An idea

[Lord Thag]

Here's an idea I thought I'd throw out. I've used the high score club for awhile now to pick out games I might not ordinarily play. I don't compete, mainly because I don't have a digital camera, but I do use it to help me focus on games I might not necessarily pull out and play otherwise.

 

So here's the idea: Is anyone interested in doing an 'appreciation club', where once a week a member picks an odd or offbeat title that most people don't play, and gives it a sell? No high scores or competition or any of that, just once a week someone saying 'hey, try this game out, I like it, and here's why', and then the rest of us can add comments or discussion, or intersting stories to the thread. It's basically an incentive to actually play that 2/3 of the collection that gathers dust on the shelf, and since score is not involved, it would open up a ton of games that the HSC can't use.

 

Anyone interested? I'll start it off if I get enough of a response. Let me know what you all think.

[vdub_bobby]

Sounds cool. Be fun to talk about games that don't/won't make it into the HSC.

[moycon]

You mean like Sneak N Peek? If so...I'm in.

[Lord Thag]

You mean like Sneak N Peek? If so...I'm in

 

Yeah, exactly! There are a ton of games that don't get enough press like that. The idea is to convince people to give an unpopular or ignored game a second shot. I can't count the number of times a post on these boards convinced me to pop in a game I'd written off, and then I ended up really liking it (Reactor, Wizard of Wor etc). Having a club would get input for lots of people, and give a lot of games publicity that might otherwise go unmentioned.

[kencrisis]

I could see how this would be good for games that don't fit into the "high score" thing. Warlords comes immediately to mind. But in general, I too use the HSC to check out games and am happy with it.

[StanJr]

I hear good things about Word Zapper....

[gospeedde]

As an aside, not having a digital camera shouldn't keep you from playing in the HSC. I never post pics and I haven't received any death threats yet. Well, no serious ones anyway.

[video game addict]

Pictures aren't neccessary for the HSC. I wish more people would play along, maybe alot do & just don't feel like posting on it. If you're gonna go to the trouble of pulling out the games & play along on your own, you might as well join in & post some scores. Not everyone is good at all games, or comes in the top, I know I'm not that good at many. I didn't grow up playing 2600 games. I had a 5200, but I barely played it as I was oudoors most days till dark. My first 2600 wasn't bought until the late 90s just an impulse buy at a thrift. And in the time that I've owned a 2600, I really didn't play many of the games I had, only a select few that I kept on for more than a couple minutes.

 

It's just been over the last year or so that I picked up a modded 2600 for ease of connecting to my tv, as well as better picture quality, and during this time I've been trying more & more games. But I love my Ataris, even if I don't excel in all the games I own, it's still a blast to play!

 

 

I'm still playing Frostbite today even though that week has ended. I've now upped my score above the 140K mark, which had I played more during the week, instead of waiting till the weekend, I may of placed higher on the standings. But I'm not concerned with beating anyone else, only trying to explore new games and learn to play (on alot of these!) And just enjoying the simplicity of them all.

 

Now getting to this idea of an Appreciation club, I definitely would not mind, but I think it would be alot like the HSC, which could be overkill, maybe or maybe not. :/ I don't know if we really need another 'club', but I think if you've played a game you like & want to talk about it openly on the forums... DO SO! No need to wait to get enough interest in a new club.

 

 

I think that's one of the best things about this place, and the members here. I love being wowed by a Stan post! It's mind-blowing just how amazingly good he is at some of these games. It's also a little disgusting when i can't get even one tenth of his score on some games, like Entombed

 

But regardless of whether a new club starts up here on Atariage or not, I just like to see more discussions on the games. More discussion is good. More clubs, I don't really care if we get or not.

[Albert]

Pictures aren't neccessary for the HSC.  I wish more people would play along, maybe alot do & just don't feel like posting on it

 

When we switch to the new forum (should happen within a week), I'm going to try and publicize the High Score Clubs a bit more. For instance, by possibly highlighting the latest contest somewhere on the front page. I'm also going to move all the HSC's into their own sub-forum to make them easier to find and keep tabs on (for the 2600 HSC's, there will be a link to them from the top of the 2600 forum).

 

..Al

[Lord Helmet]

can you join the HSC in mid season? I have been thinking about playing...

[StanJr]

Anyone can jump on board the HSC at any time. You don't need screenshots or anything like that (although if you are posting some whacked out high scores on a game, a courtesy screenshot would be appreciated... ), just the desire to play and have fun!

 

Look forward to seeing you guys in the Club.

[+SpiceWare]

I've played a few games that have shown up, but between KrokCom and the big project at work I've gone beyond that. The big project is rolling out this weekend, so I think I'll start up with next week's game.

[Lord Thag]

Anyone can jump on board the HSC at any time. You don't need screenshots or anything like that (although if you are posting some whacked out high scores on a game, a courtesy screenshot would be appreciated...  

 

Well, that's good news! I guess I'm used to all those cynical forums elswhere. Count me in, I'll certainly participate!

 

I'm still not sure how everyone feels about the appreciation club thing though. If everyone just wants the HSC, thats perfectly ok with me too, though the idea isn't to detract or compete with it. Maybe I'd better restate my idea. Basically the gist of the appreciation club is to have a weekly or monthly column highlighting a game that either never gets played (Towering Inferno, Sky Skipper), is unsuitable for the HSC (Adventure, Warlords, Maze Craze etc), just gets a bad rep (Airlock, Wabbit), or is too rare to use (Waterworld, Rescue Terra 1 etc). The idea is to have more of a discussion about the merits of the game, thefun times had with it, rather than strategy or skill pointers. Sort of a collaborative discussion/review column. Like I said, no big deal, but I would like to hear a few more yea or nay votes before I go either way with it.

 

Thanks!

[StanJr]

So something more like a "Game Conversation of the Week" sort of deal. Personally, I would love that. A lot of what goes on in the HSC is with regards to scores or strategies, and not always just about the game itself.

 

I would participate in such a discussion.

[Lord Thag]

So something more like a "Game Conversation of the Week" sort of deal. Personally, I would love that. A lot of what goes on in the HSC is with regards to scores or strategies, and not always just about the game itself.

 

Sounds good. How about the Atari Appreciation Society? We could do a weekly column/discussion group, and rotate authors each week to get a broad spectrum of opinions. Sound good? Anyone interested in postion could PM me with their suggestions, and I will schedule when their turn would be, and maybe organise the actual submissions themselves. That way, there's no 'membership' hassles, and everyone can participate as they like.

 

That sound good to everyone?

[StanJr]

sounds good to me!

[davepesc]

This sounds like Oprah's book club!

 

We all go play a game, then come together to talk about the symbolism, technique and technical aspects over tea.

[StanJr]

and I assume you will be bringing the tea....