DamonicFury

There’s a near-final “demo” version that could be used for those who don’t own the cart.

Poll closes Sunday, September 29th, 2019 @9pm EST

Lol, I certainly already have a ridiculous amount of classic-era gaming and computer stuff. It probably didn't even occur to her that I would want any more if it! 🙂 I wouldn't mind picking up a few more games... thanks for the list! Intriguing idea to pick up a cassette cable and use downloaded WAVs to play non-cart games. I think I'm good on RAM... this one already has a nice 64K. Clearly, I got lucky there as well.

Welcome back! Hope you had a great holiday!

So around 1984, my friend had a Color Computer with a few games. I think he might have had Canyon Climber, which I also played on my Atari 8-bit at home, but he also had an excellent game called Doubleback. That one was super addictive and fun and there wasn't anything quite like it on other machines. It even was a good fit for the wonky joysticks the machine used. 🙂 Fast forward thirty-five years, and I'm helping my wife clean out a closet filled with things she bought at yard sales and thrift shops and was planning to resell someday. I notice a Color Computer 2 in its box that she picked up for 20$ and ask her if I can have it. She says ok, and I proceed to test it out... works fine! I then hit up Ebay for a Deluxe joystick and some games. What a fun system this is! It seems to have a rather limited color pallete, but aside from that, the system seems very powerful and capable for its age. It's a shame most of the games for it seem to be re-named arcade ports, but there are a few standouts I've already found... but the real killer app for this still is Doubleback IMHO... just as addictively fun as I remembered it! Also enjoying Downland and Reactoid, and I'm amused by the Defender/Star Raiders hybrid of Star Blaze. Popcorn! is also an excellent port of Atari's Avalanche, which didn't seem to get ports of any kind to other machines (other than the rather different Kaboom, of course) Less exciting are the ports of Space Invaders, Bump and Jump (with no jumping!) and Asteroids (although that one does have a vector look that most contemporary ports did not have.) Anyway, this is a really fun system that seems to have been almost entirely forgotten. I'm glad I lucked into rediscovering it!

Welcome to round eighteen of this 5200 HSC season! Jungle Hunt tied the poll with Popeye, but won the coin flip afterwards. Play using the default settings. Emulation is fine, as are custom controls. Pics preferred, but not required except for HSC wins and records. The current record was set by darthkur with 43,270 points. Bust it if you can for a bonus point. The ROM and manual can be found here: https://atariage.com/software_page.php?SoftwareLabelID=629 Round ends Sunday, September 29th , 2019 @9pm EST Standings: Nuclear Pacman - 36,020 eegt97 - 34,140 JacobZu7zu7 - 7,700 bemis - 6,750 Mangia-Boy - 2,900 jblenkle - 2,300

Congratulations to jblenkle for scorching the most saucers, blasting the most bouncecraft, and sizzling the most Sentinels! Jungle Hunt will be coming up next. jblenkle - 50,580 +11 eegt97 - 32,530 +10 Cafeman - 28,092 +9 AverageSoftware - 20,310 +8 Mangia-Boy - 20,038 +7 bemis - 1,484 +6

Well, heck. Popeyes and Jungle Hunt tied at two votes each, so I actually flipped a coin and Jungle Hunt won and will be our next game.

Poll closes Sunday, September 15th, 2019 @9pm EST

I’m pretty sure it was indeed programmed for the Intellivision originally, then later ported to other systems. Good catch!

I hear ya, and you're right... the standard controllers ARE terrible and they were an awful mistake. The 4-port switchbox isn't THAT bad though (I use that thing all the time,) but for those that don't like it, the 2-port model is readily available. But man, this thing has a SOLID game library! It's a bit small (all the better for completists), but there's not that many duds in it. And most of the games are still affordable, even with the box! It's a real collector's delight. I hate that controller alternatives for this system are hard to come by. But having one makes a HUGE difference! The Coin Controls Competition Pro is a nice all-in-one analog alternative. The Wico stick is a good analog alternative, but it's rare, needs a Y-cable that can also be hard to find, and works best with a keypad add-on that's REALLY hard to find. There's also adapters for using a standard 2600 analog stick (or a Sega pad) that are vintage (Masterplay) or more recent (AtariAge's Redemption), but are also somewhat hard to find these days. An adapter can also be built to use old analog PC joysticks. Like you, I'm hoping an attractive alternative appears soon. The system has always deserved controllers as good as its internals and its library.

I’m not seeing a problem. Can you get to it from this link?

Welcome to round seventeen of this 5200 HSC season! Beamrider won the poll by two votes. Play using the default settings. Emulation is fine, as are custom controls. Pics preferred, but not required except for HSC wins and records. The current record was set by peedenmark7 with 75,890 points. Bust it if you can for a bonus point. The ROM can be found here: http://www.atarimania.com/game-atari-5200-beamrider_s11712.html Round ends Sunday, September 15th , 2019 @9pm EST Standings: jblenkle - 50,580 eegt97 - 32,530 Cafeman - 28,092 AverageSoftware - 20,310 Mangia-Boy - 20,038 bemis - 1,484

Enjoy your vacation, Mangia-Boy! As he predicted, Beamrider is up next.

Congratulations to eegt97 for catching the most crooks! Beamrider up next. Final standings: eegt97 - 607,100 - RECORD BREAKER! 11 + 1 = 12 Cafeman - 99,600 - 10 jblenkle - 73,000 - 9 AverageSoftware - 68,100 - 8 Nuclear Pacman - 46,800 - 7 Mangia-Boy - 37,600 - 6 troff - 28,900 - 5

Please note the poll for the next game is now posted. Apologies for being a bit late with it.

18,290 Used the original controller this time, as Jungle Hunt doesn’t require a lot of rapid button pressing.

Apparently this is a port of a 1979 Sega arcade game called Deep Scan, in which the enemy subs did indeed fire back. I remember reading a review back around 1983 or so that felt just as you did... the game just is beyond pointless without enemy fire to dodge.

Poll closes Sunday, September 1st, 2019 @9pm EST

My earliest arcade memories involved 70's games such as Sea Wolf and Star Fire. But I was too young to try them more than a couple times each. So my real first "favorite" would be Pac-Man. For the benefit of the younger folks, this game was a PHENOMENON! You often had a wait in a line to play it (leaving a quarter on the bezel to reserve your place.) I was too young (about nine) to be much good at it, and quarters weren't exactly growing on trees, but I did love it. I thought about it a whole lot more than I played it, doodling the characters, reading books about strategies and patterns, and wondering if there was anything more to the game than what was easily seen (of course, there wasn't much... just the various later fruits and the somewhat hard to achieve third intermission. It wasn't until many years later that most of us heard about the game-ending split screen.) After that, I was obsessed with Donkey Kong for a while, then the 1983 Star Wars arcade game. I enjoyed all the other 80's classics as well, but those three games were the ones I recall being long-time favorites.

10,800

Welcome to round sixteen of this 5200 HSC season! Keystone Kapers was tied with Beamrider in the poll, so I picked Kapers for us to play this time. Play using the default settings. Emulation is fine, as are custom controls. Pics preferred, but not required except for HSC wins and records. The current record was set by darthkur with 394,300 points. Bust it if you can for a bonus point. The ROM can be found here: http://www.atarimania.com/game-atari-5200-keystone-kapers_s11758.html Round ends Sunday, September 1st , 2019 @9pm EST Standings: eegt97 - 607,100 - RECORD BREAKER! Cafeman - 99,600 jblenkle - 73,000 AverageSoftware - 68,100 Nuclear Pacman - 46,800 Mangia-Boy - 37,600 troff - 28,900

Congratulations to eegt97 for smashing the most saucers and mangling the most Mother Ships! Keystone Kapers coming up next. Final standings: eegt97 - 334,268 - RECORD BREAKER +11 +1 = +12 Nuclear Pacman - 312,265 - RECORD BREAKER +10 +1 = +11 jblenkle - 225,755 +9 Cafeman - 179,913 +8 AverageSoftware - 115,385 +7 roadrunner - 73,685 +6 Mangia-Boy - 35,368 +5

Hmm, tie between Keystone Kapers and Beamrider. As we just did a lot of space shooting with Buck Rogers, let’s play Kapers instead. Beamrider will return in the next poll.