What have you actually PLAYED tracker for 2023 (Season 16)

[neogeo1982]

I played mostly 1 modern game this week, but still had some Sega time.

Game Gear

Battletoads - 30min

Columns- 25min

[Kurt_Woloch]

Here are my times for this week (November 20th through 26th) on classic systems:

 

Battle Zone (Bootleg of Mayday) - 44 min.

Battletoads - 4 min.

Bells & Whistles - 40 min.

Birdiy - 10 min.

Block Block - 37 min.

 

This week I continued with the quest of getting to know and replay several arcade games in alphabetical order.

Battle Zone (Bootleg of Mayday) has got nothing to do with Battlezone by Atari, it's rather similar to Defender, but a bit simpler. Actually it seems to run on Joust hardware, at least it takes over some of the sounds of Joust, which probably means it has the same sound CPU running the same software as in Joust, as the sounds are procedurally generated there. Incidentally, I started to disassemble the sound code of Joust a while ago since I wanted to improve the inofficial C-64 version by Joust which you can find here:

Joust (C64) - 1984 Atarisoft - GTW64 (gamesthatwerent.com)

As you can see there, the C64 version was done by Jack Verson and is actually a hack of the Atari 8-bit version. Though the gameplay works fine, the sound hasn't been ported over very well. I've peeked into the sound routine, and it seems to just convert the POKEY sound data to the SID format, which doesn't work very accurately at all. Thus, I thought of re-creating the sound for the C-64 version from scratch, based on the original sound code. I've attached my disassembly to this post, of the code which I guess is also being used in "Battle Zone".

The game itself is a bit hard. Similar to Defender, you blow up enemies, but they move in different patterns. Instead of the smart bombs, you have something that slows you down very much for a time.

 

Battletoads is another Jump & Run game which I don't like as much as the Asterix game I played lately.

 

Bells & Whistles is a game I liked to play back in the day, a vertical scrolling shooting game similar to Xevious and Parodius, with the extras being given by bells coming out of clouds. The bells change color if you hit them often enough, and then they give different extras. In their standard color they only give points though.

 

Birdiy is a non-scrolling game where you have to feed birds in a nest. This one seems to based on Pengo hardware as far as I can tell, but strangely it ends each round after feeding a single bird. It didn't hold my attention for too long. It has an interesting high score music though, which seems to push the Namco sound chip a bit farther than any other game I've seen, providing drums.

 

Block Block is another Breakout clone, similar to Arkanoid, but here you have horizontal and vertical blocks, and later levels add pinball elements to keep things interesting. It takes longer to finish a round though because there's no extra that would give you the capability to shoot blocks.

 

joust.asm

Edited November 26, 2023 by Kurt_Woloch

[carlsson]

Another week of zero minutes. Hopefully 2024 will be slightly less frantic with more time to play games.

[agb]

On 11/22/2023 at 12:27 PM, Atarian7 said:

I played Solar Fox to 8.5 million last night, but got bored and screwed up.  The fun part is clearing Rack 255.  That always give me a little bit of an adrenaline rush.

Great score Atarian7. Will you be going for the all time record soon?

 

Times

Atari 2600

Red Sea Crossing 15 FB HSC

River Raid Brazil version 10. Much more difficult than regular version. 
Skiing 16 FB HSC

Solar Fox 182

 

all fun. 
 

[Skippy B. Coyote]

Lots of gaming laid back in bed while I continue recovering from that surgery I had a few weeks ago, and this week the Anbernic RG35XX was my bed buddy. I ended up playing a ton of Monopoly for the Game Boy Color on it, and used it to play some Samurai Shodown II for the Neo Geo and do full playthroughs of Ristar and Ecco Jr. for the Sega Genesis as well.

 

 

 

Game Boy Color

Monopoly - 350 minutes

 

Neo Geo

Samurai Shodown II - 31 minutes

 

Sega Genesis

Ecco Jr. - 100 minutes 

Ristar - 154 minutes

 

[Wayler]

I grabbed a controller again for the longest time. Corona and the allotted free time does that. Tried out a few fastROM hacks and found out Axelay was way harder this way. Tackling Terranigma as an ongoing playthrough.

 

SNES

Axelay - 30 min

Darius Twin - 10 min

Parodius - 10 min

Terranigma - 345 min

[Keir]

Only tabletop gaming for me last week!

[Atarian7]

Atari 2600

Kaboom! - 137 minutes

Solar Fox - 103 minutes

 

 

I don't know about going for the all-time record on Solar Fox.  

[+thegoldenband]

My times for the week:

 

Intellivision:

Frog Bog - 2 min.

 

Earthshaking stuff. Or, at least, lily-pad-shaking.

[+jgkspsx]

Not much for me this week, and like @Kurt_Woloch all arcade for once!

 

Arcade:

BattleZone - 10 minutes

First time I've ever played a real machine with the periscope!

 

Flying Shark - 75 minutes

I just can't crack 100k...

 

Frogger - 5 minutes

Embarrassing performance...
 

Punch Out - 10 minutes

 

Q*Bert - 15 minutes

Real machine, ugly LCD screen. Oh well.

 

Space Invaders - 10 minutes

 

Volfied - 25 minutes

 

Beyond my own arcade time I also got to introduce three young second cousins to Gauntlet. They played for a half an hour with only two quarters to top them off! They also enjoyed Q*Bert and Frogger.

 

[carlsson]

Here's the summary for Week 47, running from November 20 - 26. We logged 1835 minutes of eligible play, playing 28 games on a total of 8 systems.

 

Top 10:

 

1. Monopoly (Game Boy Color) - 350 min.
2. Terranigma (SNES) - 345 min.
3. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 285 min. (#1)
4. Ristar (Genesis) - 154 min.
5. Kaboom! (Atari 2600) - 137 min. (#4)
6. Ecco Jr (Genesis) - 100 min.
7. Flying Shark (Arcade) - 75 min. (#7)
8. Battle Zone (bootleg of Mayday) (Arcade) - 44 min.
9. Bells & Whistles (Arcade) - 40 min.
10. Block Block (Arcade) - 37 min.

 

Pre-NES top 10:

 

1. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 285 min. (PN#1)
2. Kaboom! (Atari 2600) - 137 min. (PN#2)
3. Battle Zone (bootleg of Mayday) (Arcade) - 44 min.
4. Skiing (Atari 2600) - 16 min. (PN#7)
5. Q*Bert (Arcade) - 15 min.
5. Red Sea Crossing (Atari 2600) - 15 min.
7. Battlezone (Arcade) - 10 min.
7. Birdiy (Arcade) - 10 min.
7. Punch-Out (Arcade) - 10 min.
7. River Raid Brazil (Atari 2600) - 10 min.
7. Space Invaders (Arcade) - 10 min.
 

Top 10 systems:

 

1. Atari 2600 (5 games) - 463 min. (#2)
2. SNES (4 games) - 395 min.
3. Game Boy Color (1 game) - 350 min.
4. Arcade (12 games) - 285 min. (#3)
5. Genesis (2 games) - 254 min.
6. Game Gear (2 games) - 55 min. (#1)
7. Neo Geo AES/MVS (1 game) - 31 min.
8. Intellivision (1 game) - 2 min.

 

While the overall numbers are on the low side, the battle for the title is close with 5 min between Monopoly and Terranigma. The pre-NES duo Solar Fox and Kaboom! are in a class of their own, and brings the Atari 2600 to the systems title.

 

No changes to the 1000, 5000, 10000 Minute Clubs.

[Atarian7]

I wonder: Did participation drop off last year during Thanksgiving week?

[carlsson]

2022 weeks 45-48: 7300, 3600, 3900, 3300 min

2023 weeks 45-47: 3000, 2000, 1800 min

[Atarian7]

So it did drop some although from a higher starting point.

 

[carlsson]

More detailed comparison of participation in November:

 

2019

Week 45: 3855 min, 47 games, 16 systems

Week 46: 2422 min, 49 games, 11 systems

Week 47: 2912 min, 56 games, 13 systems

Week 48: 3147 min, 46 games, 10 systems

 

2020

Week 45: 2607 min, 50 games, 10 systems

Week 46: 1772 min, 44 games, 8 systems

Week 47: 2421 min, 38 games, 10 systems

Week 48: 3678 min, 75 games, 15 systems

 

2021

Week 45: 4087 min, 56 games, 18 systems

Week 46: 4741 min, 57 games, 16 systems

Week 47: 5306 min, 103 games, 20 systems

Week 48: 5236 min, 79 games, 19 systems

 

2022

Week 45: 7286 min, 99 games, 22 systems

Week 46: 3621 min, 76 games, 21 systems

Week 47: 3931 min, 87 games, 23 systems

Week 48: 3365 min, 84 games, 19 systems

 

2023

Week 45: 2992 min, 124 games, 12 systems

Week 46: 2034 min, 48 games, 12 systems

Week 47: 1835 min, 28 games, 8 systems

 

So we're currently back to 2020 levels, roughly speaking, after two somewhat more active years.

[Hwlngmad]

So, I was away for a bit for a trip with the family to Lima, Peru.  However, I did do some gaming while I was away.  I will leave it to carlsson to figure out exactly how we wants to record this.

 

My times from 11/19 to 11/29 were:

 

Game Boy

1) BreakThru! - 40 minutes

 

GBC

1) 720 - 25 minutes

2) Klustar - 10 minutes

3) NBA In the Zone - 5 minutes

4) Rampage World Tour - 20 minutes

5) Wario Land II DC - 20 minutes

6) Wendy: Everyday Witch - 25 minutes

 

Game Gear

1) Side Pocket - 20 minutes

[+jgkspsx]

3 hours ago, Hwlngmad said:

5) Wario Land II DC - 20 minutes

6) Wendy: Everyday Witch - 25 minutes

DC? DX?

 

I think it's Wendy: Every Witch Way.

[Hwlngmad]

13 hours ago, jgkspsx said:

DC? DX?

 

I think it's Wendy: Every Witch Way.

So, it is just "Wario Land II" and then "Wendy: Every Witch Way".  Thanks!

[carlsson]

Arcade:
Giga Wing - 10 min.

 

SNES:
Barbie Vacation Adventure - 10 min.
Cool Spot - 5 min.

 

A bit unusual choices for me. While I didn't play any games of my own intention this week, we had a Christmas party to which a friend of mine had brought a device with 30,000 pirated games, ranging from a handful Atari games, via Famicom, Super Famicom, Game Boy and Genesis to arcade ROMs. We played a few different ones, and the above ones were the ones I bothered to take notes what they were. Apparently the Barbie game origins from a leaked prototype as the game never made the market, and while I'm definitely not in the demographic for the game, it had some interesting elements like jumping over rivers, shooting (pictures of) animals, finding hidden presents etc. The last part felt a bit like Impossible Mission minus the robots.

[Kurt_Woloch]

Here are my times for this past week (November 27th through December 3rd, 2023):

 

Arcade:

Arabian - 96 min. in 3 sessions

Block Hole - 20 min.

 

MSX:

Moonsweeper - 18 min.

 

This week, my main game was "Arabian" which I remembered from a previous session, and this time I played it until I managed to get through all 4 screens after which the screens repeat with harder difficulty. Today, I set out to do the same thing again, and strangely, it took me longer to achieve that than the previous sessions of this week combined. What I noticed about this game are different levels of transparency... you can notice the "Kangaroo effect" in some places, especially with the flying carpets. As far as I can see in the MAME driver, it used bitmapped graphics as well as sprites, so the carpets may be software sprites because they run out of hardware sprites to use which would explain their limited transparency.

 

A new game in the "A-Z" series was Block Hole, I think by Konami, which I remember having played back in the day in the arcade as well.

 

Finally, I played the MSX version of Moonsweeper. I chose this version because it's the only version of this game available on Retrogames.cc. It looks and feels very much like the TI-99/4A version, but runs at a higher framerate because the MSX systems have a faster processor.

[+thegoldenband]

My times for the week:

 

Intellivision:

Frog Bog - 14 min.

Princess Quest - 42 min.

Sydney Hunter and the Sacred Tribe - 70 min.

 

Beat two Intellivision homebrews; thoughts here.

 

[+jgkspsx]

Lots of stuff on a lot of systems this week.

 

Arcade:

Battle Chopper/Mr Heli no Daibouken - 75 minutes

Finally cracked 100k!

 

Flying Shark - 80 minutes

Finally cracked 100k!

 

Nitro Ball - 10 minutes

 

Puzzle Bobble/Bust a Move - 20 minutes

Finally cracked 100k! (Okay, by a good ways.)

 

Task Force Harrier - 35 minutes

Finally cracked... you get the idea.

 

Amiga:

Bridge Strike - 25 minutes

Carried over from last week, oops.

 

Atari 2600:

Trying out the new Atari paddles and carts. Really nice!

 

Berzerk Enhanced Edition (2023) - 25 minutes

This is a new official version different than the Atari original or the AtariAge enhanced edition.

 

Breakout - 15 minutes

I honestly don't think I've ever played this version before.

Canyon Bomber - 10 minutes

Night Driver - 5 minutes

Video Olympics - 15 minutes

It started out as a pitched battle against the CPU and then after it got to 11 it turned into a bloodbath. I am not sure I ever played this either?

 

Game Boy Color:

Wario Land 3 - 5 minutes
 

Intellivision:

Night Stalker - 45 minutes

 

Neo Geo:

Zed Blade - 65 minutes

 

Odyssey2:

Killer Bees! - 25 minutes

P.T. Barnum's Acrobats! - 45 minutes

Thanks to The Voice this is probably my favorite Circus Atari take ever. TURKEY!

Q*Bert! - 10 minutes

Seems very laggy. Playing PAL conversion on multicart so I am not sure if that is part of it?

 

PlayStation:

Impact Racing - 25 minutes

San Francisco RUSH - 15 minutes

The X-Files: The Game - 75 minutes

Did Apple and Nokia actually license this???

R-Zone:

Mortal Kombat Trilogy - 25 minutes

Beat it and then played some more.

[DragonGrafx-16]

PC Engine Overload heh

 

PC Engine:

Coryoon: Child of Dragon - 122 mins
Tatsujin - 12 mins
W-Ring - The Double Rings - 10 mins
Burning Angels - 14 mins
Neutopia - 74 mins
Dead Moon - 26 mins
Barunba - 17 mins
Terra Cresta II 45 mins
Formation Armed F 16 mins
Soldier Blade 31 mins
Override - 18 mins
Final Sodier - 28 mins
Gunhed - 53 mins
Daisenpuu - 14 mins
Dinoforce - 10 mins
Antlantean - 11 mins
Magical Chase 14 mins
Ankoku Densetsu (AKA The Legendary Axe II but that's funny cause 
you start with a sword but from what I know it's not actually a sequel lol) 27 mins

Hatris - 29 mins

PC Engine CD:
Star Parodier - 33 mins
 

[Wayler]

Just continuing my travel through the world this week. Managed to beat the most overpowered boss in Spain, hopefully it's smoother sailing after that.

 

SNES

Terranigma - 304 min

[Hwlngmad]

Here are my totals from 12/1 to 12/3.  My times were:

 

N64

1) Star Wars Episode I: Racer - 55 minutes

 

2600

1) Air Raiders - 5 minutes

2) Bridge - 25 minutes

3) Front Line - 5 minutes

4) Ms. Pac Man - 20 minutes

5) Rally-X - 15 minutes

6) Space Invaders - 20 minutes