LU8

Hopefully boxed and with instructions, if lucky!

Thanks for reminding me about that long forgotten name difference. It may be the passage of time, but I also can't remember being able to repair the car in the arcade version? The one thing I do remember was the road narrowing as the game got involved, and the heart stopping fear of landing in water!!

It's a very faithful port of the arcade version. When I bought B&J 2600 in 1992/93 it had a much higher price than other 2600 games that were hanging around the shops at much reduced price, B&J 2600 was a popular title. BTW the version for NES has amazing graphics, and was released in 1988, whereas the version for the 2600 was released prior to the videogame crash.

Being an export PAL model my 7800 has Asteroids as a built in. Great system. :!:

Could indeed be due to the cheapness of the 2600jr., mine was made in China and it says 1991 on the box. On the plus side it doesn't seem to have gotten worse in the 14 years I have had it. Yes, I have tried to adjust the color/brightness settings, indeed on Frogger this helped to bend the playfield back into shape. It was all wonky without adjustment, but you still get that excessive brightness on areas involving the colour beige. Whereas insert the same games in the 7800 (Frogger & Secret Quest) and they play perfectly without adjusting the TV. When I first got my 2600jr. I had a 1980 and 82 Trinitron, the problem wasn't so noticeable, now I have a 1996 Trinitron and a 2001 TV set. I don't even try to play the 2600jr on the 2001 TV. I wonder if it could be a matter of inadequate shielding on the 2600jr. perhaps if I put a metal box around it? Still, it's handy having the 7800, when I play VCS games on it I just pretend it's a 2800 console.

First off, I am in a PAL country (Australia) and have a 2600jr. and 7800, both made in 1991, I only use PAL carts. The 2600 games appear brighter on the 2600jr than when the same games are played on the 7800. On games with beige/sandy colour e.g. Frogger, the game plays normally on the 7800, but it's a problem on the 2600jr. Specifically the middle strip where the snake walks across is so bright it becomes obscured. Ditto for the game Secret Quest, plays perfect on the 7800, but can't be played on the 2600jr because the border of the playfield is too bright and streaks. There is also an excessive humming sound going on with the colour streaking. So there are some "2600" titles I only play on the 7800 console. Indeed, I would say all the "2600" games appear correct on the 7800. On the 2600jr. they seem too bright, which makes most "2600" games (like 1981 Pac Man) much nicer, but, it means some games can only be played on the 7800. I am using a 1996 Sony Trinitron TV. I have noticed that the excessive brightness problem with the 2600jr. isn't so bad on older TVs, like my previous 1982 Trinitron. I have owned the 2600jr. since new, I don't think it has deteriorated, the problem just seems worse when you use successively more modern TV sets, which seem to have brighter pictures. Can anyone shed some light on the problem? Thanks.

$29.95 isn't a lot considering all you are getting. Beyond just the games there's the novelty of the presentation box in the style of the old VCS days, the retro shape of the FB2, and you even get some authentic controllers that can be used on old consoles. As has been said above it's a nice novelty gift for young gamers, and you really can't go wrong at this price. I was just counting all the 2600 games I have. 35 games, mostly boxed and bought when the VCS was current. But, that's still less than the 40 that come with the FB2.

Recently I heard of someone buying a FB console for their four year old son's birthday. So a new generation is discovering some form of the 2600. Just wait till those new joysticks get out there!

This is a good reason for me to buy FB 2. I threw out the original style controllers with my woody 2600 when it stopped working in the mid 80s. Since 1991 I have been using the joypad that came with my 2600jr., although I recently bought a new set of paddle controllers. So it seems I can use my paddles to play Pong on the FB 2, yet another reason to buy, because I have never owned a Pong console. Everything sounds good so far, and I don't mind the new style Fuji.

Baby steps are good, bold big steps like the 5200 and Jag can lead to financial trouble if not handled just right. Next step is adding the USB connector. At present the FB 2.0 is a programmable disguised as a dedicated console.

If the Flashback 2.0 does reach the market at $29.95 then the new Atari should be able to corner the retro market. If the original flashback managed 1/2 million sales in one year, then the Flashback 2.0 should achieve 1 million, which would be what the 2600 sold back in 1985, not bad at all. If they could just add a USB connector with the next flashback that would be perfect.

Let me tell you my recent experience with buying a new old stock Donkey Kong cart from Telegames, then you will understand what Curt said about not including a cart slot. I bought this cart, brand new, from the authorised company (Telegames), the cart didn't work. I emailed Telegames, said the cart didn't work. They said carts rarely don't work, but they said send it back and if it's faulty we will send you a new one at no extra charge. So they sent me a new one, which worked, and the extra postage was their cost. I might add that I also bought 7800 Midnight Mutants, 7800 Dig Dug, 2600 Jr. Pac Man and Secret Quest. All worked perfectly. To avoid product liability problems from old 2600 carts it's ok that Flashback 2 doesn't have a cart slot. Although, I hope Flashback 3 will have a USB connector (I think Curt said this might still happen), I also hope someone here will be making a little kit with all the parts needed to add an external cart slot to Flashback 2. I thought it was originally planned to make the 2600 jr console have just one chip, which in effect is what the Flashback 2 is, i.e. a real 2600 in a new smaller case design. And France, Infogrammes is a French company.

Yeah, I wasn't clear about the copyright issue. At present Atari can only put "Atari" owned games on the console, like Asteroids. But, if there was an external cart slot you could put in an old copy of Pac Man jr. and play that as well.

The "2600 on a chip" + VCS/2600/2600jr/7800 controller compatibility elevates this to a genuine Atari dedicated console. Yeah, 40 games is enough. When I play with my real 2600jr I only take out 4 games at a time, at the most. So for 29.95 this is ok indeed. Adding an external cart slot,...that's in the dream box for the moment. It would be nice though because then it would get around the copyright issue and Pac Man jr and other non Atari owned titles could be played by inserting an old cart. Perhaps someone could now write Super Pac Man for the 2600? Still, can you imagine anyone going to this trouble for any other old console? The 2600 is the world's No. 1 old console. With the Flashback 2.0 it has finally beaten NES through mini me reincarnation.

As was said above, the software has to suit the hardware. The GCC team that developed the 7800 console also wrote it's initial games (and excellent titles for the 2600 & 5200) and titles like Dig Dug, Ms Pac Man and Pole Position II were very good. Much of GCC's titles, and the games 5200 Gremlins and 2600 Solaris were already written in 1984, even the 2600 jr was ready for 1984, just as the 7800 was. The shame was that the GCC team left in 1984, their work on the 7800 and it's games ties in with what was fashionable in 1983/84. Have a look at the sorts of games played in the 1983 film Joysticks. You could put 7800 Dig Dug in an arcade cabinet of the time and it would have been perfect. I would have liked to have seen what GCC could have written for the 7800 if they had been allowed to stay with the 7800 program and the 7800 was catered for in the manner that the 2600 was (both in software support and marketing). The 2600 had some impressive side scrollers in Pitfall & Pitfall II, and who would have thought it could have managed a game like Secret Quest? But it did. Klax on the 7800 has excellent colors and is an example of the original type of game that should have been tried more on the 7800. It was a promising platform not trully catered for. It might have been the next 2600 if it was given a chance. Unfortunately it didn't even get the special carts the 2600 jr did in the latter stages of its life. For the record the joypad is my favorite controller, and the 7800 was very hard to find in shops. Indeed the first time I heard of it was reading on the back of a 2600 box saying the game was compatible with 2600/7800!. It would have been cool to see Crystal Castles on the 7800.