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We started prep work for the SGM 5th run a couple of months ago. Boxes are now printing in China, and we will start taking pre-orders very soon. To be available around November this year. Please contact Grazi if you haven't done so yet and want a SGM. [email protected]

Latest UPDATE: got a new sound tool that allows me to better reproduce analog sound using the SGM. Now using that to improve DKA analog sound stuff, which was sort of not great before. That delayed the game a couple of months, but still expecting to have it out before the end of the year with Pac-Man DX, Moon Cresta, and Gradius re-release. And with the new tools, which allowed me to port Moon Cresta/Eagle in just 3 weeks, I am all for arcade ports from now on.

Hi there! As we all know, world is going through some difficult times right now. COVID-19, social unrest, unemployment, political polarization, a lot of bad things going on. Most of us are under increased stress levels, new work and family routines, etc, myself included. Due to that, I had to make some hard decisions. After 4 years of intense work, I have decided to suspend work on OMNI and SGM2 for an indefinite period of time. I don't think this is the best time to keep investing money and effort in new propositions considering the current circumstances. Instead, I have decided to go back to the basics.... Not all is lost though. As part of the OMNI/SGM2 effort, I developed new tools for porting arcade games, and those tools can now help me reduce development time of SGM1 arcade ports from months to weeks. First game using the tools is done, Moon Cresta/Eagle. It took me 3 weeks to get the game running with all graphics and all but 2 sound FX done. I am now working on those final sound FX. Game is fully playable, rock solid, and runs at 60Hz locked. It is also "arcade perfect" in terms of gameplay, where each nuance is perfectly emulated, and I am compensating for the shorter ColecoVision vertical screen resolution precisely. But that is just one of the many other game I have planned. Next I hope to do Time Pilot, hopefully get the game done in a couple of months, start to finish. Also in my short list are Lady Bug, Frogger, Popeye, and Pengo. I hope to get those done or at least started in the first half of 2021. Yes, sounds crazy, but I think the tools are up to the task from my experience so far. And finally, we have a few games long due for the SGM coming this year, namely DKA (which is now taking advantage of the new sound tools), and Pac-man DX, which has been waiting in the shelf for years now, printed boxes and all. We are also re-releasing Gradius. So for 2020 the release plan is: DKA (receiving some final sound improvements), Pac-Man DX (ready for beta, boxes printed), Gradius (re-release, boxes are printing in China), and Moon Cresta (Grazi is working on premium packaging, to go for printing soon). All but DKA are premium line games, with our deluxe packaging (the same we used for Gradius). Unfortunately DKA can only be offered as a PCB due to some recent legal issues. All of that said, we have started the process for a 5th run of the SGM. Printing is underway in China, and we are about to place orders for the assembled PCBs. We will post very soon about how to pre-order. But wait, there is more! We plan to have all our Color line games back in stock soon. Our Super Game Controller is entering alpha testing soon, and we should be able to show you a physical prototype in just a few weeks. We are getting a new cartridge tooling that is exclusive to Opcode. Conceptualized by renowned designer Ted Mayer, the new tooling will free us of 3rd party sources (since I sold my original tooling years ago) and at the same time will give us an exclusive cartridge with a distinctive look. There is one more thing to announce, but I will do that in a separate post. Hope you like the news. In the meantime, stay safe and healthy and let's play some ColecoVision!

Because of the nature of the CV scene, with multiple publishers and a history of problems, that is a discussion we can have in PM. I see you were/are doing Time Pilot, and that is what I am doing next.

Indeed, Popeye is a great game, and should be another easy one, so lets move that to the list.

Awesome controller! Love it. The implications of the new tool goes beyond Moon Cresta. That means I can now quickly port arcade games, at a fraction of the time that was required before, with a high degree of accuracy. Next in line are Time Pilot, Pengo, Frogger, Lady Bug. Hopefully all started this year.

Interesting question. Here is the answer. The beauty of the tool is that it compensates for resolution perfectly. The game is still 224 pixels wide (which is arcade accurate) but only 192 pixels high for obvious reasons. The tool compensate for that in ways I am not going to discuss here, but the result is arcade accurate on a frame basis. Which means relative vertical travel velocity is still exactly the same. So in short, this is as arcade accurate and perfect as it is technically possible for the CV. The result is similar to Pac-Man Collection, where the gameplay is mostly indistinguishable from the arcade.

The plan is to have both Moon Cresta and Eagle in the same cartridge. Otherwise arcade identical. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Answering that, here is a preview of something I will announce probably in video format because it is a long story, but my focus this year is ColecoVision and ColecoVision only. Let's say I was forced into that as I will explain. Which isn't a bad thing by any means, now that I have the tools, I hope to put out a string of arcade ports on a quarterly basis or better.

This was done in record two weeks for the ColecoVision with SGM, using I new tool I created for porting arcade games for the OMNI. It works pretty well with the ColecoVision as well as you can see here. Only thing missing is sound, and I will take care of that soon.

We should have something to show soon. Finishing a redesigned right now...

No, still same VDP. Our VDP can output digital, but the problem is the ColecoVision, which is analog only...

Suggestion: subscribe to our email list. http://opcodegames.com/WebApp/EmailRegistration.html Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Guys, please subscribe here: SGM2 List

That is a good question. We went back to the drawing board this past holiday and changed a few things based on feedback: 1) The SGM2 was too "alien", with a separate cartridge format 2) Analog video only is kind of bummer 3) ColecoVisions are too unreliable, an attached plugin module will only make that worse I will post an announcement once we have the updated system designed, but we are still aiming for this year.

We have a 5th run coming. Please contact Grazi at [email protected] Thanks!

We have started organizing 5th run. Please email Grazi. [email protected] Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

After assembling and testing rev 2 board, we redesigned some aspects of the SGM2 and incorporate most feedback we got. I hope that next version will surprise you. Please stay tuned. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

We saving that for soon. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

For the past couple of weeks I have been working on something that a lot of people have been waiting for many years. A patch for a certain pack-in game. So what I am doing now exactly? Basically I am rewriting the code to play exactly like the arcade. Without going into too much technical detail, the old code didn’t compensate for the y axis reduction (arcade screen was vertically oriented). Now it does. I have stage 1 redone like that. 3 more stages to go. The plan is to make this “upgrade” available in the 1st semester. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You can still play the original cartridges on Phoenix though. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

ROMs aren’t an option, since those games use Super Game Cartridges. But we are taking care of getting new run done. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The list is still open. We will have a few announcements soon, including the controller. And in a few months, more announcements regarding the SGM2 and games that we haven't announced yet. Grazi is back on board and hopefully we will make lots of CV fans happy this year.

I guess this is a rhetoric question since you already have your answer and just want to vent about it... Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Hi, Well, we have someone working on the design again.