noobie question

[JGIII]

I just purchased a very nice 2600 and have gotten my collection up to about 50 games or so. They all seem to run well, and I have several paddles, joysticks, and driving controllers, all in working conditions. The problem arises sometimes when I put in a game, it doesn't want to respond to the controller, even if I had just finished using that same controller on a different game. I'm wondering if certain games required the controller to be plugged into the left or right slots only, or if I'm missing a way to get the game started. Any help would be really appriciated. I love having my 2600 and I want to get the most out it. Please respond back to this forum, or e-mail me at joeguzman22@hotmail.com

 

Thank you.

 

JG

[Mindfield]

There are indeed a few games that were designed to use the right controller port only. This is even true for paddles in certain circumstances -- Tac Scan for example uses the right paddle on the right port. Took me a while to figure that one out. :-)

 

Best thing to do is have two controllers plugged in when playing. If it doesn't respond to one controller, try the other one. :-)

[candiru]

As long as you're not trying to use the wrong controller for the game it's most likely that you're correct about it being in the wrong controller port. IIRC a lot of the CBS games and a few of the other 3rd party games use the other port. Some games require a controller in each port to work correctly.

 

Just make a note of any of the games that are unresponsive and then have a look at the

AtariAge 2600 database. Search the titles and then check out the manuals. Have fun!

[Ze_ro]

Well, if you're talking about joysticks, there are a handful of games that (for whatever reason) require you to use a joystick in the right port. The only one I can think of off-hand is Towering Inferno by US Games.

 

If you're talking about paddles, then there's a whole host of potential problems here. It's actually quite complicated, but if you want to read the gory details, check out my big long post about half-way through this thread. The basic idea here is that you should use a pair of Atari-made paddles hooked up to the left port, and then just try both of them to see which works for whatever game. The only game that will give you trouble in this case is Tac-Scan by Sega.

 

--Zero

[Zonie]

Starship / Outer space uses the right port for single player games. Most, however, use the Left port.

[JGIII]

Thanks everyone. Last night, we sat down, hammered through everything and got it going. A few of the games were particular about what ports the controllers needed to be in,but not to many. The biggest thing ( and I'm going to sound so lame admitting this ) was that we wouldn't hit restart once we selected the version we wanted to play. Apparently, that helps quite a bit........

 

 

Anyways, Thanks again and happy gaming.

 

 

JG