VCS/2600 Game Rarity by Number of Known Copies

[high voltage]

Just found this:

Reprogrammable cartridges released by Romox.
They could be taken to Romox’s Software Centers so they could be rewritten and taken home again.
Some of the games to be loaded onto them were exclusive to the Romox carts, so if found, it’s one of the only ways to play titles like Castles and Keys, Flapper, Bartender, or Topper.

[Rom Hunter]

1 hour ago, high voltage said:

Just found this:

Reprogrammable cartridges released by Romox.
They could be taken to Romox’s Software Centers so they could be rewritten and taken home again.
Some of the games to be loaded onto them were exclusive to the Romox carts, so if found, it’s one of the only ways to play titles like Castles and Keys, Flapper, Bartender, or Topper.

Interesting.

Do you have any pictures?

[high voltage]

24 minutes ago, Rom Hunter said:

Interesting.

Do you have any pictures?

No, found the info here:

 

http://www.racketboy.com/retro/rarest-and-most-valuable-atari-2600-games

 

 

[Lord Thag]

Here's some more info on the Romox centers, copied from a .PDF from the (now defunct) ti99ers.org site some years ago:

Content begins:

ROMOX ECPCs and SOFTWARE CENTERS: Romox was a Campbell, CA firm, with manufacturing facilities in the Phillipines, that specialized in manufacturing cartridges for home computers like the TI-99/4A and others in the same or lower price range. The company was founded in 1982 by a management team of pioneers in the computer and semiconductor industries. In 1983 Romox, with noted industry pioneer Paul Terrell as company president, announced a new idea in marketing computer game programs that would allow the user to buy their new reusable Edge Connector Programmable Cartridge (ECPC) only once, and have it reprogrammed each time a new game program was desired. Initial purchase price for the ECPC was around $25 and a new game could be "burned in" for less than $10.
The Romox Plan for the ECPC was to put Romox "Software Centers" in retail outlets like 7-11 stores, at a $160 per month lease charge to the retailer, which would allow easy access to new programs by computer users. The user had only to bring their ECPC to any outlet with a Romox Software Center, place the ECPC in the correct cartridge slot, choose the game they wanted, pay the new game fee and the clerk would activate the Software Center.

 

The Software Center was an off-white colored plastic cabinet and monitor which looked alot like a computer. It was approximately 18" wide by 6" high with a color monitor approximately 12" wide by 8" high. There were ten slots on the front panel of the cabinet for different types of computer cartridge connectors and a membrane covered keypad for typing in the catalog number of the program to burn in to the ECPC's reprogrammable chip.

 

The user pressed any key to start the Software Center, selected a program from the screen or the Romox Catalog, paid for the new program and the clerk would activate the Software Center. The machine would notify the user when the new game was ready to go. That was all there was to it.
Only 5 of the 10 slots in the Software Center front panel were used, probably because Romox already had the major players in the cartridge software business covered, but they built the
machine for the possibility of new computers in the future. I know the Spectravideo SV-318 and the Coleco Adam both came with a cartridge port and there might have been a couple of others, but the "big guns" were already on the panel.

 

Going from left to right while facing the Software Center, the slots were dedicated to:
- Slot #1: TI-99/4A Home Computer - Slot #2: Commodore VIC 20 - Slot #3: Commodore 64 - Slot #4: Atari 2600 VCS - Slot #5: Atari 400/800, Atari 600/800XL, and the Atari 1200XL
The TI-99 games housed in the Software Centers were Ambulance, Anteater, Cave Creatures, Data Base Sort Utility, Driving Demon, Henhouse, Hen Pecked, Princess and the Frog, Rabbit Trail, Rotor Raiders, Schnoz-ola, St. Nick, Topper, Typo II and Video Vegas. Other machines has more titles available. Atari 2600-49 titles, Atari (all others)-39 titles, VIC 20-51 titles, Commodore 64-26 titles and the TI-99/4A-16 titles.

 

I have never seen an actual Romox Software Center anywhere, but Kyle Crighton of Milbrae, CA, who is a software engineer in the San Jose area, has verified their existence, at least in convenience stores in the northern California area. Byte Magazine, in their February 1985 issue on page 10, reported that Romox ceased operations mainly because of poor dealer response and the general collapse of the cartridge video-game market, so it appears that the Software Center concept lived a short life.

 

ECPC CARTRIDGE PROGRAMMER: Romox also offered a complete ECPC Cartridge Programmer tool kit that was not related to the Software Center marketing concept. The tool kit consisted of:
 WD-03 Cartridge Programmer $300.00
 WD-04 Cartridge (EPROM) Eraser 39.95
 Blank ECPC cartridges were also offered:
 TI-01 Blank 8K ECPC Cartridges 19.95

 

An illustration/photo of this system may be seen in the July 1983 issue of Enthusiast 99 magazine on page 40.
During the second quarter of 1984 Navarone Industries took over the Cartridge Programmer business from Romox and added an IBM PCjr. cartridge making tool kit to their product line. At the same time, Navarone announced a licensing agreement with Romox that allowed Navarone to produce and distribute Romox's entire line of cartridge software for both the 99/4A and the Commodore 64. Byte Magazine, in their February 1985 issue on page 10 reported that Romox ceased operations mainly because of poor dealer response and the general collapse of the cartridge video-game market. Perhaps the licensing agreement with Navarone was the beginning of the end for Romox?

(Charles LaFara writing in Enthusiast 99, Nov83, p.40 -- Romox Software Catalog -- Jerry Price, former owner of Tex*Comp User's Supply in Granda Hills, CA

[+stupus]

Very cool!

[+stupus]

5 hours ago, high voltage said:

Just found this:

Reprogrammable cartridges released by Romox.
They could be taken to Romox’s Software Centers so they could be rewritten and taken home again.
Some of the games to be loaded onto them were exclusive to the Romox carts, so if found, it’s one of the only ways to play titles like Castles and Keys, Flapper, Bartender, or Topper.

All these romox titles you list though are for atari 400 or ti99 or systems besides the 2600 as far as i can tell?

[Supergun]

Right, none of those had 2600 versions. Those were for the Atari 400/800, and we’ve known about them for years now. (multiple threads about it over in the Atari computer forum here) I even have one of those programmed carts; a blue one.

 

The Xante 2600 carts would be a better example of this type of thing, but none of their games were “unique”, rather they were all re-released titles.

[+bfstats]

On 8/19/2018 at 8:56 PM, Blazing Lazers said:

Inspired by the recent discovery of a 5th(!) Extra Terrestrials cart, I wanted to put together a quick list of all of the R10/top tier rarest carts arranged by the number of publicly known copies. I greatly look forward to hearing from those who know far better than I here about more exact figures, and certainly about the estimated number of copies for games that are usually among those featured on all of the "rarest Atari games" lists. What I have off the top of my head and from quick searches:

 

 

1x copy: Gamma Attack, Red Sea Crossing, Cat Trax (was this real?)

2x copies: Birthday Mania, monogrammed Space Chase

3x copies: Ultravision Karate

4x copies:

5x copies: Extra Terrestrials

6x copies: Gauntlet

 

15x copies: Eli's Ladder

 

23x copies: Magicard

 

28x copies: Pepsi Invaders

 

and with a surprising amount of copies apparently out there, around 20x copies of Air Raid known.

 

Per Joe Santulli, who quoted CommaVid founder Dr. J.M. Bronstein to me, 20 copies of Video Life were made.

 

[lazzeri]

I do have a question... ?

 

I´ve been looking for some Xonox Single-enders lately and all manuals I´ve seen say "Double Ender" in the cover.

 

Does that means that the Double Ender were released first and Single Enders came later? I mean, are the Double Enders the original release and Single Enders the repacks?

[+stupus]

Yep, double enders were the originals.

The single ender manuals are very hard to find too.

[Supergun]

The “double ender” (as in getting 2 games for the price of 1) was the key & most integral part of their entire marketing strategy. To the point where even the company’s name, XONOX, was specifically named & written as such because it read the same, even when upside down.

 

The gimmick worked well and successful sales eventually lead to the single carts.

 

The ColecoVision line is a bit different however. As some of the titles were exclusively available as singles, and the double enders were mostly limited to the Canada area.

[high voltage]

Those 15 Eli's Ladder, is that with all the paperwork/overlays/stickies or just cartridge?

[scottyy]

do you have a complete list for the atari 400/800?

[Supergun]

Yes, I do. But far better to give that its own separate thread.

[poppalarge]

Let me first say that I very much appreciate and admire the information @Supergun is providing and the neat spreadsheet that @lazzeri is working on. I have 3 quick questions in regards to the 404 game list:

1. Atariprotos.com has Obelix being a Canadian exclusive. Should it be moved to the Expansion #1 list or did it come out in the US as well?

2. In regards to the same issue, I've also read (can't remember where, probably on here) that Motorcross Racer/Tomarc The Barbarian double ender only saw a Canadian release too.

3. Was Ultravision Karate definitely released in the US? I guess this wouldn't change the 404 list as it was released in the US anyway by Funvision (or Froggo?) I'm more looking for who was the first to release it in the US.

[+Psionic]

On 10/18/2018 at 11:59 PM, Blazing Lazers said:

Updated the list:

 

(*) 2x copies: Cat Trax (if it wasn't just a commercial sample)

 

Looks like another copy of this just turned up, although this one has a slightly different label from the ones pictured on Atarimania.  It was apparently found at a video game store called The Game Room in Charleston, SC.

 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/atariage/permalink/10160235138485255/

 

[TheVgaTv]

2 hours ago, Psionic said:

 

Looks like another copy of this just turned up, although this one has a slightly different label from the ones pictured on Atarimania.  It was apparently found at a video game store called The Game Room in Charleston, SC.

 

https://www.facebook.com/groups/atariage/permalink/10160235138485255/

 

Thanks for posting this, I'm the one who found it.  I made another thread on here before seeing this. 

After reading through this thread, what do you make of the different label (with the additional lines about the Coleco Gemini and the 2600 Adapter Module)?  Another commercial sample?  The release version?  A mystery lost to time, haha?

[+Psionic]

25 minutes ago, TheVgaTv said:

Another commercial sample?  The release version?  A mystery lost to time, haha?

 

I really don't know what to make of it, so I'll go with option #3 for now.  I'll continue the discussion over there.

[Blazing Lazers]

Assuming that this isn't one of the other two known Cat Trax 2600 carts, this will make a third known copy. 

[Tempest]

On 1/30/2020 at 6:40 PM, poppalarge said:

1. Atariprotos.com has Obelix being a Canadian exclusive. Should it be moved to the Expansion #1 list or did it come out in the US as well?

I've never seen any evidence that it was released in the US (same with the NTSC Asterix).  I would assume you could buy it directly from Atari in the US though.

[+stupus]

17 hours ago, Blazing Lazers said:

Assuming that this isn't one of the other two known Cat Trax 2600 carts, this will make a third known copy. 

Yes, it's not 1 of the other 2 boxed copies. So 3 if its legit and I think it is.

[Blazing Lazers]

3 hours ago, stupus said:

Yes, it's not 1 of the other 2 boxed copies. So 3 if its legit and I think it is.

It's a bit surprising just how little discussion there's been about this copy of Cat Trax turning up. It's nothing like the Red Sea Crossing, Air Raid boxes, or the Extra Terrestrials discoveries, but to me at least it seems to be the equal of those. Sure, the title was already known to some extent, but now I have a hard time dismissing it as just a sales sample or pre-production thing. I'm sure the ultra hardcore full set 2600 collectors aren't happy about the possiblity of this having been offered for sale somewhere back in the day.

[+stupus]

I agree as I think this is really more exciting to me as its from a big company and a 100% finished game....and a fun 1 at that.

I think maybe it just is less known and has less hype around it.

I still think the 3 copies points to a demo copy. Probably a third demo copy that eventually just got mixed into someone's personal collection.

[Blazing Lazers]

Heh, I can't help but think that over the years a few copies of Cat Trax for the VCS might have been mistaken as the common Arcadia versions and disregarded without a closer look. 

 

The question of where and how VCS Cat Trax would have been sold still stands, but if this many copies have been verified the possibility has to be considered. 

[Blazing Lazers]

 

... looks like another Red Sea Crossing copy has surfaced. 

 

... and possibly also a copy of Air Raid that might be questionable: