Atarius Maximus

First, thanks to everyone for the replies. It did bring a smile to my face when I found that picture. Mike - not sure who got the better deal there... as time went on those were probably a few of our least played games. I probably played Pac-Man more, but I remember as a kid I loved the zen-like gameplay of Night Driver when you got in the zone. I got really good at it. Both were fun in 1982!

I played it all the time back then, although I was aware of its lack of resemblance to the original. I didn't know the pic existed until today. My father passed away about 6 months ago and I inherited a truckload of old photo albums. It's been fun looking through them. Several pics of my old Commodore 64 setup as well.

I didn't notice that. That's "flipping" hilarious.

Just digging through some old family photo albums and I found a pic of me holding my brand new copy of Pac-Man, and my little brother holding a brand new copy of Night Driver. The pic was dated June '82, but judging by us holding baskets I imagine it was an Easter gift a few months prior. Good times, good memories. I played the crap out of both of those games.

I haven't tried this out yet, but I'm excited about the possibilities for 7800Basic developers. Creating graphics is a pretty big roadblock for new users and this could lower the bar a little bit. Thanks for sharing this Bob!

If you'd like to make changes to Pac-Man or Scramble, Jeff Wierer made specific graphics editors just for those two games. You can find them here and here.

I knew it! That's why he fixed it so quickly.

Is it fair to vote if you're a co-author of one of the games listed? My favorites are... KC Munchkin Meteor Shower Astro Blaster Frenzy and, well, Dungeon Stalker....

Agreed, and ouch. Looking at Best's website gives me a headache.

I just noticed this! Not sure if it'd be fair for me to join in, really, but if I remember right my high score on standard was somewhere around 68,000-70,000 on standard when I was play testing. I think Trebor may have done better than that, he probably played it more than me when RevEng and I were developing it.

I created some simple beginner sample programs and code snippets for bB about 10 years ago or so that (just looked) have all combined have been downloaded over 25,000 times. Yikes. It might be time to work on something similar for 7800basic. No promises on timeframe, but that's something I wouldn't mind doing in the future.

I know it's been over a month since you posted about it, but I'm curious if you have an update. Your most recent update was pretty cool. I've always liked your WIP's, you're definitely very talented. Also just noticed that you're also in Missouri. In STL, perhaps?

I thought I'd share some tips on setting up the AtariVox and mixing the audio, this is from Trebor, we talked about this months ago. He uses a Commodore 1702, which is also what Al uses at game shows, and he describes his setup in great detail below. Using the Sega Genesis extension cable works best, although the AtariVox will plug in to the 7800 directly if you put it right at the edge of a table. .... Regarding, a C1702 and a Vox working together...That is my exact main setup. I additionally add a set of PC Speakers which both the console and the Vox feed to, which does provide an additional layer of complexity. Nonetheless, the best way to handle it is through Y-split male/female adapter(s), a 1/8" to RCA adapter, in conjunction with the necessary (RCA) audio cables. In this example we will presume just utilizing the C1702 with one/mono RCA audio input, without external speaker(s). Let's start with the Vox. We need an easy way to control its volume level. This is what I utlilize: Koss VC20 Volume Control. It works nicely and provides the same output jack, a 1/8" female stereo. We'll now convert that 1/8" female stereo jack to RCA with this: Stereo 1/8 Inch to Dual RCA Adapter Cable. If the Atari console is modded with left and right audio channels, to simplify things, let's get that down to one, which would be required anyhow for connection directly to the C1702, with this: RCA Mono Male to Two RCA Stereo Female Y-Cable. If he just has mono output from the console than of course the aforementioned is unnecessary. Another RCA Mono Male to Two RCA Stereo Female Y-Cable would need to be utilized for the Vox side, which has since had converted its typical stereo 1/8 inch female to two RCA stereo male adapters. So at this point, we're down to one male RCA from the console side, and one male RCA from the Vox side. We still need to get that down fitting into one input/mono jack on the C1702, and we do that with one final: RCA Mono Male to Two RCA Stereo Female Y-Cable. At that point, you would be all set. You have the one RCA male jack plugging into the C1702 for sound. As mentioned earlier, to balance out the Vox sound with the console, you simply adjust the volume on the Koss VC20 Volume Control.

I love the concept, and it reminds me very much of the Gate Racer games I made a few years ago. The music is incredible, you've done a great job so far. My suggestions would be to include some left/right velocity, include a powerup of some kind, maybe an obstacle of some kind, and savekey/atarivox support is always welcomed for high scores. As Thomas mentioned already, paddle support for a game like this would be perfect. I look forward to future updates!

Not sure if knieval1 will be back to see these, but thanks for taking the time to do that. Honestly I just didn't want to.

It's for sale in the store now! https://atariage.com/store/index.php?l=product_detail&p=1056

That's much closer to the figure I was thinking of.

Really? $100,000+ to make the 2600 version, or am I misinterpreting that?

While the light bulb could be very functional, I think it's greatly lacking in a scenic mountain view with a beautifully rendered skyline.

I forgot to mention Thrust. I love it and hate it at the same time. It was one of the very first homebrews I ever bought, I've owned it for over 10 years, and I still suck at it. Most of the time it just makes me want to throw my joystick at the TV. I'd love to hear tips on that one.

I've seriously contributed to throwing this thread off topic, so I'm sorry about that. But yeah, I guess I do smell funny. Dangit, RT, stop pointing out the obvious.

This. That's the best idea I've heard for a game in a long time. I swear my youngest son always sees them first and slugs me first. We've been doing that for about as long as I can remember.

SeaGtGruff posted a demo using keypads many years ago. As far as I know no one ever made a game utilizing that code. Based on it's age, I'm also not sure if it would work with the newest version of bB. Edit: It's also an old post, but CurtisP posted an update to SeaGtGruff's code in that thread as well.

What really got me is the High Kwality© logo on the top right. Wait a minute... I see what's going on here... ...you'll be hearing from my team of high priced lawyers soon.