The Video Game Years discusses the 7800

[BillyHW]

 

It was a few years after release. I believe I got my system in '87 or '88 and it came with the grey gun, so the orange one wouldn't have come until after.

 

I know I got mine with a grey gun and it was before there were any orange ones around. You could also still get a ROB model at that time, but it maybe wasn't such a big deal anymore. Most people by that time were just getting the Action Set. I remember being shocked once the orange one's came out and I thought they looked hideous. And my cousin got an SMS before I got my Nintendo.

 

But that's all I can remember about the dates.

Edited November 25, 2014 by BillyHW

[+pboland]

 

I know I got mine with a grey gun and it was before there were any orange ones around. You could also still get a ROB model at that time, but it maybe wasn't such a big deal anymore. Most people by that time were just getting the Action Set. I remember being shocked once the orange one's came out and I thought they looked hideous. And my cousin got an SMS before I got my Nintendo.

 

But that's all I can remember about the dates.

Is was 89-90 for the orange gun update. It was about the same time that ROB disappeared from the NES systems.

 

All three systems (7800, SMS, NES) were released by X-mas of 1986. It was that xmas I got my SMS. Ironically (to me) that was the most popular system at the time because I got one and so did my buddy a couple blocks over. My buddies a couple blocks the opposite direction got a 7800 and the other one got an NES. So, out of the four of us, (2) had SMS, (1) had 7800, & (1) had NES. It didn't dawn on me until early 88 that NES was the big winner. After xmas 1987 the department stores shrank the SMS/7800 stuff in favor for the NES stuff.

[SabertoothRetro]

I watched these through '84. It's entertaining enough but these guys tend to get a lot of the facts wrong. It's the same thing with a lot of the retro gaming podcasts. The problem is that the misinformation hangs in the air and gets regurgitated over and over again and people think it's fact. It's kinda like AM talk radio for gamers.

[treismac]

I enjoy Pat's videos and Ian's commentary is also enjoyable on the CUPodcast, however, the two of them were a big part of why the 7800 segment of the '86 VGY dropped the ball so miserably. While I can't in good conscience make the case for holding the 7800's place in video game history in high regard, the fact that it is an Atari console, however, should carry some gravitas with it. Despite this, the mocking tone the two of them had came off as juvenile, like some punk kids crapping on a once great athlete. It must have occured to them that they had to counterbalance out all of the jokes they were cracking at the system, so, being evidently very unfamiliar with the system, they grasped for some compliment to pay the system to try restore some semblance of having, perhaps not objectivity, but not an outright bias against the system. Fittingly, what they grabbed was as flimsy as their commentary: the performance of the 7800's joystick. It is one thing to have an opinion that is unpopular, but it is another thing to state something nonfactual because of ignorance.

Of course, there had to be some comparison to the NES as the 7800 wasn't released in a vacuum, but to just plop the two system's ports of Double Dragon side by side and then cross your arms like that tells the whole story is just sloppy and intellectually dishonest. After talking about the 7800's inferior sound and music, why not follow up with a side by side of the two systems' ports of Commando to show that the NES didn't always carry the day? From watching previous episodes, it is clear that the commentators often talked off of the top of their heads with varying degrees of experience with their subject, so in this light it doesn't come off as if the 7800 is the victim of NES fanboys, but just laziness and ignorance.

[Lost Dragon]

@atariLBC OFFLINE:Re: 'The problem is that the misinformation hangs in the air and gets regurgitated over and over again and people think it's fact'-This is SO true.I personally think the problem is that if enough people see something that's incorrectly stated as a 'fact' in a 'respectable' magazine or on a website or YouTube video and it's done by an 'established' name, they are'nt going to question it, it must be 'correct' as X, Y and Z said it and they've been in the publishing buisness or done X, Y and Z articles, youtube vids etc and thus the information gets taken from those sources, repeated elsewhere and because it's appeared so many times in so many places, people think, ohh it must be fact.

 

 

It's something of an uphill struggle at times to get people to look at formats like the Jaguar, 7800, Saturn, St etc in a different light as they've simply bought into what they've read/heard elsewhere countless times before.

[high voltage]

Doh they can't even get the Video game crash of 1984 right, what idiots:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P36WU6cWs4U

[Shawn]

And not long ago they where shitting on some guy for buying a Magic The Gathering card for nearly $30k but sat there and justified the same

money being spent on an NES game. Black Lotus is the Gold NWC of magic cards and vice versa. Just cause your personally interested more in

one than the other doesn't devalue another hobbies holy grail, in fact it just makes you look like a total douche cause your willing to own and try to justify a hunk of "collectable" plastic worth thousands but shit on another guy who feels the same about a hunk of "collectable" cardboard.

[MegaManFan]

And not long ago they where shitting on some guy for buying a Magic The Gathering card for nearly $30k but sat there and justified the same

money being spent on an NES game. Black Lotus is the Gold NWC of magic cards and vice versa. Just cause your personally interested more in

one than the other doesn't devalue another hobbies holy grail, in fact it just makes you look like a total douche cause your willing to own and try to justify a hunk of "collectable" plastic worth thousands but shit on another guy who feels the same about a hunk of "collectable" cardboard.

This thread has pretty much guaranteed I'll never watch their videos. If they can't even get the basic facts right, and then crap on other collectors but act smug about what they collect, it's not worth the time nor the bandwidth to hear a damn thing they have to say.

[phattyboombatty]

Hey cool, it's Ian (opening shot, after commercial is played)!

 

He is a true video game encyclopedia and lives right here in SD! I love popping by Luna Video Games just to chat with him. Always a great discussion!

[YANDMAN]

Did they actually like the controller? Or have they just never actually played with one?

[Andromeda Stardust]

Did they actually like the controller? Or have they just never actually played with one?

Probably just felt it in their hands without actually plugging it in.

[treismac]

Probably just felt it in their hands without actually plugging it in.

That's what my money is on.