What have you actually PLAYED tracker for 2018 (Season 11)

[+thegoldenband]

Here's the summary for Week 38, running from September 17 - 23. We logged 2930 minutes of eligible play, playing 28 games on a total of 11 systems.

Top 10:

1. Wyvern Tales (Atari Lynx) - 607

2. Fatal Rewind (Genesis) - 419

3. Alien Trilogy (PlayStation) - 271

4. Kaboom (Atari 2600) - 270

5. Galencia (C64) - 183

6. Frenzy (ColecoVision) - 180

7. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 134

8. Turbo (ColecoVision) - 120

9. Threshold (C64) - 107

10. Chuck Norris Superkicks (ColecoVision) - 90

Pre-NES top 10:

1. Kaboom (Atari 2600) - 270

2. Galencia (C64) - 183

3. Frenzy (ColecoVision) - 180

4. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 134

5. Turbo (ColecoVision) - 120

6. Threshold (C64) - 107

7. Chuck Norris Superkicks (ColecoVision) - 90

8. Jumpman (C64) - 87

9. Eggomania (Atari 2600) - 71

10. Hunchy II (Atari 2600) - 54

Top 10 systems:

1. Atari Lynx (607)

2. Atari 2600 (564)

3. Genesis (449)

4. ColecoVision (435)

5. C64 (404)

6. PlayStation (344)

7. Atari 8-bit (56)

8. Atari Jaguar (36)

9. PC (DOS) (20)

10. Arcade (10)

Wyvern Tales swoops in to take the #1 spot (and the top spot for the Lynx) in its first appearance on the charts!

In other news, Frenzy for the ColecoVision fries up a serving of 1000-minute club action, with its 1089 minutes to date yielding spot #339.

[+davidcalgary29]

Lynx: Wyvern Tales, 111 minutes

[Iwantgames:)]

I forgot to record my times the last few weeks (it wasn’t much anyway) so before I forget again I played some Vectrex today

 

Lunar Lander - 10min

Missilebreak Outvaders - 30min

Ultima Akalabeth - 90min

 

All played on the Vectrex32 Smart Cart

[karokoenig]

Commodore 64

Galencia: 10 min

Jungle Hunt: 5 min

Steel Ranger: 10 min

 

Been forced into a part-time lurker state during the last few weeks, due to crazy busy real life. At least I visited my dad this weekend, where my old C64 is set up. And I had a chance to test my new collector's piece - Steel Ranger. An awesome new homebrew. Nice graphics, smooth animation, great music. Had my 4-year-old with me, and he tried as well. We also fiddled a bit with Jungle Hunt and Galencia. I really need to get the Competition Pro Mini working :-)

[carlsson]

I'm sorry to say this week I haven't played a single game, not even during the expo we held yesterday. I may have function tested a couple of systems but didn't sit down to play any of them.

[oyamafamily]

ATARI 2600:

Colony 7 - 42 minutes

Lady Bug - 233 minutes

Missile Command - 180 minutes

 

ATARI 7800:

Pole Position II - 20 minutes

 

EVIDENCE OF THE WEEK: My final Lady Bug gameplay footage, presented for 2600 Homebrew Tournament 2018, Round four, organized by LidLikesIntellivision (Liduario).

[digdugnate]

Back in Black, baby.

 

NES:

 

Mega Man 2 -- 180 minutes

Bubble Bobble -- 90 minutes

Tetris (Nintendo) -- 240 minutes

[zylon]

5200-

Pengo 35min

 

Slow week with lots of driving and welding jobs.

[agb]

Times for the week all Atari 2600;

Barnstorming 3 mins

Egomania 94 mins

Kaboom 21 mins

Ladybug 9 mins

Solar Fox 150 mins

Taz 8 mins

[Iwantgames:)]

Another 120min of Akalabeth and 30min of Missilebreak Outvaders on Vectrex

[Eltigro]

Another all Atari week for me for the Classic tracker...

 

2600 (all on Flashback Portable)

Assembloids 2600 - 5 min (Took me a sec to figure out what to do. Still not 100% sure what causes game overs, but I seemed to get the hang of it in the few minutes that I played it.)

Asses of Fire - 5 min (Had to try this one with a name like that... It's a side "scrolling" type jumping and missing the obstacles type game. The jumping is kind of like rocket thrusts that come out of the main character's butt... hence the name. First couple of screens are pretty easy... but it got hard super fast.)

Battlezone - 10 min (Great looking game. I feel like I played the arcade version back in the day... anyway, the usual WHAT??? NO WAY THAT HIT ME!!!)

 

Jaguar

Raiden - 90 min (Playing this for the Jaguar HSC. Setting it on 8 credits and playing all the way until a game over. I've done pretty good, but I can't play it for long at a time... as I've said a million times before, this game needs an autofire option. That has made me change my strategy, though. On the TurboGrafx version, with the turbofire, I usually use the spread "red" shot and homing missiles. On this one though, where I'm having to spam the fire button, I'm going with the blue laser weapon and whatever sub weapon I can get. The reason is that the blue laser, while narrower, is more powerful and destroys enemies in fewer hits... meaning fewer times I have to hit the button with my thumb. Anyway, I'm enjoying the game.)

[+thegoldenband]

My times for the week:

 

Genesis:

Fatal Rewind - 148 min.

Space Harrier II - 21 min.

Street Fighter II: Special Champion Edition - 263 min.

N64:

BattleTanx - 296 min.

At the start of the week I beat Fatal Rewind on Normal difficulty again, but this time with 1 starting life and 0 credits. Maybe I'll try Hard sometime soon, but I'm not relishing the idea. Psygnosis games so often become joyless on the higher difficulties.

Then over the weekend, I beat Street Fighter II on a few difficulty levels, culminating with a winning run on 8-star difficulty using only E. Honda. I continued a bunch of times, but won the fight against M. Bison on my first try -- which was a bizarre feeling, since when I beat 6-star difficulty, I had to fight him something like 40-50 times before I got the win! I guess practice helps, but it also reveals the shortcomings in the game's AI.

After that I played Space Harrier II for a bit, and then completed a few more levels in BattleTanx, which certainly gets tough later in the game.

[+wongojack]

C64: Galencia 24

[Kurt_Woloch]

Here are my times for the past week (September 24th through 30th)...

 

Apple II:

Raster Blaster - 11 min.

 

Arcade:

Burger Time - 10 min.

 

Atari 2600:

ChaoticGrill - 2 min.

 

Atari 7800:

Baby Pac Man - 7 min.

 

Commodore 64:

David's Midnight Magic - 2 min.

Pinball Dreams (Preview) - 12 min.

 

Intellivision:

Deep Zone Gorf - 15 min.

 

MS-DOS:

Mario Bros. (VGA) - 21 min.

 

PC (Windows 95):

Mario's Cement Factory (Simulator) - 23 min.

 

This week I played quite a few games, but only in short sessions. I'm now stuck with having to finish Baby Pac Man for the Atari 7800 since the original programmer, Bob, has at least temporarily left AtariAge and abandoned this game. Actually I only wanted to be helpful with the physics routines. Anyway, in order to accomplish this, I played some other pinball games for a comparison. Raster Blaster by Bill Budge is one of the earliest, it was made in 1981 and was the precursor for Pinball Construction Set and David's Midnight Magic. It's got pretty believable physics, but it seems a bit wonky at times and runs at a slightly inconsistent speed. I only played David's Midnight Magic for a short time having control problems in VICE. Pinball Dreams has only been ported to the C-64 in the last years, and even then it's not completed, but a preview. The pinball gameplay works pretty well, though, but it has got no scoring and no sound, only background music.

 

ChaoticGrill is a new clone of Burger Time for the Atari 2600 which is still in the works. I helped out with analyzing the enemy movements, and for doing this I also played the arcade original for a bit.

 

Deep Zone Gorf is an Intellivision game similar to Gyruss, so similar that someone else only slightly changed it and attempted to sell it as Gyruss.

Then there are some Mario games, though not all of them belong to this tracker.

I replayed a MS-DOS version of Mario Bros. which isn't bad, but not as well playable as the arcade original.

Then there's also a simulator for the handheld game Mario's Cement Factory which I found when looking for the MS-DOS version of Mario Bros.

[Atarian7]

Atari 2600

Kaboom! - 135 minutes

Hunchy 2 - 111 minutes

Pac-man (Dintar816 8k) - 10 minutes

 

 

 

I got a new high score on Hunchy 2: 5305

 

 

Had a lousy week of Kaboom!. I don't know what my high score was.

 

 

[Skippy B. Coyote]

It was a pretty exciting week for gaming around here this past week, and we're kicking off the month of October with a whole lot of spooky gaming time to contribute to the trackers!




Ineligible
Cabela's Survival: Shadows of Katmai (Nintendo Wii) - 257 minutes
Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon (Nintendo 3DS) - 586 minutes

Atari 7800 (Emulated on Nintendo Wii)
Centipede - 145 minutes

PlayStation
Alien Trilogy - 101 minutes
Alone in the Dark: The New Nightmare - 93 minutes


Total Video Game Play Time This Week
1,182 minutes (19 hours 42 minutes) [339 minutes eligible]

Individual System Play Times This Week
Nintendo 3DS: 586 minutes
Nintendo Wii: 257 minutes
PlayStation: 194 minutes
Atari 7800: 145 minutes



We got a head start on the month of October this past week, with both the misses and I logging a good bit of time in some very seasonally appropriate games. First the misses finished up her game of Alien Trilogy for the PlayStation by beating all 3 episodes, then she started in on Alone in the Dark: The New Nightmare; the latter of which neither of us have ever played before. She's only an hour and a half into the game at this point but she's had a lot of fun with it thus far, since it's a pretty obvious copycat of the earlier Resident Evil games and that's long been one of her favorite game series.

For my gaming time this past week I finally beat the wonderful (and rather lengthy) Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon, and oh man was that game a ton of fun. From beginning to end it was just oozing with Nintendo's signature charm infused into a pretty spooky atmosphere. I've never played the original Luigi's Mansion before, but if it's even half as good as Dark Moon was I'm definitely going to have to play it some day. With Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon completed I then started in on a game that I had been curious about for quite some time after the survival horror buff Radical Reggie recommended it, and that game was Cabela's Survival: Shadows of Katmai for the Wii.

I was pretty skeptical that a Cabela's game could actually be good, let alone provide a compelling survival horror experience, but holy hell did this game ever prove me wrong! It was chalked full of hilariously well written dialog, had a pretty creepy story, and really fun gameplay that felt a lot like Uncharted or one of the more recent Tomb Raider games. I ended up having such a great time with Shadows of Katmai that I played it through from beginning to end in a single session. It was a fairly short game at only 4 hours long, but once I started playing I just couldn't put it down; and for the $3 that I paid for it I really can't complain about the game's length. It's nice to play a shorter game now and then, and it does have some bonus on-rails light gun shooter levels to lend the game some extra replay value.

In spite of my initial skepticism, Cabela's Survival: Shadows of Katmai is definitely going to be making my end of the year list of the top 10 favorite games that I played for the first time this year, and I think I'm probably going to play through it again in the not too distant future. It's a survival horror hidden gem for sure! As far as other games that were played around here this past week go, the only other one to speak of was Centipede for the Atari 7800; which I played via emulation on the Wii. It's been a long time since I played Atari 7800 in any form so I decided to pop into the Atari 7800 High Score Club and join in for a bit. Whether or not I'll keep playing after this round is over I'm not sure about, but for now I'm having fun and that's what's important when it comes to playing games.

I think that about covers everything for this week! Next week both the misses and I have some more horror games lined up to play, and I think that's a trend that should continue for the whole month of October. So until next week, and as always, best wishes and happy gaming to you and yours!

Edited October 1, 2018 by Jin

[karokoenig]

...started in on Alone in the Dark: The New Nightmare; the latter of which neither of us have ever played before. She's only an hour and a half into the game at this point but she's had a lot of fun with it thus far, since it's a pretty obvious copycat of the earlier Resident Evil games...

 

I might be wrong there (too tired to fact-check), but I'm confident that the Alone in the Dark series started way earlier than Resident Evil.

[Skippy B. Coyote]

 

I might be wrong there (too tired to fact-check), but I'm confident that the Alone in the Dark series started way earlier than Resident Evil.

 

Oh yeah, Alone in the Dark is a series that's been around since 1992. The earlier Alone in the Dark games had their own distinct and unique style of gameplay, but for 2001's The New Nightmare the series was handed over to Infogrames (also known as "Atari, SA") and they totally changed up the controls and gameplay to make it play almost exactly like the Resident Evil games that were popular at the time. Fortunately The New Nightmare seems to be a pretty darn good Resident Evil clone from what we've seen of it so far!

[+wongojack]

 

Oh yeah, Alone in the Dark is a series that's been around since 1992. The earlier Alone in the Dark games had their own distinct and unique style of gameplay, but for 2001's The New Nightmare the series was handed over to Infogrames (also known as "Atari, SA") and they totally changed up the controls and gameplay to make it play almost exactly like the Resident Evil games that were popular at the time. Fortunately The New Nightmare seems to be a pretty darn good Resident Evil clone from what we've seen of it so far!

 

I thought it was pretty good. I happened to live in France when that game came out and it was for sale in the freakin grocery store. There was huge hype for it that was never met by the game's sales performance, but I still had fun with it. I have a PAL version of the game and when played it in on my USA PS2, I could use swapping to get it to load, but I couldn't play it after it prompted me to switch discs. #NeverFinished

[+thegoldenband]

Here's the summary for Week 39, running from September 24 - 30. We logged 3281 minutes of eligible play, playing 42 games on a total of 16 systems.

Top 10:

1. BattleTanx (N64) - 296

2. Street Fighter II: Special Champion Edition (Genesis) - 263

3. LadyBug (Atari 2600) - 242

4. Tetris (NES/Famicom) - 240

5. Ultima: Akalabeth (Vectrex) - 210

6. Missile Command (Atari 2600) - 180

6. Mega Man 2 (NES/Famicom) - 180

8. Kaboom (Atari 2600) - 156

9. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 150

10. Fatal Rewind (Genesis) - 148

Pre-NES top 10:

1. LadyBug (Atari 2600) - 242

2. Ultima: Akalabeth (Vectrex) - 210

3. Missile Command (Atari 2600) - 180

4. Kaboom (Atari 2600) - 156

5. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 150

6. Centipede (Atari 7800) - 145

7. Hunchy II (Atari 2600) - 111

8. Eggomania (Atari 2600) - 94

9. Missilebreak Outvaders (Vectrex) - 60

10. Colony 7 (Atari 2600) - 42

Top 10 systems:

1. Atari 2600 (1018)

2. NES/Famicom (510)

3. Genesis (432)

4. N64 (296)

5. Vectrex (280)

6. PlayStation (194)

7. Atari 7800 (172)

8. Atari Lynx (111)

9. Atari Jaguar (90)

10. C64 (63)

If blowing up houses in a post-apocalyptic landscape is your jam, then you'll love this week's top game, BattleTanx on the N64.

However, it's the VCS that takes the system crown, led by pre-NES #1 LadyBug.

[+Ksarul]

We actually got to play this week (although not very much)! As usual, all of our eligible time was on the TI-99/4A. ILikeTurtles spent most of his gaming time this week on the 3DS.

 

TI-99/4A

 

Restless II - 30 minutes

Bouncy - 5 minutes

Skyway - 10 minutes

Doncaster Racecourse - 10 minutes

[oyamafamily]

ATARI 2600:

Dragonfire - 6 minutes

LadyBug - 20 minutes

Missile Command - 94 minutes

Seaweed Assault - 220 minutes

 

ATARI 7800:

Centipede - 30 minutes

 

Dragonfire and Centipede are games which I played for High Score Clubs this week

[karokoenig]

Atari 2600

Dragonfire: 43 min

Phoenix: 12 min

 

NES

Holy Diver: 22 min

Pin Bot: 4 min

TMNT II The Arcade Game: 18 min

 

SNES

Populous II: 85 min

 

Some Dragonfire for the High Score Club, which has just started this week. Some Populous II on the SNES. Man, the SNES mouse is awkward. But still I am glad I have one. Having to play this game (which is rather fun) with a d-pad sounds like purgatory for me.

 

On the NES, I played two games I picked up yesterday on the flea market (Pin Bot and TMNT) and the new highlight in my collection - Holy Diver. Please excuse the atrocious photos. I had to use a stone old videocamera in stillshot mode. Now, this is a collector's edition release of the former Japan-only game. It comes in a sturdy black case with golden letters, a certificate (limited to 2800 copies), some postcards, stickers, some pins, a high quality notebook - and a white cartridge. Everything is high-quality, and the attention to detail is exquisite (see sticker on the back of the cart).

I knew from James & Mike Mondays and Mike's later playthrough that this is a good, but very hard game. And I'm a huge fan of Ronnie James Dio. So when I saw that it got released outside of Japan, I couldn't resist. Testplayed it and managed to beat the first boss. Yep, it's rough.

 

 

 

 

[oyamafamily]

EVIDENCES OF THE WEEK:

 

1) 2600 Seaweed Assault gameplay footage, presented for 2018 Homebrew Tournament Round 5

 

2) New scores on 2600 Missile Command - this week I played Game 26, Difficulty AA on ProSystem console.

 

[carlsson]

Amiga OCS:

Premier Manager 1 - 130 min.

 

Atari 8-bit:

Bertyx - 42 min.

Pong [Mirage Software] - 31 min.

Starquake - 8 min.

 

It is Hires Part II in the Atari 8-bit HSC, three collect 'em ups of varying styles. Apart from that, I continued my infinite game of Premier Manager and found that my 68030 card is acting up badly in combination with this game in particular, so I had to remove the expansion on the 1200 in order to not have the game crash.