Giant Label Variation PHOTO Website. Check it out!

[Philflound]

Got 3 more variations up right now.

 

1. Added a Math Gran Prix glued flap version of the original box.

2. Added an Air Sea Battle standard flap version of the 1978 copyright in the white warranty box.

3. Added a 1987 Kangaroo box, which we never had at all. This is a totally new version. Cart inside dated 1987 was NTSC. Still looking for 1985 and 1986 boxes for this game.

 

Will get more up tonight or tomorrow. Have several to do plus have to look through the new acquistions from this week.

 

Phil

Edited February 12, 2011 by Philflound

[Philflound]

Not sure why I didn't notice, but I found out that besides the glued flap "ninety day warranty" version I just put up for Video Pinball, I also had a tab flap version. That is now live on the website so there are 3 versions like this now.

 

I just added a 1980 Space Invaders 5 language tab flap version with a "N" sticker on the top. So you can see that too, now box version #7 for Space Invaders. I'm missing a few boxes that are on the list, so if you have them, please scan and send.

 

Also, I finally got not one, but TWO versions of the "ninety day warranty" glued flap version for Human Cannonball. That will be going up probably tomorrow. I had nothing on the site, so that will be box version 1 and will have much more detail in the listing.

 

Phil

[Philflound]

Still working hard, but have to get some of these boxed games on Ebay. I'm running out of space in my room stacking them. Here are the updates:

 

1. Added Human Cannonball box 1 variation with description as stated last night I would do.

2. Sky Diver has some variations with the little tiny flap. The list says something about a "5" below the Rev 4 and the box being a slight variation. I've yet to come across this box. I did however come across a different slight variation. My personal copy has a "4" below the Rev 4, which is the one listed and shown. But I got another copy that has a "1" below it to the side. I noted this in the listing, and added the "Bertco Graphics" info for this variation. I'm not listing the "4" and "1" as separate variations since everything else on the box is the same from what I see.

3. Found a new Dodge'Em variation. It is box 4 variation. Has the 1980 copyright inside a white background warranty box.

 

To do: Just found a new Starmaster variation box by Activision. It has the Mountainview address along with a line about "play on color television" or something like that below the title on the back of the box. I'll be updating this later. Also found a few M Network box variations. Since I haven't gotten up to M Network yet, I'll post the variations here and you can check them out on Atarimania, since I'm sending all my scans to Rom as I do them. Stay tuned.

 

Phil

[Philflound]

I did the 3 M Network games. They've been sent to Rom, and he said he would get all the scans on his site this week. I had a nice Air Raiders box that was Made in Singapore. I had a poor scan of it, and didn't notice that the background color was white with the stripes and the back of the box instead of grey. The only other I see in the list so far is a Star Strike box. I think these may have had the white label INTV releases. At least the Air Raiders had it. I'm assuming white labels were also released in grey background boxes. Anyway, that wasn't really new, just updated.

 

The second box was Armor Ambush where the "made in" with several countries is printed on the box. There are 4 versions of this box now. One with Made in USA, one with made in several countries as a sticker, the printed one I just discovered, and a Canadian English/French box.

 

The third box is Super Challenge Baseball. I finally acquired the Made in USA version and now have a scan.

 

I'm actually eager to get moving again with continuing the site. I know for a fact that most if not all M Network releases have Canadian versions. I've had a few, and see Atarimania lists many. The list is incomplete on the website. I need to get the program to convert the file to PDF again. Have to look at past messages here.

 

Anyway, the last 3 new scans that I have for now will be Imagic. 2 Cosmic Ark and 1 Demon Attack. Again, since Imagic isn't on the site yet, you'll have to go to Atarimania to see them. They should be complete tomorrow so hopefully Rom will inform everyone once all the new additions have been uploaded to his site.

 

So till the next batch of boxed games come into my possession, I bid you farewell.

 

Phil

[Philflound]

Haven't gotten to the 3 Imagic titles, but will do so this weekend. I just received a batch of 100 instruction manuals in the mail today. I've been examining them and see that I'm coming across more variations. So far, I'm only looking at Activision. There seems to be various versions of the same Rev. So far I've found some differences with Skiing and Stampede, and a few others. Three things of note that should be looked for:

 

1.) TM vs ®. On the front page of Stampede, I came across variations of the TM after Activision and others have an ® after it. I'm assuming other titles may have this. I did find this variation with Skiing, but it was with a black and white version that changed the TM/®.

 

2.) Mountain View vs Santa Clara on the back cover. It seems that there are variations with the address. I'm also assuming there could be other city variations. I'm going to have to document these much better.

 

3.) Atari/Sears legal notice. On the back cover, some of the manuals don't have a legal notice, some have 2 lines, some have 3. Again, this is going to have to be studied further.

 

So I have made the decision of adding manual scans to the site. This is not going to happen until probably at least the summer. I want to finish all the companies with their carts and boxes first. Atariguide has a nice inventory of scans for manuals, and since I have permission to use his photos, I may start there. If anyone has a site that documents manuals already, let me know. Maybe I can contribute with some that aren't listed. Please PM me any website you think is useful. Please don't just post it here, I'd like it in my mail inbox. Thanks.

 

Phil

[Rom Hunter]

I did the 3 M Network games. They've been sent to Rom, and he said he would get all the scans on his site this week. I had a nice Air Raiders box that was Made in Singapore. I had a poor scan of it, and didn't notice that the background color was white with the stripes and the back of the box instead of grey. The only other I see in the list so far is a Star Strike box. I think these may have had the white label INTV releases. At least the Air Raiders had it. I'm assuming white labels were also released in grey background boxes. Anyway, that wasn't really new, just updated.

 

The second box was Armor Ambush where the "made in" with several countries is printed on the box. There are 4 versions of this box now. One with Made in USA, one with made in several countries as a sticker, the printed one I just discovered, and a Canadian English/French box.

 

The third box is Super Challenge Baseball. I finally acquired the Made in USA version and now have a scan.

 

I'm actually eager to get moving again with continuing the site. I know for a fact that most if not all M Network releases have Canadian versions. I've had a few, and see Atarimania lists many. The list is incomplete on the website. I need to get the program to convert the file to PDF again. Have to look at past messages here.

 

Anyway, the last 3 new scans that I have for now will be Imagic. 2 Cosmic Ark and 1 Demon Attack. Again, since Imagic isn't on the site yet, you'll have to go to Atarimania to see them. They should be complete tomorrow so hopefully Rom will inform everyone once all the new additions have been uploaded to his site.

 

So till the next batch of boxed games come into my possession, I bid you farewell.

 

Phil

Your M Network scans are added.

 

[Schizophretard]

I'm going through all my games cleaning them, putting them in plastic bags, and figuring out which ones are doubles. The doubles is the hard part. I'm using the giant variation site but am confused. Either I have variations that are not listed or I'm confusing the same variation as different variations. For an example, the site has one variation of red lettered texted Video Checkers but I have one that has a fully black background with a thin bordered end label with thin letters and my other one has an off colored square that begins at game program and ends at the Fuji with a think bordered end label with thicker letters. Another example, I have a combat with braille game variations with braille end label and one with braille game variations but no braille end label. Does anyone sell a book with every single variation with pictures? I'm getting kinda scared to sell any of my "doubles". Is there a way for me to know for sure or do I just keep every cart that has a small difference that I don't see listed?

 

Edit: I just now noticed that I have two Air-sea Battles that are identical except for their end labels. One has red text on the end label and the other has more of a maroon text with a thinner longer silver border. God help me!

Edited February 23, 2011 by Schizophretard

[Philflound]

Don't freak out. This is something that some of us at the collecting community decided to do. Most of the labels have subtle variations. Most of them aren't documented because many times it was a matter of printing. By this I mean that after awhile, the dyes broke down, so the letters aren't as clear. Also, you will find that some end labels fade on the outside and form a perfect rectangle around the title. We don't really consider these variations.

 

As for collecting, keep what you feel you want to. Personally I collect original releases and possibly some rarer variations. I don't have room to keep everything. I've detailed as much as possible in the list so the collector can decide how and what to collect.

 

When you reference end labels, it's extremely hard to determine if an end label is legit to the main label. Many end labels fall off and are just thrown on to a cart with a missing end label. By buying tons of collections over the years, I've confirmed the majority of what is in the list. I've also consulted many collectors and legitimate websites for photo documentation.

 

Phil

[Chris Leach]

This is nice.....I am gonna go through all my 1000's of carts and see what might be variations you need? Or might need...

[Schizophretard]

Don't freak out. This is something that some of us at the collecting community decided to do. Most of the labels have subtle variations. Most of them aren't documented because many times it was a matter of printing. By this I mean that after awhile, the dyes broke down, so the letters aren't as clear. Also, you will find that some end labels fade on the outside and form a perfect rectangle around the title. We don't really consider these variations.

 

As for collecting, keep what you feel you want to. Personally I collect original releases and possibly some rarer variations. I don't have room to keep everything. I've detailed as much as possible in the list so the collector can decide how and what to collect.

 

When you reference end labels, it's extremely hard to determine if an end label is legit to the main label. Many end labels fall off and are just thrown on to a cart with a missing end label. By buying tons of collections over the years, I've confirmed the majority of what is in the list. I've also consulted many collectors and legitimate websites for photo documentation.

 

Phil

 

I feel I want to keep intentional variations and not printing errors...

 

How about this one? I have a Donkey Kong that isn't on your site. It has a ® after by Nintendo instead of TM. In the middle it says in two lines,"VIDEO GAME CARTRIDGE FOR USE WITH ATARI® 2600 VCS". At the bottom it says in five lines with a space between line three and four,"DONKEY KONG is the trademark of Nintendo of America Inc. © 1981 Nintendo of America Inc. Atari® is a trademark of Atari, Inc. Printed in U.S.A.(space in between lines here) Package, Program & Audiovisual © 1982 Coleco Industries, Inc., Amsterdam, New York 12010." The back of the cartridge says,"MADE IN U.S.A." My other cartridges are a cream color but this one is gray.

[Schizophretard]

I took a picture of it:

[Schizophretard]

What is the difference between these two variations of Indy 500?:

 

version h)* C PicBl ©1978, CART1, orange letters

 

version j)* R PicBl ©1978, CART2, orange letters

[Philflound]

What is the difference between these two variations of Indy 500?:

 

version h)* C PicBl ©1978, CART1, orange letters

 

version j)* R PicBl ©1978, CART2, orange letters

 

CART1 is the locking circuit board protector. CART2 is the free sliding circuit board protector. CART3 has no circuit board protector.

 

My suggestion is to go to the main Atari 2600 page and look at the PDF file. Though it isn't current (have to update it real soon), it explains all the abbreviations and such in the list at the very beginning. This will give you a good idea of what you're looking at.

 

Phil

[Philflound]

I'm happy that I won a small lot of boxed games which includes the white box Slot Racers. That actually isn't on the list for some reason and now that it's going to be in my hand, it will be listed in detail.

 

Also, I have decided to finally go through the list of Atari made games and make all box descriptions standard, so all will be consistent with format. It will look like this:

 

#)Box Date, Color, (languages), content on box, Printed/Made In, Rev, flap type, (printer)

 

# is what the box variation is numbered. I try to keep it in date release order with the exception of knowing that silver/grey boxes came after color boxes and red boxes came last

Date of course is the last copyright date written on the box if there is one

Color is the main color of the box

Languages is more of an option, only listed if there is more than 1 language on a box

Content on box is for specifics like copyright notices, stickers, special edition stripe, etc

Printed/Made in is where the box was made logically

Rev is the revision number on the tiny flap if there is one

Flap type is the standard top flap tuck in, glued flap, tab flap, or other type

Printer is Bertco, Aopak, Ivy Hill, or other printer found on the tiny flap on the bottom part of the box

 

There may be some other little info written, but for the most part, this will now be the standard format.

 

Phil

Edited February 26, 2011 by Philflound

[Schizophretard]

What is the difference between these two variations of Indy 500?:

 

version h)* C PicBl ©1978, CART1, orange letters

 

version j)* R PicBl ©1978, CART2, orange letters

 

CART1 is the locking circuit board protector. CART2 is the free sliding circuit board protector. CART3 has no circuit board protector.

 

My suggestion is to go to the main Atari 2600 page and look at the PDF file. Though it isn't current (have to update it real soon), it explains all the abbreviations and such in the list at the very beginning. This will give you a good idea of what you're looking at.

 

Phil

 

Okay. Thanks. Mine are cart one then. What about the Donkey Kong one?

[Schizophretard]

I can't find a single picture of my label. It looks like the Junior one. Is there a label variation site that has it?

 

Your site has been helpful sorting out my labels. Thanks. I'm just having trouble with ones that have small differences like the two Air-Sea Battle picture labels with one having the Fuji touching the boat and one with it in the water. I have three versions. The two from your site and one with the Fuji a little deeper in the water and the submarine a little higher up. When I line all three of them up in order it looks like an animation. It looks like a camera is moving down to expose more of the submarine and water. Either the two that aren't touching the boat are the same variation or they are different variations. I'm leaning towards different because the difference between your two is the same difference between mine.

[Philflound]

It looks like you may have found a new variation for the Donkey Kong. Though I wish it didn't have the screw holes exposed. Do me a favor and scan the main label and end label. Do NOT alter anything of the picture. Send it to me at pdispenza@verizon.net. Since you gave me great detail in info above, you don't need to explain anything further.

 

Also, you may want to check Atarimania.com to see pretty much everything released. Rom and I work together to try and keep a consistent and accurate database of Atari games. He shows most of the stuff as on my website, sometimes more as in the case of ads and other items. I give detail as to why any listing is a particular variation.

 

As for the case of Air Sea Battle, it seems that the Fuji and product number and such are stamped over the picture. Slight shifting occurs many times. I do not detail slight shifting because you can have maybe 5-10 variations for slight shifting. I do detail major shifting, as if something is touching an edge of the picture, or edge of an object in the picture and another variation does not touch that. It is a good reference point. Centipede is a good example with some shifting with the segments of the bug itself. I think I list 3 variations with the segment shift, but there are technically probably much more. If you went and measured every little shift, you'd probably have like 50 variations for all games.

 

Phil

[Schizophretard]

I just found out that I have a new(possibly rare) label variation of one of histories most popular video games and you're the one upset about the screws?

 

I'll be happy to help you preserve this label variation. Now all I got to do is clean up this dusty scanner and try to remember how to work it.

 

Air Sea Battle: Did Atari's printing machines have a problem making perfect copies or what?

[Philflound]

You're talking the 1970s here. Printing wasn't a priority for many companies, at least not having quality printing. Just look at all the old trading cards. Baseball and such. Those cards were always off center with printing spots, fuzziness, and color quality was not always the best. As long as the game worked, I don't think anyone really cared too much. We strive for quality scans, but take whatever is available. It's mostly so the whole label or box is seen in its entirety without any info missing.

 

I just received a box of mostly empty 2600 boxes and discovered a new variation with Carnival from Coleco. I'm wondering if other Coleco boxes have this variation so I'll have to start viewing all the boxes from Atarimania and Atariguide besides any here and make sure I didn't miss it. Since I personally don't own too many Coleco boxes, I've had to rely on others for the photos. The variation is on the arcade machine version of the box. At first I was noticing this new box I just got had a small ® after Sega on the front. Then I started comparing it to the one on file. I then discovered that the words "Plays, sounds and scored just like the arcade game!" is above the picture of the joystick on the back of the box. The one on the website is blank above the joystick. I'm guessing that others would have this same variation since these are all arcade machines for the most part with a few exceptions. I'll keep everyone informed on what I find. In the meantime, if you own this type of variation, either with or without the words above the joystick and it differs from what is on the site, please let me know and if you can, scan both front and back of the box and send it to me. Thanks.

 

Phil

[Schizophretard]

Is this how you want them? I made them the sizes of the pictures on your site.

 

Your site is very helpful. Thanks for it. I originally sorted out my doubles based on Atari Age's variations but now I realize they are just the basic variations. I'm not even half way done going through my doubles but so far most of them belong in my collection. I'm not going to have many doubles to sell.

[Philflound]

I guess that will do. I'll get it live on the website later this evening.

 

Phil

[Philflound]

I discovered Donkey Kong and Venture both have this same variation. I meant to say the box that does NOT have the illustration is the box with this variation, since both types of boxes show the arcade machine.

 

Phil

[Rom Hunter]

Is this how you want them? I made them the sizes of the pictures on your site.

 

Your site is very helpful. Thanks for it. I originally sorted out my doubles based on Atari Age's variations but now I realize they are just the basic variations. I'm not even half way done going through my doubles but so far most of them belong in my collection. I'm not going to have many doubles to sell.

Thanks.

 

It will be added to the database.

 

[Schizophretard]

I discovered Donkey Kong and Venture both have this same variation. I meant to say the box that does NOT have the illustration is the box with this variation, since both types of boxes show the arcade machine.

 

Phil

 

So box 2 has my variation?

[Schizophretard]

Did Activision make their labels out of different materials? I have two Skiing carts of the same variation but one is way more glossy and feels more slick.