misspent_youth

Related to Murph's: ColecoVision: the Tournament Experience

I think that's probably an error by the legal or marketing staff at Sears, using the Copyright indicator (circle 'c') instead of the Registered Mark indicator (circle 'r'). You probably couldn't successfully argue for copyright on the word Pong because it doesn't really meet the legal requirements for a copyright work.

I guess a couple of times I've been the odd one; we owned a ColecoVision at Christmas of 1982, and most of my friends had a 2600. I did know one kid at school that had a CV also, and he had the steering wheel module, so we traded games a bit. We also had the 2600 adapter for the ColecoVision, so I guess we didn't get left out of the game-swapping goodness with my 2600-owning friends. Then my parents decided that we'd get a computer, so we got... the Coleco Adam. I never knew anyone that owned that back in the day. I also worked at a game store in the early 90's and traded my Sega rig (Genesis, CD, 32X) for a recently traded in 3D0. I think the thing still cost something like $500 used, though I got a discount for working at the store. I never knew anyone else that owned one of those back then either.

I've got Jungle Hunt and Tapper CIB, as well as a decent collection of the newer homebrews.

It's extremely unlikely that the licenses survived the bankruptcy of Coleco back in the day. Most contracts (at least, most contracts nowadays) contain clauses that say the contract dies if one side goes bankrupt. As well, unless the original license agreements didn't have expiry dates built in, they would have long ago expired. I guess we can always hope, though.

In Canada, at least in Ontario where I live, Wal-Marts have McDonald's in them. It's a match made in heaven!

One thing I remember fondly was the absolute thrill of going to the corner video store that rented games to check out the new games that showed up and to actually look at the boxes as opposed to looking at them in a magazine. We didn't own a ton of games, so it was nice to get that little snapshot of a game that came with a rental and it was so fun to try an figure out which game I'd like based on the blurb on the box and the box art.

Maybe you could get your work to reimburse you for your 'ergonomic input device'?

I don't think that's exactly true. regardless of whether it was done contrary to ebay rules a deal was struck. if an offer was made, and acceptance was given, those are the enforceable elements of a contract, as long as something of real value was going both ways. The guy made a deal and then backed out. That's a lack of integrity. Just because you don't like how the deal was struck doesn't mean the guy has free reign to back out of it.

Y'know, ebay really needs to leave a public comment section in people's auctions so that those in the know can warn off potential scam victims. It's like how Craigslist has a sort of self-policing aspect; when a ridiculous ad gets posted, there's usually a companion ad posted a few minutes or hours later that call out the original ad. It would be great if e-bay had such a function for this kind of d-baggery.

the copy of Smurf was the 2600 version because it was in a red box, not the gray ColecoVision box.

Add me to the group that never owned a 2600. My parents bought the CV and XM1 at the same time as a Christmas gift for me and my sister. Atari games were more prevalent then, so by the time we got rid of that first setup (sob), we probably had twice as many 2600 games as CV games. Not to mention that they sold new 2600 games long after they sold new CV games, at least at the store I worked at. Because the XM1 is what I'm used to when I want to play 2600 games, I don't really find it much of an issue to insert and remove the XM1.

Both Yurkie and NIAD have done excellent work on ColecoVision rarity. Both of their efforts are available in this thread.

I received my games today. Absolutely top notch work! Unfortunately for me, each of my CVs has the garbled graphics issue, and I don't have desoldering tools to get the power switch off for cleaning/re-lubing. It mean's I'll have to wait to experience the fruits of Pixelboy's labors, either that or drag out the old Adam. Then again, maybe it's just the reason I need to take up Yurkie on one of his mod/refurb offers. Regardless, thanks for the hard work Luc!

Check here: Classic Gaming Collectors of Canada Not a ton of traffic, but there are some west coasters. Mostly Ontarians though.

I remember when I first saw Need for Speed on the 3DO. I traded a full Genesis/SegaCD/32X rig and some cash for a 3DO, and that game was stunning. I think it was the Pacific Coast track, where you crest a hill and see these multicolored hot-air balloons...simply brilliant. That game had some pretty horrific pop-up, but I still think of it as one of the best driving games I've played, and I loved how the cars looked and sounded like the real thing.

I voted homebrew because of the reasons many gave above about time and dev tools and the 'labor of love' angle. I think (based on nowhere near a complete survey) that the ratio of good games to suckage is much greater in homebrew than in original programming.

You're fooling yourself if you think that clickwrap agreements aren't enforceable. Clicking 'I Accept' is largely equivalent to signing a contract. As long as you know there are contractual terms, you stand a pretty good chance of having them used against you. There are some issues that arise when you talk about 'take it or leave it' contracts that you can't negotiate, but mostly it's about whether or not you should have known there were contract terms at the time you bought the 'license'. The main reason why this isn't much of an issue is that, other then the RIAA, most businesses realize that suing your customer is a sucker's bet. You just try and take a software company to court and watch their lawyers file numerous motions to dismiss your lawsuit based on the stuff in their EULA.

I guess I was just at the sweet spot as far as age goes when video arcades hit their peak. The same way I used to love taking my few coins to the corner store to load up on candy when I was pretty young is how I felt about arcades. Pretty much any spare change I had went into video games, at the corner stores mostly, but to the arcade when my friends and I managed to get some real money together (like $5 or something). When a Chuck E. Cheese opened in my city, that was the best video game experience I think I've ever had. I still remember the layout, and many of the games (even where they were on the floor) and this is more than 25 years later. I love, love, love classic home gaming, but if I had to choose between collecting classic consoles and classic video arcade machines, the arcade machines would win (if money was no object).

To pick up on high voltage's comment, I disagree that any of the Atari consoles after the 2600 were 'great'. Don't confuse this with me saying I don't like them, because in some cases I do. They may have been, and probably are high quality machines that deliver good gaming experiences, etc. (I haven't played them all to know), but to me 'great' means more than just a good quality machine. It's something that those outside of industry insiders and users would remember it as notable or worth having. Maybe something that parents remember as the 'it' thing their kids wanted, or was part of popular culture by being in movies or music (that weren't just a targeted ad). Pong and the 2600 certainly qualify, NES, and even the PS1. All the other Atari systems high voltage mentioned were 'also rans' according to this measuring stick, as were the Inty, my fave the Colecovision, and most others. Great machines, sure, but not what will be remembered by anyone other than someone that has played and loved them or worked in the industry.

The one thing I think that grading has going for it (at least in the sports card world) is that they also authenticate the game, so it's a way to rest easier that you are falling victim to a fraudster. Pf course, in this hobby, and this site in particular, there are a number of people that informally perform this function, so it's less of an issue. And, since it basically is a bit of a poison to the fun side of the hobby, and generally would result in prices getting elevated, or at least some sellers getting more delusional, I hope it doesn't catch on.

Marty, this problem would land right in your lap if you did a nice thing as offered above and hosted a place for people to sell their roms. IP owners and their lawyers are going to go after the person they see as doing the most harm, and if a person is hosting a centralized repository for ROMs of copyright infringing material, that's a target that would be worth spending some legal dollars on. You'd be the Shawn Fanning of the community, and someone like Nintendo or Atari whose properties are the subject of a significant number of homebrew titles would see you as worth making an example of. Of course, you know your way around the business, so this is not anything you don't know, and in fact you likely have a perspective that most people don't. But I'd hate to see you get the gears because of trying to help out the community.

I'm sorry, but I would certainly like it if someone could make an arcade quality port of an existing game for a console that it is not currently available on. For example, I would surely love to play Tron or Galaga on my ColecoVision in cartridge format (or even in rom format on a multi-cart if that's how the person putting forth the effort of making that possible wants me to), but you can be 100% certain that the rightful owners of the IP have no interest in making that happen. without the homebrew scene that will never happen. You can also be assured that the majority of classic gamers share my opinion, as evidenced by any thread that questions what games people would to see as homebrews. People name arcade ports and ports from other systems, not 'someone should make a game with a helicopter that turns into a motorcycle that fights crime and captures ghosts while killing zombies'. As was mentioned before, ports of existing IP are the best way that homebrewers can recoup the considerable resources expended in producing any game. I personally think it would be a shame if homebrewers stopped making ports simply because they are not able to pursue a legal remedy for those who would infringe their copyright. It is certain that homebrewers' efforts will be pirated, regardless of what the underlying intellectual property situation is. The only difference is what the author can legally do about it. What needs to happen is that consumers refuse to support the lazy compilers who attempt to make an easy profit off of someone else's work. Making a homebrew port of an existing game is NOT a lazy attempt at profit. selling compilations of roms is.

Dark Wizard on the Sega CD was pretty decent. Then again, I haven't played a ton of that genre of game, so I may be talking out of my ass...

I notice how the first Coleco catalog had tons of vaporware whereas the CBS one didn't. Maybe by 1984 Coleco knew the writing was on the wall and just didn't have as much stuff in the pipe. Or maybe CBS didn't want to bother advertising stuff people couldn't already get. Thanks for posting!