Retro Rogue

Between the three, the honor of the voice module would go to the TI99/4 (not the 4A), released in 1979. The 4A (the more commonly seen model) was released in '81. The TI99/4 is a much rarer unit, as are it's peripherals. You can read more about it here. However, the TI99/4 is technically a computer - not a console. And as far as computers go, there were already speech modules for computers (s100 based cards as well) as well as kits that could be built. The O2 Voice was released in 1982, as was INTV's Intellivoice. Both used voice synthesis chips (usually the chips already had the syllables and many of their words hardcoded in, so that the game had to use what was available). The Vectrex however, did not use a voice add-on to do it's speech. I believe the vectrex and more specifically the game Spike has the honor of being the first digitized voice on a console.

Weren't they? I thought at least in combination with a console: The Master System (Mark III) had a few 3D games with the shutter glasses Nope. As Crossbow mentioned, the Vectrex system (1982) had them. That's also one of the reasons the Sega "first in 3D" commerical was pulled.

If you want the original handheld pong, pick up Blip (1977, Tomy). You can usually find them on ebay - in fact here's one. We had a Blip tournament at the MGC this past year.

If you want an entertaining read, yes - First Quarter (The Ultimate History of Video Games) is fun to read. However - do not use it as a source for solid video game history. Be sure to crossreference with other sources if that's what you're after. It is full of errors (naming the wrong company for the creation of the Vectrex for example), incorrect info (attributing things to the wrong people, wrong time periods/mixing several events together, or repeating heresay), and other problems. I talked to the author about this, and he mentioned he doesn't have control over the book to do a revision. He sold the rights to the publisher.

I'm not surprised, Sega also claimed they were the first with 3D glasses.

They're on the Best site under collectibles.

As someone previously stated - it's not an emulator. Roms wouldn't do you any good. The code for all these games have been ported over to the custom "nes on a chip" engine, and very poorly at that.

Actually, that honor would belong to Smurf: Rescue In Gargamel's Castle Yeah, but Smurf Rescue doesn't really scroll smoothly, which may or may not disqualify it. Personally, I wouldn't consider BC's Quest for Tires a "platformer" anyways. Smooth scrolling is a hard thing to do on the colecovision, as I don't believe there's any hardware support for it. I've been interviewing one of the original programmers and he said they were all pretty much in awe when they saw Zaxxon come out on it and the scrolling that was achieved. Yah, that's something I hear about and I have encountered CV controllers from thrifts every so often that are like that. But I must have lucked out with my original pair - had them for 21 years, played the hell out of them during the 80's, and the still work just as good as when I got them. What about them feels awkward and clumsy? I'm just shocked that someone could feel that way about them, as I feel the complete opposite.

Actually, that honor would belong to Smurf: Rescue In Gargamel's Castle, which came out on the Colecovision in 1982 (it's launch year). BC's Quest For Tires didn't come out until '83. Actually, I didn't have a problem with the stock controllers like most people did. I enjoyed them and they were a pleasure over the cramps I used to get holding the big 2600 stick bases. But the controllers I liked the best were the Super Controllers, which gave a really comfortable feel to the hands because of their vertical grip design. With the arcade style ball grip stick, keypad on the top, a roller dial and 4 "action" buttons in the handle (we're talking a 4 button controller in 1983) it was way ahead of it's time and I still prefer it over any other controller. They were originally supposed to have a rumble/vibration generator built in as well, which also would have put it even further ahead of the curve.

Yes, there was an indent and they were not just glued to the top. Take a look at my closeup photo of the pre-restored stick on the previous page. Yours could most likely be a crossover period one, or one that has had the grip replaced. As I mentioned previously, the grips are heavy duty rubber with a real nice feel to them. If you look at the Heavy Sixer box by the way, you will see the Atari logos on the tops of the sticks - though you'll just be able to make them out because of the angle of the picture. Interestingly, I have a non-heavy sixer six switch ('78 model) that uses the same heavy sixer picture. As Rob mentioned, he had a Sears one with the Sears logo on them.

Woh! Now there will be a run on the hex discs! Nice pics! Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA Thanks. Yah, I thought about that. But this was the only way I could think of right now to let people who need them know that they're there. Like I said in my last post, I hope people will be decent about them and not order them just to order them.

They're listed under the collectibles page. But guys, I'm going to ask a favor (and I know it might be to late). Please don't order these if you don't need them. I understand the need to "collect", but it will take them out of the hands of people who *actually* need them to restore original heavy sixer sticks.

Also, the rubber guard itself is heavy duty rubber that's fit into the stick differently than the later versions. Likewise, the inside stick is not always black it can also be grey. Here's what the underside spring area looks like: Here's the contact board that the springs set in to: And here's the actual pcb (contact side up). There are actually several revisions of the heavy sixer pcb, and I have a few different ones. This one is a revision 5:

I agree! There would be alot more if .. they didn't fall off and get lost easily .. I lost the two SEARS discs that I had in the late 1970's. Back in 1998, I mentioned the Hex Discs to John Hardie .. and he said that he remembered them. But he didn't have one. I disagree. While indeed sticks with them still intact from 1977 are harder to find, the hex disks themselves are not rare. B&C still sells the original Atari logo hexs for the heavy sixer sticks in fact. Here's a closeup of one of a pair I got at a thrift: And here's the pair restored: Not quite. :wink: This was from the museum section of the last Midwest Classic (Now Midwest Gaming Classic):

I don't think that it's all about being lazy really. Not as much that it's the fact they don't have the time to comb multiple thrift stores in hopes of beating out people raiding them to sell $5 items for $70 on ebay. :wink:

Thanks. It seems that there's no overlay emulation: full color or black and white. Too bad! hahaha... did it ever cross you mind that graphically the colecovision is not capable of overlays? We are talking no more than 16 color 320x160? resolution here. Maybe even less. IIRC, isn't it 320 x 256? I could have sworn that's what the HGR2 mode in the SmartBAsic language on ADAM could handle The TMS9918a that the Coleco uses has a 256 x 192 pixels plus a defineable border area around that. The different graphics modes then define up this area differently for characters and sprites (8 x 8 sprites or 16 x 16. No more than 4 on a horizontal line. There is also a hardware based "zoom" capability to enlarge sprites.) The playfield images are generally created through character patterns. In Graphics Mode II for example you have can have 768 pattern definations for the 768 patterns positions. There are also text modes of course. An interesting function of this VDP chip (but not used in the Colecovision though some have hacked it) is that the chip is capable of Genlocking (mixing the graphics with an external video signal). Would have been interesting to see some sort of Laserdisc game attachment for the Colecovision that used this.

The Ultimate History is a good book with a lot of good info in there, and certainly belongs in anyone's bookcase of course. Unfortunately though, there's also a lot of errors as well - so as with anything else read it for the enjoyment of the feeling of getting behind the scenes of the industry. Don't try and use it as a completely factual reference though. (I'm specifically focusing on the pre-NES history in the book). I had several talks with Steve about it, and he has no way to correct a lot of it. He sold the rights to the book (this is actually the second version) and has no control over it's content now.

I think it pretty much is a console version of the period's 8-bit computer, much like the Atari 5200. In the US, we got the ADAM machine which had a Colecovision core. In Japan, the MSX computer has many games which look identical to their Colecovision counterparts. I almost forgot about this, but yes the MSX does appear to be VERY similar to the coleco. Yes, which is why it mistakingly gets confused for a "stripped down msx machine." However, the ColecoVision was designed long before Kay drove for the MSX standard (as was Texas Instrument's TI99/4 and later TI99/4A computers). In hindsite, it does resemble a stripped down MSX, using TI chips for sound and graphics. The ColecoVision was designed for computerlike functionality and expandability from the get go as well. So if they would have stayed in the game (and gone through with that upgrade expansion box) they theoretically could have expanded it to compete with the NES and SMS. Instead, as we all know, they cancelled production in favor of ADAM.

I have an appreciation for all the old black and whites, and miss those days. Days when you had to go to bowling alleys and bars to play a video game. Hmm....sorta like it is now again. Looking back (in a related topic) I really have an appreciation for the cabinets of the period as well. That time period was when the arcade industry was transitioning to video games and basicly stuffed video game hardware inside electro-mechanical/mechanical style cabinets. Big, boxy, oversized monstrosities with lots of wasted space between the bezel and monitor, and pinball style silkscreened 3 color sideart. Started really phazing out in the late 70's in favor of the more commonly seen video game cabinet styles.

What you're looking for is WFD Copy then. That allows you to create disk images from and also write disk images to an ST floppy on your PC. That's what I had the Milatari people use to convert and archive their large floppy library. It's pretty easy to take data in and out of an ST disk image. Just set up your emulator of choice to have a hard drive (which is maped to your actual PC hard drive). Then it's just a matter of draggin and dropping programs, data, etc. on the ST desktop from your floppy "image" to the hard drive "image" which basicly just copies it directly to your PC. I've recovered tons of old text files and such from my old ST floppies this way.

No, it would be the RCA Studio II most likely, which was also released before the Video Computer System (2600). Likewise, the Odyssey is a far cry from a "pong prototype". While it's crude analog graphics were hardly stellar, the tennis game was only one of many. The main reason it was followed by "Pong" consoles (of which there were a good 75 already from '74-'76) and not Ski, Simon Says, Analogic, Hockey, Football, Cat and Mouse, Haunted House, Submarine, Roulette, States, Fun Zoo, Baseball, Invasion, Volleyball, Handball, Wipout, Win, Interplanetary Voyage, Basketball, Brain Wave, Shootout, Dogfight, or Shooting Gallery consoles is of course because of the appearance of a rather "similar" game in the arcades at the time by Atari. No. Fairchild's Video Entertainment System (The VES, later renamed to Channel F) was released in August of 1976, the RCA Studio II came out in January of 1977, Atari's VCS (2600) came out in October 1977. What really killed the VES wasn't the VCS's superiority over it - it was the original crash (the 1st video game crash) of winter '77. When it appeared on the market, it of course scared the many makers of pong consoles. With the release of two more programmable consoles over the following year, it scared them so much so that as is well known, most got out of the business. Consequently, stock was dumped at discount prices that following Christmass (since consoles were mainly marketed at that time instead of year around back then). It killed sales for all three consoles, and they struggled to survive (even changing the name to Channel F to stop confusion with Atari's VCS). But the damage was done and within a year Fairchild dropped the system and sold it to Zircon (including the rights to the revised edition they were working on). RCA's Studio II (which was technically obsolete by the time it hit the market when compared to Fairchild's system) went out within about a year as well. The only reason the VCS survived at that time was because Warner was willing to pump the money to keep it afloat. It's well known Nolan wanted to cut losses and dump it.

Is it a TRS-80 or one of the COCO's (TRS80 Color Computer)?

Yes, Atari briefly had a series of arcades across the country at one time similar to Aladdin's Castle. Atari Family Amusement Centers, etc. The tokens usually go anywhere from 50 cents to $1.25 among token collectors.

Technically superior? Umm, I love my 2600 as much as anyone (580+ pieces in my collection and counting) but I don't think it was technically superior to the ColecoVision. It had a wider color palette and could animate the few sprites it did have smoother than the ColecoVision. Comparing 8-bit architectures is not as black and white as it might be with today's more homogenous platforms. Actually, if I'm not mistaken, the ColecoVision chipset allowed for smooth sprite motion, it just wasn't a feature used by many ColecoVision games due to the way they used the hardware. Yes, it had hardware support for 32 sprites though many games just used character graphics and video ram. Having a wider color palette does not make it more technically advanced however - there's a lot more on the drawing board than just that. As for the original post - 1978? Where do they get 1978?

Not in the least when compared to other systems of the time. It sold for around $1000-$1100, which was cheaper than the Apple II and Apple II+, and right around the 800's price of the time. It also had to do with the point you also address below - their ability to use their own components. Yes, that's what I was alluding to as well with my comments on inhouse design and manufacturing. Yes, and my point in listing all that had to do with it being a computer and not a "game console" as the original poster questioned. A different graphic chip is a different graphic chip. Just as a 65C02 is a different processor than 6502, irregardless of backwards compatibility.