV used a 9-pin design, so most controllers for the Vic-20, Commodore-64, Atari 2600 or 7800, and even the Genesis, do work on a CV. But a 5200 really needs a 5200 controller, due to that weird analog design. Also, those things break down too easily, and are difficult to repair because in part of those "strips."

I will grant what you didn't mention- when making certain specific "specialty" controllers, such as a light gun or a paddle controller, the 5200 is much easier to design for, assuming you have a 15-wire/pin cord. In fact, since every 5200 controller has TWO potentiometers in it, even a 2-port 5200 can, like the 2600, have four players. This would be much trickier for a CV.

 

5) No better than a CV Roller Controller. That said, if you have one for the 5200, then Centipede for the 5200 is so much better than the 7800 version. In fact, it has all of that "something" from the arcade version.

 

 

 

The best reasons for a 5200? Well, the reasons I picked up one a decade ago at a townwide garage sale, and after hours of effort, was able to fix it:

 

Nostalgia for a happier time.

 

When, during a test- did I get it running?-..."CHICKEN! FIGHT LIKE A ROBOT!" Berzerk. Defender. Qix. Star Raiders. Ms. Pac-Man and Pac-Man, the latter somehow better-playing than the NES version. Blueprint, and now, with my paddle controller, Super Breakout.

 

I do prefer it to my 7800, overall.

Edited November 6, 2008 by phuzaxeman

[Lord Helmet]

1. Great classic arcade ports

2. Adventure 2

3. Its an Atari 5200

 

Thats all the reason you need

[doctorclu]

1. Cool look. A neat repackaged Atari 400.

2. Star Raiders and the 360 degree controllers.

3. Space Dungeon and the 360 degree controllers.

4. Good quality selection of Arcade ports.

5. The Atarimax flash carts to select both 5200 and XL ports for playing.

[jbanes]

The 5200 was the PS3 of its day. It was big, it was powerful, and it was full of QUALITY games. The quality aspect of the games was something that the CV couldn't claim. At best, the CV was full of straightforward arcade ports. Sometimes they were fun, sometimes they were tedious. Coleco pretty much left that problem up to third-party developers.

 

Atari was the exact opposite. When they acquired a major license, they tended to do the work themselves and made sure that the game was fun. Thus the 5200 is home to some of the best renditions of Pacman, Missile Command, Moon Patrol, Robotron, Bezerk, Joust, Q-Bert, Kangaroo, Vanguard, and the list just keeps going.

 

If it weren't for the tendency of the controllers to self-destruct, the machine would be much better remembered. (That and the fact that the system was killed almost immediately by the crash of '83, then snubbed by Atari's new owner.)

 

So here's my list:

 

1) The best games of any system of its time

2) Powerful design; one of the most practical of its day

3) Operating joysticks feel good in the hand and are extremely capable controllers

4) The sound generated by the POKEY was music to gamer's ears

5) A great deal of expense went into making it the best game platform of its day. From joystick couplers to the massive trackball, the system was made for maximum enjoyment.

 

I just wish the controllers didn't need so much TLC.

[CV Gus]

But Berzerk and Qix are among the tops for me, still. In all my years of being in the classic arcade scene, there was one and only one place where I was ever able to play Qix- across the street from my high school. So during lunch, I'd sorta, well, "accidently" wander off the grounds, and if I found myself there across the street and I just happened to have a few quarters, well, as long as I wasn't late "wandering" back...

[Jess Ragan]

My five reasons for preferring the 5200 (and as I mentioned in an earlier post, this is entirely subjective):

 

1. Better programmers. Some of the arcade ports on the ColecoVision were just cack, written by less experienced programmers using PASCAL. Making games with a high-level programming language like PASCAL is like digging a ditch with a garden hoe... sure, it's technically possible, but it severely limits your scope. It shows in a lot of ColecoVision games, which lack the polish of their closest 5200 counterparts.

2. The colors, Duke, the colors! The ColecoVision has a total of sixteen colors, and the hardware designers chose all the wrong ones. You're stuck with such unappealing hues as aged parchment yellow, air sickness bag green, and too much bran for breakfast brown, while the 5200 lets you taste the rainbow with 128 vibrant colors. You really notice this in the games, which pack more color per square inch than the ColecoVision ever could with its drab sprites and bit-mapped backgrounds.

3. Background scrolling. Sure, the ColecoVision could technically do this, but not very well. It always scrolled the playfields in jumpy eight pixel increments, with only a few exceptions. 5200 games, on the other hand, scrolled as smoothly as buttered silk, without even a trace of choppy movement. It's that smooth movement that makes 5200 games look more professional than their ColecoVision counterparts.

4. The greatest controller of the early 1980s. No stupid, not the stock joystick! I'm talking about the Wico Command Control, which has an attractive arcade look coupled with the absolute precision of analog input. The Wico Command Control for the ColecoVision, by comparison, is absolutely ghastly and one of the worst controllers of that time period. While it's true that you can connect a Sega Arcade Pad (the best controller of ALL time) to a ColecoVision, it leaves you without a keypad for games that require it.

5. Better exclusives. A lot of the ColecoVision games were sloppy arcade ports that don't stand the test of time. Coleco very rarely made original software for its system, while it was more common to see a killer app like Countermeasure or Ballblazer pop up on the 5200. I think the ColecoVision had better third-party software support, but Activision in particular seemed to prefer the 5200, if Megamania and The Dreadnaught Factor are any indication.

[Crazyace]

Gateway to Apshai was around for the 8 bit - I guess if there had been a need it could have appeared on the 5200 easily.

[+Cafeman]

An analogy: Imagine playing Wii Sports with a Playstation controller. Or have you tried playing Kaboom! on an Activision Classics disc with a Playstation controller? Not so much fun anymore, is it.

 

Once you have played (1) 5200 Missile Command with either the direct-mapping analog controller, or the trak-ball, you will realize just how satisfying and fun the game can be. Same goes for playing (2) 5200 Centipede -- which is already a fantastic translation -- with the 5200 trak-ball. These are fun experiences and stand out as unique among systems. Not even the A8 has these exact fun experiences because they don't have the analog.

 

To a lesser degree but still a valid point, playing 5200 Star Raiders and 5200 Rescue on Fractalus is so nice because all the controls are mapped to your 5200 controller; you don't have to let go of your controller and search for certain keyboard keys. It's a very minor point but if you were there back in the day, the 5200's 2-button and 12-key controller seemed high quality and very nice. And dual-stick games like Robotron and Space Dungeon rock on 5200.

 

As with the A8, 5200's sound is so fantastic for most its games. Way higher quality than anything I've heard from 2600/Intelly/7800/CV systems. Has anyone else been pleasantly surprised each time they hook up their 5200 again and hear certain sound FX and tunes on various games? You know, the splash sound in Mario Bros, or the ghost-eaten sound in Pac-Man, or Frogger's music?

[Crazyace]

I had the a8 trackball - it ruled for missile command

( Even the touch tablet wasn't too bad for some games )

[+Cafeman]

I had the a8 trackball - it ruled for missile command

( Even the touch tablet wasn't too bad for some games )

 

It didn't rule like the 5200 Trak-ball rules!

[pinball22]

It didn't rule like the 5200 Trak-ball rules!

 

Yes, the 5200 Trak-ball rules by threatening to sit on all the other controllers.

 

(Seriously, it's a nice controller and need to pick myself up one sometime... but you have to admit it's a little huge.)

[+Cafeman]

Yes, the 5200 Trak-ball rules by threatening to sit on all the other controllers.

 

(Seriously, it's a nice controller and need to pick myself up one sometime... but you have to admit it's a little huge.)

 

*sits on pinball22*

 

[Allpaul]

no particular order:

 

 

Well, first:

 

1) Big and sleek is right...TOO damn big. That thing is so big, I've had trouble storing it. A CV, on the other hand, can go anywhere a 5200 can, plus more. I like the overall CV look better, although the red LED on the 5200 is nifty.

 

 

How in the world do you always manage to turn every thread on Atariage into something about the merits of the Colecovision? By now we all know how much you love your Colecovision! Do you want to be with it? Gee Whiz!

 

Isn't there a Colecovision message board anywhere? If not, you should start one!