In defense of Pac-Man...

[bradhig1]

Pacman vitanim leeching. I didn't know the mic was on when I was running xsplit. If only there was a way to speed up stella. Playing on game 2

 

Edited October 22, 2017 by bradhig1

[ZylonBane]

... and in case you didn't know, they butchered the 2600 and Intellivision versions on purpose in hopes you will give in and buy a ColecoVision instead. #RESIST

 

Not sure if joking or crazy person.

[CPUWIZ]

 

Not sure if joking or crazy person.

 

Who?

[Nukey Shay]

​...and the 2600 port of Pac-Man was intentionally crippled to upsell the 5200

 

If the goal is to cause consumers to abandon their current system, it would not be of interest to release ports to those platforms at all. The goal is to make money...not to spend it creating something that you hope nobody would buy! BTW Gerry Kitchen has stated that his 2600 version was his best effort at the time, and that if he didn't spend so much development time on the hammers (instead of dropping that feature), he might have worked in a 3rd and possibly 4th screen. Regardless, the port was an instant hit.

[Nukey Shay]

Pacman vitanim leeching. I didn't know the mic was on when I was running xsplit. If only there was a way to speed up stella. Playing on game 2

 

Altering the frame rate is cheating...there are much easier ways to do that.

 

Did you know that game 2 is exactly the same as game 6 due to a glitch? Game 2 was supposed to have a slower Pac-Man according to the manual. I'm thinking that adding the children's versions had introduced that problem (an oversight when choosing the player speed...the comparison is off by 2).

[ZylonBane]

Who?

 

First base.

[BIGHMW]

​...and the 2600 port of Pac-Man was intentionally crippled to upsell the 5200

 

If the goal is to cause consumers to abandon their current system, it would not be of interest to release ports to those platforms at all. The goal is to make money...not to spend it creating something that you hope nobody would buy! BTW Gerry Kitchen has stated that his 2600 version was his best effort at the time, and that if he didn't spend so much development time on the hammers (instead of dropping that feature), he might have worked in a 3rd and possibly 4th screen. Regardless, the port was an instant hit.

Well despite its limitations, the original Pac-Man was fun to play, it was a bit easier to play than was my 5200 version, although the graphics were subpar considering the anticipation in 1982 of something like what Pac-Man 4K would become 30 years later.

 

Back in 1982, nobody knew the possibility of really being able to tap deep into all 4K of the 2600's inner memory and exploiting it such as what we can do now. I'm sure that Gerry Kitchen would be proud of us for us doing such a fantastic job with Pac-Man 4K.

[ZylonBane]

Back in 1982, nobody knew the possibility of really being able to tap deep into all 4K of the 2600's inner memory and exploiting it such as what we can do now. I'm sure that Gerry Kitchen would be proud of us for us doing such a fantastic job with Pac-Man 4K.

The 2600 doesn't have 4K of memory. It has 128 bytes.

 

And it's Garry Kitchen, people.

 

[retroeight]

I never thought the 2600 Pacman was that bad until I played Pacman 8k. Pacman 8k is gorgeous. Even Tod Fry was impressed by that game. Maybe Darrell Spice will do a Pacman 16 or 32k that will melt my mind. I'd love to see a panel with the homebrewers who keep on breaking new ground and the people who worked on these systems back 40 years ago.

 

What is Pac Man 8k? A homebrew?

[retroeight]

 

Electronic Games' review of VCS Zaxxon is clear evidence that they were biased and didn't know what they were talking about. To call Zaxxon "the very best home video game cartridge in the land" is simply insane. Not only does it bare less resemblance to its arcade forebearer than Pac-man, it also plays considerably worse.

 

Atari 2600 Zaxxon was horrible. Just horrible.

[bradhig1]

 

Altering the frame rate is cheating...there are much easier ways to do that.

 

Did you know that game 2 is exactly the same as game 6 due to a glitch? Game 2 was supposed to have a slower Pac-Man according to the manual. I'm thinking that adding the children's versions had introduced that problem (an oversight when choosing the player speed...the comparison is off by 2).

Much easier ways how?

[hizzy]

 

What is Pac Man 8k? A homebrew?

 

Yes. you can find it in the forums!

[NE146]

 

Atari 2600 Zaxxon was horrible. Just horrible.

 

Disagree. This is an old point, but if it had NOT been called "Zaxxon" it would be considered a (relatively) good VCS game and is unique in its shmup library. Heck it even has a boss!

 

e.g.

 

Edited October 22, 2017 by NE146

[BIGHMW]

 

Yes. you can find it in the forums!

 

...and you'll also find Pac-Man 4K in the AtariAge store, I intend to pick one up later on.

 

And as for ZylonBane, why is Pac-Man 4K named so?, sure, the 2600 has 128 bits of RAM, the 4K I was talking about is the available ROM space it has in it.

Edited October 22, 2017 by BIGHMW

[BIGHMW]

The OG version of the commercial for the Atari original 2600 version of Pac-Man, heck, it's still a great game regardless, even though it got trumped by both the wonderfully-done Pac-Man 4K and also Pac-Man Arcade (a.k.a. Pac-Man 8K) in which you'll find both of in the AtariAge store!!!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7P0BA7ae-Xk

[BIGHMW]

.....and now, here are 4 versions of this classic in this order:

 

OG version of 2600 Pac-Man (1981, Atari)

 

Ms. Pac-Man (1983, Atari)

 

Pac-Man Arcade (Pac-Man 8K, AtariAge, a hack of the OG Pac-Man)

 

and

 

Pac-Man 4K

 

As you can tell, Jr. Pac-Man is missing from this clip

 

Please excuse the picture as the poster has a little color-adjusting to do on his CRT, as Pac-Man 4K is shown with the maze in green, when it is actually blue.

 

.....and they are all filmed in live action on a TV so there is no questioning how well they will look on your CRT, but as for those of us who upgraded to a LCD or LED TV your results may vary, I can't wait to dig into Pac-Man 4K and the OG Pac-Man when I order them later on

 

[+Random Terrain]

OG version of 2600 Pac-Man (1981, Atari)

 

Ms. Pac-Man (1983, Atari)

 

For people who want to know, Pac-Man was released in March/April of 1982:

 

randomterrain.com/atari-2600-memories-history-1982.html#pac_man

 

 

Ms. Pac-Man was released in February of 1983:

 

randomterrain.com/atari-2600-memories-history-1983.html#ms_pac_man

[NE146]

Pac-Man Arcade (Pac-Man 8K, AtariAge, a hack of the OG Pac-Man)

 

You mean a hack of Ms. Pacman but we all know what you meant. Btw.. I like the vid, but noticed you played 2600 Pacman with the difficulty set for very short power-pill time.. that mode always frustrated me.

[ZylonBane]

And as for ZylonBane, why is Pac-Man 4K named so?, sure, the 2600 has 128 bits of RAM, the 4K I was talking about is the available ROM space it has in it.

 

I suspect the term you're fumbling for is that the 2600 has 4K of address space. Which wasn't even a hard limit anymore at the time Pac Man came out, as Atari was already doing bank-switched cartridges by then.

[Nukey Shay]

Much easier ways how?

 

Make the vitamin always onscreen, if that is what you were after. But you could also:

Erase the ghost bitmaps or make them always edible, give yourself infinite lives, ignore lethal collisions, make the points always climb regardless of what you are doing, etc. etc. etc.

 

Any cheat is easy if you hack the binary.

 

The point is that playing at a rate faster than 60 fps is no different than altering the game. So it's not really worthwhile to grind on the vitamin...it takes 90 seconds for another to appear. Tackling a high score in such a manner would take forever.

[Bryan]

Back in 1982, nobody knew the possibility of really being able to tap deep into all 4K of the 2600's inner memory and exploiting it such as what we can do now.

 

 

And as for ZylonBane, why is Pac-Man 4K named so?, sure, the 2600 has 128 bits of RAM, the 4K I was talking about is the available ROM space it has in it.

 

Maybe I can help a little with the semantics here. The 2600 has no ROM in it. It is simply a 6507 (which can address 8KB total, whether it be RAM, ROM, registers, whatever) connected to a 6532 PIA, Atari's TIA chip, and a cartridge slot. The only RAM in it is the 128 bytes contained in the 6532. The lower 4K is mostly wasted space due to cost saving measures in the design and so only 4K of the 8K space is left available for things plugged into the cartridge slot. A cartridge must include some program ROM since there is no firmware inside the 2600, but it can also contain other things in more advanced cartridges.

 

So, that 4K does not exist inside the 2600, but rather always comes from something outside the 2600.

[zzip]

​...and the 2600 port of Pac-Man was intentionally crippled to upsell the 5200

 

If the goal is to cause consumers to abandon their current system, it would not be of interest to release ports to those platforms at all. The goal is to make money...not to spend it creating something that you hope nobody would buy! BTW Gerry Kitchen has stated that his 2600 version was his best effort at the time, and that if he didn't spend so much development time on the hammers (instead of dropping that feature), he might have worked in a 3rd and possibly 4th screen. Regardless, the port was an instant hit.

 

Even if they had delivered a decent 2600 Pacman port, the 5200 would still be much closer to the arcade than the 2600 could ever pull off, so it could still be a 5200 system seller. I think instead the 2600 port destroyed a lot of goodwill people had towards Atari.

[Bryan]

Even if they had delivered a decent 2600 Pacman port, the 5200 would still be much closer to the arcade than the 2600 could ever pull off, so it could still be a 5200 system seller. I think instead the 2600 port destroyed a lot of goodwill people had towards Atari.

 

Although we're much more familiar with the console cycle today, it still stands to reason that when the new games on your console are skunked by the new games coming out on other consoles, your customers are going to get upgrade-itis (or at least they'll lose interest and stop spending). That's fine for a console maker that has a monopoly, and it's acceptable for a console maker that is currently enjoying a competitive advantage. But, when you're running behind in the next-gen game you do not want your customers freaking out and jumping ship. Instead, you squeeze every ounce of performance you can out of your existing console to buy time.

[BIGHMW]

 

You mean a hack of Ms. Pacman but we all know what you meant. Btw.. I like the vid, but noticed you played 2600 Pacman with the difficulty set for very short power-pill time.. that mode always frustrated me.

 

I haven't got any carts or the Harmony cart for my new 2600 Jr. yet. I just ran into this vid and wanted to post it up here so everyone gets to see it.

 

....and yes, I DID mean a hack of Ms. Pac-Man, Thanks!

 

Plus, I'm 51 (still 25 in my heart thanks to my youthful enthusiasm in which I preach to all of my fellow 40-50-somethings!!!), and seem to be a bit slow to the mark when it comes to my 5200 carts (I got my first Big Sexy for my 17th Birthday back in 1983 and now own an a/v-modded 5200 hooked up to my Insignia TV), so that's why I got the 2600 Jr and also the Harmony cart and intend to pick up the new Atari Flashback ver 2.0 soon.

[+KaeruYojimbo]

 

Yeah, but I thought Coleco could've done a better job of translation from the arcade version to the 2600, look at what guys did with Pac-Man when they created Pac-Man 4K and Pac-Man Arcade (8K), so there is the available room for improvement on this version of Zaxxon, although this looks fun despite the butchering job Coleco did on pretty much all their 2600 releases (especially Donkey Kong and Donkey Kong Jr., compared to the terrific Donkey Kong 2600 and Donkey Kong VCS), and in case you didn't know, they butchered the 2600 and Intellivision versions on purpose in hopes you will give in and buy a ColecoVision instead. #RESIST

 

If we can do more like we did with Pac-Man 4K, then there IS room for perhaps a Zaxxon 4K out there to

 

For all the grief the original VCS Donkey Kong gets, it's actually pretty #$@&ing amazing for it's time. The 2600 was designed to display symmetrical low-res backgrounds, and here's the girder stage, asymmetrical and relatively high res, with tons of objects on the screen and no flicker.

 

And that whole "Coleco intentionally butchered the VCS and Intellivision versions" thing is complete bull. The majority of the Coleco 2600 games actually aren't terrible. The Colecovision versions look better because the Colecovision was newer hardware designed to play arcade conversions. The 2600 was 5 years old at thins point and designed to play Tank and Pong. The initial plan was actually for it to be off the market by 1982.