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Plug 'n' Plays are now Buy 1 Get 1 of Equal or Lesser Value Free.

This is probably terrible timing with Black Friday/Cyber Monday going on but I just added 3rd party Atari 2600 games. Loose games make great stocking stuffers!

Al-just-added-some-new-games-to-the-store-and-I'd-like-to-get-in-on-that-action bump.

I am not in favor of any type of DRM for homebrew games. It will ultimately get defeated. If Adobe and Microsoft can't protect their work what chance does the homebrew community have? If anything, continue to make the ROM publicly available and have a "Donate" button for those of us who just want the ROM but wish to contribute to the author. Most games in the AtariAge store already have the binaries publicly available anyway and Albert seems to be busier than a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest so is piracy really an issue?

I like the idea of having the downloadable ROM as a purchase option (or as a "Donate to Developer and AA" if the ROM is already publicly available). On another note, I also like owning physical carts of awesome homebrews but I couldn't care less about boxes. I'd rather have the option of getting the game's artwork on glossy cardstock with a condensed version of the game's instructions on the back. It'd be an homage to what Atari did with the Lynx where some games came with posters with the game's instructions on the back. They were completely impractical because if you hung them on a wall you wouldn't be able to read the manual but I think glossy cardstock would be a great alternative. And how cool would it be to thumb through a pile of them to find the instructions to the homebrew you're about to play?

That Star Castle artwork needs to be on a poster. It's just beautiful. The composition is fantastic and the fact that the ship is AtariAge-orange is just perfect.

I really wish I knew! Garbled graphics were never an issue with my 7800 until I bought Pac-Man Collection. I figured it may have been the cart so I posted about the issue and another user said to try the game after the system had warmed up. It worked so I just left it at that. I've never encountered solid-state electronics that worked better after "warming up". That just seems weird to me.

I've had my 7800 since around 1987 (bought second-hand) and I've only had two issues with it (so far): 1. The power button was always a little flaky. You had to kinda squish it around to get it to work. I finally replaced the switch earlier this year. Works great now. 2. Pacmanplus' wonderful Pac-Man Collection displays garbled graphics if the system isn't sufficiently warmed up. I feel like I should probably knock on wood, though.

End of the weekend bump. I added a few more plug and plays and cut some prices.

I love my Atari and all the games that came during that era, but I gotta go with the era of platforming goodness starting with the NES and ending when the 16-bit wars fizzled out. It was at that time when I started fully enjoying my Atari anyway. 2600 games were being cleared out at stores in the mall and I was buying up a shitload. I only had nine games growing up so it was blissful. The NES brought in an exciting time for gaming that just got better when the Genesis and SuperNES came out. It was an excellent time to be a gamer.

Rather than having a box, I think a better alternative would be to have some nice glossy card-stock about the same dimensions as the manual that has a picture of the game's artwork. Why use up shelf space for the artwork when you can hang it?

I can't believe the amount of people that believe this is about bB-bashing. [edit: I'm an idiot. Just saw "King" at the end. My point still stands. ]

I didn't want it to be true. I used to love following you guys' (and others) development threads to see how much more graphical detail or gameplay you could add to your games by shaving a few bits here and there or buying up some extra cycles of time. To me, it was that part of the process that helped persuade me to get a game into my collection: seeing that level of effort, passion, and excitement. We went from Combat to Pitfall to Solaris to Thrust to Boulder Dash and now it feels like we're back to Combat again.

I think you misunderstood my post. bB is a great learning tool. The issue is that it makes it easier to churn out what the developers think is a finished, refined product that is cart-worthy. The market is thus getting flooded. bB, as great as it is, is simply enabling this behavior. Many crap games have been made in assembly too. Nobody is arguing that. But it takes a bigger effort to churn anything out in assembly so the homebrew market never got as flooded as it is now. As Thomas pointed out, there seems to be a market for anything that is put on cart. Look at any thread with a "limited release" and see how quickly the slots fill up. As expensive as these carts are and as cheap as us classic gamers usually claim to be, you'd think that the buyers would be more discerning.

Thanks for saying out loud what many of us (probably) are thinking. I can't help but feel that the overwhelming use of bB is somehow discouraging or pushing away the developers who strictly use assembly. I'm not knocking all games made in bB and I'm certainly not knocking bB. I'm just saying it takes something that was once inaccessible to the masses, makes it accessible, and is easily abused.

In the early 80s I remember being impressed by Pitfall at a friend's house. In the late 80s it was Solaris. I played it all the time even though I never got very far. The graphics were excellent and the sound effects were cool. I loved the animations of the ships that would launch the little mini-ships. And the sounds that accompanied it were really cool.

To be honest, "Batman Refunds" doesn't sound like a very fun game anyway.

Added 7800, Master System, boxed NES, Genesis, and N64 games. More to come.

I guess the real question is, why do we move gaming systems into discrete categories when they reach a certain age? Threads like these (as well as topics which discuss delineating console generations) prove that it's a constantly moving target and is different based on the age and region of the person observing it.

Classic. I don't think it means what you think it means.

Thanks, KeeperofLindblum! It doesn't happen often and I usually underestimate shipping but if I happen to go over by about $2 or more you'll get it back. To all who have helped me make space in my house by buying stuff, thank you! I'm going to be listing a lot more games really soon, probably this week, so keep an eye out.

A week ago I would've voted "4-switch woody" because it's what I grew up with and played the heck out of. However, I just acquired a Heavy Sixer and ohhhh myyyy is it nice. This isn't just a typical Atari with thick edges as I've been lead to believe all these years. The entire bottom case half is thick and curvy. In fact, the entire bottom case half is nothing like the bottom case halves of any of the following models. The plastic is not the hard brittle stuff but a kind of hard rubbery material. There's probably a name for it. Light Sixers and Four Switchers went with an angular style. You can really see it when looking at the console head-on. I had always heard that the Heavy Sixer's weight was attributed to RF shielding or whatever. That's wrong. It's from that super-thick case bottom. And that rubber grommet that the RF cord pokes though? Niiice! The whole thing oozes style and you can really see where Atari cut corners with later models. That said, I still love my 4-switch woody but my vote's gotta go with the Sunnyvale Heavy Sixer.

End of weekend bump. Added NES Racermate Challenge 2, Atari Video Cube (complete in box), and Game Boy & Game Boy Advance games. Thanks again to all who have bought stuff!

This is a tough choice because I love almost all of the 2D Castlevanias. I can rule out the GBA games because I never played Circle of the Moon and I didn't care for Harmony of Dissonance at all. I guess it helps that they're not in the poll. I only tried Dracula X on an emulator but never got into it too deep. When it comes to wanting a quick fix, my choices narrow down to the original, Dracula's Curse, or Bloodlines. Of those, I'd narrow it down further to Dracula's Curse. It's got the classic control mechanics and graphic style with the added depth of multiple paths and characters to play.

Bumpity. Stuff added. Prices lowered.