Working Coleco Venture on Intellivision II!

[jlew715]

Hey all,

 

As we know, when the Intellivision II was designed, Mattel implemented the stricter copyright routine so third-party games, namely Coleco, (and Mattel's own Word Fun) wouldn't work on the new console. It seems like everyone eventually figured out how to get around this, by many already-released games were incompatible. As far as I'm aware, Coleco never re-released their games in the US market with updated code to get around the Inty II copyright check. However, I've read that some versions of the European CBS Electronics release of Coleco's games have updated code and (in theory) should run on an Inty II. The real question is - would you want to? Coleco is somewhat notorious for intentionally gimping their Inty ports to make the ColecoVision look better.

 

In my case, however, Venture is one of my favorite Intellivision games after the AD&Ds! So I decided to order a CBS copy of Venture and got it working. It could just be my imagination, but the CBS version seems to run noticeably smoother than the US-market Coleco version (on the Inty I of course).

 

How-To:

1. Pictures 1 & 2 - Obtain the "Green Dragon w/ White Lines" box version of Venture. The are at least two other CBS box versions; I'm not sure if they all contain Intellivision II compatible code.
2. Pictures 3 & 4 - Great! You have a Venture cartridge that has the right code to work in an Inty II. Only one problem - the cartridge doesn't fit in the console! There are three "chines" above the PCB contacts which prevent insertion into the US-market Intellivision II. Unscrew the two screws on the back of the cart.
3. Picture 5 - The other half of the cart is normal and should fit in any Intellivision. No work needed here.
4. Picture 6 - Break off (ouch! sorry) the three chines with some needle-nose pliers (etc) and sand/file down the remaining nubs.
5. Picture 7 - Reassemble the cartridge (was it really that easy?).
6. Picture 8 - Not quite! Now that you've filed down the chines, the cartridge actually goes too far into the Intellivision II. So when you insert it, insert it about 5mm short of the hard stop. Do that, and you're playing Venture on an Intellivision II!

 

 

[+JasonlikesINTV]

Neat!

[blainelocklair]

Nice work. Glad to know it can be done.

[wolfy62]

That is cool,thanks for sharing this info!

[MauAnouk2012]

Hi

 

Great....

 

Thank you so much for this information.

 

As soon as I read your post, I took cartridge and made the change on my ZAXXON CBS (photo). All perfect.

As you wrote, one must not only insert it all the way.

 

 

Ciao

 

 

Edited November 25, 2018 by MauAnouk2012

[Intymike]

I see the price for the CBS games rising.

[MauAnouk2012]

I see the price for the CBS games rising.

..

[jlew715]

As soon as I read your post, I took cartridge and made the change on my ZAXXON CBS (photo). All perfect.

As you wrote, one must not only insert it all the way.

I’m thinking of cutting some adhesive rubber feet to put next to the middle chine to function as a “bumper” so it will stop when properly inserted.

[arcade124]

Now, we should start testing if other CBS box variations work and if they run any smoother. I may order some myself to test this. Has anyone else tested this?

[m-crew]

I see the price for the CBS games rising.

lmao !!!

[mr_intv]

Thanks for sharing this. Works like a charm on my cbs Venture. Now I need more cbs variants....

[+DZ-Jay]

I don't quite understand this hack ...

 

Is it that the Intellivision cartridge which fits on the console has code that does not work on the Intellivision II; and that there is another cartridge which does not fit, but with code that actually does work on an Intellivision II?

 

I don't understand -- why would Coleco release a cartridge for Intellivision that does not fit in the console? Or is it a cartridge for some other console which happens to also run on the Intellivision II???

 

-dZ.

[mr_me]

CBS manufactured coleco cartridges for europe where there was no intellivision II. Venture was one of the coleco cartridges that fails to start on an intellivision ii. The cbs version of the cartridge seems to have an updated rom. Not sure if the rom change made it into any coleco versions of venture.

 

Is there a similarly updated cartridge for Donkey Kong, Carnival, Mouse Trap.

Edited December 1, 2018 by mr_me

[jlew715]

I don't quite understand this hack ...

 

Is it that the Intellivision cartridge which fits on the console has code that does not work on the Intellivision II; and that there is another cartridge which does not fit, but with code that actually does work on an Intellivision II?

 

I don't understand -- why would Coleco release a cartridge for Intellivision that does not fit in the console? Or is it a cartridge for some other console which happens to also run on the Intellivision II???

 

-dZ.

The cartridge that fits on the console (Coleco North America release) has code that does not work on Intellivision II.

The cartridge that does not fit on the console (CBS Europe release) has code that does work on Intellivision II.

 

I don’t understand why they bothered updating the code to the Europe release, since Europe only had Intellivision I, where the original code worked anyway.