Rev. Rob
-
Content Count
1,249 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
1
Posts posted by Rev. Rob
-
-
Philips -started off as a lightbulb making company- (and is now btw the second oldest computer/video game company around)Really? I'm not saying you're lying but I've never seen any video games or video game hardware made by Philips.
Magnavox Odyssey^2 a.k.a. Phillips Video Pac?
Phillips CD-i?
Are you serious?
-
It was RCA that increased the leingth of VHS to four hours against the protests of JVC, and it was RCA that made the best players. IMO, history shows that RCA won that fight.Not bad considering, at the time, they had just the Odyssey to look at for clues.
Untrue. Atari Pong was released in 75, a full two years before the Studio II. In addition, a slew of dedicated consoles were released in this era that far outpreformed Studio II.
-
Thanks for all of your help. Hey, I wouldn't mind if you decided to redo it if I was wrong.
That's a good way to get into the credits in the manual! Also, it's an "Odyssey" game, not Odyssey^2.Ouch. I sure can't help too much there, since I have nothing from the original Odyssey to compare it with.
At least you won't have to do much work soldering parts onto the board.
Also, doesn't it use .156" pin spacing instead of .1"? In that case, the library I uploaded won't help you much.
Umm... I dunno. Lools like 1mm on my ruler. Anyone have any tech documentation?
-
On the upshot, it STILL isn't as bad as the VIS.I don't consider VIS a game system... and even if I did, VIS blows it out of the water.
I love the Studio II. You just have to pretend it's from the 1950's when you're playing it and it will seem ahead of it's time. Anyone want to sell me Bingo?y-bot
You know, I'd really just like a scan of this thing. Anyone?
Upon its release, the Studio II was immediately rendered obsolete. The controllers were integrated into the console; no cords, no wires. The sound came from a speaker on the unit, not from the TV. The color was only in black and white. The 1976 release of the Channel-F had almost none of these shortcomings.Actually, if I'm not mistaken the Channel F also had a speaker in the unit that generated the sound.
Hence why I said "almost none." However, as another poster already pointed out, Channel-F later used the TV speakers for sound.
A little nitpick:Overall, it’s a joke. RCA, the American company who defeated juggernaut Sony in the first format wars and won supremacy for the VHS standard over Sony's Betamax, must have had too many people working on VCR's and not enough on video games. In a word, Studio II is awful. In a few words: "Worst. Console. Ever."I'm not sure I'd give RCA credit for winning supremacy for VHS over Beta-- it was a combination of a lot of factors, including VHS being licensed to a zillion manufacturers by JVC.
It was RCA that increased the leingth of VHS to four hours against the protests of JVC, and it was RCA that made the best players. IMO, history shows that RCA won that fight.
I like my Studio II. It goes great with my RCA Selectavision CED player. If I could find an RCA front-projection TV from the early 80s, I could create my own "failed RCA products" entertainment center!Ya, I like having my Studio II near my 32X, Saturn and Dreamcast. It masks the SEGA-stench of failure quite well.
Hell, it could almost nearly make the Jaguar seem like a stunning success.
-
"Communication is performed with a high speed 64-bit data bus, rated
at 2400 megabits/second. The 68000 is only able to access 16 bits
of this bus at a time."
Doesn't that make the Jag only 16 bit?
-
Gregory DG, cx2K & Shawn Sr. - it's Electrocop - no maybe, no confusion, it's the 7800 version of Electrocop...Further from my last email from Amy:
Re: Electrocop - I think Atari had another team working on the Lynx
version simultaneously, but they didn't share anything about that game
with us. That's why there's no real similarity between the games. All
we knew was they wanted a Robocop-ish sidescroller. So we made one!
(with ninjas and giant brains; go figure)
Which serves to explain the Robocop-ishness
sTeVE
Anyone else think they borrowed a LOT from Revenge of Shinobi?
-
I realize your board is done, but there may be others interested...I've only designed one board with it, but FreePCB seemed to work fairly well. For me, it was a lot easier to learn than Eagle. Gerber and drill file outputs are included.
Thanks,
5-11under
Awesome, I will check this out too!
-
Perfect. Every place I've checked so far doesn't take Eagle files.But Eagle can generate Gerbers. Check to see if PCB Express does so as well. And pcbpool also takes the files from many different programs, not just Eagle.
When I am done designing it in Eagle, would you mind taking a look at it before I send it off?I don't see why not. The only problem is that I might feel an urge to start the whole thing from scratch.
You might want to spend some time learning how to edit library files in Eagle first. It was quite a while before I figured out how to take an existing edge card connector library object, copy it, and make multiple equivalent versions that had different edge lines (long vs short carts vs open edges) included.
It's a lot of work to get the right dimensions, and you probably won't get them right on your first board run, but once you figure out how to make library objects that include the dimensions, its pretty nice.
Here's my 2600 Eagle library file. If you can play with that until you figure out how to make an O^2 library, everything else is easy.
Thanks for all of your help. Hey, I wouldn't mind if you decided to redo it if I was wrong.
That's a good way to get into the credits in the manual! Also, it's an "Odyssey" game, not Odyssey^2. -
Technical Specs:
Processor
RCA COSMAC 1802
CPU Speed
1.78 Mhz
RAM
2.5KB
It’s January 1977. RCA had watched as rival TV manufacture Magnavox successfully released the world's first video game console, Odyssey, five years earlier. RCA executives also saw numerous "pong" systems that came to the market and were met with success and acclaim in the years in between, most notably, Atari's Pong in 1975.
This was particularly upsetting to some folks at RCA because they had turned away the inventor of the home videogame console, Ralph Baer, who had approached RCA with his idea before doing business with Magnavox.
In an effort to enter into a new, popular, and lucrative market, RCA decided to counter the popular dedicate consoles that dominated the market by releasing a system that is programmable. The idea was that programs on cartridges could be sold separately and work with one console. Game programs could be sold cheap, and consumers would only have to purchase the expensive hardware once.
An excellent idea, but unfortunately, despite an attempt rush the Studio II to retail shelves, Fairchild, a maker of semiconductors and camera parts, beat RCA to the punch in 1976, by releasing their vastly more powerful Channel-F system only a few months from the RCA's introduction of their game system.
Upon its release, the Studio II was immediately rendered obsolete. The controllers were integrated into the console; no cords, no wires. The sound came from a speaker on the unit, not from the TV. The color was only in black and white. The 1976 release of the Channel-F had almost none of these shortcomings.
The Studio II was marketed only during 1977. With the release of the Atari VCS and Magnavox’s Odyssey 2, RCA decided to cut their losses on a poorly planned and marketed console venture, never again to return to the video game world.
A total of eleven (11) programs were released for the Studio II. The console also have five simple games built into the unit, such as Doodle, Addition, and Freeway.
Overall, it’s a joke. RCA, the American company who defeated juggernaut Sony in the first format wars and won supremacy for the VHS standard over Sony's Betamax, must have had too many people working on VCR's and not enough on video games. In a word, Studio II is awful. In a few words: "Worst. Console. Ever."
After purchasing the Game.com, Tiger's internet capable final attempt at the handheld game market, I thought I had played the worst. Even Game.com's predecessor, the LCD based R-Zone that screams nerd when worn on the head, is vastly superior to RCA's blunder.
Fairchild's 1976 Channel-F console, released several months before Studio II, was years ahead of RCA. Their console featured color, and graphics detailed enough to produce quality clones of Atari hits such as Combat and Lunar Lander.
On the other hand, Studio II isn't powerful enough to produce a clone of an ASCII based calculator game from the mid 1990's. Yes, the graphics are actually much worse. See: Freeway. Even the obligatory Pong clone is so poor and slow, that a novice gamer can easily play a match against himself with little difficulty.
The simple selecting a game to play requires unintelligible combinations of numbers, which makes reading the manual a must. This is clearly why RCA printed abbreviated instructions on the back of the cartridges themselves, and why the carts are actually inserted backwards into the system. This is the only evidence of forward thinking that exists from RCA in regards to the Studio II.
Controls that do not detach from the console, (this was an option for the 1972 Magnavox Odyssey and the Channel-F), make game play a chore, forcing the gamer to hold the entire console. Two player games are an even bigger nightmare.
The graphics are surprisingly not far ahead of where Magnavox was five years earlier, and with a console that didn't even have a CPU. Studio II is hardly worthy of being considered a part of the generation that gave birth to consoles such as Atari's 2600, Mattel's Intellivision, and Odyssey 2.
A conversation piece at best, the Studio II does have a few oddities.
1. The console was intended to be in color. This is proven by the existence of 1978 Sheen M1200, a UK clone, and also by the fact that some of the games were programmed in color. Likely to cut corners, console can only output in black and white.
2. Interestingly, the console's external power supply plugs into its TV game switch (RF unit), and not directly into the unit. This of course also means that any Studio II minus the game switch component is even more utterly useless than a complete system.
3. What’s with the name? Seriously? How can it be a “II” of anything if it’s the first of something?
Possibly the only US console to be supported by its manufacturer for less than one year, Studio II is quickly, and rightfully, forgotten amidst game history.
Here is a screenshot of Baseball:
Admit it, you would never have know that is supposed to be baseball if I hadn't told you.
Here's another one of Black Jack:
"Shit" is right! LOL!
-
At those prices for second-hand games, can you really fault getting old systems chipped and using copies?No, but for me the whole experience is actually owning the box and manual as well.
-
It may help if you told the world more about your homebrew... For what system is it?Odyssey.
-
First of all, what program have you designed the board in? They don't take MS Paint files you know.I used a program called PCB Express, and the output is a .PCB file. Is there a way to convert that to gerber?
There is also PCB software that has a "free" mode, like Cadsoft Eagle, which is limited to two layers and a small board. The good news is that their idea of "small" is plenty big for cartridge boards, unless you want to make some kind of 8-ROM monster board for the Genesis or SNES. Eagle also happens to have a version with runs in X Windows under OS X, which is why I use it.Good PCB software (like Eagle) will also have a schematic editor, then you can route the board without making stupid mistakes. Don't bother to use the autorouter feature; most of them suck completely, and it'll just make your board look ugly.
As for where to get it done, I went with pcbpool.com because they take Eagle files.
Perfect. Every place I've checked so far doesn't take Eagle files.
When I am done designing it in Eagle, would you mind taking a look at it before I send it off?
Thanks!
-
The Dina 2-in-1 and the Telegames Personal Arcade are the same machine, aside from having different power supply units. Essentially, Telegames bought the rights to market the Dina in the US, and just changed the box and the label on the console. Anyhow, the ColecoVision may be made of cheap parts, but the Dina/Telegames console is even worse. II also heard about colecovision clones Dina and the Telegames personal arcade that were made years later. Would one of these be better to get than a colecovision? Is the hardware better? Are they imports only? PAL only?
Please sir, please... tell me what power supply to use!
-
Hi all,
I am getting ready to publish my first homebrew. I have designed the PCB, but I have no experience in actual fabrication. So, anyone have any resources? (Programs, companies, etc.)
Anyone wanna get involved.
Thanks!
-
HELP, HELP, HELP!
I just got one of these off of eBay minus the power supply. Anyone know what kind I need to get?
Thanks!
-
In 1995 the 16-bit era was coming to and end. Sega had been in the lead in the 16-bit console race since it introduced its Genesis in 1989 and it was fighting to retain that lead. Though the Super Nintendo Entertainment System would become number one in sales after the 1995 holiday season, Sega were committed to releasing new and innovative software to keep an edge. New franchises were born, and Comix Zone, “The worlds first fully interactive comic book,” was one of them.
The game takes place in present day New York City. Through a cinematic introduction gamers are introduced to the hero, Sketch Turner, a writer/artist/freelance rock musician who is working on his comic book, Comix Zone late on a dark stormy night in his gothic high rise apartment with his best friend, Roadkill, a sewer rat who Sketch saved from death years earlier. Suddenly, seemingly from no where, the villain of the comic book world which he created, Mortus, rises from the pages and traps Sketch in his own comic book, along with his pal Roadkill Through out the game Mortus sketches in enemies to attack Sketch.
The game begins with Sketch in the N.W.E. (New World Empire) control room in Newer York City. There he meets face to face with another one of his creations, General Alissa Cyan, (much more attractive than Mortus). Alissa gives Sketch a briefing of the situation and Sketch is left to explore the depths of Comix Zone.
Players take Sketch page by page and panel by panel through this distinctive title. In each panel on all six pages there is either a fight or a puzzle to solve. To move from panel to panel a flashing arrow will appear to show which path to take. Sometimes there will be two arrows… Sketch can only choose one. This adds a high replay value to the game. Players will want to play it over and over until they’ve explored all possible paths.
The combat is simple, as Comix Zone is at its hear a side scrolling beat ‘em up. There are three action buttons. One button jump, one button can be assigned a special move, such as “Shoulder Smash” or “Block.” The third button is the attack button, depending on the directing pressed on the D-Pad, this cause Sketch to kick or punch. Sketch can also roll or tear a piece of paper out of the comic book to make a paper airplane which has the ability to destroy all obstacles and enemies in his path.
There are several items in the games that players can collect to assist Sketch. The attack items which are pretty self explanatory: throwing knife, hand grenade, and dynamite. In addition to that there is Ice Tea which restores health, and Roadkill the rat. Roadkill has an exceptional sense of smell. This “item” can be used to locate hidden items in panels. Moreover, as Roadkill was transferred from our world to the comic world something strange happened. His tail became electrified. In addition to sniffing out goodies, Roadkill can be used to electrocute enemies. Another item in the game that players will run across are question marks. Be weary of collecting these. When picked up their can either give you a random item (except for Roadkill), or explode in your face taking down half of your life.
This unique gaming experience is my truly great by the sense of comic book authenticity. Each character and back ground is hand drawn by real comic book artists. Even more enchanting is the fact that each character and enemy produce speech or thought bubbles. Sketch himself is prone to making Spiderman-esque smart-alecky remarks.
Plans for a 32X version of Comix Zone were announced, but the game was cancelled as Sega decided to drop support for its Genesis add-on. Later a PC version was released. Later, the game was published by THQ for Nintendo’s Gameboy Advance. More recently, it saw new life in the Wii Virtual Console.
Anyone who hasn’t played this game should. It provides a unique gaming experience in an authentic comic book atmosphere.
-
The Vectrix has always been facinating to me. But I just can't bring myself to pay $100+ for a 20+ year old system with more parts than useual to go bad (especially since most people sell that old of stuff 'as is' which many people like me automatically translate into 'doesn't work' )Vectrex consoles are very reliable. Not need to worry. And the $100 beats the price of a modern game console, for sure!
Cool to hear. I'm probably just making excuses cause i"m an ultra cheap bastid
But yeah, if I get money, I'll think about picking one up...I do think it's definately one of the cooler consoles out there, especially with the built in monitor.
I've got some questions though.. First, how hard is it to get overlays? What all games had them, and can I make them on a standard Ink Jet printer or something? I assume most of the games have/had them. Second, how many people can this thing support? I know it's got a nifty controller (I actually had one of those moded to play 5200 at one time) But I've not seen anything on ammount of controller ports. And uh...that's about it.
Awesome review BTW. Look forward to more. Can I jack it for my board?
Sure... just give credit to www.revrob.com
-
The Vectrix has always been facinating to me. But I just can't bring myself to pay $100+ for a 20+ year old system with more parts than useual to go bad (especially since most people sell that old of stuff 'as is' which many people like me automatically translate into 'doesn't work' )Vectrex consoles are very reliable. Not need to worry. And the $100 beats the price of a modern game console, for sure!
BTW, I thought Battlezone was monochrome? The red text was just an overlay I thought (or is the red actually drawn on the monitor) Though Tempest would be really damn cool on a home system.You're probably right. I should have researched better.
-
Before the days of Mario and the NES, there was a phenomenon in this country. Outside of schools, next to Laundromats, on street corners, in every mall in America existed a world – now nearly extinct – called video arcades.
These so-called video arcades featured new and exciting video games. These games represented the cutting edge of videogame technology. Even all of the way through the 1990’s, video arcade games were always years beyond what home consoles were ever capable of.
In the 70’s and 80’s this was ever more apparent. A new technology called vector graphics.
“Vector graphics or geometric modeling is the use of geometrical primitives such as points, lines, curves, and polygons, which are all based upon mathematical equations to represent images in computer graphics.”
In other words, vector graphics where polygonal models, or wire frames which could be made to look like true 3D.
One of the earliest popular vector games ever released was Atari’s Asteroids, which featured stunning glowing vector lines drawn on a black background. Released in 1979, the world had hardly seen anything like it. It was much more crisp and futuristic looking than common pixilated raster games of its era.
The unavoidable port to the 2600 proved the limitations of home console. Without a special screen, vector graphics are impossible. Many Asteroids fans revolted at what is commonly accepted to be the worst version of Asteroids to have ever been produced.
The next year, in 1980, Atari continued their success with vectors and developed Battlezone, a 3D tank warfare simulator. Unlike Asteroids, Battlezone featured 3D and color. This game proved to be so popular that the US Army commissioned a version known as The Bradley Trainer, to train new recruits on their Bradley combat vehicles.
Despite the success of Battlezone, Atari was not in a position to port this game in its arcade form. The Atari 2600 and other game consoles of the time were woefully outdated technologically, and relied on tech from the mid 1970’s. This would prove to be a factor in the pending Video Game Crash.
The problem in the home market was that there was a demand for the wildly popular vector arcade games, but no one was poised to step up. That is, not until 1982.
In November of 1982 a little known videogame company entered the market with a new console. The company was Santa Monica, California based General Consumer Electronics, Inc. (GCE) and the console was the Vectrex.
The Vectrex was designed to be the console of choice for the serious gamer, and also to compete head-on with Atari and Mattel, and Coleco, the “big three” console developers of the day.
The GCE Vectrex featured a 9-inch monochrome built in monitor, specially designed to be able to display vector graphics. The world’s first ever controller that featured an analog joy stick – with four buttons. It also had another secret weapon, Minestorm. Minestorm was not just a pack-in, but a built in game, commonly referred to as the “Asteroids killer” by Vectrex fans of then and now.
Because the monitor was only able to display black and white, GCE used a trick that arcade developers used at the time. With each game came packed a screen overlay, to simulate color.
In 1983 Milton Bradley, a consistent force in videogames, was so impressed with the Vectrex, that they bought GCE outright, and began marketing the console in other markets.
With the support of MB, GCE developed several innovative add-ons: The light pen, which allows one to draw with vectors on the screen, and a 3D headset, which was required for certain cartridges. Both features were revolutionary at the time.
Plans were immediately laid out to replace the Vectrex with a console that contains a larger, color screen, and one that is powerful enough to wow audiences with games on the par of Atari’s Battlezone.
Unfortunately, the game market was destined to crash. With the crash, Milton Bradley abandoned the Vectrex in 1984 and closed down GCE forever. The planed sequel never surfaced, and no prototypes are known to have survived.
Fortunately, several prototypes of incomplete games did survive, however, and have since been released by the very much active Vectrex homebrew scene. In addition, several original works and ports of other arcade classics such as Missile Command and Space Invaders have also been released for the Vectrex in recent years by the homebrew community who continues to support their beloved console.
In 1988 Smith Engineering attempted to secure the rights to the Vectrex name, technology, and game library from Hasbro, (a company that MB merged with years prior). Smith Engineering intended to release a new handheld Vectrex. This deal almost happened, but Hasbro felt that there was still no home market for consoles, especially handhelds. They also felt that consumers would not go for the $100 price tag. One year later Nintendo launched its Game Boy for $109.99, and the rest is history.
The Vectrex can commonly be found on eBay and other auction sites. Be prepared to spend over $100 for the system and a few games. Though the system is “easy” to find online, it is highly desired, and can commands a high price, especially a complete system with documentation and packaging.
-
I've been going through archived gaming boxes... wondering if this stuff is perceived collectable; is there any worth to these items?Pictured...
Android Assault (?)
Power Rangers (?)
AH3 Thunder Strike (?)
Loadstar (Alpha)
Fahrenheit 32X (?)
Monkey Island (?)
Others I own...
Fatal Fury Special (Review Copy)
SoulStar (?)
Black Hole Assault (?)
Frankenstein (?)
Radical Rex (Final)
Mickey Mania (?)
Lethal Enforcers II (Sample CD)
F1 (?)
L.O.T. (Review Copy) not sure what this game is.
Yes, sir. There is most definately a market. It's called: Rob's wallet.
-
NES online services, Japan only?Ya, but I forgot to specify that I was concentrating on the US only.
-
The Net Link was my first venture on the web like so many others'.Are you Shadow from #Netlink1, et cetera?
I demand an answer to this question, sir!
-
$175 is quite a hit to the wallet. AFAIK, Daytona USA CCE Netlink Edition is the most pricey US Saturn title at over $200.Ya, but Panzer Dragoon Saga is the greatest game ever made, sir! I'd pay more than $200 for it. However, I would not pay much at all for Daytona USA CCE Netlink Edition. I only regret that I couldn't afford it when it came out.
-
Hi guys:I was at the Salvation Army today and I purchase a Japanese Vectrex system, ( 100% complete and working ) for $15 Bucks, I have no knowledge about the Japanese versions and I was wondering if its worth anything for collecters here in the U.S.A.. Any info will help.
Anthony...
LOL - I'll give you $50 for it!
But then, I would be ripping you off. The Japanese Bandai Vectrex is worth about $400, so you got an amazingly lucky deal. I have never had such luck in the wild before!
Like us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
AtariAge on Instagram
Watch us on YouTube
Chat on Discord
In depth Look - RCA Studio II AKA: The "Real" Worst Console Ever
in Classic Console Discussion
Posted
Oh, I get your point now.
Well, I think that the Channel F is a fantastic game machine. I fully credit it as being the first modern game console, It really wasn't all that underpowered either. If Fairchild hadn't gone under they might have stuck around. Some of the games are very good.
When Fairchild and RCA jumped into the market, it's not like the concept of a programmable console wasn't already an idea, it just wasn't affordable until then. I can't give RCA credit for any forward thinking. My point is that their software was less advanced than any other software at the time. I don't know what they could've been thinking. Their hardware was also woefully outdated. Detached controllers were also an old idea at the time. I don't see how they could have any excuse. They certianlly do not get any credit from me.
Seriously, who knows why it's called Studio II?