[Top 5 games for 7800]

Asteroids

b*nQ

Food Fight

Joust

Robotron 2084

 

Many more very solid games - OG and homebrews - but these are my favorites.

[Another Review of At Games Atari Flashback Pong Blast]

I bought one thinking it would be an easy way to add Stunt Cycle to the library, and fun/easy to take on trips or to family get togethers.  It was pretty lame and I gave it to a little cousin on the first outing.

[CX-40 wiring: better terminal recommendations?]

You could always add little pigtails to the PCB to use bullet connectors, but if you are already soldering something to the PCB it might as well be the actual control wire.

[Atari 2600 Video Game Release Date Pages (Updated)]

A literal treasure trove of information.   Thank you for taking this on and making it so cool!

[Edladdin Super Twin 78 Stick Review and Attack of the Petscii Robots Application]

This is lovely!  Thank you so much for your kind words Vinnie.  🙂

 

And yes, we can move the buttons around as folks desire. 

 

These days, most people choose one set of controls with stick on the left and the other with stick on the right.  This effectively gives you ambidextrous options on the 98% of single stick games, as you can plug in one control set or the other.

[Most recent binaries for the games of mine being pulled. All in one place.]

Amazing!   Thank you.  💗

[Qix - Any Fans?]

Many, many hours and much love playing this on my 4 port 5200 as a teenager.  I never saw the arcade version back in the Golden Age, and precious few since then.  By coincidence, I just saw one at Funspot last week!

[Atari Modular]

These are my favorite!  I have an array of 21 of them on my game room wall.

[5200 CARTRIDGE WALL DISPLAY IDEAS??]

4 hours ago, -^CrossBow^- said:

@edladdin please tell me that top shelf is plastic or acrylic? Because if that is tempered glass, you need to lessen the weight or add additional support...

 

Its plastic, with the slat attachment built in.   I need to replace that with the straight up metal shelf brackets and a nice piece of glass, or thicker acrylic.

[5200 CARTRIDGE WALL DISPLAY IDEAS??]

16 hours ago, jeremiahjt said:

I am confused. Where is Bounty Bob Strikes Back?

Its waiting for my winning lottery ticket to arrive.  😭

[5200 CARTRIDGE WALL DISPLAY IDEAS??]

41 minutes ago, sramirez2008 said:

Nice game room!

Thank you! 

 

Its the "Edlad-Den".  😂

 

[5200 CARTRIDGE WALL DISPLAY IDEAS??]

ULINE offers a line/system of "slatwall" retail display products that I have used to solve this exact problem.  The boards come in 4x8 sheets and the associated accessories provide lots of ways to display carts and other treasures.

Here's a link to the slatwall front door:

https://www.uline.com/Product/AdvSearchResult?keywords=slatwall

 

I hope this helps!

 

Ed

[Homebrews]

I dearly love b*NQ, Ken Sider’s Q-Bert homebrew. And Armor Attack II and RipOff are lots of fun.

 

For OG games, the Joust and Ms Pac-Man ports are solid and inexpensive. Food Fight and Ballblazer are GREAT.  And not everyone agrees, but I really like Dark Chambers.

 

IMHO, all the fighting games and flight simulators are terrible, tho Super Huey has an arcade mode that is sort of ok. 

["New" 7800 owner]

When your hands get tired of sad old CX-24s, our complete lineup of 7800 hardware is available right here in the AtariAge store!  🙂

 

https://atariage.com/store/index.php?l=product_list&c=111

[doubledown's latest controller build...the Atari Micro Joystick Controller]

Very cool project!

[Edladdin Super 52 - whatever became of it???]

Thank you. That’s a solid possibility. 

[Edladdin Super 52 - whatever became of it???]

Hi Everyone!

 

Thanks so much for following the longest and most onerous of the projects we have undertaken - the Super 52.  This is still a live project, but its been in hibernation for awhile. 

 

The plan is to deliver:

Arcade Controller in the same sloped aluminum case as the rest of our "Super" controllers - 8" x 14", made by Hammond

Analog Hall-Effect Joystick

Two pair Suzo-Happ buttons in ambidextrous layout

Membrane Keypad with custom 3D printed overlay frame

Rotary encoder X-axis spinner for paddle games, with "steering" and "paddle" modes

Onboard "Masterplay" adapter allowing use of 1-button CX-40 compatibles and 2-button Sega Genesis controllers

 

Status:

At this point we have a working prototype based around a PCB designed by our magnificent engineer, Bob Bugash.  It has a few weird issues, described below.  We also have thousands of dollars worth of parts in inventory, ready to roll:

 

240 analog joysticks

250 membrane keypad/artwork

100 3D printed overlay frames

350 molded DB-15 cords

250 rotary encoders

 

We have yet to purchase the custom stamped aluminum cases from Hammond, the printed circuit boards, and the parts that will populate the circuit boards.  We also haven't nailed down a good source for a large spinner knob.  We used to buy a really nice knob from a firm that was basically the same size as a 2600 paddle or driving controller knob, but this project has taken so long that they went out of business.

 

Play and The Weird Issues:

The prototype works great on most 5200 games, including all joystick games.  The analog play is really sweet.  I've been using it to play many games of Dreadnaught Factor, which is one of my favorite 5200 games. 

 

The spinner is great on normal paddle games like Kaboom! and Super Breakout, but there are a few weird spinner issues that I don't know how to solve.  For example, while you can use a CX-53 Trak-Ball to play some linear horizontal games, like Space Invaders and Galaxian, neither of these play well with the spinner, where there is a distinct lag.  Another problem... I was really excited about being able to play Pole Position in "steering" mode, where I thought the player could use the keypad to shift the transmission - a native feature that was in place to support CX-53 use.  But in actual practice, the keypad does not respond to gear shifting instructions, so you can steer just fine but the game is unwinnably stuck in "low" mode.  You CAN change the controller mode to Joystick, change gears, and change mode back to "Steering", but this is not very slick or satisfying.  I don't know what the problem is.

 

The analog-to-digital joystick converter port works fine.

 

What are we waiting for?

In the course of testing, we realized that we could significantly spread out our costs/risks on this project by using the same PCB to drive a hand-held controller adapter - a "Seagull 52" - for a much cheaper price than the full controller.  I didn't want to do this while the Masterplay-clone guy was still in business, but he seems to have withdrawn from that product, so we are planning to go ahead.  Unfortunately, right before pandemic Bob decided to retire, sell everything, and move into an RV, just because he happened to hit the 80 year old mark, leaving us on our own with the puzzle of adjusting the layout of the PCB to fit the Seagull enclosure.  Over the winter I have learned how to use the PCB design software that Bob used to design the board, so as soon as we get past tax season I should be able to start this reconfiguration effort.  Once that is done, we should be able to proceed on both products: the Seagull 52 controller adapter and the Super 52 arcade controller.

 

Since 2020 I have been maintaining an email list of people to contact and prioritize when this damn thing is finally ready.  Please PM if you want to be added to the list!

 

Thanks again for your support on this, our line of Atari 2600/7800 and ColecoVision controllers, and the Seagull 78 controller adapters.   This year we will hit our 9th year of serving the community! 

 

 

[slower-paced or strategy Atari 2600 games?]

These are not strategy games, per se, but when I'm not in the mood for twitch games, my favorites are:

 

Atari Backgammon

Atari Bowling

Atari Golf

Atari Miniature Golf and the AA "Plus" hack

Atari Othello

Imagic Trick Shot

 

There's the other board and card games, if you like them.  Once in a while I'll play 3D Tic Tac Toe, but I'm not usually excited enough to reach for Blackjack/Casino, Checkers, Hangman, or Concentration/Hunt & Score.  Let alone Rubik's Cube/Video Cube.  And I'll admit I own but have never actually tried Sneak n Peek.

[What are your current Top 10 Aftermarket Atari 7800 games?]

These are the ones I reach for most often, especially the top 2.  So great!

 

1. b*nQ

2. Armor Attack II

3. Ripoff

4. Super Circus AtariAge

5. Super Cobra

[Best 5200 games (1982-87 only please) you owned in your opinion?]

As a kid:

Dreadnaut Factor

Gyruss

Moon Patrol

Pac-Man

Qix

Space Dungeon

 

As an adult, Pengo and Popeye are part of the regular rotation, along with Centipede and Galaxian with the Trak-Ball.

 

[Best VCS games you owned in your opinion?]

As a kid I played tons of:

 

Adventure

Berzerk

Bowling

Boxing

Breakout

Circus Atari

Defender

Kaboom!

Miniature Golf

Missile Command

Ms. Pac-Man

Phaser Patrol

Pitfall

River Raid

Robot Tank

Space Invaders

Starmaster

Video Pinball

Yars Revenge

 

OG games I found and fell in love with in the adult/collector era:

Chopper Command

Centipede

Dig Dug

Millipede

Pengo

Phoenix

Pitfall II

Q-Bert

Realsports Volleyball

Room of Doom

Save Mary

Seaquest

Spider Fighter

[Tips for fixing bad difficulty switch?]

If the cleaning does not work, Best Electronics has new old stock of replacement switches.

[SwordQuest Earthworld logic]

3 hours ago, Lord_of_Sipan said:

I actually did a ton of research into the swordquest games years ago because the whole situation with them is just such a bizarre train wreck. Which of the prizes still exist and who owns them today? How exactly did the “tournaments” work and did any of the contestants actually “solve” the games in the way we think of it today in terms of knowing the actual code?

 

I don’t remember the specifics but I agree that at least with Earthworld, I really don’t think anyone actually solved the game for the contest. It is my understanding that the comic “hints” were a little too obvious and the comic being pretty much the whole “puzzle” had become known pretty widely prior to the contest. This meant it was mostly just luck what word you picked to submit out of the 3 (I think?) potentially correct answers.

 

 

Here's an account of the tournaments that were actually held and the prizes awarded.

 

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the-quest-for-the-reallife-treasures-of-ataris-swordquest

[SwordQuest Earthworld logic]

It’s not a proper game.  There’s no rhyme or reason to the objects or their placement or their combinations.  It’s all random.  It’s the opposite of everything that makes Adventure glorious, where every object and character has a purpose that flows within the narrative/story of the game.  Swordquest games are pure trash.

[First-time owner of a 7800. Have a few questions.]

I really appreciate the numerous mentions of our Seagull 78 controller adapter and our arcade controllers!   Edladdin Controllers was born specifically because I bought my first 7800 back in 2013 and was immediately dismayed to see that the games were great but the controllers were pure garbage.  

 

We are an official AtariAge vendor, so you can buy with confidence through the AA Store:

 

https://atariage.com/store/index.php?l=product_list&c=111

 

Our arcade controllers are more expensive than most other options, but they are built in heavy aluminum cases that are wide enough to rest comfortably on your lap so you can keep a light touch on joystick and fire buttons.  Likewise, we use authentic Sanwa joysticks and Suzo-Happ pushbuttons, so there are no cheap knockoff parts under the hood.  And you get to choose your own mix of joystick ball color(s) and buttons, so its customized for you.   Lastly, we have two 2600/7800-centric controllers in the lineup: the Super 78 and the twin stick Super Twin 78.  We also offer a "Super Combo" that will drive not only the two Atari consoles, but also classic ColecoVision and the Collectorvision Phoenix.   Its more expensive, but if you have or plan to add ColecoVision to your retro arsenal, you have the option to get the controller that will serve all three.