Venture Official Release

[peteym5]

Venture is full assembly language. I use Basic to test graphics, calculate, and encode data.

 

Has anyone seen a problem running Venture on a Pal TV or monitor? I played through a bunch of levels running Venture in PAL in emulation, everything looked normal.

Edited December 3, 2014 by peteym5

[gozar]

Well, here is my solution. I went to eBay and won a copy of Venture for the Colecovision for $5.24 shipped.

 

Not that I don't appreciate the hard work that went into the A8 version, but being accused of piracy has put a bad test in my mouth. There are too many other projects, such as Dungeon Hunt, to support.

[Marius]

Well, here is my solution. I went to eBay and won a copy of Venture for the Colecovision for $5.24 shipped.

 

Not that I don't appreciate the hard work that went into the A8 version, but being accused of piracy has put a bad test in my mouth. There are too many other projects, such as Dungeon Hunt, to support.

 

I have the game on my Atari 2600. Also original cart btw.

 

The 2600 game is a little bit boring, although it is not bad. Fun detail was that shooting in the rooms had the same sound as a bump-sound in Midnight Magic

 

I read apologies from Pete somewhere about comments about piracy and all that, so that's accepted for me.

 

I must say this thread has made me more curious about the actual game. To be continued?

[peteym5]

From now to December 31st. AtariSales is running a sale, if you purchase $25.00 or more, you can select one of his other games he has listed for free. I think Venture at $39.95 would put you over that $25.00.

 

http://members.tcq.net/video61/holiday2014.html

 

I had discussed the ideal with Video61 and KJMANN12 once we get several games working on cartridge, do either a bundle deal, or a multicart containing several games.

[NML32]

From now to December 31st. AtariSales is running a sale, if you purchase $25.00 or more, you can select one of his other games he has listed for free. I think Venture at $39.95 would put you over that $25.00.

 

http://members.tcq.net/video61/holiday2014.html

 

I had discussed the ideal with Video61 and KJMANN12 once we get several games working on cartridge, do either a bundle deal, or a multicart containing several games.

 

No thanks, I'll just stick with piracy.

Edited December 3, 2014 by NML32

[adam242]

From now to December 31st. AtariSales is running a sale, if you purchase $25.00 or more, you can select one of his other games he has listed for free. I think Venture at $39.95 would put you over that $25.00.

 

http://members.tcq.net/video61/holiday2014.html

 

 

That's generous... might finally push me to pick up a copy of Xenophobe.

[+CyranoJ]

Has anyone seen a problem running Venture on a Pal TV or monitor?

 

I don't know. Where's the download to test it?

[Goochman]

Xenophobe and Venture would be a great deal at $39.95 - I own both

[peteym5]

Since no one who purchased the cartridge overseas had provided specific details about what is going on with Venture running on PAL, we are not going to be concerned until someone provides some details. The game has been out for more than one year on cartridge, and it is my determination the Venture is running without any problems on PAL video. We cannot confirm there is a problem. This is not going to persuade us to put Venture in a public downloadable format. I have closed the book on doing further work on Venture. I am more focused on new projects.

Edited December 4, 2014 by peteym5

[BrianC]

 

I have the game on my Atari 2600. Also original cart btw.

 

The 2600 game is a little bit boring, although it is not bad. Fun detail was that shooting in the rooms had the same sound as a bump-sound in Midnight Magic

 

I like the 2600 version, but it definitely pales in comparison to the Colecovision version. The CV version has more details (like music and obstacles in the rooms) from the arcade intact and a whole level that is missing from the 2600 version. If I remember correctly, the CV version is also more polished and has better hit detection.

Edited December 4, 2014 by BrianC

[Marius]

Since no one who purchased the cartridge overseas had provided specific details about what is going on with Venture running on PAL, we are not going to be concerned until someone provides some details. The game has been out for more than one year on cartridge, and it is my determination the Venture is running without any problems on PAL video. We cannot confirm there is a problem. This is not going to persuade us to put Venture in a public downloadable format. I have closed the book on doing further work on Venture. I am more focused on new projects.

 

I still don't see the difference between buying a dump of the rom, and buying a cartridge and then dumping it myself. Could you explain this, in a way I can understand it.

The cartridge can be dumped with the AtariMax USB-cartprogrammer. I have a few of those. So the minute I receive the cart here, it is already dumped. So selling me the dump is less work for Atarisales, and less risk (no shipping, no lost packages). Again: I'm not asking for a .XEX or .ATR

 

I have decided I am not going to buy a cart, so that is a closed book for me too then. Pity, but there are more cool games.

 

Last comment: this has been the most surrealistic and demotivating topic ever for me. I'm offering help, I'm offering money (!!), I'm offering a promise not to spread anything, I'm offering a suggestion which saves you work and time and risks... and it leads to nothing. Sorry, very disappointing.

 

 

In stead of 'wasting' my money, I'll donate $50 to charity. Anyone a good charity-project in mind?

Let me know!

 

Greetz

M.

Edited December 4, 2014 by ProWizard

[Draugr]

So where can I download the pirated rom?

 

I've asked for this game for Christmas. I hope my brother or wife pick it up for me. I love Venture!

[Wrathchild]

Instead of 'wasting' my money, I'll donate $50 to charity. Anyone a good charity-project in mind? Let me know!

 

If you don't mind it being in the UK, look here

[peteym5]

From now to December 31st. AtariSales (Video 61) is running a sale, if you purchase $25.00 or more, you can select one of his other games he has listed for free. I think Venture at $39.95 would put you over that $25.00.

http://members.tcq.n...oliday2014.html

 

Venture is now being sold for $39.95 with free shipping. I now recall we had Raybags beta test Venture an executable version for us on real hardware in PAL and stated it worked 100%. To get around the game being too easy, a challenger mode has been added along with controller shooter options.

 

What I meant by closing the book on Venture is that I will not making any new versions of Venture attempting to find a cheaper cartridge. I am focusing on making new games right now. We put a lot of effort into bring this game to the Atari 8-bit. I made an effort to put the game out for $39.95 instead of $49.95 for everyone here concerned about the price. Maybe in the future we might include Venture with a multicart, or do a really enhanced Venture with VBXE support or Super IRG graphics. That is not going to happen for awhile.

Edited December 4, 2014 by peteym5

[Yellowman]

In March this year I got the game venture. Naturally, I was curious and tried it out the same.

Unfortunately, I was very disappointed, it does not work on PAL Atari. The game always crashes after some time. See photo.

I've tried it on several PAL Atari and more it crashes. Luckily I have two NTSC Ataris, this it works just fine.

Were there any beta testers with real hardware PAL? As with Tempest Extreem.

Furthermore, a new module housing was used which can not close properly. The board is crooked in the housing. Even the packaging is very simple. The manual is a joke.

For a game from the 80's it's OK. But for today, with poor processing (cartridge) and the thick PAL errors are the $ 39.95 too much.
In Tempest Extreem, also of Atlantis Games, the game cartridge, packaging and instructions is much better.

OK, this is my opinion.
I respect the programmers who, programmed for 30-year-old Ataris.

[peteym5]

You purchased the 32K Williams Cartridge version of the game. I know the 16K Atari Cartridge had not been released before October 2014. Now does it crash immediately or did it crash when you entered the Wall Room? I am aware about the board and IC chip problem with the Williams Cartridge. I wonder if the board being crooked causes one or more of the pins not to make contact or cross contact. If that is the case, the bank switching falls out of sync with the VBl for the multiplexing I am still trying to find out if the problem still exists with the 16K Atari Cartridge version because it did not require any bank switching. Just mapped 16K into RAM when it.

 

Thankyou, I am looking into problems with Venture running PAL Atari Computers.

 

EDIT. Just been informed from Video61 that foreign customs have been known to open up the cartridges to look inside. If this is happening and the assembly is loose, you will need to screw the cartridge back together and make sure the board is straight to makes proper contact. This could explain how some people are getting the cartridges and falling apart after they got the cartridge. Maybe one of the customs agents was eating something and that is how orange residue got on one of the cartridges. The cartridges do not leave Atari Sales in that condition.

Edited December 5, 2014 by peteym5

[_The Doctor__]

Video 61 claimed the same .. 'it's the customers fault' routine before....

 

that was until enough of us b*tched about the same taped together crap here on Atari Age... please check the forums.

 

enough is enough... stand by the product... or replace defective or poorly constructed crap. Stop blaming the customer who was only too willing to buy the crap in the first place... What's the claim now... we part with our money so we can unfairly assail a product? Get real. And please stop making us PAY to ship defective crap back... just do it right the first time and back the product like any decent retail operation has for the past 40 or so years!

Edited December 5, 2014 by _The Doctor__

[peteym5]

I believe I was referring to foreign customs, inspectors that look over stuff being imported into their countries. I never blamed customers for anything. I personally was not aware of problems with the Williams 32K cartridge and board until it was posted on here. One of the reasons why Venture in 32K Williams are no longer being manufactured. Future Venture cartridges will be in the Black Atari metal + plastic shell.

 

I put that up there for the people who received the Williams cartridge and it fell apart. What is needed to repair them. Custom probably took it apart, someone looked inside, and did not put it back together correctly. The Atari black cartridge shell would be harder to reassemble because it has more parts to them.

[_The Doctor__]

Lol I see you went back and edited it from costumers to customs bravo... but the same claims were still made in that case as well...... It seems really sketchy that customs agents have an unquenchable desire to tear apart Atari cartridges. The cheese doodle residue sounds like a delicious addition to the chips they are trying to eat from within the cases....

 

The only time customs attempts to open cases to anything happens under certain conditions.....

 

When the dog alerts on an item

When the detector alerts on an item

When an item appears tampered with

When there is visible material of interest like tape glue foil or foreign objects seen through slots or

protruding from products

When the weight of an object does not match what it should weigh...

And finally a random check is done every blue moon just to see if something new can be observed.

 

Customs does not have and affinity for cartridges unless it looks like poorly constructed taped or altered to use as smuggling devices or instruments of destructive intent.

 

I used to deal with customs on a regular basis and have a relative that works in customs. It is a complete rarity that an item is not re-assembled properly and if it isn't... An attachment declaring such an occurrence and why is affixed to anything that is damaged in that fashion unless it is part of an investigation.

Edited December 5, 2014 by _The Doctor__

[Marius]

Pete ... Read my pm again, but slowly and careful this time. I give you the perfect hint into the right direction about exactly that problem.(crash on pal)

 

Check my atari history and conclude I did not step right from the cotton fields into this forum.

 

Haven been debugging stuff for atari since the early 90's and have noticed enough issues between emulator use and the real thing to conclude things without even seeing the actual game or code.

 

You've probably noticed that I start sounding a bit harsh. I hope you have the guts to see there are some reasons to be. I almost ordered the cart ... With all that hideous shipping torture. To get a buggy program.

 

If you simply would sell me a rom dump we could work this out and you could fix this and send me a fixed version.

 

If you read my posts over you'll notice that I am trying to help you and your friends to improve this program. Please please please stop this ancient attitude and stop believing in a 'this program is bug free since it works on emulator' attitude.

 

Since it was only tested with a xex by rybags this does not mean it will work on a cart. On ebay this would be called: untested

 

And we all know what UNTESTED means.

 

Sigh.

[Marius]

And one other thing to take in mind:

 

The reason for not releasing a disk version, because every copy protection can be bypassed….

 

I think a cartridge is one of the easiest things to copy these days. Perhaps in the 80's it was harder for the crowd, but today with all the add-ons like The!Cart, AtariMax Flash, Sic, MyIDE ][ etc. it is so much easier to simply dump a cart and run the dump on that newer device.

 

I think a disk with copy protection is harder for most people to 'hack' than a cart.

 

Like I said before: the only (!) valid reason to release a game on a cart only is, when the game takes real benefit of the cartridge. I mean a game that uses over 64K so with bankswitching technique it still can run on stock atari. That's cool (like Bomb Jake, which can only run on 320K atari as Binary Executable, or on 64K in a bankswitching cart).

Or a cool feature where game state, or high score can be save in the cart. Yes… that are cool features where people can think: ah yes… a cartridge… that choice makes sense.

 

The biggest disadvantage, where you run into (again!) is that a cart is so hard to fix in case of bugs or shortcomings.

All that returns of cartridges… with all the known problems of shipping, customs… etc. etc.

 

The reason I keep talking about this, is that I think that somewhere the light must go on at Video61 / Sal…. I really respect your work Pete. I really can not understand that you -you are actually the one that is doing the real, hard work- work together with people that have such a retarded philosophy.

 

While you are the one that is brave enough to come here and give answers to our questions!

 

I hope you can convince your people they are on the wrong track, and I still hope I can test things for you, and I am still willing to pay 40$ for a Rom Dump of the game (and when it is ready the fixed Rom Dump). That saves a LOT of work, and makes more profit for Video 61.

[tep392]

Customs could not have opened the cart without at least patially pulling the label off and that would have damaged the label in the process. My cart was taped shut and had the crooked board. I disassembled it and found the chip plus socket were too tall and interfereing with the shell, preventing it from fully closing. I burn't a new "thinner" chip and all was well. I also found it very difficult to open because the over sized screw deformed the plastic enough to make it very tight while trying to pull apart.

[+CyranoJ]

Customs does not have and affinity for cartridges unless it looks like poorly constructed taped or altered to use as smuggling devices or instruments of destructive intent.

 

 

Maybe they thought it was a bomb. I mean if the case is held together with tape and bits are hanging out...

 

Can't stop lol'ing at 'Does this thing I won't let you test work on PAL. Can someone please test it?'

[Marius]

I burn't a new "thinner" chip and all was well.

 

That's what I meant!

 

Getting the code from the chip is easier than copying a floppy disk.

[tep392]

 

That's what I meant!

 

Getting the code from the chip is easier than copying a floppy disk.

Very easy when it's socketed. Of course I would never share it with anyone. I firmly believe that selling ROM's has Zero impact on pirating. If anything, it reduces it.