Why did the SECAM 2600 have such a pathetic colour palette?

[Rom Hunter]

It really looks genuine brown, not faded; the other colors (blue, green, etc) are not faded either and are still solid.

(Dirty quick lame phone pics attached) (I can quality-scan it if needed).

Trust me: that one used to be blue.

 

I've seen more of these.

 

[Bryan]

I haven't seen Atari's solution for SECAM (external to TIA), but it appears to only use the LUM lines. Forcing B&W mode helps ensure that different objects will have different LUM values.

 

Only if the cartridge makes it so. It sounds like Atari was good about making sure their European cartridges were programmed to have SECAM-specific color selections, but I'll bet that wasn't the case for all games or all companies. It makes me wonder if any games show up as a completely blank screen when plugged into a SECAM 2600.

 

Well, the whole idea behind having a B&W mode was to have different shades for different objects because a red ship and a blue ship would look exactly the same on a B&W TV if their brightness was set the same.

 

It seems like any game where the same brightness is used in many places will have a problem with objects disappearing on a SECAM unit.

[+FujiSkunk]

Well, the whole idea behind having a B&W mode was to have different shades for different objects because a red ship and a blue ship would look exactly the same on a B&W TV if their brightness was set the same.

 

Right, but again, the cartridge had to be programmed that way for it to work. Technically the color switch was just another toggle, like the difficulty switches. Cartridges could ignore it, like most released in America after 1981, or use it for something else entirely, like Space Shuttle and a few of the red-label-era Atari games.

Edited August 24, 2011 by FujiSkunk

[FAMICOM_87]

On 8/24/2011 at 9:48 PM, FujiSkunk said:

 

Right, but again, the cartridge had to be programmed that way for it to work. Technically the color switch was just another toggle, like the difficulty switches. Cartridges could ignore it, like most released in America after 1981, or use it for something else entirely, like Space Shuttle and a few of the red-label-era Atari games.

Indeed so some games are not even playable on this SECAM shit .  I prefere to pay SECAM Atari on black and white mode 8 shades of gray . Those 8 colors are awful.