Team Pixelboy News Bulletin - November 26th 2021

[Pixelboy]

Good day to you all, ColecoVisionizers!

 

It's been a while since my last news bulletin, and I think now is a good time for an update, especially with several people wondering why Asteroids and Star Castle were released in such a low-key fashion. The main subject of this news bulletin is to present and discuss my ColecoVision trading cards, but before I get into that, let's go over other news tidbits.

 

THE ASTEROIDS CONTROLLER, OR LACK THEREOF

 

As many of you may recall, Asteroids was supposed to be released as a pack-in game for the Asteroids Controller, which was announced as a partnership between Team Pixelboy and our resident custom controller maker doubledown. If you look up doubledown's profile on AtariAge right now (i.e. at the time I'm writing this bulletin) you'll notice he hasn't visited the AtariAge forums since last July. I haven't had any contact with him outside AtariAge since then (I tried contacting him by e-mail, but to no avail) so for all intents and purposes, the Asteroids Controller project has been pretty much stalled since last spring.

 

doubledown's job has been keeping him extremely busy this year, and that's the main reason why he hasn't worked at all on the Asteroids Controllers. During our most recent conversation via AtariAge private messages, he explained to me that he was going to travel a lot over the next few months, for what he called "service calls he had been putting off".

 

He has, of course, an excellent reputation on these boards, and I'm still fully confident that things will eventually clear up for him and he will be able to build all the Asteroids Controllers and honor all pre-orders. I just don't know when that is going to happen. For all we know, brand new customers may be giving him more work to keep him busy until the end of 2021 and beyond, and we just have to wait for him to come back.

 

All copies of Asteroids have been ready to ship since last June, and when Star Castle went from project to finished software over a relatively short amount of time this summer (thanks Mystery Man!) I decided to ship all copies to those who had pre-ordered the games. I didn't organize a proper pre-order period for Star Castle, choosing instead to simply offer the game to those who had pre-ordered Asteroids, and all copies were snatched up that way.

 

So for those who would like to purchase Asteroids and/or Star Castle, I'm afraid you're out of luck. Or maybe not quite. I recommend keeping an eye on eBay seller "2coolspirit" who has already begun to auction off a few copies of both games. That's pretty much your last chance to score copies of both games brand new.

 

As a closing note on this subject, you'll be glad to know that all of the "legacy hacks" designed to be played with the Asteroids Controller are all 100% done, and will be offered to everyone who will (eventually) purchase an Asteroids Controller. I'm talking about B.C.'s Quest for Tires, Carnival, Cabbage Patch Kids - Adventures in the Park, Omega Race, Smurf - Rescue in Gargamel's Castle, Space Fury, Star Trek, and Victory. Speaking from personal experience, playing all these games with an Asteroids Controller offers quite a different feel when compared to playing these games with a standard ColecoVision controller. They all feel more "arcade-y" somehow, if that makes sense.

TRADING CARDS, WITH NO ACTUAL TRADING INVOLVED

 

It's hard to believe that I publicly started to discuss this trading card project way back in 2011 (or perhaps even before that). Since then, I've been accumulating box scans and working on card templates, but publishing new homebrew ColecoVision games often got in the way. This year, I was finally able to finish all the templates for my first series of trading cards, namely the "North-American" series: 165 cards covering all of the ColecoVision games released in North-America during the eighties, including a few I like to call the "Canadian Essentials", which are games that were released by Canadian publishers in bilingual (English/French) boxes, and for which English-only boxes do not exist. Some prototype games are also included in the deck, with homebrew box art. You can see a small sample of the cards in the picture attached at the bottom of this post.

 

More series are planned for the future. The next series, to be released next year, will be the "European" series featuring roughly 100 cards covering mostly the same games as the "North-American" series, but with European, Australian and Asian box art. If I can, I would also like to release a "Canadian" series, with bilingual boxes, as it turns out that there are enough of them to make a deck of 50+ cards! And in 2023, I will turn my attention to homebrew games, beginning with a series devoted to Team Pixelboy releases, quickly followed by series for Opcode Games, CollectorVision, etc. with the end goal of making a trading card for every homebrew game ever released with a proper box and manual. I'm hoping that all the homebrew authors and publishers won't have a problem with me making trading cards out of their games.

 

I should take a moment to mention the "Hardware" cards. Initially, I wanted to include some cards in the "North-American" series for ColecoVision hardware (console, expansion modules, controllers). The cards are almost technically done, but I want to put beauty pics of the hardware on the back of the cards (in lieu of screenshots) and for that, I need doubledown (yeah, that guy again). I have a special agreement with doubledown to snap those pictures for the back of the cards, so I have to wait until he gets back before the cards can be finalized. Once I have the back-of-cards pics, I will either release the "Hardware" cards as small upgrade packs (i.e. cards to add to already-released decks) or maybe release these cards as their own stand-alone series. We'll see. For now, the "Hardware" cards are temporarily on hold.

 

With all this said, let's talk pre-ordering and purchasing. I need to know how many decks of the "North-American" series I need to order from the print shop, which is located somewhere in Germany. I also want to gauge interest in the other future series, as described above. I took the time to mention the trading cards to everyone who pre-ordered Asteroids (with or without the Asteroids Controller) and/or Star Castle, and I will be contacting all the interested people again (plus a few more) shortly, in order to direct them to this forum thread, and initiate a general survey.

 

If you are interested in purchasing these cards, I would like you to contact me by e-mail (at pixelboy at teampixelboy dot com) and confirm your interest, and I would also like you to tell me how interested you are in the future series. Will you only buy the first "North-American" series and say no to the other series? Or will you buy some of the series but not some others? Or will you buy them all like a true ColecoVision fanboy? Please let me know your intentions!  

 

In terms of pricing, I have to place orders of decks of 55 cards with the printer in Germany. That's why there are 165 cards in the first series (3 decks of 55 cards). Each pack of 55 cards costs roughly 20$US to print, so I expect a full deck of 165 cards to carry a price tag in the 60-to-65$US range. Maybe a little more, but not much more. So that's about 40 cents per card. Each deck of 165 cards will be stored in a two-piece plastic storage case (either Ultra-Pro or BCW, it's not decided yet).

 

You have until December 15th 2021 to place your official pre-order for a deck of the "North-American" series. After this date, I will place the print order with the print shop in Germany. I'm not sure how long it's going to take for the printer to print and ship the decks to me, and I will very probably receive them in January at the earliest, but I'll contact everyone as soon as I receive them. Of course, it will always be possible for me to print more decks of these trading cards in the future, but I'd like to place print orders in large batches, if I can.

 

Anyway, what I would like to do is create a mailing list which is separate from my homebrew video game pre-order records. Anyone who pre-orders (or buys) a deck of trading cards will be added to this mailing list, and I will notify everyone on this list whenever a new series or a new upgrade pack is close to release.

 

There's something I need to mention at this point: It's getting increasingly difficult for my e-mails to reach the inboxes of those I'm trying to contact. This is especially true for G-Mail and some other e-mail providers that seem to hate me for some reason, to the point where they don't just mark my e-mails as junk/spam, they block my e-mails altogether, with no warning or error reported back to me. I just want to be clear on this: I always make it a point to reply to all my e-mail within 24 hours, and I often reply within just one hour when I'm home. So if you contact me by e-mail and expect a reply, check your junk/spam box after a few hours if you don't see my reply in your main inbox.

 

Anyway, for clarity's sake, here's the list (subject to change) of the different series I'm planning:

 

- North-American (to be printed and released soon)
- European / Australian / Asian (2022)
- Canadian (2022 or 2023)
- Team Pixelboy (2023)
- Opcode Games (2023)
- CollectorVision (2023)
- Côté Gamers and other homebrews (2024)
- Homebrew boxes (of commercial and homebrew games) (2024)

 

To conclude this (rather long) post about the ColecoVision trading cards, I want to mention that I'm always hunting for box scans to turn into trading cards, and I'm still missing quite a few scans of legacy commercial boxes, especially of Canadian boxes. In the coming days, I will post pictures further down in this thread of the boxes I'm still looking for. If you have any of those boxes and are willing to scan them for me, please send me a PM or an e-mail.

This concludes this Team Pixelboy News Bulletin. We now return you to your regular forum activities.  
 

[Crapahute]

Feel free to use my scans if you need

 

https://www.colecoboxart.com

[Pixelboy]

1 hour ago, Crapahute said:

Feel free to use my scans if you need

 

https://www.colecoboxart.com

I'm actually counting on ColecoBoxArt.com, especially for the "European" series next year. Thanks a lot, Crapahute! 

 

[Ikrananka]

34 minutes ago, Pixelboy said:

I'm actually counting on ColecoBoxArt.com, especially for the "European" series next year. Thanks a lot, Crapahute! 

 

And if any are still missing I have a near complete European games collection so happy to help out.

[Pixelboy]

2 minutes ago, Ikrananka said:

And if any are still missing I have a near complete European games collection so happy to help out.

The only European box I'm still looking for is the one for Frogger. Aside from that, I believe I have all of the European box scans, whichever scans I'm missing on my own hard drive can be found on ColecoBoxArt.com, and I'm probably going to download them all next month to have all the scans in one place. Thanks! 

 

By the way, was the Splice Vision ever released in an actual box? I have box pics for the Hanimex Pencil II, the Dina 2-in-1, the Telegames Personal Arcade and the Bit-90 computer. I'd like to acquire a box scan of the SV-603 Adapter if possible, and any other "international" pieces of hardware that is directly ColecoVision-related.

 

[Ikrananka]

21 minutes ago, Pixelboy said:

The only European box I'm still looking for is the one for Frogger.

Actually you do have that one.  I uploaded that for you a few weeks ago and got your email back thanking me for it ?

[Pixelboy]

49 minutes ago, Ikrananka said:

Actually you do have that one.  I uploaded that for you a few weeks ago and got your email back thanking me for it 

Oops! You're right! I forgot to update my list accordingly! Thanks for reminding me!   

 

[Hastor]

As someone who was waiting on starcastle, but not asteroids, this is a bummer to find out. The eBay thing have me hope until I saw it was a scalper getting tons by auctioning them. If a copy was only offered to those with an asteroid pre order, how did they get several? Surely something so limited would have had a purchase limit so you could offer the rest to other customers.

Edited November 27, 2021 by Hastor

[Pixelboy]

11 minutes ago, Hastor said:

As someone who was waiting on starcastle, but not asteroids, this is a bummer to find out. The eBay thing have me hope until I saw it was a scalper getting tons by auctioning them. If a copy was only offered to those with an asteroid pre order, how did they get several? Surely something so limited would have had a purchase limit so you could offer the rest to other customers.

I didn't actually put any limit, and this scalper, as you call him, ordered several copies of both Asteroids and Star Castle, and he paid for them at full price. For the record, this eBay seller is the only one who ordered multiple copies like this, for the purpose of reselling them. I wasn't expecting him to put them up for auction one by one like this, but he bought them fair and square, so that's his choice.

 

[Hastor]

Not claiming anything illegal, just seems this could have been better planned out for customers who can't afford every game. The practice of buying limited things just to resell right away is frowned upon by many here. Some creators don't care, some refuse to do business with the person again. That's all personal opinion, I just feel a bit slighted for not getting a chance at it, despite being the most regular customer I can afford to be (I'm definitely not one of your biggest customers but have a shelf of many of your games as I could afford them - it has been a lot of money to me) then being directed to high priced eBay sales by the creator.

 

It's all your choice for sure in how to run your business, and my choice in how I view that as a customer. I'd just like all customers to be considered, even if they can't afford multiple things (or just call it a bundle from the start). Just saying what would have made me feel better as a customer. Definitely no demands on you. Selling limited coleco games, they will sell even if you charge that much up front, you could just auction them on eBay yourself, so there's no incentive to take a different approach financially from your side. Just sharing my thoughts and feelings as a customer looking forward to Star Castle, to find out I never had a chance.

Maybe I'm alone here in wanting this one but not asteroids. Well wanted both but couldn't afford them, and like starcastle better.

Just providing some feedback from how the experience feels from my side. Not writing you off or anything. Just saying it could be considered in future situations. Mostly major disappointment speaking because I like your products.

Edited November 27, 2021 by Hastor

[+evg2000]

It's not the same as TPB version, but maybe you can find john dondzila's version of Star Castle, either as a cart somewhere or maybe the rom is available?  Maybe more obtainable if all you want to do is play star castle.  His version is called star fortress.

[Pixelboy]

2 hours ago, Hastor said:

It's all your choice for sure in how to run your business, and my choice in how I view that as a customer. I'd just like all customers to be considered, even if they can't afford multiple things (or just call it a bundle from the start). Just saying what would have made me feel better as a customer. Definitely no demands on you. Selling limited coleco games, they will sell even if you charge that much up front, you could just auction them on eBay yourself, so there's no incentive to take a different approach financially from your side. Just sharing my thoughts and feelings as a customer looking forward to Star Castle, to find out I never had a chance.

Maybe I'm alone here in wanting this one but not asteroids. Well wanted both but couldn't afford them, and like starcastle better.

Just providing some feedback from how the experience feels from my side. Not writing you off or anything. Just saying it could be considered in future situations. Mostly major disappointment speaking because I like your products.

Okay, I understand your point perfectly well. But I'd like to raise two points of my own:

 

1) I don't consider what I do to be a business, even though it may seem that way to many, especially with the way I interact with those who purchase my games. A business to me is something you do to make a profit, and I sell my games at cost, with no profit margin. I treat these games as projects, which goes from idea to complete-in-box game within a certain time frame, and after manufacturing enough copies to meet most of the demand, I consider that project done and I move on to the next. I don't have a crystal ball that tells me exactly how many copies I should produce, and not meeting the demand often happens. You're certainly not the first to contact me about a game and being disappointed when I tell them "sorry, it's sold out".

 

2) Please don't take this the wrong way, because I really don't mean to make it personal, but where were you all this time? Star Castle was added to teampixelboy.com at the same time as Asteroids, and you had months to contact me and try to secure a copy in advance. Several people did exactly that (ordering Star Castle and not Asteroids) and they got their copies. I don't think it's fair to say that you "never had a chance". You actually did.

 

I can only hope you understand my point of view on this.

 

Edited November 27, 2021 by Pixelboy

[Hastor]

Based on what I saw on the site, it seemed pre orders weren't up yet, so I didn't want to ask you the obvious, to be told that the site would be updated when they were, I hear many people with sites complain about such inquires that are covered on the site. I was also expecting an email announcement when pre orders were up, much like the email I got about asteroids and others in the past. If that was changed on the site, I didn't notice that we could contact you about pre orders yet and that's on me. If it wasn't mentioned, I'd assume asking you would be annoying and I'd just be told to watch the site. That's what I gathered my options were from the site.

 

It did feel like I was waiting months for pre orders to go live, just to find out they were held in secret and I didn't get a chance. That would disappoint me with any product I'm anticipating. If the site indicated there was an option to contact you to get it, I'm surprised I missed it, but did, and apologize for missing that.

 

I'll be fine it's a game I missed, not the first, the disappointment just got me really hard at first. I do appreciate what you bring to the Coleco.

[AtariBrian]

4 minutes ago, Hastor said:

Based on what I saw on the site, it seemed pre orders weren't up yet, so I didn't want to ask you the obvious, to be told that the site would be updated when they were, I hear many people with sites complain about such inquires that are covered on the site. I was also expecting an email announcement when pre orders were up, much like the email I got about asteroids and others in the past. If that was changed on the site, I didn't notice that we could contact you about pre orders yet and that's on me. If it wasn't mentioned, I'd assume asking you would be annoying and I'd just be told to watch the site. That's what I gathered my options were from the site.

 

It did feel like I was waiting months for pre orders to go live, just to find out they were held in secret and I didn't get a chance. That would disappoint me with any product I'm anticipating. If the site indicated there was an option to contact you to get it, I'm surprised I missed it, but did, and apologize for missing that.

 

I'll be fine it's a game I missed, not the first, the disappointment just got me really hard at first. I do appreciate what you bring to the Coleco.

Not sure if you have a way to play Atari 2600 games but if you do there is an awesome Star Castle homebrew game that you should get from the AA store.

[TPR]

1 hour ago, Hastor said:

I'll be fine it's a game I missed, not the first, the disappointment just got me really hard at first. I do appreciate what you bring to the Coleco.

Just curious for those who missed out on this run - will there be a "passing of the baton" to another publisher for these two titles like the other Team Pixelboy games?  (Not agreeing or disagreeing with any of the discussion above, just trying to help give some 'hope' to those who might have missed these games for a future re-release.) 

[timdu]

4 hours ago, evg2000 said:

It's not the same as TPB version, but maybe you can find john dondzila's version of Star Castle, either as a cart somewhere or maybe the rom is available?  Maybe more obtainable if all you want to do is play star castle.  His version is called star fortress.

FYI - I currently offer STAR FORTRESS for the COLECOVISION for sale for $25 plus shipping.  ( loose cartridge and manual )

 

I obtained permission from John D. a few years ago and I continue to sell these and I have them in stock.

 

http://timduarte.blogspot.com/2021/07/star-fortress-for-colecovision-this.html

 

I also sell John's excellent version of SPACE INVADERS for the Colecovision, which is called SPACE INVASION.

 

If you have any questions, please send me a message.

 

thank you,

 

 

Tim

[+evg2000]

57 minutes ago, timdu said:

FYI - I currently offer STAR FORTRESS for the COLECOVISION for sale for $25 plus shipping.  ( loose cartridge and manual )

 

I obtained permission from John D. a few years ago and I continue to sell these and I have them in stock.

 

http://timduarte.blogspot.com/2021/07/star-fortress-for-colecovision-this.html

 

I also sell John's excellent version of SPACE INVADERS for the Colecovision, which is called SPACE INVASION.

 

If you have any questions, please send me a message.

 

thank you,

 

 

Tim

that’s cool Tim

I have them both from when John was still producing them

[Pixelboy]

3 hours ago, TPR said:

Just curious for those who missed out on this run - will there be a "passing of the baton" to another publisher for these two titles like the other Team Pixelboy games?  (Not agreeing or disagreeing with any of the discussion above, just trying to help give some 'hope' to those who might have missed these games for a future re-release.) 

I haven't really given it much thought yet, as I'm still finishing up processing orders. Earlier today I contacted a bunch of people who hadn't pre-ordered either Asteroids or Star Castle, but did pre-order other future games (Space Shuttle, Arabian, Utopia) to tell them about the new trading card series, and several of them were genuinely surprised that Asteroids and Star Castle somehow went completely under their radar, much like Hastor above.

 

So I guess it would be best to pass both titles on to CollectorVision, if they want to make more copies themselves, although if I do this, it will mean that I won't be at liberty to post the ROMs of Asteroids and Star Castle on Christmas Day 2022. That'll be CollectorVision's decision to make in terms of sharing the ROMs in whatever fashion. And I really have no control over how long it's going to take CollectorVision to make more C.I.B. copies of those games.

 

Edited November 28, 2021 by Pixelboy

[TPR]

Appreciate the answer! Even if it is very non-committal, that's very understandable. 

[LongJohns]

Not having the hardware to play these on, I would be interested in purchasing the ROMs if you made them available.

 

[Pixelboy]

Quick note: I spent most of the today at my best friend's place today, and now I'm way behind on replying to e-mail. Please be patient, as it's going to take me a while to reply to everyone.

 

[Pixelboy]

Okay, so first of all, I managed to catch up with my e-mail during my lunch break, and reply to everyone who contacted me over the last 48 hours.

 

Secondly, just so everyone is officially aware, it seems I really underestimated the demand for Asteroids and Star Castle, and so I worked out a deal with CollectorVision just yesterday, so they can manufacture more copies of the games. I don't know when those new copies will materialize, however.

 

Also, just for kicks, I'm going to send a paper letter (via good ol' fashion snail mail) to doubledown to see if I can reach him that way, and get him to drop by these forums to give us an update. Not sure how long it's going to take for the letter to get to doubledown's home, but perhaps we'll hear from him before Christmas. Any news from him will be welcome, even if it's "I'm too busy to work on the Asteroids Controllers right now". Fingers crossed! 

 

Edited November 29, 2021 by Pixelboy

[insertclevernamehere]

Any news on Arabian?  Last I heard was 2022 but is that late 22?  I'm guessing late and therefore likely delayed to 2023 so here's your chance to confirm or potentially make my day.

[Pixelboy]

I will be working to release Space Shuttle, Utopia and Arabian on Christmas Day 2022.

 

That end goal may move around, of course, but for now that's the plan.   

 

[Pixelboy]

As I indicated in the first post of this thread, here's the list of boxes I'm still looking for, with pictures to proove that these boxes actually exist.

 

1) I'm looking for the Canadian (French/English) editions of these games:

- Burgertime

- Donkey Kong Junior

- Dr Seuss - Fix-Up the Mix-Up Puzzler

- Frogger

- Gorf

- Jumpman Junior

- Ken Uston's Blackjack/Poker

- Lady Bug

- Mr Do!

- Mr Do! (second version, cabinet facing other way)

- Root Beer Tapper

- Smurf - Paint 'n Play Workshop

- Space Panic

- SubRoc

- Super Cobra

- Tarzan

- Time Pilot

- Victory

 

2) I'm looking for the Canadian (French-English) version of these hardware products:

- Adam Family Computer (stand-alone edition)

- ColecoVision console

- Expansion Module #2

- Expansion Module #3

- Roller Controller

 

3) I'm looking for the European/international versions of these hardware products:

- CBS ColecoVision console (with "Mouse Trap Included" sticker)

- SV-603 Adapter

 

There's a guy named Anthony Pietrak on http://collectedit.com who owns a few of the games listed above (Root Beer Tapper, Smurf - Paint & Play Workshop, Super Cobra and Victory, to be exact) and I tried to register on that site so that I could send a private message to the guy and try to get some scans, but the registery process seems to be broken. Is there anyone here who happens to have an account on CollectedIt and could try to contact Anthony on my behalf?