rob_ocelot

Incoming! Everyone please shuffle to the right to make more room under the bus!

If you make a habit of murdering people they refer to you as a serial killer. What do they call you when you repeatedly murder the careers of hardware engineers? (egads, to think this is probably only the tip of the body count)

A shame, really. So you didn't get the rah-rahing Greek chorus you wanted here and now you are leaving. Maybe you should just retire to your Facebook echo chamber and smell your own farts for a decade or two. A parting thought for Mike: Namedropping Clay Cowgill into this discussion was a really low move on your part. His involvement in your sorry saga had absolutely no bearing on it's ultimate failure, and IMO only served to give yet another name for people to focus on and swing the spotlight away from you. Like Kevtris, you wanted CC to work for free and maybe glean a few smart-sounding buzzwords from him that you could throw at the next unlucky hardware guy who happened to cross your path. Now Clay's name will pop up in Google searches associated with this Sean/Lee character. Unlike you when you hired Sean, most real busineses do background checks on prospective employees including casual Google searches for obvious red flags. Think about that the next time you come here wanting sympathy and understanding while wearing your "I'm the only one who suffered a loss" t-shirt.

Sounds like a quote from Tony Wilson, Factory Records' founder. Or Martin Hannett. As for who this mysterious 'Lee' is -- We've just unmasked Janus as one of Mike's cronies who was trolling or hyping here and there's the ugly possibility that it was happening at Mike's behest or instruction. Would not at all be surprised to find Janus or another sheep in the Retro fold posing as a 'hardware engineer' at some mysterious Google-esque entity. That sounds like just the sort of shit someone who thought they could pass off a video capture card as a console would come up with. This is probably the most mundane of the pack of lies told.

Looks like they predicted smack talking while playing online games too.

My prediction is he will GTFO of Dodge as far as video games are concerned. If he has any other interests or hobbies I wouldn't be at all shocked if he bulldozed his way into one of those as a money making venture. With video games he made the classic mistake of taking something he liked and had a decent working knowledge and turned it into his job. Quickest way to turn something you like into something you loathe is to make your income depend on it. Not to say that someone CAN'T do this and be happy and successful but the odds are really stacked against you.

Why do I get the feeling that most of the credientials of the 'team' are just fluffed up peacock tails. Game testing is the about the lowest of the low jobs in the industry. The guy who gets the morning coffee and shines the exec's shoes with his tongue is higher up on the totem pole. Just remember, seven years later this guy thought he could be calling the shots at Apple...

I never really understood just what the big deal was about the console and cartridges still working in 50 years. Do people really expect display technology to be compatible? Do you expect the same kinds of financial value placed on old consoles that we do now? Would your grand- or greatgrandkids even care about this stuff? A lot can change in 50 years. You can fit the entire history of the console market in that. Ikea used to make a computer desk called the 'Jerker' (and I'm sure the designer was having a bit of a larf when he named it). The second version of the desk is the Best Damn Desk Ever. Solid, useful, can be configured multiple ways for a multitude of uses unrelated to computers. Practically indestructible too. People into making music still rave about the desk to this day becuase it could easily bear the weight of heavy keyboards and mixing consles. There was a shrine website to this desk at one point. And then Ikea discontinued it. Why? Because it was too good. People only had to buy it once and they never returned to buy another one. Sure, add on accessories sold but the markup was just not the same as the desk. Ikea replaced the desk with a similar looking but nowhere near as sturdy desk. In fact, the replacement (Gallant, ISTR the name was) would fall apart within a year or two -- and that's exactly what Ikea was hoping... there was a 50% chance you might come back in and buy a replacement versus a 5% chance you might come back if your Jerker broke. The problem for the Chameleon (or any new retro console) is market saturation. Once the OCD completists, cartridge hoarders and speculators buy your system where do you go from there? Maybe Piko or Collectorvision can give us a rough idea how much of a market there is for retro catridges. If someone is making a full time living by producing retro catridges I have yet to hear it -- almost without exception these people have day jobs in addition to their side business. I haven't even mentioned things like the Flashbacks eating into your pie. If these things (and all things retro) are selling like gangbusters you'd think you'd see more big fish in the industry throwing their hats into the ring in a big way. Pixelated 2D graphics are not a trend. They are a fad. Fads come and go and get revived approximately once per generation, give or take. Flared jeans, high-top sneakers, capri pants, clogs. These things keep coming and going like clockwork. The fashion world (at least the marketing end of it) will keep shoving these down our throats till the end of time. Mike made the #1 classic marketing mistake: He assumed his needs were universal. "I want a new retro system with cartridges" became "Everyone's going to want this" quite quickly.

I'd LOVE to see new games written for older arcade hardware, eg Williams 6809 and running on an FPGA system that was modular so you could hook it up to the display and UI of your choice -- be it a modern HTDV, an older composite/RF TV, or an arcade monitor in a coin-op cabinet with arcade controls. Official support from companies like IREM and Taito would be icing on the cake. That's just me though. I wouldn't mistake my wanting this as everyone else wanting this.

If there's something to be angry about it's your microphone, Eli -- manufacturer totally threw you under the bus there. In all seriousness, thank you for providing another perspective to this whole mess. Fills in a lot of blanks and gives clarity to other events we've heard about. IMO, the good folks here at AA should be striving to present as complete and clear a picture of the inner workings of Mike's companies as they can without being biased or heavy handed. The next person who stumbles onto a summary of this mess should be able to form their own opinion of events. If they choose to deal with Mike or his affiliated ventures in the future then hopefully they will do some minimal research and inform themselves.

I'd be very cautious about what's being broadcasted on the 'Coleco' end of things. With all we've experienced in this saga is manipulating both sides of a social media conversation to give the appearance of legitimacy completely out of the question now? I know that sounds paranoid but the players involved have continually sunk lower than even my most pessimistic expectations.

I'd say a little of column A and a little of column B. All I know is Mike has probably made some out-of-work forensic accountants very happy.

With all the Hollywood accounting, stockholder shell-gaming and other assorted financial shennanigans that have come to light recently I doubt Carlsen would have seen a dime, even if the RVGS or CC was a success. Mike seems very flexible in both the scope and breadth of his promises -- gentlemen's agreements seem to be the order of the day and it's practically financial and legal suicide to make these sorts of vague or off the cuff promises. However, what I think Carlsen is alluding to in the interview is that if the CC became a success he (and possibly others) would extract their payment from Mike in court -- hence Carlsen's mention of patents. John took his toys and left and has been waiting for Mike to take the bait and use (or claim to be using) something he developed without permission. To mix metaphors here, that damn bus was never going to navigate through all the burnt bridges much less move at all because of the quantity of people thrown under it. The Chameleon was painted into a corner and screwed no matter if it became a success or not

I laughed so hard at that (it's been a shitty week IRL) I'm holding you personally responsible for my next drycleaning bill. Bravo, sir.

More to the point, you can't fight their illogic with logic -- even using logic backed up with facts. There's a cognitive disconnect happening there that skirts around or conveniently ignores inconvenient information, kind of like a zipper missing a tooth but it always manages to navigate through and zip up the jacket just fine.