joeybastard Posted January 7, 2005 Share Posted January 7, 2005 I was playing Caverns of Mars on my 800Xl last night and got to wondering. Why wasn't this made for the 5200 too or a 2600 version for that matter? I really like the game and its copyright is Atari so I wonder they didn't port it cross platform. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sku_u Posted January 7, 2005 Share Posted January 7, 2005 I was playing Caverns of Mars on my 800Xl last night and got to wondering. Why wasn't this made for the 5200 too or a 2600 version for that matter? I really like the game and its copyright is Atari so I wonder they didn't port it cross platform. It was ported over by either kenfused or classics and is available on the multicart classics offers. It is a great game. As for why Atari didn't port it over back in the day, it may have been a simple question of timing. When was it released originally? Atari more or less gave up on the 5200 by 1984. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sku_u Posted January 7, 2005 Share Posted January 7, 2005 Nevermind, I just checked over at Atarimania and it lists the relase of this of 1981 which would have put it right in the mix for porting over to the 5200. Does this one appear on any rumor lists? Maybe Tempest will see this thread and be able ti shed some light on this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joeybastard Posted January 7, 2005 Author Share Posted January 7, 2005 I've never seen it as a rumor for the 5200 which is part of what got me wondering about it. The graphics of it are simple enough that a decent version could be done on the VCS too, I think. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Mitchell Posted January 7, 2005 Share Posted January 7, 2005 Gosh I love Caverns of Mars! I had it on cassette back in 1982 and would play it on my 800. It would take almost 5 minutes to boot up from cassette playback which didn't bother me any .. the music and the image would suddenly show up on the screen. Now I have the cart of course!! Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Allan Posted January 8, 2005 Share Posted January 8, 2005 I love playing Caverns of Mars on my 5200. It's one of my favorite games. Allan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Allan Posted January 8, 2005 Share Posted January 8, 2005 Opps. Allan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Allan Posted January 8, 2005 Share Posted January 8, 2005 Dammit no edit! Allan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Inky Posted January 8, 2005 Share Posted January 8, 2005 Caverns of Mars and Blaster are the two main reasons I pull out my 600 XL! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Allan Posted January 8, 2005 Share Posted January 8, 2005 Caverns of Mars and Blaster are the two main reasons I pull out my 600 XL! Yea, I love Blaster also. It's what is usually in my 5200. What a great game. It never gets boring for me. Allan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deathtrappomegranate Posted January 8, 2005 Share Posted January 8, 2005 You know, I have a strange feeling that someone might be working on this... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad2600 Posted January 8, 2005 Share Posted January 8, 2005 I have Caverns of Mars for my 800XL and I like it quite a bit. A 2600 or 5200 version would be cool. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
classics Posted January 9, 2005 Share Posted January 9, 2005 Nice label, did you finally get a copy of the manual scan without a watermark? Steve Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Allan Posted January 9, 2005 Share Posted January 9, 2005 Nice label, did you finally get a copy of the manual scan without a watermark? Steve Yes I did. I just have been so busy lately. I'm not to thrilled about the font though. I think it could be better. Allan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NovaXpress Posted January 14, 2005 Share Posted January 14, 2005 Caverns of Mars wasn't actually developed by Atari. Here's a section from atarihq: Once upon a time, young Greg Christensen built electronic gizmos like amplifiers and sound generators from scratch. Ready to take on another challenge, he bought an Atari 800 computer with his savings. After Greg taught himself the basics of programming, he decided to have a go at designing a computer game. Six weeks later, the high school senior had developed Caverns of Mars--a game in which the layer flies a spaceship down through the twists and turns of a cavern while battling enemy craft and blowing up fuel dumps. Why not, he thought, send the program to Atari Program Exchange (APX) in Sunnyvale, Calif. and see what happens? Two months later, Greg received a call from an Atari executive who raved about Caverns of Mars. Not only did APX accept it, the company wanted permission to market the game as one of its upcoming products. In the all of 1981, Caverns won an APX contest. The prize: $3,000. Now an 18-year-old college freshman, Greg received his first quarterly royalty check this summer--for $18,000! Atari has told him he might eventually earn as much as $100,000 in royalties from Caverns of Mars. I suspect that Caverns wasn't even considered for a 5200 release because it wasn't a hot license and possibly also because it wasn't developed in-house. APX offered a lot of good stuff developed by homebrewers, such as the Excalibur RPG. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Mitchell Posted January 14, 2005 Share Posted January 14, 2005 I remember hearing that when Greg Christensen sent his Caverns of Mars program to Atari Program Exchange that the APX office personnel stopped working that day so that everyone there could play the game. Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Inky Posted January 14, 2005 Share Posted January 14, 2005 I was playing Caverns of Mars on my 800Xl last night and got to wondering. Why wasn't this made for the 5200 too or a 2600 version for that matter? Thinking about it, Doesn't River Raid 2600 have many of the elements required for CoM, albeit upside down? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
www.atarimania.com Posted January 14, 2005 Share Posted January 14, 2005 APX offered a lot of good stuff developed by homebrewers, such as the Excalibur RPG. Excalibur wasn't a homebrew at all, it was designed by a team led by Chris Crawford at Atari. The group was working on artificial intelligence at the time and also developed a game called Gossip (which was never released officially). -- Atari Frog http://www.atarimania.com Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joeybastard Posted January 14, 2005 Author Share Posted January 14, 2005 Thinking about it' date=' Doesn't River Raid 2600 have many of the elements required for CoM, albeit upside down?[/quote'] Sort of, CoM goes both up and down since you have to escape the cavern alasobackthe weay you came. @Nova - Thanks, I didn't know it was an APX program. That explains a lot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Godzilla Posted January 14, 2005 Share Posted January 14, 2005 it really is a shame there is nothing like apx today... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Mitchell Posted January 14, 2005 Share Posted January 14, 2005 it really is a shame there is nothing like apx today... Ahmm! Atariage! and others. Anyway APX distributed their programs on cassette which took up to 5 minutes to load into the Atari computer. A cassette drive is all I could afford then. I seem to remember that floppies were available from APX also. Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NovaXpress Posted January 14, 2005 Share Posted January 14, 2005 I'm pretty sure Excalibur was only available on disk. I know I've still got an APX catalog buried away which I now need to find. I recently found the original programming guide that came with 800, which I was very excited to see. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Allan Posted January 14, 2005 Share Posted January 14, 2005 http://www.atariarchives.org/APX/ Allan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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