A while ago I convinced myself that the 5200 mainboard could be reduced to the size of a game cartridge, but still using the original 40DIP ICs and DIP ROM. Last Fall, I gave it a try. Family obligations and the dread of soldering small SMT components put the project on the back burner until a couple of days ago.

It works wonderfully! The mainboard measures 88mm x 108mm and features audio line out and svideo out. Here it is in comparison with a 5200 cartridge. And with an Atarimax USB flash cartridge, shell removed, running Pac-Man off of that cartridge.

solidcorp, on Fri Jul 29, 2011 8:43 PM, said:

I shouldn't reply, but I'm going to.
But I'm only going to because I honestly don't think you understand.

This thread feels like one giant troll.
In short, it's "Look-- I made something.  You can never have it.  Well, you can if someone pays me an insulting price, maybe.  But that doesn't guarantee that you'll have it anyway."

Maybe you don't understand the community here.  We're a dying breed.  As time goes on, this hobby has less and less followers.
We're really far removed from the 80s.  A few people have brought new life into the hobby, and one of the cool outcomes was the creation of this site.
It's a place where a few of us who can't get enough of the Atari's heyday can hang out.  I remember the Atari 2600 I got when I was 5, and it defined a major part of my life.  It led me to be a programmer, and to homebrew a few games of my own.  This community has been VERY good to me, so I have always shared what I have with them.  But, still, I recognize that times change.  The older I get, the more people I meet who have no idea what an Atari was.  It's kind of sad.

As there become less and less of us, and as time goes on, this community only grows in respect for one another.  I'm blown away by things I've seen.
People on these forums defend each other when attacked by jerks.  We are brought together by our love of Atari.  Homebrewers share new creations, and people lovingly test their code.  New finds are brought forth to keep that flame of excitement from being extinguished.  People disassemble old ROMS to find new secrets.  There is a lot going on here, but our common ground is love for Atari, and trying to keep this thing alive for as long as we can.

So, why lock this thread?  Well, there's a LOT of very good people on here.  This isn't an outpost of pirates.  It's people who love a hobby.  Your initial posts were fearful of that.  But, we're the good guys.  Our love of the hobby is what brought us together.  So, think about this long and hard-- what value is this thread?  You're dangling a carrot in front of a bunch of good people.  And, they'll never be able to reach it.  I know you think that's not true because you've offered a "fair price", or at least fair to you.  But, it's not fair to us.  Let me explain why.

To the good people here, there are only a handful here or less that could afford your asking price.  So, you're putting pressure on a few fortunate souls.  They could buy it; sure.  If they do, you need to understand that they'll never get their money back from resales.  Ever.  It's not possible.  One-of-a-kind protos usually can recoup a couple of thousand dollars in sales.  As I said, it's a dying community.  So, whenever one of those people who can afford a prototype has one from "back in the day" come across his or her way, the sell price is typically a few thousand dollars.  People in this community have taken THOUSAND DOLLAR LOSSES to "do the right thing".  They resell copies to make back their money, but still lose money.  We respect those who do that, with our meager 50 dollar contributions.  It's history, and those that can afford to do whatever it takes to help.

Forget about the Boxed Air-Raid-- that has special sentimental value to some collectors, and it's a special piece of history, so it doesn't count.  Apart from that, a few thousand dollars for a single copy of something is the general norm.  It's a price that's fair for the buyer to possibly make their money back in sales (though they usually don't even break even), and to satisfy the programmer for a job well done.  So, your price is exceedingly unfair.  Most of the community seems to have resolved that they don't care.  We don't want to pressure the few that can purchase this take a $25,000 or more loss just to keep people here happy.  It's not right.  I think even that if you did have a tentative buyer, we'd try to talk them out of it at this point.  I don't want anyone putting themself that far out for a game.  And, it really is just a game.

You've also done something very wrong by not guaranteeing a ROM release.  "It's up to the buyer".  Well, thanks a lot.  The community here takes a back seat I guess.  Let's say some guy here or on ebay did buy it and said not to release.  Then you've wasted our time with a story about something we didn't buy and can never play.  And, that's a really sad story to put on a website that celebrates and breathes life into Atari.  This is your most egregious error.

I don't know where your confusion comes from.  Many of us are tired of this, and the points made above are detailed in many posts.

Look, then From one programmer to another, I respect your past and current work.
However, you're not respecting ours.  We built this site and community.
We watch out for each other, and we try to be fair to each other.

From this point forward, this thread will be people trying to convince you to lower the price, for reasons above, and to consider full release if sold.
Sounds like you're immovable in that area.  So, then what's left to talk about in this thread?
Questions have been answered, and we've seen all that we're going to see.
So, what else could anyone have to say?
And, if people are going to pat you on the back about previous work you've done, do it in another thread.

It's your move.  But, if you're just going to sit on this with an unfair price, then you're wasting our time.
You've moved a lot of respected people on this site from curious to angry.  That's not a good way to act in this community.
You really ought to think about what your actions are doing.  The longer this thread goes nowhere, the worse you're making yourself look.
You're not a contributor.  You're not being fair.  And, you're wasting the time of the only people that care about this stuff at all.

  -John

Guys,

This is David Crane.  The author of this thread - Byte Knight - tracked me down through a Facebook account that I rarely use.  He provided me this link.

Where do I start?  First, one poster hit the nail on the head regarding making Pitfall 3… Activision owns the PItfall name, and they have even made a couple of sequels since I left the company in 1987.  Pitfall belongs to them because the company was paying my salary when I created it. (Under today's intellectual property laws, the Mona Lisa would belong to Lisa's husband who paid Da Vinci for a portrait of his wife.  And Queen Isabella of Spain discovered America - since she paid for the trip.)  So, No, I will not be making Pitfall 3.  I couldn't if I wanted to.

Second, the 2600.  The 2600 has always been my favorite system because of the challenge it provided.  But as much as I love it, it is not the best system to make a game.  And in my line of work, I believe that the game is more important than the system.  SInce you are viewing this thread, you all have a fondness for the 2600 and the games from the early days of video games.  And you enjoyed playing Pitfall.  I submit to you that it is not the 2600 that made those games great.  Sure, the limited hardware forced us to be more creative in making games, and it showed in those early titles.  But I have found that those same skills translate into game design regardless of the system.  When I am given complete creative control and the time to make exactly the game I want to make, it can be just as much fun to play as Pitfall.

So what system is best?  With the right team in place, any modern system has the power to deliver on my vision of what a game should be.  And I know what I'm talking about.  I have published over 100 games since I started, and I have programmed them on 25 different game consoles or platforms.  What is my favorite modern system?  I really like the iPhone and iPad, but I will always choose the platform that best complements the game.

Another reason that it would be difficult to make Pitfall 3, even if I had the rights, is because I am always working on new game ideas.  I am currently in the design and planning stage of the biggest game project I have taken on in 20 years.  You all know now that it won't be Pitfall 3.  But on the other hand, this September is PItfall's 30th anniversary.  And nobody would be surprised if my new, major game project were to pay homage in some way to the most popular game I ever made.

All is currently top secret.  But if you would like to be among the first to learn about the project when it becomes public, go to http://www.JungleVenture.com and submit your email address.  You will hear the details at the same time the press is notified.  You can also follow me on Twitter @PitfallCreator.  I'm not one of the most talkative tweeters, but neither do I announce where I am going to dinner every night.  And as I start to leak details on the project, it will probably be there.

But for this group I have to come back to the 2600.  I will admit that I still have a certain fondness for the good ol' VCS.  In fact, sitting on my desk about 5 feet away as I write this is a PC with a CAD design 80% complete for a super 2600 cartridge that incorporates the best of my DPC chip design and my $FE bank switch circuitry, among other cool features.  One day I hope to finish that circuit design and make a 2600 cartridge that would really kick butt.  All I have to do is figure out a way to make that project complement my new, big game project rather than causing a distraction.

I'll work on that.

Sal was a bit quicker with the video than I thought  

I didn't think the day would come, but I've decided to stop messing about with the game and just release it. Hopefully there aren't too many problems with it...

It's suitable for all XL/XE machines with at least 64K RAM. In the .zip is a MaxFlash cartridge image suitable for emulators. Of course you can also use the cartridge image to program a real 8Mbit MaxFlash cartridge to run on a real machine.

 sharrier.zip   351.13K   1061 downloads

Hi guys,

   Surgery went great last week, been taking it super easy and recovering, still have to relax for a few weeks and take things slow. I have two devices now attached to my mitral valve that have completely closed off the severe leaks that was causing my PA pressure to skyrocket and putting me into congestive heart failure.

   Starting to feel better and stronger and going to start this week to perhaps see if I can map some drives to my development computer and setup remote desktop so I can remote into my office and try to do some work on the XM board, I know Mark has been itching for me to finish up a bunch of things and add some corrections and updates to the schematics too, so lets see how things go, it would be great to have the XM's shipping at the end of March, going to see how I can handle getting back into things...

   Seeing my cardiologist on Tuesday for followup and to review over the surgery in detail, not totally out of the woods yet, these devices need 6 months to permanently seat and I also have a few other issues which hopefully will be better managed now with the major leaky valve fixed, but I'm on the right track.

  Just want to thank everyone for all the positive messages and well wishes, it put a smile on my face and I really appreciate everyone's support...


Curt

As an admirer of the amazing work that PacManPlus has done with the 7800 system, I just wanted to start a thread where other fans of his work could express their appreciation for all he's done.  This is emphatically NOT a thread to rehash and re-fight issues that have recently happened, but just for expressing thanks to a guy who's contributed so much to the 7800 and this site.

Just as a reminder, this is the man who programmed:

Pac-man Collection
Super Pac-man
Junior Pac-man
Super Circus AtariAge
Meteor Shower
CrazyBrix
Asteroids Deluxe
Space Duel
Space Invaders 7800
FailSafe
(possibly others, post them if I missed something!)

I don't know Bob, haven't ever even interacted with him, but reading through some recent threads, it's clear he hasn't been receiving the kind of recognition that he is due as one of the superstar programmers of this community.  So many thanks to him, and I hope everyone who's enjoyed his work can use this area to express their own appreciation.

Hi:

I've been pointed to this thread by jweirer and GroovyBee.  Thank you all so much for what looks like one of the nicest things anyone has ever done for me.  I have apologized in the other thread for misunderstanding most things (except for the person who was banned): http://www.atariage....ost__p__2330263

You all are great, wonderful people, and I really feel silly now.  There will be more games from myself and GB in the near future.
Thank you,

Bob

This is all very interesting and so wrong. I can understand keeping a binary from the unwashed hoarders. I also understand the pride and desire to seek acclaim for one's work. I even understand wanting a reasonable return on your time. Good luck. However, there's a line where pride and sensibility ends and pure tackiness begins and this particular one is way way over it. Put whatever ridiculous price you want on your cartridge, and maybe some idiot will buy it. That's your right, but it doesn't make it right. And despite your "many months of very hard work", or words to that effect, and your laughable asking price of $32K... no matter HOW hard you worked and HOW clever you think you are... that pales to insignificance compared to the work that many other homebrewers have done on their games which have, generally, freely been available as playable binaries. And no matter what you write, and how good you think it is, there are far better programmers out there who can do just as good a job. You may not get this -- the REAL reason that most of us program '2600 is... because we enjoy the challenge.  Not for the money, not for the fawning accolades of those begging for copies, nor for the feeling of self importance you may get. We do it because we can and because it's fun. It's a real pity you don't share that community spirit and sense of fun with the rest of us.

As a homebrew author who has developed bank-switching cartridges for three systems and given away the executable for his biggest project, I find this whole thread to feel like a giant psychological game. I'm proudest of the fact that those who bought my game and those who downloaded it for free write me to tell me how much they enjoy it. When I decided to develop for obsolete platforms I had to come to grips with the fact that although I wouldn't make much money, I could make people happy and make a name for myself.

They had MANY chances to change their behavior.  They constantly attacked members here with personal insults.  Neither would ever admit fault.  They trolled many threads looking to start arguments.

I've been on this forum for nearly a decade and not once have I had an issue with anyone else.  It was not a personal vendetta against those two.  They simply cannot play well with others.  They are not capable of having a rational discussion.  They cannot accept the fact that people have different opinions.

Nobody on here needs to be called a "stupid idiot", "skunk", "envious snake" for disagreeing with an opinion.  The forum is a better place without them.

i) He violated the terms of use.

ii) He was rubbing people up the wrong way intentionally.

iii) There are now threads and threads of just crap that are not of any use to anyone unless you have 20+ hours to sift through the diarrhoea that came from Atariksi/Divya.

I think it's perfectly logical to ban him for the above reasons plus countless others.

Aaron

With the exception of a very (VERY) few people... the Jaguar community is the most childish, useless and pathetic bunch of people I have ever seen in my life.

You all really disgust me.  My basic issues:

1. No one works openly and constructively, never posting wip game code (just like 2600, 5200, 7800, 800 coders) never posting their source code (just like the 2600, 5200, 7800, 800 coders)

2. Everytime someone has a new game, you spend more time bashing the coder(s) and game(s) then supporting the games.   Maybe you guys don't realize it, but practically no one codes anymore on the Jaguar platform, you should be happy with any games or work done on the platform.

3. You spend more time attacking one another then ever having any kind of constructive conversations.

4. You are actually concerned with PIRACY!!?!?!   YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Notice how nearly every 2600, 5200, 7800, 800 homebrew is freely posted up for everyone to download.   Yet when someone makes carts - people still want to buy the physical carts.

5.  You guys are trying to make money from the Jag Platform --- you've got an audience of only a small handful of people (maybe if you'd stop alienating everyone that comes along you'd have a far larger base of enthusiasts!!!)

6. Everything has to be secret, no one is willing to share info, status of work or projects.   You all have these little camps that fight with one another none stop.

7. Learn to WORK with one another, TALK with one another, SHARE idea's and such with one another - hey here's an idea, go look at the Atari 2600, 5200, 7800 and 8bit forums - see...   people WORKING WITH ONE ANOTHER, not FLAMING one another, SHARING with one another...

I have so had it with the whole lot of you, I have stacks of diskettes with source code to Kasumi Ninja, Defender 2000 and other sources.... they can just sit around until that bitrot to sh*t for all I care...  all of the tools and source code I've released over the years, the Encryption keys for carts & disks, the countless files, video's and what not... you guys have squandered and pissed away so many opportunities to do some positive things with one another and maybe make people take notice and have some respect for the Jag Community...

All people do is look at the Jag community and move on - nothing to see hear, just a bunch of squabbling babies who don't know how to work with one another and get along...

Go ahead - Flame away, I could give a rats ass, nothing worthwhile in the Jag community to be bothered with anyway...  hurry back to your flamewars, you might miss something....


Curt

Hi All...

Well, I literally blew the dust off of things 3 days ago, the workbench and early Test XM's and Mark and I are going back and forth.  My main XM test unit unfortunately got knocked around badly in a tipping over of equipment on an adjacent workbench and it got banged up really bad and many of the jumper wires got ripped up, so its useless right now.   I have got both feet back and just sent Mark some updates, one additional update I need to get to him tomorrow, but if all goes well, then (HOPEFULLY) in a week I'll get boards for 4 final test units in, 2 will be for Mark and I to finalize designs and testing, debug the Audio portion and once we wrap that up then the other two will initially go out to Perry and Bob as they have both been in desperate need to test their games on real XM hardware.   So lets hope to get things wrapped up, I am feeling really good and feeling very upbeat, so I really want to get these XM's out to everyone.


Curt

If Therealbountybob is making a pitch to give Atariksi and divya16 a second chance, I offer my account as a replacement in the banlist.

They were told countless times, they took no notice. They moved over to threads that were perfectly healthy before their involvement and damn near killed them - although the 7800 one recovered quite nicely once they were ejected from it.

People like emkay can wind people up at times, but at least in their case it just  comes out of their enthusiasm and they are trying to progress things a bit with experiments and bits of code, music and graphics here and there so it's not really a bad thing. Atariksi and divya16 were just outright looking for a fight with no other motivation.

I'm thinking things are better without them and the forum is pretty much pointless with them because anything worth discussing (for example a potential weakness of the A8, or a new technique adapted from another platform which would involve, god forbid, *acknowlidging that it exists*) would stir up debate, which if done with an ounce of common sense can lead to people trying to prove/disprove/experiment with things and some good can come of it.

If you can't have those kinds of discussions then there's no point really.

As opposed to the multi-GHz consoles we have today that just play pointless cut-scenes featuring dead-looking characters in between scripted game play? Yeah, I think it's funny. Funny how 15 year old arcade hardware trumps today's consoles in pure game play value and entertainment.

In the past month, H2 has undergone a ground-up redesign and the new direction is very promising and exciting, and it will be more capable than originally conceived.

I've said this before, but I mean it when I say this year is the year...

Hi guys,

Can't thank everyone enough for all the posts and well wishes...  I just posted this over in another thread, but wanted to copy here to give everyone an update on things:

My Mitral Valve is a real attention whore, been replaced once, repaired twice and now it is leaking all around where its seated badly and causing my pulminary artery pressure to skyrocket and in turn blood is not flowing enough and I ended up with 18 liters of fluid saturation in my body, mostly in my belly, not a good thing, all my organs were being pushed against, tough to breath, and heart wasn't pumping well...    So meeting with cardiac surgeon to discuss game plan, looks like he feels very confident in going in with a mini-thoracodomy and going up into my heart to repair the points where the valve is leaking, possibly with a medical anchor ring to lock it down into place once and for all...   recovery time will be much less traumatic as well since they wont have to crack my rib cage open yet again, so hoping for some good news come Wednesday and get me booked for an OR and have them fix this valve once and for all...

Happy New Year and I hope 2013 is a fresh new start for me health wise and I can stop having recurring heart problems, for a guy who never smoked, drank, did drugs or anything, I'm really getting the short end of the stick on my lately and I really need my heart fixed once and for all, got a lot to live for - my Wife and Daughter and still have so much to do Atari wise, so I need to get back in the game...


Thanks
Curt

OKay,

So, do you want a NEW console that is 2600/7800 compatible in the

2600jr Style:
http://www.pugo.org/...Atari2600jr.jpg

Or

3200 "System X" Style:
http://www.atarimuse...lvia/sylvia.JPG


With the 7800 Expansion Module moving to shipping shortly, it would be the intention to incorporate its features inside this new console, so it would all be built in - the high score keeping, pokey and so forth (just not the SIO and keyboard ports)  So this would be a new super-7800 system.   It just comes down to, which design would you prefer?   The 3200 console is slightly bigger then the 2600jr, but around the size of the 7800 console, it is a more complex casing so the product cost would be higher due to the case, just keep that in mind.

This would NOT be an Atari product, it would not be licensed to use the Atari name, it would however be under a very well known video game company name that some may feel is equally as important as Atari.   So this would be done and sold under a non-Atari name, it would be an Atari-compatible system only.

Need as much input from people as possible by Sept 15th please... thanks.

Curt

Hi Guys,

I thought I'd celebrate the one year anniversary of the release of Halo 2600 at the Classic Gaming Expo by making the source code available. It's not particularly cleaned up or well documented but I put it here, as is, with the hopes that it will help some future 2600 homebrew programmers, just as I was helped by others who posted their code. Please let me know if you have any questions and thanks to everyone for their kind words about this project over the last year.

                           -Ed Fries

Hi,
This is my little contribution to Your world,
It took me 4 days to get it there, and its still not perfect - as you can see, there are sone glitches (complete lack of sync) during the game boot i haven't investigated yet, but it all come in its own sweet time

I would like to thanks following members for their contribution to this project:
Shawn Jefferson, who talked me into this and gave Lynx I and few games (on their way from Canada)
uicr0Bee for lending me his Lynx II and Batman game so i could work while waiting on Shawn's parcell

Tools used:
Rigol DS1052E oscilloscope for initial gueswork on LCD interface (there is no documentation for it, apart from schematics, so i had to do it the hard way)
Altera/TerasIC DE1 board with custom 3.3V<>5V level shifter board i've also used during SoundBoard development

enough said, enjoy!