Skippy B. Coyote

It's really not that hard to figure out, especially considering that almost every phone being made these days has a camera built in. I'm not a very technically inclined person either but taking and uploading a picture is about as simple as it gets, and I don't think asking for a little evidence to back up an extraordinarily high score claim is too much to ask. Ultimately it is entirely up to S.BAZ whether to approve a score without evidence to support it, but I do feel like there should be some kind of evidence requirement for score claims big enough to make the Top 10 for the week. Yes, someone just did last round actually.

Oh wow, you're right. I hadn't noticed until you pointed it out but everyone else's score ends in either 50 or 00, with the only different one being Keilbaca's since it's not possible to get a score ending in 20 without exploiting the glitch.

Oh rub it in why dontcha! I hope no one felt offended by the fact that I dislike Super Mario World, Ninja Gaiden, Mega Man, and all those other tough platformers. I know most people really like those games so I accept that they're good games, I just don't like them because I'm terrible at them and they frustrate me. I do like all the 2D Sonic games on the Genesis and the two Super Mario Land games on the Game Boy though, so I'm not completely adverse to platformers.

Sometimes there's a fine line between collecting games as hobby and hoarding them to distract yourself from some psychological or emotional issue. Out of the wide array of things the collection owner could have done to deal with his girlfriend breaking up with him though I don't think collecting an absurd amount of Top Gun cartridges was a bad thing at all. Sure it's weird, but probably a heck of a lot healthier than finding comfort at the bottom of a bottle or getting angry and picking fights with people. It was pretty novel way to take his mind off what was bothering him and I think the best thing of all about this story is that the original owner was able to get to the point where he didn't need the strange little collection anymore. Depression can be a long row to hoe.

This is a tough choice for me, since I've played a pretty fair amount of terrible games on a wide variety of systems over the years, but if I had to pick just one it would have to be a game that actually isn't generally considered terrible at all: Super Mario World for the Super Nintendo. I know this game is widely regarded as one of, if not the, greatest 2D platformer of all time and I think that's part of why I despise it so much. I've never been particularly good at 2D platformers that require intense amounts of precision so every time I've ever played Super Mario World it just felt like a floaty impossible to control mess that was way more frustrating than it ever was fun. No game has ever made me want to snap my controller in half quite like this one. My second and third place picks would go to Ninja Gaiden on the NES and Revenge of Shinobi on the Sega Genesis, with honorable mentions to every Mega Man game ever. Noticing a trend here? I freakin' hate precision platformers, no matter how good anyone says they're supposed to be.

I know exactly the stage you're talking about, and I did finish it before the game looped back to the beginning levels I guess I've completed the final castle too. Killer score by the way! Did you happen to get a picture of it? I only ask because I was pretty sure that picture or video evidence was required for high score submissions (especially ones that high) this season.

Our of curiosity, are the Sears joysticks you're talking about these ones? If so, the reason they and your two button C64 style joysticks aren't working with Choplifter, Rampage, and Xenophobe is because those are games that require a two button Atari 7800 controller; and all your controllers are just ambidextrous Atari 2600 style single button controllers. They may have two buttons, but those two buttons aren't wired up in such a way that the Atari 7800 will recognize them as a two button Atari 7800 controller. Most Atari 7800 games will play fine with single button or ambidextrous Atari 2600 style controllers, but for the games that require a two button 7800 controller you'll need either a Atari 7800 Pro-Line Joystick, CX-78 Europad controller, or a custom made joystick with two buttons wired up in a way that the Atari 7800 system will recognize them. Most people do not care for the hand cramp inducing Pro-Line Joysticks so I would recommend getting a CX-78 Europad. Personally I like them quite a bit and find them to be a comfortable and reasonably economic choice, though there are quite a few people around the forum producing and selling custom two button Atari 7800 arcade sticks (Edladdin, Wyluli Wolf, and Kosmic Stardust) that will give you a very authentic arcade control experience if you don't mind spending a little more for it. Hope that helps!

It's in the neck, right below the Adam's apple. It's also sandwiched up against your vocal cords, making the main risk of a thyroidectomy the possibility of losing your voice if the surgeon's hand twitches and they nick your vocal cords. That's probably my biggest worry about it at this point.

It was a big week for the Atari 7800 around here this past week, which is no surprise considering some of the gems that showed up in the mail! Ineligible Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance (Game Boy Advance) - 82 minutes Street Fighter Alpha 3 (Game Boy Advance) - 29 minutes Arcade Ms. Pac-Man (played on Namco Museum for Game Boy Advance) - 9 minutes Xevious (played on Namco Museum: 50th Anniversary for GameCube) - 22 minutes Atari 2600 Crystal Castles - 39 minutes Popeye - 11 minutes Space Rocks - 5 minutes Atari 7800 Asteroids - 125 minutes Centipede - 64 minutes Donkey Kong (emulated on Nintendo Wii) - 20 minutes Donkey Kong Junior - 37 minutes Donkey Kong PK - 178 minutes Double Dragon - 190 minutes Joust - 68 minutes Ms. Pac-Man - 12 minutes Pac-Man Collection! - 218 minutes PlayStation Tomb Raider - 84 minutes Total Play Time This Week 1,193 minutes (19 hours 53 minutes) [1,082 minutes eligible] Individual System Play Times This Week Atari 7800: 912 minutes Game Boy Advance: 111 minutes PlayStation: 84 minutes Atari 2600: 55 minutes Arcade: 31 minutes This week was quite possibly the biggest week my household has ever had when it comes to the Atari 7800 platform, with very little else played on any other systems. I did spend a little time playing some Game Boy Advance fighting games as I debated whether or not to sell them (the answer for both ended up being "yes") and the misses got in around an hour and a half of Tomb Raider on the PlayStation mid-week, but other than that it was pretty much an "all Atari" week for us. The week started off with my wife doing her usual morning games of Joust or Pac-Man Collection! over breakfast, accounting for most of the times for those games, but I also spent a bit of time playing my old favorites Asteroids, Centipede, and Donkey Kong Junior here and there. When things got really exciting though was when the spousal unit surprised me by snagging an absolutely pristine condition copy of Double Dragon for the Atari 7800 on eBay, and while I had never enjoyed the game very much when I played it via emulation I was still pretty stoked to try playing it with my other half. It arrived in the mail a couple days later and we spent quite a bit of time playing it together, and as I had hoped it was a lot more fun playing it with her on real hardware than it was playing by myself via emulation; though I'll admit that I never managed to get terribly good at it in spite of learning the most effective moves and strategies. The spousal unit on the other hand pretty much mastered the game in 2 days and ended up beating it on her own with an ending high score of 114,220! Not to be outdone in the rare game department, this week I finally got the copy of Donkey Kong PK that I had been on the waiting list for since last December! I could go on and on about what an amazing job tep392 did on every single aspect of the game, but I think it can all be summed up in one sentence by simply saying "It's arcade perfect". From the sound and animations to the enemy and barrel AI, it seems that the original source code for nearly everything was lifted straight from the arcade game and ported to a pokey equipped Atari 7800 cartridge. It wasn't a cheap addition to our Atari 7800 library by any means, but for any fan of the original Donkey Kong arcade game it is a game that's well worth getting on the waiting list and paying the high price of admission for. Wrapping things up for the week, I was absolutely thrilled to find out this afternoon that Crystal Castles is the game being played in the Atari 2600 High Score Club for the coming week so I had to get in a game or two of it. I ended up just doing one game because I actually topped my all time high score of 123,893 with a new high score of 138,560 on my first try, which I'm pretty pleased with and think should carry me into the Top 5 for the coming week even if I don't improve any further after that. And there's a pretty good chance that I might not improve my score, since this coming Thursday (May 11th) I will be going into the hospital for a total thyroidectomy surgery and may not feel like playing much in the way of games for a while after that. I'll only be in the hospital for a day or so after the surgery, but I've heard the recovery can be pretty rough going so who knows whether or not I'll do any gaming for the rest of the week after that. Ah well, I guess misses will just have to make up the lost time for me! She does still have quite a ways left to go in Tomb Raider I think. Until next time, best wishes and happy gaming to you and yours!

Thanks James! I am taking cash via PayPal as well as trades now, and I just lowered the prices (in some cases rather drastically) on the selection of PlayStation games available. I'm confident that you won't find a more affordably priced copy of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night anywhere on eBay.

BTB needs practice, badly! Or an Edladdin arcade stick, that could work too.

Sweet! This is one of the few Atari 2600 games I actually own a copy of too. I'm not sure whether or not I've beaten the final castle as well, but I do know that when I was playing this afternoon I did get to the point that the game started back from the first level at least once. What always gets me is the harder difficulty third level when you're up on top of a big X shaped castle roof with three elevators going down and there's about half a dozen trees chasing you like mad. I've never been able to fend them off long enough to take an elevator down and finish the level.

Crystal Castles!? Awesome!! This game is definitely in my Top 10 favorite games on the Atari 2600, so I know I'm gonna have a great time playing this round. On my first try this afternoon I already topped my previous all time high score (which was 123,893) and hopefully I can improve it further with some more practice. Crystal Castles (B/B Difficulty, Default Settings): 138,560

If only Best Electronics still made their light guns as well as they used to I'd definitely get one instead an Atari XE light gun. Three or four years ago I bought a Best Light Gun and it was absolutely perfect in terms of shooting accuracy and build quality, but sadly (and stupidly) I sold it back when I liquidated my Atari 2600 collection a couple ago. Since then I've bought a total of three more light guns from Best and they were all rubbish. Two of them arrived looking like they were assembled by trained monkeys and the third one looked fine on the outside but couldn't hit the broad side of a barn when I tried using it. After that I bought an Atari XE light gun from another retailer that was supposed to be brand new but it arrived covered in dings, scratches, and dirt. It did shoot a lot more accurately than any of the Best guns I've bought over the last year, but it was in such terrible cosmetic condition that I sent it back for a refund. At this point I just want a light gun for my Atari 7800 that is in pretty cosmetic condition and shoots accurately. I don't care if it's made by Atari, Best, or some other company as long as it looks nice and shoots well; I'd just rather not roll the dice on ordering directly from Best again since the last three light guns I bought from them were all defective in one way or another.

Aw man, H.E.R.O. has gotten kind of ridiculous in price. A couple years ago when I (stupidly) sold off my Atari 2600 collection I sold my really nice condition copy of H.E.R.O. for $27, but it looks like now that I'm working on rebuilding my old collection I'm probably not going to get away with paying any less than $45 for it. I blame Metal Jesus personally.

The original post has been updated with new games and I've now priced everything for sale as well.

I purchased a like-new in box Wico Command Control bat top joystick from Zetastrike and he was great about every aspect of the transaction. Fast and professional with PM responses, courteous with price negotiation, and quick to ship my joystick once payment was made. The joystick arrived exceptionally well packed in the box and looks & works exactly as described. I'd buy from him again any day of the week!

I can't speak for any other Pokey chip games, but I was able to get a copy of Donkey Kong PK by politely requesting to be added to the waiting list for a copy, waiting a few months until the next production run came around, then sending the funds for it via PayPal when I received a PM saying that they were ready to be built. No special connections or supplying my own Pokey chip required.

I agree 100% with every bit of that. Make games you like rather than what's popular, skip the original Zelda because it's far too difficult to figure out where to go and what to do in any reasonable period of time without a guide, and go for Link's Awakening or Link's Awakening DX for a great 2D Zelda experience. Link's Awakening DX is actually my personal favorite Zelda game, and I've played all of them except for Link Between Worlds and Breath of the Wild. I know most people seem to think of Link to the Past as the iconic Zelda game but frankly some of the puzzles in it are just way too cryptic to try and figure out without a guide. On the other hand I think Link's Awakening has just the right puzzle difficulty level. Enough that you may have to spend a few minutes pondering over what to do now and then, but it'll always become clear before too long without making you need to resort to using a strategy guide. Nintendo really nailed the puzzle difficulty on that one, and it had some great humor too.

Hello again guys and gals! This time I'm looking for an Atari XE light gun, either new in the plastic wrap or in gently used and pretty condition with no unsightly blemishes. I am aware that B&C ComputerVisions still carries new old stock XE light guns, but their asking price of $55 shipped​ seemed a little steep so I figured I'd enquire here instead. If anyone has one of these that they'd be willing to sell for a slightly more affordable price then feel free to shoot me a PM and we'll do business.

Since I wasn't feeling too great last Monday and didn't get around to taking a picture or talking about the games played that week (thankfully I was still able to get my household's times posted though), this week's writeup is going to cover the past 2 weeks of gaming in my household. Let's do this thing! Last Week's Picture This Week's Picture & Play Times Atari 2600 Masters of the Universe: The Power of He-Man - 94 minutes Popeye - 127 minutes Smurf: Rescue in Gargamel's Castle - 120 minutes Atari 7800 Choplifter! - 46 minutes Dig Dug - 123 minutes Double Dragon (Emulated on Nintendo Wii) - 32 minutes Bentley Bear's Crystal Quest (Emulated on Nintendo Wii) - 65 minutes Frenzy! (Emulated on Nintendo Wii) - 12 minutes Galaga - 11 minutes Ms. Pac-Man - 41 minutes Joust - 116 minutes Pac-Man Collection! - 123 minutes Rampage (Emulated on Nintendo Wii) - 18 minutes Scrapyard Dog (Emulated on Nintendo Wii) - 23 minutes Space Invaders (Emulated on Nintendo Wii) - 11 minutes Xevious - 278 minutes Game Boy Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins - 92 minutes Game Boy Color Shadowgate Classic - 211 minutes PlayStation Tomb Raider - 181 minutes Total Play Time This Week 1,724 minutes (28 hours 44 minutes) [1,724 minutes eligible] Individual System Play Times This Week Atari 7800: 899 minutes Atari 2600: 341 minutes Game Boy Color: 211 minutes PlayStation: 181 minutes Game Boy: 92 minutes The usually chart dominating gaming juggernaut that is the Sony PlayStation has taken the backseat to the humble Atari 7800 ProSystem in my household the last few weeks as I kept busy playing some of my all time favorite games, including Xevious for the Atari 7800 High Score Club, and the spousal unit discovered the joy (and occasional frustration) of starting her day off with some light gaming on the 7800 over breakfast. It all started about two weeks ago when the misses decided that she would try Ms. Pac-Man on the Atari 7800 one morning while she was waiting for her new copy of Pac-Man Collection! to come in the mail. She was always a much bigger fan of the original Pac-Man than Ms. Pac-Man, but Ms. Pac was all she had at the time so she thought she'd give it a go. Once I saw her playing Ms. Pac-Man I got all excited and decided to give it a play over breakfast too, and what followed ended up becoming a two week long high score competition between she and I in Ms. Pac-Man every morning over breakfast. For a while I was in the lead, that was until earlier this week when the misses spent a couple hours studying YouTube lectures on the exact behavior algorithms of all 4 ghosts and put that knowledge to good use by absolutely crushing my current high score of 78,290 with her score of 92,200. A good man know's when he's beat, so at that point I conceded defeat and declared her the winner. Gotta love it when your wife can kick your ass at video games. Outside of the 7800 the past two weeks in gaming for me have involved trying mostly unsuccessfully to get myself motivated to finish Scooby-Doo! Night of 100 Frights on the GameCube (though I have been enjoying a few quick arcade games here and there on a couple GameCube compilation discs), doing a full play through of Super Mario Land 2 on the Game Boy, and working on playing through one of my all time favorite point-and-click adventures: Shadowgate Classic. Due to ongoing medical issues with my thyroid I wound up in the hospital for a day this week, so I had plenty of time to kill while stuck laying around in a hospital bed and—since I had the foresight to bring my Game Boy Color along with to the ER—Shadowgate Classic seemed like the perfect thing to fill it with. It's a very relaxing game to play, and it had been years since I last played it so I had forgotten the solutions to roughly half the puzzles; but that's alright by me since I'm appreciating the challenge of trying to figure them all out again. As far as the misses' gaming activities for the past two weeks go, in addition to Ms. Pac-Man she also spent a fair bit of time on the 7800 playing Joust, Dig Dig, Choplifter!, and eventually Pac-Man Collection! as well when it arrived in the mail. She had never played Joust before this week and has been really enjoying the unique premise and bird-based combat action of the game. She spent enough time on Joust alone this last week that she's already blown past all my records in the game and playing a multiplayer game against her is just a recipe for a swift and merciless defeat. When she wasn't firing up the Atari 7800 over breakfast and a few times throughout the afternoon every day she also made some time (albeit a fair bit less than usual) for some of her old favorite PlayStation games, Resident Evil: Director's Cut and the original Tomb Raider. I think the last time she played RE: Director's Cut was around Halloween last year when she did a marathon of every Resident Evil game on the PlayStation, but it's probably been a good couple years since I saw her play the original Tomb Raider. It didn't take her long at all to breeze through Resident Evil: Director's Cut on Advanced mode last week, and this week she's just been making her way through Tomb Raider at a leisurely pace half an hour here and half an hour there in the evenings lately. That should just about cover all the gaming news from around here for the past week, and next week looks to be not all that dissimilar. I've got Shadowgate Classic to keep puzzling away at, the misses still has a long way to go in Tomb Raider, and I have no doubt that we'll spend a whole lot of time having fun together on the couch... playing Atari 7800, that is. Until next time, best wishes and happy gaming to you and yours!