HoshiChiri

I was told by the clerk at one shop I visited recently that my lil' haul of 6 games and 2 controllers made the biggest pile of Atari stuff he'd sold in quite some time. Around here it's still pretty dead. BUT- I also know from retail experience that shopping trends take about 6 months to move cross-country. If you guys over on the east coast start seeing an uptick, keep me posted so I know how long I have to clean out my local shops!

Having just upgraded my TV myself, my first bit of advice is- CHANGE YOUR ASPECT RATIO. Putting the composite input to a 4:3 display changed my picture from 'horrid' to 'I can live with this for now'. If that's not enough to get you by, you've got a bit of an uphill battle trying to find scalers/interlacers/etc. to improve your picture. The short version is 'get a framemeister and the best video cable you can manage'. That's gonna cost you, though- the framemeister alone is 300ish dollars. boxpressed gave me this link: http://retrogaming.hazard-city.de/ It's a big ol' ball of picture-upgrading info. Give it a lookover, it'll help you sort things out.

Those are the ones... my sticking point is in the manuals where they explain how to hook up your deck. On the hdmi page they all say 'dvd only'... and I can't figure out if that means no picture from the VCR, or if the manual writers are confusing hdmi with high-def and trying to say it won't upscale the vhs. Even if you know what the terms mean, you can still get caught on the jargon!

I gotta go with Fairchild Channel F carts, big, yellow, funky patterned numbers on the label- it's like they're made of condensed School House Rock

On that front, I've been trying to figure out if any of the HDMI-output VCR/DVD recorder combos will output all signals over said HDMI. Most of the manuals make it sound like only DVDs will, even the built-in VCR doesn't. If I could find one that does, I'd love to free up an input for another console (and if any sort of upscaling happens, so much the better!)

I'm in the Puget Sound area of Washington state. My travel options are limited, which is why I cited in-person pickup for the city of Federal Way- it's the easiest for me to coordinate.

Jin makes a good point- where's the love for the portables? Judging from the repiles over on the 'systems that defined your childhood' thread, people really have a lot of love for their handhelds. They were also home to some incredibly well-made, and extremely important titles (like Tetris... or, y'know, POKE-BLOODY-MON!) Then you add in the incredible ease of finding devices that run the overwhelming popular Nintendo handheld games- I personally own 7 devices that play original Game Boy games. Not one of them is an original Game Boy (in any of its forms.) It makes the portables a fun, easy to collect way to have your retro goodness.

I tend to think about this not just in terms of fun factor (an entirely subjective things, really), but in terms of historic value as well. I'm sure there are many young'ns today who would find the open-ended design of the original Legend of Zelda confusing & bothersome- but there is no denying the MASSIVE impact that game had on the whole gaming 'thing'. Taking the Big Important titles into consideration, a good system lineup is: Atari 2600, NES, Genesis, Playstation 2**. That'll give you the means to play the bare minimum in terms of 'games that defined gaming'*. Now, if you want to flesh that out for a better picture of what gaming's really been over the years*, add in: Intellivision: A great system to showcase the transition from the squares and lines of the Atari era to the sprites of the NES- especially good to show younger players, who don't always seem to realize NES graphics didn't materialize out of the ether, games were really just moving to that level anyway. The crazy controller and voice synthesizer help show the push for additional complexity as well. Plus, there's some good stuff on it! SNES: While it failed to make as big a splash as its predecessor in changing up the market *dodges a brick*, the perceived rivalry of Sega vs. Nintendo was the height of friendly rivalry in gaming. Having both is basically nessecary to really explore that aspect of gaming history. Dreamcast: Sega's swan song for consoles is home to some of the strangest games that have ever come out. It's a fascinating look at what a console can be when the people making it realize they probably aren't making it through the console cycle and quit trying to cater to the mainstream. As for the rest of the list, there's definitely a lot of fun to be had up there, but in terms of overall relevance to gaming history? Not much to offer. * obviously I mean 'console gaming history'. Arcades and PC are a whole 'nother kettle of fish. ** PS2 because it runs PS1, and therefore can fill in for both systems in representing Playstation's contribution.

Bump for Atari 5200 becoming available again!

The Genesis. We got a NES when I was in kindergarten, and I did play it, but the Genesis was what we had when I got serious about my gaming. I remember spending an entire Saturday beating the original Sonic the Hedgehog. I once came home from school in the pouring rain, and plopped down to play Sonic 2 without bothering to dry off. My siblings and I used to argue over who got stuck with the crappy jump legs in Cyborg Justice until we mastered stealing parts from other robots. To this day, I still get the Lightening Force theme stuck in my head. My teen years were defined by the playstation I got for Christmas when I was 13. So many discussions at school about whatever the current Final Fantasy was... but the best reaction was my mom to seeing me playing Parappa the Rapper for the first time. "This is a baby game! Do you know how much I paid for this?!" I still find that comment infinitely amusing.

A big thanks to everyone who's bought/expressed interest so far- I went through far more stuff far faster than expected! The remaining items will likely only remain available until Thursday the 4th- after that, games will go to a local shop and Angel Tales will hit either Ebay or Amazon. (I haven't decided on the 5200... I may keep it if I can make the space!) 2/2 edit- I have eliminated the single-game pricing, as I only just realized I won't be able to collect smaller shipping boxes from work before the cutoff. I will still split lots for local pickup, however! The same pointers are in effect: -Shipping is not included in prices. -Please allow me up to 3 days to ship- it's not always easy for me to get to the post office. -If you're able to get to Federal Way, Washington, I will gladly arrange in-person pickup. -Additonal pictures will be taken upon request. PS1 games: CyberTiger, complete Miss Spider's Tea Party, complete JetMoto, complete (Greatest Hits) The Game of Life, complete NHL Faceoff '99, complete ALL PS1 GAMES: $7 Atari games: Jr. Pac Man for 2600, cart only Football for 2600, cart only Pole Position for 7800, cart only (damaged label) Combat for 2600 Space Invaders for 2600 Super Challenge Football for 2600 ALL ATARI GAMES: $4 Angel Tales Box set With mini-plush, watched once. $50 Atari 5200 system I got this from a local thrift store specifically to offer here, so it's marked at cost. No hookups or controllers, untested. The metal accent has a few stratches and dings, but otherwise it's in good shape. The back cover/hinges are intact. $11