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Slow news day week month year for "Atari VCS." In the spirit of their social media minion, who seems to have run out of small talk, here are some reruns just to keep the thing alive.

If the pigeons are still looking for a mascot here's an idea:

Heavy Laserdisc viewing happening in my house as of late...

I like simple games, PacMan, Qix, etc. Well, today I played Video 61's Animal Keeper. I ordered Putt 18 from Lance and got this instead. Not disappointed, in fact, I LOVE the game. Never played 2600 Zoo Keeper, so I knew nothing of it. Man, this is a fun game, additive. I have already reached Level 20, 63000 points! I decided to keep the game. This Atari 8-bit never lets me down. 35 years after getting my Atari 800XL, a gift from mom (I was an adult), I still love it. It still does not let me down. Wonderful surprises still await. And, by the way, I am almost 60! Thanks Lance and crew! Keep 'em comin'!

Happy 4th to my fellow Americans! And to everyone else, happy, umm... 4th!

Test run preview.. it's pretty hard to do a decent run animation with two frames only !

The shambling corpse wearing the skin of Atari hasn't gone out of its way to tell people what they really are. It's not quite deception but it doesn't seem honorable, either.

I don't know... There are an awful lot pf people out there associating "Atari" with Atari.

Thanks for the encouragement y’all ! . I owe much thanks to NukeyShay for help with the kernel for overhead view . I also am essentially using the kernel from my other game 1vs1 basketball for the first person portion , which he also pretty much wrote also .

Here is a slight revision to the XBGDP called Isabella6. This adds the ability to delete a file on a disk drive with the XB statement DELETE "DSKn.FILE". N.B. This does not work when using FIAD and Classic99. Also boot tracking has been added so you can have the XBGDP on DSK1 to DSK9. If it is on DSK3 you would start it up with RUN "DSK3.LOAD". There is one case where boot tracking does not work - if you are using the TI assembler that comes with the package, the return will be to the start of XB which tries to RUN DSK1.LOAD. There is no practical way to change this. You will have to type RUN "DSK3.LOAD" again or you could have a one line LOAD program on DSK1: 10 RUN "DSK3.LOAD". This does not happen if you use Asm994a. ISABELLA6.zip

It's a not-so-nice Spring day. Because it's Spring means all the bugs have woken up from their slumber and decided to have a party...on your dining room table! So your job is to squish the nasty, gross ants! But beware the bees. If your arm touches the bee, your squishing days are over. The quicker you squish the ants with your finger, the more points you get. To squish the ants, press FIRE to press your finger down on the table. This is a "semi-port" of the Jaguar game I made a while ago. Some things had to change due to the Atari 2600. The game randomly decides whether to put an ant or bee on the table. ants5.bas.bin

What's hilarious about this method is that if someone asked for a fast way to multiply two numbers and you replied "add the two numbers and square that result, then subtract the two numbers and square that result, and subtract the second result from the first and divide by 4", he'd probably punch you for being obtuse. Also, whoever came up with that exploit is a genius.

The hostname lookup on my site should be working again ... looks like I was using a PHP function that became deprecated then unsupported.

Not sure if/when I'll take my C64 mini out of the box to actually use, but if I did, this joystick mod seems to be the thing to do:

Which brings up something I've wondered about. Let's say the name and marks of a certain abandoned company were to go for sale. Someone bought them, but didn't want the marks to fall into the hands of Fre... I mean , some "Ne'er do well." Could something be done to actually kill the brand, or will it always exist? EDIT: As far as RKO, they were a record company well into the 70's, and I think early 80's

What I love about the old 8bits is that devs knew how much ram and other hardware restraints they had so while striving to make great looking games they for the most concentrated on making the game fun to play first and foremost. Sure there were bad games and not so good games but when the dev had the needed time and flair we got and still get some bloody amazingly great games that have playability in spades. I feel blessed if you like to have come from the start of games on computers etc, like many I've seen the advances in tech but I can still be captivated by games on a 40+ year old machine to this day and also see new games for it that are as fun now as when the machine and games were brand new and fresh. That's a wonderful testament to the machine and the amazing past and present programmers....

If the word "beta" appears, Ebay blocks it. I'm not interested in trying to game their system. If they don't want it, they can't have it

At the moment I just would like to add that there exist tricks which allow to use about 90 colours in one scan line - see "New Direction" intro by MaPa and PG:

Yaron yes 8 pixel wide, and Charlie damn ? now that you said it, I can't see the ninja anymore.... hmm there was an error in the animation of the ninja.. is that better ?

I'll add one more thing to the issue of mismatched lead spacing, known as pitch. Measure the hole spacing in the motherboard with calipers, and try to match this spec when ordering the new component. Mouser and Digi-Key usually have this listed on the order page under specs, and other vendors such as Jameco provide the datasheet where the information is provided. Basically do your research before ordering. Don't ever force the wrong pitched part into a board such as the previously posted image suggests with the angled leads. If the lead spacing isn't a match, then either reform the leads carefully by making a series of bends in the leads with needle nose pliers, or just get the correctly pitched part in the first place (better).

Even as a C64 guy originally, I've learned to appreciate the Atari 8-bit as well for its strengths, and have enough drawers to keep both in my collection. PixelCrunch seemingly innocently asked about Atari graphics, and within five posts it turned into another Atari vs Commodore thread...

I want to point out something that has taken me a very long time to finally identify. I had exit code that was doing a BLWP @0 on the Geneve 9640. The program has 5 different object files with numerous REF's and DEF's spread out in the files. In the first object file, I had used instructions like CLR @LABEL1 as well as MOV @LABEL1,@LABEL1. LABEL1 was REF'd in the first source file and DEF'd in a later object file. Use of the REF and DEF labels in some cases were after the use of the label and in some cases before the label. That was my mistake. I should have REF/DEF everything in the first source file of each object file. GenLINK did not resolve the location of LABEL1 in all places, so, something like CLR @LABEL1 was resolved to CLR @>0000. I had also used cases of SETO @LABEL1 as well. So, I had some cases where the correct location of LABEL1 was used, and some locations where it did not get resolved in my coding. I was going through numerous routines trying to chase down the issues when I finally tracked it down. Anyways, thought I would just point this out. Beery

That is normal behavior. warheads.bas.bin is the output file. warheads.bas is the source file. Everytime you compile, it will delete the output file, and generate a new one if the compile is successful.

After watching that, it's not the Alpha Lock key that's depressed!

This capacitor is going on the Power board for my 1084S-P. All the new capacitors are about half the size of the originals. Old and new (installed) 200V 220uf capacitors.

I could get behind that, as I'm a huge pinball fan myself! Definitely would be cool if the pinball portion of Baby Pac-Man could be leveraged into some original tables!! ..Al

Turns out I was misinformed. The Apple II version, which I played religiously for a while, had unique backgrounds for one or two levels before Doh. The arcade game has a unique background only for Doh. Between this and the ones I linked to earlier, I believe all the backgrounds are covered.

Not ours. We're the FB 3 on. The future is Stella emulation until FPGA's get inexpensive enough.

Hmmm, now that I am moving along again, maybe I can be the first to solve it!

I've added Google links to the start times of upcoming shows that will tell you when the show starts in your time zone anywhere in the world! ?

That's pretty much close to how I classify gaming eras... 1st generation is Vintage with games like Pong which can't be emulated normally and usually require more than one player. 2nd generation is Classic with the Pre-Crash systems (as definied by the r.g.v.c. newsgroup in the 90's). In fact the Crash is also a major barrier between generations (X & Y) who started with 8-bit games. 3rd and 4th generation is Retro a.k.a. the Post-Crash era (8 & 16 bit) and is the most popular period on the Internet. The 5th generation is Transitional because while we had rudimentary 3D games on the Playstation & N64, there were still good 2D games on the Saturn & Jaguar. The Modern era would be 6th gernation and onward because that's when all the games had accerlated 3D graphics and current game genres well established. The only difference between the generations is the game resoultions (480p, 720p, 1080p and 4K).

You can also mix 4 hues and 4 brightness levels in 4 color mode. If you add character mode and PMG, you get 6 brightness levels. And using 2 frame flickering you can get 8 hues and 11 brightness levels. That can make images like this: Also check the Rasta convert thread ..

I must really be missing *something* when it comes to Ballblazer. I mean, it's a Lucasfilm game... and a game somebody felt was good/important enough to bother using an extra sound chip on. Sometimes after reading posts like yours, I'll go back and give it a try, like I just did. But no matter the once_a_decade I play it, it's still the same experience every time... an exercise in running back and forth. Run up to the 'thing' and steal the ball. With ball circling in tow, run down to the goal and "shoot". Wash, rinse repeat. As far as overly simple sports games go, I get and enjoy One-On-One basketball. I get and can even enjoy Hat Trick. Yet the fun still continues to elude me in Ballblazer.

Similar technique in GR.11 mode: - black + 15 hues which share the same luminance (playfield pixels) - black + 15 hues with another luminance (missiles as the 5th player over the playfield pixels, black is still black in this mode) - 6 colours of multicoloured players (additional colours made of P0+P1 pixels and P2+P3 pixels) Which means up to 37 colours in one scanline (picture attached, OlivierP palette).

This topic seems to have gone sour.

Well, it's not really "the complete answer" - for example in graphics mode 9 one may use 38 colours in line (see the picture attached): - 16 shades of one colour (playfield pixels) - 16 shades of another colour (missiles as the 5th player over the playfield pixels) - 6 colours of multicoloured players (additional colours P0+P1 and P2+P3)

The Atari hardware has several things than can be combined that can add/vary colors, so the simple answer to this is "it depends". The "Per Scanline" designation is important here, because all color options, and even graphics modes can be changed on each scan line. Few games use only a full screen of a single graphics mode. Multiple graphics modes mixed on screen is the norm. Also, for the sake of the question this answer covers only what can be done strictly through inherent hardware capabilities that once set up requires no further CPU support to maintain. First, is the "normal" 14 graphics modes. Depending on the display mode there could be two, or four, or five colors (per scanline). However, Player/Missile graphics are separate color registers from the playfield and can add four more colors to this, so there could be up to nine colors (per scanline). The Atari has nine color registers, so this would be the limit of colors created purely by color indirection (using the color registers.) (per scan line). BUT, different GTIA options provide other color interpretation possibilities beyond the "normal" modes. This allows 9 colors as playfield graphics (using color registers), or 16 colors (all the same brightness), or 16 shades of one single color. So, the answer can be sixteen colors (per scanline). HOWEVER, (there's always some other trick going on the Atari) color merging options in GTIA can mix playfield and player/missile graphics colors together, and the total number of colors possible doing this is 23 colors. Nine of those come from color registers. The rest of the colors are done by overlapping Player/Missile objects with each other and overlapping Playfield pixels with Player/Missiles pixels. This would be a fairly contrived situation and has limitations, but it is do-able, and it is an inherent capability of the hardware. So, the complete answer is the hardware can produce up to 23 colors (per scan line).

I think to sum this up, if replacing that capacitor makes things better as far as noise in the video is concerned, then that means the original had gone bad. Reason for the original cap failing can be chalked up to age, inactivity, or damage caused by the stress of physical manipulation (likely bent too far side to side). When replacing said capacitor, the pitch (lead spacing) should match the board, capacitance should match the original (10 uf), and the voltage just needs to be a safe margin above 5v which 16v definitely is. Things such as the reforming voltage, although it might play a role in the ultimate life, probably won't matter since any new capacitor close to the original spec will outlast any of us unless you are still in your teen years (that counts me out). Bottom line as has been already pointed out, a higher voltage rating than the original part is not required, nor will it work any better because of it. However due to better efficiencies in newer designs you might find that a newer 16v part is both smaller in size and pitch as compared to the original capacitor. Thus a higher voltage newer version might match the old one's pitch and be a better fit which will prevent damage when inserting it into the board. And lastly as Gunstar pointed out, if the pitch is too small don't force it into the board, but instead reform the leads to fit properly as he described. And lastly let's not kill the messenger who has possibly pointed out a valid fix for the vertical lines issue that has been such a long standing problem on the A8. He might have simply used the higher rated 25v part because it fit better in the original hole, although his statements about safety related to this are really a non-issue.

Similar to the current incarnation of RKO: "The company seeks out additional distribution and co-financing ventures for new productions as well as for sequels, remakes and live stage productions based upon its library of titles." http://rko.com "RKO is one of the oldest continuously operating movie studios, and occupies a unique place in the history of film making." Funny, I thought they stopped making movies in the 60's; that does give them a unique position: they were the 1st of the Big 5 to shut down. They are still better than Atari SA; they've actually helped produce a few things.

Well, it is of course your right to enjoy blocky graphics, poor-res explosions, jerky movement, and tiny sprites, on a limited size screen. AtariBlast is pretty awful, don't really understand why it's used as an example so many times, unless there's simply nothing better. Anyway, this discussion which I tried to keep technical has of course descended into another stupid pissing match. I guess some people just can't let go of the mine-is-better mentality, even 30 years later. Have fun, I'm out.

I was about to refer to the chicken shortage at KFC last year, but the CNN article already mentioned it. Perhaps this is a new thing in the business world, to run out of your base ingredient. In that case Atari seem to doing everything right, assuming they're short of games for the new console. Just as expected really.

Fun Fact: Tonight Show Johnny ? (for you whipper snappers who don't know the hell I'm talking about, google it) back in 1973 made a comment about a toilet paper shortage as a joke. But people took it very seriously.

The base Atari OS mathpack FMUL works by repeated addition while counting down multiplier digits. It takes ~9750 cycles on average for RND(0)*RND(0) and ~16600 cycles for worst case of all nines in the multiplier, not counting DMA cycles. In the current version of Altirra Extended BASIC, I use a decimal mode version of the classic square-table algorithm that can multiply two standard Atari FP numbers with rounding using 1K of tables. Average is ~2010 cycles, worst case ~2030 cycles. Turbo-Basic XL uses an algorithm that precalculates the multiplicand by all BCD bits and then adds all partial factors for each bit set. Average is ~2180 cycles, worst case ~3120. The final result is not rounded but adding that wouldn't cost much. TBXL's algorithm uses no table space but requires some code space and particularly some temporary space for the premultiplied factors. In the AltirraOS math pack, I convert the multiplier digit pairs from BCD to binary (0-99), then run a transposed loop that processes the same binary bit position across all multiplier bytes before doubling the multiplicand for the next bit position. Result is rounded. Average time is ~2580 unhalted cycles, worst case around 3560. The advantage of this algorithm is that it requires no large tables or unrolled code and not much temporary space, so it can fit within both the ROM and page zero memory constraints of the math pack.

IRATA.ONLINE - one on-line service for #retrocomputing, many platforms. 13 seperate emulators running each version of #PLATOTERM, connecting, and participating in a #PLATO teleconference, with screen share and chat. No voice-over, had a cold. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9f8Vy9g7yM

For the sake of completeness: Copying 8192 bytes with the CPU takes on Handy 50ms and on a Lynx II 67ms Drawing 102 unpacked 160 pixel wide 16 color sprites takes on Handy 33ms and on a Lynx II 17ms.

Are you serious? You "discovered" a link to the docs? Oh, please, don't start the same shit as in the Jaguar forum. Just wait that you find a bug in Suzy no body else found so far.

Second on the video cable, but at the same time, if you actually have a TV that can take those leads (or a 300 ohm adapter like the below), then just strip the broken wire back and loop the bare wire around the terminal. It'll work just fine - I ran that way for many years.