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Andromeda Stardust

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Posts posted by Andromeda Stardust

  2. Posted · Edited by stardust4ever

    See? It's not an April Fools joke after all! :-D

     

    http://homepage.ntlworld.com/pascual.nicholson/news-2010.htm

    (scroll down to August 23rd)

    What complicated new technology is housed in the VODE box I hear you ask? Ah, sorry to disappoint you all. The VODE simply houses an old 640x480 pixel digital camera operating in video mode and pointing at a standard Vectrex console. The box is present to prevent reflections from ambient light. The camera feeds compositie video into the TV via the TV's SCART socket. It’s not easy to see the actual screen quality in the video, but admittedly, I knew in advance that I would be disappointed with the final result. Not only for the fact that the resulting graphics on the TV are comprised of pixels instead of crystal sharp vector lines, but also because the resolution of the camera is poor.

  4. Posted · Edited by stardust4ever

    Much like seeing the ending to an NES game, you could have earned it with play and practice, but you'd rather spend 20 bucks on a book that will show you how to do it, so you can then complain you're bored and want a new game.
    That's why Galoob invented this wonderful device called a "Game Genie".

     

    In all seriousness, I used to be one of those narrow-minded people who thought that "anything released before X date was crap". Case-in-point: I was born in 1981, and as a teenager, I had this mentality that all music released before 1980 was junk. I was into 90s dance and hip-hop back then. then when the 2000s hit, I started to become disillusioned with the direction that pop and hip-hop music had taken. Granted, there is some good music still being produced, but a lot of what I hear on the radio nowadays is garbage to me. Hence I got an XM Radio and started listening to stuff I never knew existed. Now I'm 31 and adding many of the great legends of classic rock to my CD collection. I was almost tempted at one point to buy a record player last year, but didn't because records are too bulky and I can't play them in my car. While I still despise 70s disco and funk, I must admit some of the greatest rock ballads of all time were also made during that decade.

     

    If anyone noticed my signature, I've gone through a similar revelation with Atari. I used to be in that Nintendo camp who thought everything that existed prior to the 3rd video game generation (NES) was crap. I bought my first Atari in 2012 and am thoroughly enjoying it. My 4-switcher has a manufacture date sometime in 1980, so it likely was rolling hot off the assembly line around the same time while my parents were knockin' the boots. I've been collecting old forgotten VCS gems, and I am continually blown away by how much cheaper the games are compared to NES/SNES. My VCS collection skyrocketed in relatively little time as a result. Sure, the Atari graphics are somewhat "raw" compared to the NES, and I do believe they are an acquired taste, but that certainly doesn't make them "bad" or "sucky". LOL, My friend and I had an absolute blast playing Warlords.

     

    Moral of the story: don't knock something if you've never tried it.

    • Like 1

  6. Posted · Edited by stardust4ever

    That's odd. I have a cart with a Duck Hunt label that actually turned out to be Baseball.

    If they are 5 screw games, it would be relatively easy to get a tiny flat head screwdriver to switch the cart shells. Even after Nintendo started using the security screws, people could still use a special bit to unfasten the cart and swap ROMs without damage. I've heard of it happening from time to time with rare or highly sought after games. One guy at Nintendoage bought an Earthbound SNES cart at a flea market that actually had some crappy baseball game inside it. He was PO'ed big time, and of course when he went to take it back the vendor was either gone or pointed to his "no refunds" policy. As for most 1st and third party Atari carts that I have seen have the screws located underneath the label, so such an error would be very difficult to fake on an Atari cartridge without obvious label damage. What would make the mismatched carts rare and vauluable, is that most games with mismatched boards probably got returned for refund or exchange, and likely destroyed. People still collect baseball cards with printing errors on them, or "mistake" coins that were not minted properly. Something unique like a two-headed nickel or quarter would be likely be considered a "holy grail" to some coin collectors. I mean, some guys collect cartridge/label/screw variants of the same game, so a mismatched Atari cart could be a big deal to the right collector.

  7. Posted

    Okay, I'm going to throw this one out to you guys. I've been debating this to myself. Should the 2nd quest be selectable by the player? When you beat the game, you can play the 2nd quest, which are the same levels, but harder. I've gone back and forth on making this option selectable by using the select switch at the beginning of the game. However I see the 2nd quest as being kind of a gift for those that beat the game. Having it be an option to start with would kind of defeat that purpose. What do you guys think?

    If you plan on releasing this to the AtariAge store, I believe "hard mode" should be a privilege for those who buy the cart. Meaning the public demo ROM should be released without hard mode. I also think it would be fitting to rescue Toad instead of Peach at the end of 4-4 (simple graphic hack will do) for the demo ROM only, but keep Peach in the cart version.

     

    Personally, I never thought that "hard" mode was really necessary in Super Mario Brothers, as it always felt a little tacked on in the original game. I usually just quit playing after I saved Peach, although I did once restart on World 8 hard mode, and somehow beat the second quest without dying. That said, I think a difficulty mode select would be a nice gesture, but it's wholly up to you whether you enable "hard mode" at the start. Megaman had "Hard Mode" available at the start, although the normal difficulty was punishing enough. In Castlevania, you had to earn it. Also, while play testing "Princess Rescue", I find myself leaving the Atari running for a long duration of time at the game over screen, just so I can resume on world 2 or higher without replaying world 1. I still haven't beaten world 2 yet, although I haven't played it a lot. The original NES game had warp zones to at least give the option of skipping ahead, although I typically found it more fun to play strait through. I'm going to say that if you decide to program it so you have to rescue the princess at least once to enable "hard mode", you should enable the player to start on any level up to 4-1. just like the original NES game used the "B" button to select a world whenever hard mode was activated. I really feel like doing so would stay faithful to the original game.

  10. Posted

    Massive Bump!!!

     

    I appologize, but I just read on the storefront that Pacman 4k was coming to AtariAge following the Expo. I used the search function to find this thread. I have the "Pacman Arcade" cart, but this version of the game looks fabulous!

     

    I'm assuming the 8k version never got produced, so I'm assuming no intro jingles and such. Is the final game really that difficult? I'm pretty good at VCS Ms Pacman, but I royally suck at Jr Pacman.

     

    Either way, I'm buying this when it hits the store. I can't believe I never knew this game existed.

     

    Kudos...

  11. Posted

    Imagic was known to have done it too with a large batch of mismatched VCS Atlantis/Cosmic Arcs being sent out. Known error carts may be worth money as collectors items, similar to how coin collectors often collect mint errors. Nintendo's stringent quality control basically eliminated such issues with NES.

  13. Posted

    Making fun of a dead console by using a dead singer? Does that mean the joke is dead right off the bat?

    Everybody is so obsessed with Composite video mods, and I knew that vector graphics are technically impossible on any consumer grade CRT TV without completely gutting the electronics and rewiring the tube. So it made sense that such a mod would be technically impossible, but people are gullible enough to click the link anyway.

     

    Originally, I had the link point to the NES "Rick Roll" cart:

    but as much as I love the 80s, as well as NES, the "Rick Roll" joke is just so old and worn out by now. Trololo is so much classier because he really doesn't say anything at all. The fact some guy looped it for 10 hours is just too hilarious. It even says "Trololo" in the comment tag!

  15. Posted · Edited by stardust4ever

    Late breaking news! This simple 10-minute mod only requires two solder points and allows you to output Vectrex video directly to any CRT TV set. Actual modding of the television set is not necessary. Only caveat is that proper screen orientation will require tilting the TV on it's side. This mod will allow you to play any and all Vectrex games on your large TV screen in glorious monochrome, especially useful to resurrect your Vectrex if the original picture tube is worn out or busted.

     

    All pertinent details on how to perform this mod will be revealed to you in the following link:

    http://tinyurl.com/cygv95n

  16. Posted · Edited by stardust4ever

    looks like one of the IC's is going bad. especially when you said it sometimes fires up fine then gets worse as it runs. Sounds like a IC is having thermal issues. or a transistor is breaking down. you may be able to find it by getting some component chill spray and spraying each IC and transistor to see if the display comes back. when it does, you found the component causing you the trouble.

    One time, I had my laptop overclocked, and was running some stress-test software. I opened the back of the laptop and the CPU was 80 degrees C in Speedfan. I turned one of those "duster" bottles upside down and sprayed the CPU heatsink until there was frost on it, then the fan stopped blowing. I was so afraid I'd broke something, until a few seconds later, the frost melted away and the fan slowly kicked back in as the CPU heated up to semi-normal operating temps. My CPU was running sub-zero (below freezing or 0 C) temps for about 15-20 seconds, and it didn't crash my laptop either. LOL, that was probably a dumb thing to do with my laptop as frost could easily short out the components as it melts. I eventually quit trying to overclock it after it crashed three times in a single day. My laptop obviously survived the ordeal as I'm typing on it right now. But please beware of frost/condensation if you're thinking of using an inverted CPU duster to chill components, especially if you live in a humid region like Louisiana. Also those CRTs are built of tough stuff, but beware if your duster can shoots frozen splooge onto the CRT, the thermal shock might crack the tube and you'll be saying goodbye to your Vectrex.

  17. Posted

    KIds today with ther Skrillex and their salvia smoking.

    Not to mention kids these days are getting high on synthetic Marijuana, which is actually more dangerous than smoking real pot, because since it's an illegal product with no quality standards, you don't know what the hell it's made from. At least those who grow their own know what they're getting, geeze! They had a recent crackdown in Louisiana for synthetic pot. Billy the Exterminator (he had a show on A&E) got busted, LOL!

     

    Next thing you know, people will try to figure out how to smoke the contents of those VGA cases. Expensive hobby, to say the least! :rolling:

    • Like 1

  18. Posted · Edited by stardust4ever

    Don't short-change yourselves. It's pricey, but you if you want an authentic experience, you've got to shell out the dough for the real McCoy:

    pacmac-30anniversary-table.jpg

    Namco 30th anniversary coctail cabinet ($3500) - I wish I could afford one of these. Someday, when I have a really nice job and I get my own place, I'll convert the garage into a "game cave" and put a minibar, pool table, foosball (table soccer), darts, a homemade NEScade, a vintage "Console TV" cabinet with various retro systems attached to it, and one of these Namco babies (I try to avoid the term "man cave"; it's so sexist. I mean, can't the wife chill out in there too?).

  20. Posted · Edited by stardust4ever

    You are stupid if you follow VGA.

     

    VAG is where it's at!

     

    LOL, that's hilareous!!! :D Someone needs to share this link with nintendoage, as some of the sealed collectors there are the biggest VGA meatheads on the planet. I collect games to actually play them. Any game that's not playable (including those sealed away in acrylic VGA coffins) is worthless to me, regardless of value. Might as well bury them in the NM desert landfill with the ET carts if nobody's going to play them.

  23. Posted · Edited by stardust4ever

    You know, some people actually prefer the A/B buttons side-by-side instead of stacked. I always used the "Option B" control scheme for Super Mario All-Stars, virtual console NES games on the Classic Controller work the same way, as do GBA games on the original DS or VC GB games on the 3DS. I've also been playing NSMB2 3DS with the A/B option as well. Actually, I'm comfortable using either control scheme, but I generally prefer B/A over Y/B when given a choice. So I don't see what the big fuss is over using the A/B buttons since that's what all VC games are set up to use. And just in case anyone's forgotten, the original Game Boy and GBA also placed the "A" button slightly higher than the "B" button.

  24. Posted

    If you want a good alternative to the Hori digital controller, retrousb.com sells a very nice Game Cube - SNES adapter. All of the digital buttons are mapped too. It's also perfect for playing Game Boy Player as well as Virtual Console games, if you've got a Wii that's backwards compatible with GC. I had a Hori controller at one time, but thieves broke into my house in 2006 and stole my Game Cube + Games and accessories... :sad: If I'd known how much a pain they would be to find in the wild, I'd have bought another one while I still had the chance. Oh well. At least they didn't steal my true retro games stuff.

     

    http://www.retrousb.com/product_info.php?cPath=22&products_id=31

     

    A, B, X, Y, L, R, and D-pad all map flawlessly

    SNES "Select" maps to the "Z" button on Game Cube, so you should have no trouble playing Game Boy games with an SNES pad. All non-analog inputs are represented on the SNES controller.

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