What have you actually PLAYED tracker for 2017 (Season 10)

[BurritoBeans]

NES

Ninja Gaiden II - 27 minutes

 

I have a whole spreadsheet of times but can't post until (hopefully) the middle of tomorrow as a massive storm knocked power out everywhere up here and there's no way I'm typing it up again on a phone.

 

I put Ninja Gaiden up as this one was silly - it's my cart and it worked fine on my NES but everyone else who brought a NES to this party couldn't get the stupid cartridge to work - past that it was fine though... I just got stuck on the third stage and called it quits, but it's always good fun.

[+wongojack]

Nothing tracked again for me this week, but I kept going with Mass Effect and Pinball FX2.

[+thegoldenband]

NES

Ninja Gaiden II - 27 minutes

 

I have a whole spreadsheet of times but can't post until (hopefully) the middle of tomorrow as a massive storm knocked power out everywhere up here and there's no way I'm typing it up again on a phone.

 

I put Ninja Gaiden up as this one was silly - it's my cart and it worked fine on my NES but everyone else who brought a NES to this party couldn't get the stupid cartridge to work - past that it was fine though... I just got stuck on the third stage and called it quits, but it's always good fun.

 

I can hold things open until you get power back.

[BurritoBeans]

Well, turns out Penelec got power back while I was at school - I have to say, I'm impressed... usually it drops, we report the outage, and it takes a few days at least - so this was a nice change over the usual, especially with the amount of downed power lines in other nearby areas.

So, here's the massive amount of times - it's not a lot of time (well not compared to my Lawnmower Man sprees...) but it's a lot of different times. Also, note - sorry that the formatting sucks, I just have no good way of doing this that I know of as I can't completely BBCode the thing, pasting it into word and then into here doesn't work, etc...

 

System Game Playitime (Minutes)

Arcade 1943 10
Arcade Area 51 15
Arcade Beast Busters 45
Arcade Beast Busters: Second Nightmare 60
Arcade Lethal Enforcers 15
Arcade Moon Patrol 25
Arcade Space Invaders 20
Arcade Splatterhouse 115
Arcade The Simpsons 20
Arcade Time Crisis II 15
Arcade X-Men 20
Total Time: 360

Atari 8-bit Asteroids 15
Atari 8-bit Ballblazer 20
Atari 8-bit Montezuma’s Revenge 10
Atari 8-bit MULE 10
Atari 8-bit Star Raiders 10
Total Time: 65

Atari 2600 Astroblast 5
Atari 2600 Beamrider 5
Atari 2600 Combat 5
Atari 2600 Demon Attack 5
Atari 2600 E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial 10
Atari 2600 Laser Blast 11
Atari 2600 Phoenix 5
Atari 2600 Picnic 5
Atari 2600 Pitfall 22
Atari 2600 Pitfall II 30
Atari 2600 River Raid 5
Atari 2600 Stampede 5
Atari 2600 Tennis 5
Total Time: 118

Atari 5200 Bounty Bob Strikes Back 20
Atari 5200 Centipede 5
Atari 5200 Defender 5
Atari 5200 Dig-Dug 5
Atari 5200 Pac-Man 5
Atari 5200 Star Raiders 20
Total Time: 60

Atari 7800 Centipede 5
Atari 7800 Choplifter 5
Atari 7800 Donkey Kong 5
Atari 7800 Food Fight 5
Atari 7800 Galaga 5
Atari 7800 Ninja Golf 10
Atari 7800 Xevious 5
Total Time: 40

Atari Lynx Batman Returns 5
Atari Lynx Blue Lightning 5
Atari Lynx California Games 5
Atari Lynx Hard Drivin’ 5
Atari Lynx Paperboy 5
Atari Lynx Rampage 5
Atari Lynx Xybots 5
Total Time: 35

Fairchild Channel F Videocart 3 – Video Blackjack 15
Fairchild Channel F Videocart 5 – Space War 15
Fairchild Channel F Videocart 9 – Drag Strip 15
Fairchild Channel F Videocart 15 – Memory Match 15
Fairchild Channel F Videocart 21 – Bowling 15
Total Time: 75

FM Towns Chase H.Q. 10
FM Towns Galaxy Force 10
FM Towns Loom 10
FM Towns Operation Wolf 10
FM Towns Puyo Puyo 15
FM Towns Raiden 10
FM Towns Samurai Showdown 15
FM Towns Splatterhouse 106
FM Towns Super Street Fighter II 10
FM Towns Tale of Alltynex 10
FM Towns Truxton II 10
FM Towns Twin Cobra 10
FM Towns Viewpoint 10
Total Time: 236

Game.com Batman & Robin 5
Game.com Centipede 5
Game.com Duke Nukem 3D 5
Game.com Fighters Megamix 5
Game.com Mortal Kombat Trilogy 5
Game.com Resident Evil 2 5
Total Time: 30

MSX Alien 2 15
MSX Vampire Killer 55

Total Time: 70

MSX2 Aleste 10
MSX2 Comic Bakery 10
MSX2 Dix 10
MSX2 Dynamite Bowl 10
MSX2 Metal Gear 30
MSX2 Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake 45
Total Time: 115

NES Castlevania 25
NES Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest 25
NES Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse 25
NES Double Dragon 10
NES Double Dragon II: The Revenge 10
NES Double Dragon III: The Sacred Stones 10
NES Duck Hunt 10
NES Hogan’s Alley 10
NES Super Mario. Bros 3 10
NES Super Off Road 20
NES The Magic of Scheherazade 10
Total Time: 165

PC-8000 Deep Scan 20
PC-8000 Flicky 20
PC-8000 Soko-Ban 20
Total Time: 60

PC-88 177 10
PC-88 Alice: Adventures in Wonderland 10
PC-88 Hydlide 25
PC-88 Ice Climber 10
PC-88 Lode Runner 10
PC-88 Night Life 10
PC-88 Snatcher 25
PC-88 Tenshitaci no Gogo 10
PC-88 Thexder 10
PC-88 Xanadu 10
Total Time: 130

PC-98 Brandish 20
PC-98 Brandish 3: Spirit of Balcan 40
PC-98 Desire 15
PC-98 Pac-Man 10
PC-98 Policenauts 20
PC-98 Popful Mail 10
PC-98 Steam-Heart’s 10
PC-98 YU-NO: A Girl Who Chants Love at the Bound of this World 45
Total Time: 170

SNES ActRaiser 20
SNES ActRaiser II 20
SNES Mega Man X 5
SNES The Lawnmower Man 212
Total Time: 257

Vectrex Armor Attack 15
Vectrex Berzerk 15
Vectrex Mine Storm 15
Vectrex Pole Position 15
Vectrex Rip-Off 15
Vectrex Star Castle 15
Total Time: 90

X1 177 10
X1 3-D Bomberman 10
X1 Battle City 10
X1 Door Door 10
X1 Elevator Action 10
X1 Mappy 10
X1 Spy vs. Spy 10
X1 Super Mario Bros. Special 20
X1 Xevious 10
Total Time: 100

X68000 Akumajō Dracula 70
X68000 Alien Syndrome 10
X68000 Bubble Bobble 10
X68000 Cameltry 10
X68000 Daimakaimura 84
X68000 Fantasy Zone 10
X68000 Gradius 10
X68000 Gradius II 10
X68000 R-Type 10
X68000 Salamander 10
X68000 Sol-Feace 10
X68000 Space Harrier 10
X68000 Strider 10

Total Time: 264

 

Overall Time: 40.6666666666667hrs

 

So how'd I get so many times? Well, there's two reasons:

 

1. I didn't really have school last week... it was more "just go to work for the eight hours school takes and then stick after a bit because the co-op program thing and all my teachers were out"
2. We had a bunch of parties at work so I brought some crap in alongside coworkers to mess with

And I don't want to type for a million more words because I did it right before power went out and this is the 2nd time I've typed this. So, for thoughts on random stuff:

 

• The Japanese PCs were big hits with people, be it coworkers or random people walking around the arcade
• I still suck at 3/4s of NES games
• Vectrex is a good bit of fun - the controllers were kinda dying on the stick but past that the games were a lot of fun... I just love the graphics

And past that I don't remember crap, it was a few days ago at least this all happened, so that's it. Next week will be some Game.com and SNES - I'm taking the Game.com to school and Lawnmower Man may have a new skip we found, so I'll see what happens.

Edited May 3, 2017 by BurritoBeans

[Opry99er]

That's a bunch of games...

[carlsson]

10 minutes of M.U.L.E. is like playing two rounds and then giving up the game. I suppose at beginner level (6 rounds) one might be able to squeeze down a full game in 20-25 mins, given there are no land auctions or crystite mining going on.

[BurritoBeans]

10 minutes of M.U.L.E. is like playing two rounds and then giving up the game. I suppose at beginner level (6 rounds) one might be able to squeeze down a full game in 20-25 mins, given there are no land auctions or crystite mining going on.

 

Yeah, you pretty much hit the nail on the head of "Playing two rounds and giving up" - I don't exactly know what to do in the game and didn't read the manual. Maybe some other day I'll figure it out if I ever get my own copy, but for now it was just to see what the game looked like as I've never really played it before.

 

A good few of the games, especially on any of the stuff I brought, I just didn't put a ton of time into - I guess the big example is that some of the PC games were just RPGs that people brought because they have nice graphics or sound or whatever to show off the system. When there's so much stuff and not a ton of time anyways, it's hard to get too into the things.

[Atarian7]

Is that more games than last week?

[+thegoldenband]

Very, very busy week for me, but I'll try to get things posted sometime tomorrow.

[+thegoldenband]

With apologies for the delay, here's the summary for Week 17, running from April 24 - 30. We logged 8352 minutes of eligible play, playing 218 games on a total of 30 systems.

Top 10:

1. Lemmings (Mac OS Classic) - 450

2. Popeye (Atari 2600) - 356

3. Smurfs Rescue in Gargamel's Castle (Atari 2600) - 307

4. Xevious (Atari 7800) - 303

5. Tunnels of Doom [Quest of the King] (TI-99/4A) - 290

6. Kaboom (Atari 2600) - 262

7. Sim City 2000 (Mac OS Classic) - 240

8. Lawnmower Man, The (SNES) - 212

9. Shadowgate (Game Boy Color) - 211

10. Oregon Trail (Mac OS Classic) - 200

Pre-NES top 10:

1. Popeye (Atari 2600) - 356

2. Smurfs Rescue in Gargamel's Castle (Atari 2600) - 307

3. Xevious (Atari 7800) - 303

4. Tunnels of Doom [Quest of the King] (TI-99/4A) - 290

5. Kaboom (Atari 2600) - 262

6. Legends II (TI-99/4A) - 180

6. Sparkdrummer's Challenge: Rescue at AtariAge (TI-99/4A) - 180

8. Masters of the Universe: He-Man (Atari 2600) - 154

9. Dig Dug (Atari 7800) - 123

9. Pac-Man Collection (Atari 7800) - 123

Top 10 systems:

1. Atari 2600 (1448)

2. Mac OS Classic (1240)

3. Atari 7800 (1033)

4. TI-99/4A (945)

5. SNES (496)

6. Arcade (456)

7. Sega CD (320)

8. Sharp X68000 (264)

9. FM Towns (236)

10. NES/Famicom (225)

Week 17 cracks our all-time Top 10, just sneaking into the #10 spot. But the biggest news is that it sets a new all-time record for the most games played in a single week, with 218 games exceeding the old mark of 213 games set in Week 42 of 2015. Wow!

With 30 different systems played, Week 17 also ties the record -- set in the final week of 2016 -- for the most platforms seen in a single week.

And what better game to lead us to these heights than Lemmings, a game that's all about being led places? It takes the #1 spot and almost brings Mac OS to the top, but ultimately it's the Atari 2600 and Popeye that rule the other two charts.

Finally, who's new to the 1000-minute club? How about International Tennis Tour on the SNES (1010 min. logged), which serves and volleys its way into spot #281.

[+thegoldenband]

Also, I meant to address this:

 

I began by playing some Atari 2600 games on my iMac G3 in the "Action Pack" packages... I dont know whether to call these Mac ports of the 2600 games, or whether they are truly emulated. The gameplay was spot on, graphics and sound were excellent. Played the dog piss out of these games.

 

[snip]

 

I will post full times tomorrow, but I wanted to get a ruling on the Action packs on the Macintosh... whether to call them ports or emulation.

 

From a quick glance at a YouTube video of the Windows version of the Atari Action Pack (the Mac OS version isn't on there), the sound in Enduro, Crackpots, etc. seems like it's not using the Atari routines at all, but something different (maybe a FM synth?). That suggests to me that it's been reprogrammed for the new platform (even if only slightly), and so should count as a Mac OS game -- unless the Mac OS version has totally different and superior sound?

 

That said, don't let these questions deter you from posting times. At the same time, though, anything you can do to give me a strong basis for classifying these is helpful. Usually you folks know the games you play better than I do, after all.

 

In truth, these edge-cases are the ones that tend to be most time-consuming -- as are things like variant titles, different versions of homebrews, etc. -- because they interrupt the flow of my data entry and can take a fair bit of research. Also, I often don't have time to look at the thread until I compile the stats, so I may miss questions until it's already the due date and can't really ask for clarification without delaying the weekly post. So anything you can do to guide my work and anticipate ambiguous situations is helpful, and also gives other posters a chance to disagree if necessary, so everyone can hash it out and I can simply follow the consensus.

[Opry99er]

10-4.

 

The sound seemed a bit off to me as well, as well as a few gameplay mechanics on SeaQuest. Initially I thought they were Atari ROMs wrapped with an executable emulator, but the more I played, the more I believed otherwise, hence why I posted them in the Mac category.

 

 

Thanks again for updating!!! Great week, all!

Edited May 6, 2017 by Opry99er

[karokoenig]

Atari 2600

Popeye: 10 min

Smurf: 15 min

 

High Score Club. Not a lot more to say about this...

 

Commodore 64

Card Sharks: 175 min

 

I finally won the table. Gorbatchev was the last and toughest opponent. He does bluff now and then, which makes it annoying. He IS kind of predictable, in that in 5-card draw you do have a good idea of what his initial hand is. So in the end it was just a slugmatch with mostly small pots to bring him down. Nice game.

 

SNES

Doom: 25 min

Inindo: 20 min

Road Riot 4WD: 3 min

 

Well, what can I say... Doom on the SNES isn't all that great, at least for my taste. I played the first two levels and don't feel like I want to return to this game anytime soon. The blood-red cartridge does look badass, though.

Inindo looks like a decent game. I only fiddled around with it and saw the role-playing part. According to the interwebs, it also has strategy parts. Anyone played through this yet and can tell me if it's worth playing?

[+thegoldenband]

Inindo looks like a decent game. I only fiddled around with it and saw the role-playing part. According to the interwebs, it also has strategy parts. Anyone played through this yet and can tell me if it's worth playing?

 

Zenic Reverie, aka The RPG Consoler, played through Inindo recently but didn't like it. (Probable spoilers there, BTW.) I'd imagine one's pre-existing fondness for -- or distaste for -- the Koei house style might be predictive here? To me, it looked like a game I might enjoy.

[carlsson]

Arcade:

World Rally (Championship?) - 15 min.

Well, one of those "barely a blip" weeks. I didn't even enter the Atari 8-bit HSC yet, due to being tired and having lots of other things to get done. The sole reason I played this arcade game was that it is parked in our computer club's headquarters, and since I was the last person to leave after our Saturday morning meeting, I decided to turn it on and play a little before going back home. To be honest I don't know if the game installed is the Atari Games release or the Gaelco release, as screenshots on The International Arcade Museum look quite the same. Next time I'll read the title screen more closely, though in practise perhaps it doesn't matter all that much.

[Iwantgames:)]

Not too many retro games this week but I did play quite a bit of Puzzle Bobble finally broke 2mil

 

 

Sega CD

 

The Misadventures of Flink - 25min

 

 

Wonderswan

 

Ganzo Jajamaru Kun - 10min

 

Puzzle Bobble - 246min

 

Space Invaders - 7min

 

[+Darrin9999]

Emerson Arcadia 2001 :

 

1. Alien Invaders - 25 min

2. Astro Invaders - 30 min

3. Breakaway - 20 min

4. Cat Trax - 35 min

5. Crazy Climber - 25 min

6. Crazy Gobbler - 10 min

7. Funky Fish - 15 min

8. Escape - 45 min

9. Hobo - 10 min

10. Jungler - 35 min

11. Missle War - 40 min

12. Mobile Suit Gundam - 15 min

13. Nibbleman - 30 min

14. Pleiades - 30 min

15. Parashooter - 20 min

16. Red Clash - 20 min

17. Robot Killer - 70 min

 

 

Bally Astrocade :

 

1. Astro Battle - 25 min

2. Ballypin - 30 min

3. Brickyard - 15 min

4. Candyman - 40 min

5. The Incredible Wizard - 75 min

6. Galactic Invasion - 35 min

7. Muncher - 55 min

8. Space Fortress - 25 min

 

 

TurboGrafx-16 :

 

1. Aero Blaster - 75 min

2. Detana!! TwinBee - 120min

3. Devil`s Crush - 50 min

4. Dropoff - 15 min

5. Drop Rock Hora Hora - 25 min

6. Final Blaster - 25 min

7. Galaga `88 - 45 min

8. Galaga `90 - 65 min

9. Gokuraku Chuka Taisen - 35 min

[Kurt_Woloch]

Here are my times for this past week (May 1st through 7th)...

 

Arcade:

Q*bert - 77 min. in 2 sessions

Q*bert's Qubes - 157 min. in several sessions

 

Commodore 64:

Juice - 43 min.

 

Online (non-eligible):

Reach the core - 29 min.

Zak - 25 min.

 

This week I continued playing Q*Bert and variants. There were two more games of Q*bert in which I reached Levels 8 and 9, respectively, and several games of Q*bert's Qubes in which I didn't reach my goal of 300,000 points. I also played the C-64 game Juice which is a variation on Q*bert. Here you have unlimited "flying discs", but there's a time limit for each level, and not making the level in time means Game Over.

 

Then I tried two online games. Zak is a jump'n'run (and shoot) game in the veins of Super Mario Bros., but at 25 min. it's not very long, especially given the fact that you have unlimited lives. In Reach the core you control a drill which is drilling towards the "core" but usually breaks or runs out of energy before it reaches it. But you can improve that situation by slowly applying the funds you get for drilling towards upgrades. I haven't reached the core yet through...

[Atarian7]

Atari 2600

Kaboom! - 126 minutes

Masters of the Universe The Power of He-Man - 104 minutes

Popeye - 72 minutes

Smurf Rescue in Gargamel's Castle - 189 minutes

 

 

Kaboom! High score of the week: 145,291

 

 

 

[oyamafamily]

ATARI 2600:

Chase the Chuckwagon - 45 minutes

Crystal Castles - 5 minutes

Defender - 190 minutes

Kangaroo - 10 minutes

Missile Command - 65 minutes

Popeye - 95 minutes

 

COLECOVISION:

Beamrider - 50 minutes

Dac-Man - 15 minutes

H.E.R.O. - 10 minutes

Mr. Do! - 20 minutes

Q*Bert - 45 minutes

 

NES / FAMICOM:

Mario Bros. - 40 minutes

[oyamafamily]

EVIDENCES OF THE WEEK:

 

1) ColecoVision Beamrider emulated, Skills 1, 2 and 3 in sequence

 

2) ColecoVision Dac-Man emulated, score 26,750

 

3) 2600 Defender on real console, score 1,055,000 (Game 1-BB)

 

4) 2600 Defender emulated, score 1,055,050 (Game 1-BB)

 

5) 2600 Missile Command on real console, score 966,270 (Game 1-BB)

 

6) 2600 Popeye emulated, score 167,450 for NEW HSC Season 6, Weeks 14-15 (Cartoon Contests)

Edited May 8, 2017 by oyamafamily

[+thegoldenband]

My times for the week:

Genesis:

Action 52 - 2 min.

Asterix and the Power of the Gods - 3 min.

Bloodshot - 1 min.

SNES:

Aero the Acrobat - 55 min.

International Tennis Tour - 90 min.

Sküljagger - 138 min.

Beat Sküljagger (for the second time), won a couple more tournaments to continue my very slow progress through International Tennis Tour, and was reminded of how much I dislike Aero the Acrobat.

[Opry99er]

Not much for me..

 

 

TI-99/4A:

 

St. Nick (360 minutes)

Tunnels of Doom (70 minutes)

 

 

VCS:

 

Asteroids (60 minutes)

[Skippy B. Coyote]

It was a big week for the Atari 7800 around here this past week, which is no surprise considering some of the gems that showed up in the mail!

 

 

 

Ineligible

Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance (Game Boy Advance) - 82 minutes

Street Fighter Alpha 3 (Game Boy Advance) - 29 minutes

Arcade

Ms. Pac-Man (played on Namco Museum for Game Boy Advance) - 9 minutes

Xevious (played on Namco Museum: 50th Anniversary for GameCube) - 22 minutes

Atari 2600

Crystal Castles - 39 minutes

Popeye - 11 minutes

Space Rocks - 5 minutes

Atari 7800

Asteroids - 125 minutes

Centipede - 64 minutes

Donkey Kong (emulated on Nintendo Wii) - 20 minutes

Donkey Kong Junior - 37 minutes

Donkey Kong PK - 178 minutes

Double Dragon - 190 minutes

Joust - 68 minutes

Ms. Pac-Man - 12 minutes

Pac-Man Collection! - 218 minutes

PlayStation

Tomb Raider - 84 minutes

Total Play Time This Week
1,193 minutes (19 hours 53 minutes) [1,082 minutes eligible]

Individual System Play Times This Week

Atari 7800: 912 minutes

Game Boy Advance: 111 minutes

PlayStation: 84 minutes

Atari 2600: 55 minutes

Arcade: 31 minutes

This week was quite possibly the biggest week my household has ever had when it comes to the Atari 7800 platform, with very little else played on any other systems. I did spend a little time playing some Game Boy Advance fighting games as I debated whether or not to sell them (the answer for both ended up being "yes") and the misses got in around an hour and a half of Tomb Raider on the PlayStation mid-week, but other than that it was pretty much an "all Atari" week for us. The week started off with my wife doing her usual morning games of Joust or Pac-Man Collection! over breakfast, accounting for most of the times for those games, but I also spent a bit of time playing my old favorites Asteroids, Centipede, and Donkey Kong Junior here and there.

When things got really exciting though was when the spousal unit surprised me by snagging an absolutely pristine condition copy of Double Dragon for the Atari 7800 on eBay, and while I had never enjoyed the game very much when I played it via emulation I was still pretty stoked to try playing it with my other half. It arrived in the mail a couple days later and we spent quite a bit of time playing it together, and as I had hoped it was a lot more fun playing it with her on real hardware than it was playing by myself via emulation; though I'll admit that I never managed to get terribly good at it in spite of learning the most effective moves and strategies. The spousal unit on the other hand pretty much mastered the game in 2 days and ended up beating it on her own with an ending high score of 114,220!

Not to be outdone in the rare game department, this week I finally got the copy of Donkey Kong PK that I had been on the waiting list for since last December! I could go on and on about what an amazing job tep392 did on every single aspect of the game, but I think it can all be summed up in one sentence by simply saying "It's arcade perfect". From the sound and animations to the enemy and barrel AI, it seems that the original source code for nearly everything was lifted straight from the arcade game and ported to a pokey equipped Atari 7800 cartridge. It wasn't a cheap addition to our Atari 7800 library by any means, but for any fan of the original Donkey Kong arcade game it is a game that's well worth getting on the waiting list and paying the high price of admission for.

Wrapping things up for the week, I was absolutely thrilled to find out this afternoon that Crystal Castles is the game being played in the Atari 2600 High Score Club for the coming week so I had to get in a game or two of it. I ended up just doing one game because I actually topped my all time high score of 123,893 with a new high score of 138,560 on my first try, which I'm pretty pleased with and think should carry me into the Top 5 for the coming week even if I don't improve any further after that. And there's a pretty good chance that I might not improve my score, since this coming Thursday (May 11th) I will be going into the hospital for a total thyroidectomy surgery and may not feel like playing much in the way of games for a while after that. I'll only be in the hospital for a day or so after the surgery, but I've heard the recovery can be pretty rough going so who knows whether or not I'll do any gaming for the rest of the week after that. Ah well, I guess misses will just have to make up the lost time for me! She does still have quite a ways left to go in Tomb Raider I think.

Until next time, best wishes and happy gaming to you and yours!

[Atarian7]

Where is the thyroid located?