Red Sea Crossing AtariAge database

[Wickeycolumbus]

On one hand, I believe it exists because ROMHunter says it does. On the other hand, I don't believe it exists and is real until CPUWiz says it is. I like to see the hardware teardown and an analysis of a dump. Pix and screens won't do it for me.

 

 

I really don't understand the analysis of the dump part. It seems people are thinking that it could look absolutely legit, exactly like the ad, but there's no way in hell the faker could have stayed away from recently discovered tricks. Doesn't make any sense to me.

 

Even if a code analysis occurs and weird stuff is found, there's no telling that the programmer didn't invent the tricks/strange code himself. This is a game done by one guy with no documentation. Just look at the recently released Extra Terrestrials, there's weird code in that which causes it to not work properly on emulators. There's a chance that if this game was discovered in a similar way to Red Sea Crossing that this code would cause the person looking at the dump to question it's legitimacy. As we know, Extra Terrestrials is 100% real, even with this strange code.

[Rom Hunter]

Fully agree with you, Wickey.

 

Leaves us with the lack of a picture of the inner parts for the non-believers.

 

But who cares.

 

The cart was shown, a video was shown, the ad was shown, game info was shown and the programmer confirmed its existence.

 

That's more than enough for me.

 

I have not one single doubt about this cart.

 

My only wish left is that this little piece of VCS game history can be archived some day.

 

[Zach]

Exactly. A ROM won't give 100% proof either. If someone were to go to the trouble of programming, creating a label that appears to be made with pre-digital technology, and obtaining Music Machine, why not program from scratch? Someone could ignore all the programming tutorials on the web and just study binaries from back in the day. You could also create a binary without using DASM or any other established assembler. A hex editor would be enough.

[ianoid]

I just would like to see a dump comparison and some play testing.

 

When Air Raid was dumped it was noted to have a high degree of similarity to Space Jockey. I still consider that a real release as opposed to a hack.

 

It may be real, I'm just the cynical type.

[Nukey Shay]

I really don't understand the analysis of the dump part.  It seems people are thinking that it could look absolutely legit, exactly like the ad, but there's no way in hell the faker could have stayed away from recently discovered tricks.  Doesn't make any sense to me.

 

Even if a code analysis occurs and weird stuff is found, there's no telling that the programmer didn't invent the tricks/strange code himself.  This is a game done by one guy with no documentation.  Just look at the recently released Extra Terrestrials, there's weird code in that which causes it to not work properly on emulators.  There's a chance that if this game was discovered in a similar way to Red Sea Crossing that this code would cause the person looking at the dump to question it's legitimacy.  As we know, Extra Terrestrials is 100% real, even with this strange code.

 

It's a question of odds. While it might be true that a novice independant software creator might discover a programming trick of technique which predates another program...odds are against it. This game was admittedly made by reverse-engineering several games and borrowing code from them...so it's unlikely that it would be using a technique which was not in common use at the time of it's creation. Writing programs is really never completely original...a programmer is constantly borrowing bits and pieces of what is known (the same is true in other fields as well...construction, literature, art, filmmaking, etc). Careful analysis reveals what influenced the work. Multiple instances where such attributes appeared in later works? Not gonna happen.

An expert can recognise his own work as clearly as if it were a fingerprint. And all it would take is one "signature" method to spoil a fake.

 

With that said, everything that has been presented so far shows that this is legit...so there is currently no reason to assume that it isn't.

[Miss 2600]

If it weren't for the cartridge with the flashing lights, I'd be much more looking forward to getting a copy or just playing this game over the upcoming Star Castle because the game play looks interesting and possibly unique and the cutesy graphics are more my game tastes. Sadly, it looks like he's given us an Eric Cartman "Screw you guys, I'm going home" exit.

Edited May 6, 2012 by Miss 2600

[accousticguitar]

One of these days bit rot will take over and the game will be lost, then it won't matter whether it was real or not. It'll be worthless too.

[CPUWIZ]

Photoshopped!

[Dino]

Fully agree with you, Wickey.

 

Leaves us with the lack of a picture of the inner parts for the non-believers.

 

But who cares.

 

The cart was shown, a video was shown, the ad was shown, game info was shown and the programmer confirmed its existence.

 

That's more than enough for me.

 

I have not one single doubt about this cart.

 

My only wish left is that this little piece of VCS game history can be archived some day.

 

 

The point is you have been wrong before about games you were certain were legit. Whilst dumping a rom and analysing the code won't give 100% certainty that the game is legit, it is another check that is available.

 

The really disconcerting thing about this whole affair is nagn's behaviour, which is absolutely consistent with a scammer. No part of what he had done to date portrays any confidence that this is legit.

[CPUWIZ]

Fully agree with you, Wickey.

 

Leaves us with the lack of a picture of the inner parts for the non-believers.

 

But who cares.

 

The cart was shown, a video was shown, the ad was shown, game info was shown and the programmer confirmed its existence.

 

That's more than enough for me.

 

I have not one single doubt about this cart.

 

My only wish left is that this little piece of VCS game history can be archived some day.

 

 

The point is you have been wrong before about games you were certain were legit.

 

Guardian, anyone?

[Zach]

The sad thing is there is probably another copy out there in the possession of someone who would happily sell it, if only they knew how rare and valuable it is.

[Rom Hunter]

The point is you have been wrong before about games you were certain were legit.

 

AFAIK only one in the past ten years actually: the infamous green labeled Guardian.

 

Don't make a fool of yourself by calling that "The Point", Dino.

 

The real point is that nagn2 is being accused and offended by several people in this community time after time because he's not willing to keep convincing the nay-sayers, while I can't recall him offending anyone.

 

He's not opening a unique cart and he's not dumping the ROM, that's all.

 

At all other points he has been giving us as much information as he could: clear pictures from all angles, a video, the gameplay description and the programmer's info.

 

Edited May 7, 2012 by Rom Hunter

[Dino]

I was referring to Ianoid's earlier post.

 

Since he felt comfort in the legitimacy of the cart based on your opinion, I was pointing out that you have been wrong in the past.

 

Noone is asking him to open the cart. But if the end game is selling this cart for thousands of dollars, which I believe is nagn's intention, then he needs more evidence than screenshots, photos and youtube flicks.

 

Tanman did it with his Airraid box, and many others who have come by these forums with really rare stuff have bent over backwards to make their item available for verification before sale.

 

If nagn is offended by the doubters, he only has himself to blame as his behaviour has been most peculiar for someone with a legitimate rarity.

 

For anyone that disagrees with my position, why not pay nagn's asking price for the cart since its 100% legit?

[Rom Hunter]

You simply can't compare the green label Guardian case with this one.

 

There was only one crappy picture of that Guardian cart and I made the mistake to get all jolly-jumpy over it in my enthousiasm.

 

In this case, there's more than enough evidence to proof that it's real.

 

Nagn2's behaviour doesn't make this a false cart; most of his behaviour was caused by the accusations from others.

 

If you read his first posts when he found it, he was fully cooperative in giving all the info he could.

 

Then again, I can fully understand that a serieus buyer also wants a ROM check and inner parts picture before spending thousands of dollars.

 

But once again: it's up to nagn2 to give a potential buyer that service.

 

Edited May 7, 2012 by Rom Hunter

[Dino]

I agree you can't compare this to guardian. Then again, you can't compare it to the gamma attack find either, but we haven't reached that point yet have we? unti then, I say it shouldnt be included. For all we know this may still be vaporware

[Rom Hunter]

Red Sea Crossing vaporware, because the ROM hasn't been checked?

 

...

 

[+Propane13]

Do any collectors live out near Ohio?

If I still lived in Chicago, I would have paid this guy a visit the first summer that he reported owning this cartridge.

 

I think that's the right way to attack this problem.

 

-John

[Crazy Climber]

It's simple really

 

1 - GET RED SEA CROSSING

 

2 - ????????

 

3 - PROFIT!!

[Dino]

Red Sea Crossing vaporware, because the ROM hasn't been checked?

 

...

 

 

Nope. Its vaporware UNTIL its checked. For all we know he found the ad and mocked up a cart with some pretty basic gameplay. The label shouldn't be too hard to fake should it Rom?

[Wickeycolumbus]

Red Sea Crossing vaporware, because the ROM hasn't been checked?

 

...

 

 

Nope. Its vaporware UNTIL its checked. For all we know he found the ad and mocked up a cart with some pretty basic gameplay. The label shouldn't be too hard to fake should it Rom?

 

You could say the same thing about every prototype or one of a kind game that has ever been found. If this were a prototype, you'd have people yelling about how dumping it would 'destroy the value'. This is absolutely not vaporware, the programmer has confirmed that it was finished and sold.

 

The way this discovery has been received by the community boggles me. Here we had a guy that was more than willing to provide pictures and videos of the game play, was willing to show the cart to other people, and was even open to dumping the game until the programmer expressed his wish for it not to be dumped, only to have him scared away by people who harassed him every chance they got. Well it doesn't matter much anymore, since he hasn't posted since he said he was done trying to sell the game, and probably won't return to AtariAge. The best we can hope for now is for the game to be sold privately and it MAYBE get released at some point down the line.

[Pioneer4x4]

What the heck, I'll jump back in. In my opinion, he has only posted about it to stir sh17 up. The last comes across to me as "Why isn't it in the database, if it was there, I could sell it for more money" but then nothing, no way to allow anyone to examine, no answers to questions, most of them civil, and common sense. I just wonder why anyone with something that unique would not be pouring out the info, asking others what can be done to help authenticate/verify/identify it. It can only help them as long as it is all on the up and up.

Then again, who knows, maybe it is not a computer/video game/internet nerd like all of us...

[atari181]

What the heck, I'll jump back in. In my opinion, he has only posted about it to stir sh17 up. The last comes across to me as "Why isn't it in the database, if it was there, I could sell it for more money" but then nothing, no way to allow anyone to examine, no answers to questions, most of them civil, and common sense. I just wonder why anyone with something that unique would not be pouring out the info, asking others what can be done to help authenticate/verify/identify it. It can only help them as long as it is all on the up and up.

Then again, who knows, maybe it is not a computer/video game/internet nerd like all of us...

Who you calling a Nerd?

 

I would have to agree, I do believe that the game exists, but Nagn's actions seem kinda odd. If he waits to long the programmer may just pull 100 or so out of his garage and he won't get shit for it.

[Dino]

Red Sea Crossing vaporware, because the ROM hasn't been checked?

 

...

 

 

Nope. Its vaporware UNTIL its checked. For all we know he found the ad and mocked up a cart with some pretty basic gameplay. The label shouldn't be too hard to fake should it Rom?

 

You could say the same thing about every prototype or one of a kind game that has ever been found. If this were a prototype, you'd have people yelling about how dumping it would 'destroy the value'. This is absolutely not vaporware, the programmer has confirmed that it was finished and sold.

 

The way this discovery has been received by the community boggles me. Here we had a guy that was more than willing to provide pictures and videos of the game play, was willing to show the cart to other people, and was even open to dumping the game until the programmer expressed his wish for it not to be dumped, only to have him scared away by people who harassed him every chance they got. Well it doesn't matter much anymore, since he hasn't posted since he said he was done trying to sell the game, and probably won't return to AtariAge. The best we can hope for now is for the game to be sold privately and it MAYBE get released at some point down the line.

 

I'm not stating that the ROM needs to be distributed. the mere act of dumping a cart does not reduce its value at all. its distributing the rom that reduces the cart's value. Also, protoypes are not rated in the rarity guide, so there's no need to have them confirmed since a rarity is not assigned to them. I don't recall the last time anyone asked for a prototype to be included in the AA rarity guide, but there were a lot of requests for the database to be updated for released games..

 

People's memories of what happened 30+ years ago are not exactly reliable. Whilst romhunter adds cartriges to the Atarimania database even based on advertisments (e.g. Gogo home monster), the AA database has a history of adding only confirmed carts. That's why games like gamma attack and birthday mania were added recently, but not red sea crossing, even though the cart had been found before the AA database upgrade.

 

How nagn was treated is partly due to his own behaviour. If you see a man dressed in a suit outside your house you may say hello on your way past. If he's wearing a balaclava and carrying a crowbar, things may be a little different.

 

I very much doubt anyone will pay the kind of price nagn will be after without concrete proof that the cart is legitimate. Once that occurs, then I'm sure Albert will update the rarity guide. Until then i dont see anything changing....

[nofrills100]

Wickey,

The guy is an adult, not a 5 year old attending school for the first time. I have a hard time accepting that we 'scared' him away.

He wants to sell it right! - then what is stopping him?

He has had interest from some of the top collectors here, he will not find a better deal elsewhere.

He is not interested in the forums for any other reason than to sell this thing, then why not get it over and done with?

The longer he waits the more chance there is that another will surface... Then he can halve the value of his own.

[Miss 2600]

 

Then again, who knows, maybe it is not a computer/video game/internet nerd like all of us...

 

I think that is the key. I think he was probably taken aback by the constant skeptism even after the screen shots, cartridge photos, video, phone conversation with the programmer, and the discovery of the ad. I remember he mentioned he got a lame offer for Music Machine from a member of this board and then the insistance on dumping the ROM. He probably regards some of the members here as scammers trying to get the game for free. I can understand that. If one is not familiar with the classic gaming community, the behavior of some AA members might seem as aggravating to him as his behavior seems to them.