Jump to content
Have You Played Atari Today?
2600|5200|7800|Lynx|Jaguar|Forums|Store  

Herbarius

Members
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Content Count

    759

  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by Herbarius

  1. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

    Anyone figured out how to save/archive that? Tomorrow it will propably be gone, and that's a shame.

     

    Not that I wanted Google to run this thing all the time, but it would be nice to be able to show people this at a later date, if they have missed it... or even if they didn't, like "still remember when Google did this?"

  4. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

    I am not really sure... I didn't really play many games before I got my first PC. However I've some vague recollection of some exceptions, but I'm unable to put them in any order: Tetris, Pac-Man, Rick Dangerous.

     

    The first game I cleary remember playing with my dad was Wing Commander on the Amiga 500. He controlled the joystick while I was the "co-pilot" and pressed the commands on the keyboard when he asked me to, but it was exciting as hell. Such began my love for the Wing Commander series. ;)

     

     

    When I got my first PC, there were two games on it, so these were the first games I really played by my own and more than just once. Those were Sokoban and Block-Out (

    ). Not sure which one I played first, but I believe it was Block-Out. At least, I definitely played that a lot more, because as a kid I only could solve the first Sokoban level ;) .

  6. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

    Could that be it, I've been told that a several games where bought in the USA and Japan. I have three copies of Pacman, and only one is giving me colors close to original (have to finetune), the other two are purple. What color would I get if I use a NTSC version of Space Invaders, I have two cartridges, both give me strange colors, fluor green ship and spaceshutle and almost white aliens.

    How can I see if a cartridge is PAL or NTSC?

    Yes that could be it.

     

    How you can see if a cartrdige is PAL or NTSC differs between the game companies, for some you can't easily tell at all. Here is what I can say about Atari and Activision games:

     

    For Atari cartridges with picture label: You'll see a little letter "P" on the end label of PAL games, which isn't there on the NTSC version.

    For Atari cartridges with text label: On the front label of PAL games, there is a suffix "-P" appended to the serial number of the game ("CX number")

     

    For Activision cartridges: You'll see the words "International Edition" beneath the game title on the front label of PAL versions.

     

    However, as far as I know, to all those three rules are some exceptions (meaning, there may be Activision PAL games without "International Edition" on it, and also Atari PAL games which are missing the "P"), but for most of the games it holds up.

     

     

    green ship and spaceshutle and almost white aliens
    sounds about right... however, I don't have the 2600 Space Invaders, so I'm not 100% sure.

  9. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

    Intel is *THE* standard for business, both in graphics and microprocessors. The sales figures do not lie. Hard to believe, yes, the graphics standard!

     

    Sure, but it's notoriously bad for games. If that company decides to bring out that PC under the "Commodore" label, they seem to be targeting it at gamers, because, yeah you know. So that's why I can't understand why they have a Intel graphics chip.

     

    But of course, the reason is, they didn't design or put together that system at all. As others in this forum already pointed out, that same unit had been around for years, it's only now that someone thought about slapping the Commodore label on the surplus and cash-in some money that way... or something like that.

  11. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

    Assasin's Creed, at the time it was released.

     

    But apart from being graphically impressive it had actually some "short-term addiction"... You know what I mean, you get hooked almost instantly, think "what an awesome game it is" and so on... but it doesn't last very long until you realize you've been "fooled". In the case of Assasin's Creed when you get tired of always the same mission objectives.

  12. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

    So, I recently aquired some new 2600 games, two of those were Activision Decathlon and Starmaster. Turns out, the Starmaster cart doesn't work at all, no matter how much I clean it, and the Decathlon cartrdige is one of those real cheap ones with two holes in it and both pins which "unlock" the cartrdige slot are broken off. The game works fine though, if you manage to get it in (e.g. by inserting just the PCB alone).

     

     

    So I though, I'll just put the Decathlon board into the Starmaster case (especially as I already own Starmaster). Carefully removed the label and tried to do it but it just doesn't want to fit. It's really frustrating... There are even two plastic thingies which seem to go into slits in the PCB (even though the Starmaster PCB did have nothing like that), but it just won't fit. It's like half a millimeter or something that doesn't match up. I also tried combining the top half from the Decathlon cartridge and the bottom half from Starmaster, and even those two don't really fit together. Without the PCB in you can get them closed after some fiddling around, but you see one half is slightly smaller than the other, which seems to cause the plastic to bend a little.

     

     

    I now thought about taking some sand-paper and "improving" the molds so it will fit. Any better suggestions or warnings about this?

    I don't have much time right now, I'll try to take some pictures later.

  13. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

    Ideally, I'd prefer if the top level of each forum would show threads from all the subcategories. That way it doesn't matter how many subcategories you create, because using them is optional. You'd just click a subcategory if you want to filter it. But that's probably something that isn't supported by the forum software.

    Yes, I'd like that as well!

     

    And yes, of course I'm always in favor of PC-gaming related stuff. I've grown up with PC gaming, only got into the 2600 in recent times, never had any modern (or at that time modern) console. I also think lots of Europeans could tell you the same story.

  15. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

    Well, I have no personal experience, but was a bit surprised to find that my parents and relatives (namely uncles) had little to no idea there ever was a crash, they had their Atari at home with relatively casual use, a couple of my uncles were big arcade fans too, but they don't really remember video games going away at all.

     

    That scenario doesn't seem to be all that uncommon. You see: For the consumer, the crash was more like having more games to play than ever before, because of the drastic price-cuts.

     

    Of course, some people - or maybe even many people - moved away from gaming during that time. All those people who just followed the hype but didn't become "gamers" in the long run, but abandoned it as soon it wasn't a novelty anymore.

     

    It is interesting for me that some people mention a "kind-of" crash in ~1994, because that fits with my "three eras of videogames" model. (I'll open a thread about that within the next 36 hours or so).

  16. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

    I think for me it depends of the context of the conversation, and may also vary with the game...

     

    If it's "classic gaming" with an emphasis on "gaming", then yes, if its with an emphasis on "classic", then not. If that does make any sense ;)

     

    The N64 is even more likely to recieve that "label", even though it's newer. Having sequels to games that haven been on the NES and SNES as well as using cartridges may help with that.

  18. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

    And I forgot to mention how disturbing that 2800 advertisement was. :!:

     

    What's the matter with it? Seems fine to me - apart from not being able to understand a word of course... ;)

    [EDIT: Okay, "not a word" isn't quite correct: I believe I heard something that sounded like the word "American" and also the words "computer game".]

    What did you find disturbing about it?

     

    Ever watched the japanese Sega Saturn Commercials? Now those are disturbing (at least some of them)

    The winner is clear: the kids who actually go outside and play real baseball
    Not according to Sega:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SanWyvMQunI

    :D

  21. Posted

    I figured its about time that my 3-year-old new what a video game was so I brought out one of those 5-games-in-one Namco controllers that came out years ago and includes 5 Arcade games. We've been playing Pacman because I figured it was probably the easiest game on the list to figure out and she loves it. She's not to good but I wouldn't expect that at 3. She understands about getting all the "dots" but doesn't understand to well about avoiding the ghosts yet. :-)

     

    Anyhow, I absolutely love coming home from work and having her say "daddy, play video game?"

     

    Anyone else start their kids on video games with old school consoles or computer games?

     

    For retrobuffs like us, who was there, a game is so much more then just at game. We have all the memories and associate a certain game with lots of happenings around us. Todays youngsters doesn't have that. For them, it's just a game, no more, no less. To be able to get the most out of a game like Pac Man, you must have been there and been a part of the magic. Not to say that Pac Man isn't a good game that todays children can play. But don't expect them to like it as much as you did. ;)

     

    I'm a hardcore retrogamer but i'm also well aware of that these games never will present them same magic for todays kids as they did for me. (sad enough)

     

    I tend to disagree. I grew up with PC games, and my machine was always some years behind the current generation. A good friend of mine which I often visit had a PC which was even older. There was lots of "magic" associated with the games we played nonetheless.

  23. Posted

    The most important thing is, be patient with her.

     

    My first (very foggy) memory of playing Pac-Man - and I definitely was older than 3, more like 5 - was my father gave me the joystick, I looked at the screen, was overwhelmed by the experience, didn't know how to do it, my father was like "hey, you have to avoid the ghosts!" but I hadn't even really figured out the relations of the joystick movements to on-screen movement when my father decided to try something else.

     

    I sure would have liked to continue trying it and propably would have figured it out if I had a little more time, but under the "pressure" of the situation I couldn't do it.

     

     

    So, don't assume "she doesn't get it" too quickly. Also it definitely could help if you first play it yourself and let her watch for a while before letting her try it. (I'm not just talking about Pac-Man, but any type of game).

    If possible always start with slower game modes.

     

     

    As recommendations for other games I would post Pong (good 2 player-experience) and Centipede.

     

    Of course, don't forget at her age you propably should limit the daily exposure to video games rather rigidly. But I guess her mother already takes care of that ;)

  24. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

    I'd say it is more similar to the Magnavox Odyssey than your typical Pong unit.

     

    1. You have to keep scores manually (using those sliders on front of the console)
    2. If features a light gun

    By the way, this unit was also shown in AVGNs recent Pong Console review, although the one he had didn't work so he could only show the unit itself. Maybe it had a different name, but it definetely is the same machine, even the same design.

     

     

    EDIT: Oh, I just saw it also states it has automatic on-screen score-keeping... Seems pretty redundant to me.

  25. Posted · Edited by Herbarius

     

    Can you use the 128 keypad in 64 mode?

     

    No, unfortunately. I was extremely disappointed to discover this. If anyone's ever figured out a workaround or a hack (hardware or software), I'd love to know it. I've even yet to find a driver for the CardKey numeric keypad I have.

    It propably is possible, but at the cost of disabling the keypad for the 128 mode... I'm basing this on the existence of external numerical keypads for the C64 (AFAIK they connect to the userport).

     

    However, maybe you can build in a switch to make it usable in both modes (requiring you to flip the switch when changing modes).

     

    But it propably won't be easy.

AtariAge
Forums
Store
General
Follow AtariAge

Copyright ©1998-2021 AtariAge

×
×
  • Create New...