johnnywc

Hello all, I recently purchased a lot of 5200 games (local pick up), plus a 4-switch model that was advertised as 'working'. When I got home with it and tried to hook it up, I realized there was no place to connect the power supply. I had only ever owned a 2-port model, but I recalled that there was a model that connected the RF and power through one cable. After some research I quickly discovered that it required a switch box that wasn't included. When I chatted with the seller to ask where it was, they said that they had modified it so you didn't need the switch box. Basically what they did is splice a composite cable onto the end of the RF cable. They said that they would just hook that up to the TV and it would work. I'm not a hardware guy, but that is impossible, right? You still need to hook up the power brick somehow I would assume. Anyway, before I go purchase a switch box or return this thing (assuming they'll take it back), will the switch box still work since they hacked the RF connector and it is now a coax connector? I looked at picture of the switch box online and it looks like it has a port for an RF connector and one for coax (plus the power brick). I assume the coax was for cable TV, so I'm not sure if this unit will work if I connect the game to the coax? I would think not since I assume the power is being routed through the coax connector? Any help is appreciated! Thanks, John

Great job to you, Oscar and Nathan! Aardvark is an amazing game and I must admit it even got my vote for Best WIP Homebrew over my own Wizard of Wor Arcade! Can't wait for the official release and congrats again!

As we get closer to finishing up Wizard of Wor Arcade (2600), Champ Games has announced a contest where you get a chance to design the custom mazes that will be included in the final version! Check out the official announcement in the Contests forum! Good luck!

Hello all! Champ Games is nearing completion on Wizard of Wor Arcade for the Atari 2600. This updated version of Wizard of Wor offers many new features from the CBS original release, including updated graphics, sound fx, more mazes, speech (using the Atarivox), high scores, and many more! One additional feature that we have created is the ability to create and save your own mazes! A maze editor has been added to the game that will allow you to create up to 3 custom mazes that are then playable as in the first 3 dungeons. If you have a Savekey/Atarivox, you can also save the mazes so your creative work isn't lost when you power down your Atari. Each of the 3 custom mazes will have a default layout that will be shipped with the cartridge. This is where you come in! We are asking you to use the maze editor to design your best maze and send us a screenshot. If we choose your design, it will be included in the final version of Wizard of Wor Arcade and you will have your name added to the credits section of the official manual! The rules: The contest runs from now and ends March 8th, 2019 at 12:00 midnight EST. Entries should be submitted on this thread as either screenshots taken via Stella (press F12 to take a snapshot) or as a clear photograph of the screen if using real hardware. A maximum of 3 entries are allowed per person. All 3 selections will be taken from a different person, so there will be distinct 3 winners. If identical mazes are submitted by different people, only the first submission will be evaluated. These mazes are used in the first 3 dungeons of the game, so they should be designed with no large open spaces if possible (these types of mazes are used in Worlord mazes starting at level 8 ). The winners will announced on this thread on March 10th. The Maze Editor To start designing a maze, first download the latest version of Wizard of Wor Arcade: wowarc_maze_editor.bin Next, start up the game either in Stella or copy the file to your Harmony cart to run on real hardware. If you are running this in Stella, please note that you will need a later version that supports the CDF bankswitching scheme to run it. After the splash screen is done, the tile screen will be displayed: When on the title screen, flip the Color/BW switch (or press Pause on a 7800) to view the maze options: There are two options: "ARCADE MAZES" or "CUSTOM MAZES". When ARCADE MAZES is selected, only the Arcade mazes will be used during a game. If CUSTOM MAZES is selected, the first 3 dungeons will use the 3 custom mazes. The rest of the mazes in the game will use arcade mazes. To switch between the two options, either press left or right on the joystick or press SELECT. If you want to play with only arcade mazes, press the button with ARCADE MAZES is displayed. To edit mazes and use custom mazes, you'll want to select CUSTOM MAZES: To edit mazes, press the button while CUSTOM MAZES is displayed. The first custom maze be displayed with the message EDIT MAZE 1 and 2 flashing cursors: (Note that you can also flip the Color/BW switch (or press Pause on the 7800) to return to the title screen without editing mazes.) For now, the maze is blank; in the release version of Wizard of Wor Arcade this will display one of the winning mazes, maybe yours! To create your own maze, use the joystick to move around the cursors and press the button to add or remove a wall. Note that all mazes are symmetrical, so any changes made to the left side will be the same on the right side: When creating your maze, make sure that all squares can be reached (don't box in any areas). If so, a message will be displayed saying the maze is invalid. You will need to correct the error before the maze will be saved: You can revert your changes to the current maze by pressing RESET. If you haven't made any changes, pressing RESET will display the default maze layout (for this demo, the default is a blank maze, in the final version it will display the winning default maze). Once you have finished editing the first maze, you can edit maze 2 by pressing SELECT. Note that your changes are saved automatically when you switch mazes or return to the title screen. Press SELECT again to edit maze 3, or keep pressing SELECT to cycle through the 3 mazes. When you are done editing, you can return to the title screen by flipping the Color/BW switch (Pause on a 7800). Press reset or the fire button to start a new game and test your mazes! Once you have decided on your mazes you wish to submit, press F12 in Stella to take a screenshot (or take a picture of the screen if using real hardware) and post your submissions on this thread (maximum of 3). Good luck and thanks for the help! John

Lol yes the players will have hockey sticks The plan is to use the missiles for the sticks (just like they did with Activision's Hockey).

Thanks! Here's what I have so far, but this was put together over 15 years ago so I'm sure we can do better. We will probably have a combination of both; a sped up timer plus the ability to set the period length (see screenshot above). Thanks for the suggestions! The screenshots are from 2004, long before DPC+ was available, so it's currently just using straight up assembly. However, the plan is to use the DPC to add for improved graphics and more features (speech, tournaments, savekey, team editor, configurable rules (time/period, penalties, offsides, 2-line passes, icing, pulling the goalie, etc).

I was working with ZackAttack for a bit last year; it seemed that he had come up with a way to get around the issues using his own custom development environment. We spoke of getting together at some point to discuss how we could port EA to this at some point, but first I may need to upgrade my dev machine (it's from 2007) to run the more-demanding requirements.

Hello everyone, Wow - that's a lot of support for Food Fight! There is a proof of concept that was started by Mike Haas (AA member iesposta) that looks really good (and one for Satan's Hollow as well)! For those of you who don't know, Mike did the amazing sounds on Mappy and the sound fx/speech phrases for our upcoming release of Wizard of Wor Arcade, as well and the music from Super Cobra Arcade. We have talked about working together to bring Food Fight and Satan's Hollow to the 2600 sometime soon! Thanks so much for the kind words! Making these games would not be half as enjoyable without the support and appreciation from the AA community, so for that I thank you and everyone else for the inspiration! Elevator Action is one of my favorites and will be completed for the 2600 one way or another. I was impressed with the proto from Las Vegas (I bought the box copy lol) but it is unplayable IMO. My only complaint is that is was advertised as "90% complete" when it's really about 60% IMO. I have posted screenshots of the WIP that we started a couple years ago but we took a break once there were some issues discovered in the BUS stuffing technology that we were using. If the issues can't be resolved, I will make the game with the same technology used in Mappy. The downside is that the graphics won't be as good, but the gameplay and sound will be the same either way. Thanks - we would love to see a whole line of Champ Sports, starting with Hockey. After 15 years, we finally posted some screenshots so we're moving towards committing to finishing this game one way or another. Thanks again to everyone for your support! John

Hello everyone! I just came across this thread, thanks everyone for the kind words! Thanks especially to Anthony for putting this interview together - it was a pleasure getting an opportunity to speak to you about all things Atari! Thanks Steve! Being 12 in 1980 was IMO the best age to be to experience classic video games when they were first becoming popular. Good timing - we were very lucky! Thanks Jeremy! I miss the old days of CHAMProgramming back in the 90's... making those games were some of the best times! I'm glad I've been able to find a new way to continue to bring these kind of games to more players through 2600 programming with games like Lady Bug, Scramble and Mappy! It's funny you should mention Intellivision Bowling; that is exactly what I was envisioning as far as a Champ Sports Bowling would be! Thanks! I have the original design for Mountain Raider (from 1982) and I spent some time back in 2007 fleshing out a more realistic design (based on my knowledge of the 2600). I hope to finish this someday soon! Activision's Hockey is one of my all time favorite sports games for the 2600 and the original driving force behind making a new hockey would be to expand upon the original but add things like more players, larger scrolling rink, team editor, playoff-type tournaments, etc. A focus on making it more like pro hockey but keep the 'pick up and play' arcade feel of the original. I recently posted some screenshots of hockey (after 15 years lol) on the Champ Games Facebook page to gauge interest in a new hockey, and a whole Champ Sports line of sports games for the 2600. These are very rough (this was started when I was first learning 2600 programming) so there is major room for improvement, but it gives you an idea of the direction we're taking. Thanks again to everyone for your interest and support - it's much appreciated! John

Hello! The final ROM will most likely be released in a few months. The gameplay has not changed much since the last public ROM from 6/6 (most of the changes since then were for menus, options, etc.) so it should be a very good example of how the final version plays. It is also compatible with the latest version of Stella as of version 5.0.2 (6.0 is the latest version). Here is a link for the build from June 6th.. have fun!

Thanks for the feedback! I agree, the game is too hard with a joystick and I'm considering removing joystick support completely since (a) it really isn't fun playing a game like this with a joystick and (b) I could really use that extra ROM to add a few more bells and whistles. As for the color/bw option, that has been removed; instead the color/bw switch will now pause/unpause the game as it does with other Champ games. The bw option was more of a novelty and doesn't make much sense as even the arcade wasn't played in black/white as it had color overlays. The game plays much more like the arcade now; the paddle starts at 16 pixels wide and then goes down to 12 for the 3rd and 4th rows and down to 8 for the last two rows. You can also use the difficulty switches to have paddle sizes of 12, 10 and then 8. Also, the # of paddles to start a level goes down from 6 to 3 to 2 to 1, so the game naturally gets a bit more difficult with more paddles. The rate at which rocks are dropped increases slightly each level, and the minimum delay for a level decreases also, plus the interval itself increases during a level. This means that the rocks will drop more frequently as the game progresses. Lastly, the max speed that the rocks drop also increases with each level. I may make this a bit faster, but to me the game gets pretty challenging on the 3rd board. Of course, NOVICE setting will give more misses, lower score for a bonus, slower paddle progression per level, slower rocks, slower delay,etc. while ADVANCED will increase them. We'll be sure to deliver a game that has difficulty settings for all skill levels! Thanks for the feedback! John

Thanks! I discovered Zoo Keeper back on MAME and it's one of my favorites; we're hoping to do it justice on the ol' 2600!

Thanks! I've taken a small break from WoW to work on Avalanche, but I'm 99% done and will be getting back to this soon!

I ended up returning mine to Amazon for a replacement which had the same paddle issues. I've been working with Hyperkin's support team (they were very nice) and they came to the conclusion that there is an issue with the control boards and they're hoping to have it fixed in a later revision. Since paddle games are a must for me, I ended up returning the 2nd unit to Amazon and will hope a fix will come out soon. At this point I'll wait for the Collectorvision Pheonix which I've already pre-ordered and is supposed to be available in the summer. It will support Atari 2600 games from an SD card, is an FPGA implementation (no software emulation) and I'm hoping the paddles will work on that without issue.

Thanks Steve! I didn't spend much time on this one, it started out as a proof of concept (and a way for me to learn how to program the paddles). Any suggestions for improving gameplay, game options, etc. are welcomed!

Hey Brian, This is the same as the ROM a few posts down; I think back in 2007 you couldn't edit the first post so I figured I do it today so anyone finding the thread today would be getting the latest. In related news, I have started working on finishing this one up (keeping it 4K) in hopes we can give it a proper release sometime in 2019. If anyone has any suggestions for improvements or game play options, I'd love to hear them! Thanks, John

Thanks! We're taking a bit of hiatus from Zoo Keeper development to focus on Wizard of Wor Arcade, but we'll be returning to this very soon. Stay tuned for updates!

Hi James! Thanks James! I'm glad I was able to squeeze it in. I think it will add replayability to the game. This is the first I know of, although I know Duck Attack will actually save your inventory, etc. so you can continue a game at a later time. But I do believe this is the first to save user created data.

This is very interesting - thanks for sharing! If you have the time, you should post your findings in this thread where this issue is discussed extensively with people with much more knowledge about the Atarivox than myself, including Richard H. who designed it. Thanks!

Thanks for the info! I have gone ahead and returned it and ordered a new one, let's hope it fixes the problem!

Thanks for the info - I will contact them now!

LOL I forgot it's *still* 2018! WoW Arcade will be released sometime *next* year.

Thanks! Yes, there will be a PAL60 version available when the game is released this year.