I finally got my record player needle in the mail. The first thing I played on this new needle was the Temptations' "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone." I have the single version on CD and I'm trying to figure out the differences between the single version and the album version (I bought the album on record for $1.) Has anyone noticed the Weather Channel plays the beginning of that song in their "Local on the 8s" segment sometimes? I figure that's kind of odd because it's not Muzak. So what did they do
...or rather, its games. Three of them came in the mail for me today: Batman Returns, Shadow of the Beast and Switchblade II. They were delivered to me very fast, I wasn't expecting either package until at least tomorrow. Still no record player needle, though; Detrola is beginning to tick me off a little... Well, anyway, the low was between 39-42 this morning (all the local stations said 39, but the Weather Channel said 42), in other words, BRRR! Luckily, it's 68 now. I'm a little worried abou
Interesting idea for a 2600 game: There are aliens that are trying to make the world a dark place by covering the sky with clouds. The earth has only one airplane that can destroy clouds, and as luck would have it, you happen to be flying it. The aliens are guarding the clouds to make sure you don't shoot them, but you can get clear shots in. The aliens can shoot at you, so you have to dodge their shots as you shoot the clouds away. As you do, the sky gets brighter and brighter until you shoot a
The newest GBA game out is called "Puppy Luv Spa & Resort." I just got it today to add to my collection of GBA games out during the slow death of the system. Has anybody noticed that the title is a pun for the term "puppy love", only this is about loving actual puppies. Also, it seems kind of odd that Nintendo themselves have strayed away from the system they created while other big companies like EA, Ubi-Soft, THQ and Activision have been releasing titles this year. And Nintendo Power will
So I had Northwest Cable News on (apparently I'm one of the few who do), and heard my name. Naturally, I turned to the TV set, and then heard the word 'rape.' I later then saw that they spelled my name wrong, which is a relief because it wasn't me. My name is Christopher Read, and the guy who's in prison for rape was Christopher Reid. Stupid moron, he's a disgrace for people whose names sound like or are mine. I looked in the Salem-Keizer phone book, and there is a guy with my name in there (las
#1 - It didn't get to be as cold as the local stations thought. I think it reached only 46 as opposed to 38 like they said. The Weather Channel got it right, though.
#2 - I never did get the Halloween decorations up. I guess I'll do that tomorrow.
Since I was born on the same day that they voted to have Keizer (the town just north of us) seperated from the rest of Salem, and that it's almost been 25 years since it happened, and I lived in Keizer for the first 11 years of my life, I've decid
I want to put the Halloween lights up now, but Mom insists on October 1. Well, I'll show her. When she gets home tomorrow, she'll find a whole bunch of Halloween decorations up...but no outside Halloween lights. It'll feel like Halloween tonight when the low here is expected to reach 38 (4 Centigrade). That's too cold! I guess Mom's so hesitant to celebrate the Halloween season because she hates fall and winter. Well, anyway, I got 8 new batteries so that means taking apart the bottom of the Lyn
First it was that Shanghai wouldn't work for some reason. That got fixed. Then Hydra wouldn't fit into the cartridge slot. I got that to work, too. Now it's almost out of batteries (and of course I don't have any more AA batteries.) I'm sick of having to buy batteries so I put an ad up in the Wanted forum for a Lynx AC Adapter. Hopefully this will be the end of my Lynx problems.
My mom doesn't like going to the post office, especially after work. But we had to go today and I just got back. There's construction work on 25th (the street where the post office is), so you can't turn right, which is good because there's no traffic coming from the right, so it's easier to turn left, back on the way to my house. So you could say construction work is a good thing. Too bad it's scheduled to end October 8th. Well, anyway, I didn't do anything of value yesterday which is why ther
I's be addicted to Atari 2600 games. Just got some more in the mail today, bringing my grand total to 177. I'm almost to 200. I'll have to go through the AA Database and find some more that I want, and then post a topic in the Wanted section tomorrow. That's basically how I get games, since no store in my area seems to have any (Well, the used video game store has some, but I already have them.)
So I went to Value Village in search of Atari 2600 games, and I found a whole bunch of Intellivision games, even a speech module, but no Intellivision. I would have bought the games if I had a console to go along with it. I searched high and low for a console in that place, but couldn't find one. They had an Atari Flashback console, but no actual carts. So I went to K-Mart next door and bought the SBSP season 5 vol. 1 DVD set. Now I have all of them except for season 4 vol. 1. I have a whole bun
Since my Grandma died about two years ago, he had her cat to keep him company. Last month, though, the cat got really sick and decided to put the cat to sleep. He had been really depressed, so me & mom really didn't think he'd get another one, but his depression comes and goes, and he got out of his funk and yesterday wanted to show us the cat he had on hold at the humane society. So we went in the cat visiting room and she was really playful, playing with us and his cane. Yesterday, he took
Well, the stupid mailman still is coming between 4-5. Luckily, I got Crackpots, Fast Eddie & Bermuda Triangle in it. I also got some new shorts. And I also got some garlic and herb bran crackers. They taste surprisingly good for them being bran crackers. That's it for today.
I went downtown today to get two games I wanted: DK Jungle Climber and Drawn To Life. Both of them start with the letter D. I just thought that was kinda odd. Anyway, they're OK games, not ones I would sit around and play for hours (like Mario Kart DS.) Both of them are platform games (like Super Mario Bros.) Next week I plan to go out again on Wednesday and get Namco Museum DS and Sonic Rush Adventure. (I usually wait a day to make sure Gamestop has the games in stock.) It's funny because the S
Well, I wanted to rush to get the vhs-to-dvd recorder, but I'll have to wait until next month if i want my mom to pay for half of it, we were going to go halvsies on it. I can't pay for it all by myself.
Anyway, I'm going to send a money order out to Detrola and get me a new needle for my record player. We bought the thing at K-Mart a couple years ago or so (they still sell them if you're interested.) When I mailed them for some forms, the reply was fast, so I'm hoping to get the needle by Frid
It was just a simple trick to get me and my sister to shut up for about an hour or so . I was 3 and my sister Stacie was 7. The date was February 14, 1986. Either Mom or Dad hit the record button at 8pm on NBC and history was made. An hour later, Disney's DTV Valentine's Day special was on VHS, including all commercials (my parents liked to cut them out for us. I wish they would have kept them in.) Well, anyway, fast forward to about 18 years later. One little tiny post on the Retrojunk forums
I got back into collecting coins from different countries again. I need to get about 50 of those cardboard coin holders. So far I have 63 coins from different countries (and by countries, one of which is Newfoundland, which is actually a province of Canada. Why would they issue their own coins in the 1940s?) The world record is 235, so I have 172 to go, which is odd because I have 172 Atari 2600 games (that is if I don't count dupes.) So I've seen the number 172 twice so far today.
Power Factor is basically a side-scrolling Xybots. You go around shooting stuff, much like Abadox, only you're a guy and it's not forced-scrolling, and it's in a building. Normally, I would say a game like this is a meh, at best, but what saves this game from it is the codes. I can't play games very good (which is why I like puzzle games), so when a game comes along with an invincibility code, especially for the Lynx, I get it. Without it, I can only go as far as level 2 (Yes, I can beat level 1
Zyx is coming along nicely. Too bad 2600IDE won't tell me how many bytes I have left. I've solved the major problem about getting more than 255 bananas. And to make sure, I've tested it. You can check the latest binary file out in the bB forum. I'd make my own company that makes nothing but 2k games and call it 2K Games, but the 2K Games name has been taken. (In this company's case, they're talking about the year and not the size of their games. Stupid 2K Games had to steal my name.) I don't kn
I just went to the mailbox and there to greet me was the latest Lynx game I purchased: Power Factor. I bought this primarily for the invincibility code. I think codes like this are cool. That's why I like Abadox for the NES so much. I actually had enough interest to beat the whole game with its invincibility code. If there was a Game Genie for the Lynx, I would buy it. I think every game should have an invincibility code. But I'm a little hesitant to put one in GoSub 2 because it might be trigge
Remember about 14 months ago when I first started making Atari 2600 games with Batari Basic? Then you may remember this little fellow. His name is Zyx. It was the worst entry in the 2006 minigame compo. Well, now I'm applying what I learned in the past 14 months to make a new version of this. And I'm only going to use 2k. I have about 100 bytes left. To start the game, press the fire button. The object is to catch the falling bananas. If you let one touch the ground, you lose a life. To start a
...on Strat-O-Gems Deluxe. So close, and yet so very far. My previous best is about 78,000. This time around, I got 96,725. Unless I get extremely lucky like I did this time, I don't think I'll be able to break 100,000. Anyway, Strat-O-Gems is the best Atari 2600 homebrew game so far.
Well, Best Buy came through again. They had Deal or No Deal for GBA. It was only $20. And, I got the complimentary "Would you like the warranty that covers damaged games?" I only had a $20 bill so I said No. I may or may not write a review for it, haven't decided yet. I turned it on to make sure it worked, and a big huge long disclaimer comes on every time you turn it on saying basically "You get no money for playing this. It's for entertainment only." I guess people have gotten stupider since I
I wrote a poem I don't know how long ago (probably a year or so) and had the tune to go along with it somewhat in my head, but I now just put it together. I made a MIDI out of it. At first, I was going to put some other instruments with it (like drums and strings), but decided the piano was enough. That, and I thought the poem was too stupid to go with the melody I made, but here are the words and the midi is here. (1:20)
"Slack-Jawed Jackdaws"
slackjawed jackdaws up in the tree
laughing a
I changed my mind about M&Ms: Break 'Em for GBA. At first, I thought it was unusually worse than the DS version, but as it turns out, I was unknowingly playing level 3 instead of 1. But as I started on level 1 and the levels got harder gradually, it seemed like a better game, in fact, one of - if not the - best games on the GBA this year so far. And call me crazy, but I actually like passwords. In the DS version, it has a battery-pack save, so it keeps progress of the number of lives you hav
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