e1will

Thanks! All I did was send them an e-mail. Most people have no idea there's an active and vibrant 2600 gaming community, so when you tell them, they often want to hear more. Figured it couldn't hurt to let them know! I'll have to pop into the Goodwill here and see how many cartridges they have lying around. --Will

Yup. My problem is that this game has the same flicker (30Hz) as Asteroids and Yars' Revenge did, but seems to look worse, at least in emulation, no matter what settings I've tried. So right now I'm saving up for a Harmony cart, so I can see exactly what the deal is on real hardware. --Will

There was a nice little writeup linking to AtariAge in the News-Sentinel today: http://www.news-sentinel.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100809/BUSINESS/8090325 --Will

Nice mockups. I think CE would be an excellent fit on the 2600. --Will

If the rights holders have an issue, they'll take it up with Ed. If anyone else has an issue, they should find something more constructive to do. --Will

Sounds like you're ready to try the next 2600 game. There's lots of good ones, I'm sure the folks here can recommend some.

Even better! I'll PM you the Duck Attack! ROM pack once I'm done adding to it (I keep thinking of new things to add, like a game world map.) The AA store would be the perfect place for this sort of thing. --Will

This thread (and the other one) have been interesting to follow. Now I'm really curious to see if there's a market for digitally distributed homebrews, so I'm going to try it. I put together a $15 "ROM pack" zip file containing the ROM of my game, its manual, and some extras, like a monochrome version of the game and a behind-the-scenes essay on the development with some screenshots of the early prototype versions. And if you buy the cartridge (from Al) I'll toss in the ROM pack for free, so hopefully it won't discourage people from getting the cartridge. This is the first time I've done something like this, so I'll be very curious to see if there are any takers. --Will

Maybe I should ask Valve for permission to do a 2600 version of Portal... then we can add Chell to the list. --Will

Just a teaser pic of the title screen. Haven't got all the flicker issues worked out yet but I'm not conceding defeat just yet. --Will

Fun game! Any Easter eggs? --Will

Level 12 is the last level with new rooms to discover. --Will

Crossposting from the 2600 forum... The Toledo Free Press has a front-page story on Duck Attack! http://www.toledofreepress.com/2010/08/03/tech-savvy-fans-programming-developing-on-classic-console/ --Will

Yep! I'm going to ask my Toledo buddies to stock up some copies for me. --Will

Nathan Strum's awesome Duck Attack! art is on the cover of this week's Toledo Free Press. They did a niece piece on 2600 retro-gaming: http://www.toledofreepress.com/2010/08/03/tech-savvy-fans-programming-developing-on-classic-console/ Enjoy! --Will

I like the idea of authorized digital distribution. Here are my thoughts: 1. Let people download and try your game for free for as long as they like, without any DRM or strings attached. 2. If they love the game and want to reward your effort, but don't have enough money for a cartridge (or don't even have a console to play it on), suggest a donation via PayPal (say, $5) as a way of saying thanks to the developer. It's important to emphasize that this is optional (although greatly appreciated) so that people won't feel ripped off if they paid $5 (or whatever) and then see the binary floating around elsewhere for free. 3. Offer a special digital package for a little extra. For $15, you get a custom, numbered binary with the number of your choice that will display in the credits or title screen, zipped up with an RTF or HTML manual. Each binary is unique, so there'd only be one "#1", one "#2", etc. (Who wants Duck Attack digital edition #1? ) I don't like the idea of random jerks taking my work and putting it on a CD with a thousand other ROMs they found on the Internet and getting cash for it, but I think the solution to the piracy issue is not trying to punish the bad guys by slathering DRM, digital signatures and the like on your work, because you'll just end up irritating and inconveniencing legitimate users, and the DRM will just get cracked by someone anyway. Instead, you should reward the good guys (homebrewers and game players) by giving the game players an easy way to reward the developer, and giving the developer a way to reward the player with special editions. --Will P.S. I wrote an anti-DRM parable a while back that sums up my feelings on the issue: http://willnicholes.com/appleseller.htm

Your timing is perfect... http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/166988-cge-releases-and-aa-t-shirts-available-for-purchase/ --Will

Yep, it's a recent homebrew (and a very good one.) --Will

I think someone best described it as "flickerfest" Would have been in 1983, no doubt. Or even 2009, given the limitations of the time... On topic, I'd never even heard of Juno First as an arcade game, but now it's my favorite 2600 game. --Will

Thanks! I would have loved to have been there myself... --Will

I thought I would see how far I could get playing straight through this weekend (no saves, no cheats) on difficulty B/B. Just over 4 million points. (I do much, much worse on difficulty A/A.) --Will

Yep! This is definitely going forward. I spoke with Craig Pell and he was kind enough to give the thumbs up on the Indenture part of the project, so I'll be working on this alongside a few of my other projects. Whether Indenture + Dragon Attack + Bedraggled gets finished before Facebook Hero I don't know, but I've been working on both lately. I'll definitely post some more bins and screenshots as I get further along. --Will

The Yars Revenge Easter Egg has to be the most irritating Easter Egg I've ever encountered. I remember when I first got the HSWWSH message when I was playing as a kid, and my reactions were: 1. Neat! What's this mean? 2. Wait... my game's OVER? WTF? Why HSW decided to punish the player for discovering it is a mystery to me. Note to self: Hack Yars Revenge sometime to allow the player to keep playing after HSWWSH appears. (Or did someone already do this?) --Will

The Fort-Wayne Journal-Gazette did a piece on Duck Attack! today: http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20100725/LOCAL0201/307259917/1002/LOCAL --Will

I talked to Frank Gray at the Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette about Duck Attack!, the upcoming Classic Gaming Expo and 2600 homebrewing in general this week, and he wrote up a piece in today's edition: http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20100725/LOCAL0201/307259917/1002/LOCAL --Will