Chris-in-NJ

Really want to grab myself this one soon. Never heard of it in the arcades, but looks like a simplified Beamrider. Or is Beamrider a more difficult Juno First?

1985-vintage Toshiba 19" CRT. Has composite video in, which I use for my Flashbacks (Atari 2 and Colecovision). My 7800 is RF all the way, using monster cable and an RCA-to-coax adapter. When my 5200s worked, I'd connect my 2-port the same way.

Bought it new and loved it, but only on the easiest version, because I could never get past the spider room on any other variation, no matter how hard I tried. I also managed to extend the opening level for as long as I wanted (most of the time.) Must dig it out and give it a spin or two.

I've had a working 7800 since the mid '80s, and would play my 2600 games on it. I also had a 2600 console that I'd left at my parents' house when I got married in 1999, which I neglected, and my father *threw away* a few years after that! I have never liked Pitfall! or Adventure. I have never owned an Adventure cart. When younger, I would peel the labels off my Imagic carts and put them on the other way around so that I could fit the carts in the Atari-branded brown album-thing cartridge holders and still have their names visible. I have only played Warlords with 4 players once in my life, and that was about 35 years ago. I now have two sets of paddles for the first time ever (found a set at a flea market back in May) bit have yet to find 3 players who'd like to play it at the same time as me.

Wow, I can use a 2600 Trackball on this if I have a Redemption adapter? I have both, must give it a try, once I get one of my 5200s repaired (again.) There's one thing that sticks out in this version which looks like it's incomplete - near the end of some levels, some insects will come out, particularly the one that walks along the bottom of the screen, and the next millipede doesn't appear until they're all gone. The arcade game and 2600 versions aren't like this. Does the 8-bit version do this too? Hope I've expressed myself clearly enough

Perhaps I should mention that I prefer an actual stick, rather than a Nintendo-style thing with four little pushbuttons. I'm not into modern gaming at all, so have no system newer than a 7800. My kids have a Wii and I've tried to play games on it that require joystick-type movement and have failed miserably I would think the same would hold true for Sega Genesis controllers. Why, oh why do all these modern controllers put the firing buttons on the right-hand side???

As luck would have it, the Sega Genesis compatible joystick I bought a few weeks ago for my 2600/single-button 7800 games decided to stop moving to the right this morning, so I'm looking for a replacement. Much as I hate the Pain-Line sticks, I have a 5200 Redemption adapter that uses them, so I'm looking for one, as well as a decent 2600 single-button stick to use when I don't need both buttons. Manufacturer doesn't matter. If there's a 7800-compatible stick out there that's less painful than the Pro-Line, then I'd just need that one and no 2600 to go along with it.

Broke 300,000 on this earlier today, using a pair of Sears paddles I found at a flea market last weekend (which my brother duly cleaned alongside my original Atari-branded paddles that I've had since the late '70s) and with the normal difficulty setting. Some of the screens are incredibly frustrating, but once you pass the screen with no side or top wall, it looks like you get the first screen again, with much faster balls, then random screens. Really enjoying this game.

I went there a few weeks ago. They had no 7800 systems or Euro controllers IIRC... Perhaps they've gotten some in?

May I ask where this retro game store is? I live close to the Digital Press store, but anywhere that sells Atari stuff is somewhere I'd like to visit, so long as it's not too far away.

I'd rename it "Yars' Revenge."

A big round of applause to PacManPlus. Since I got my 7800 back up and running, I've bought three of his homebrews from the Digital Press store -- the other two are Moon Cresta and Jr. Pac-Man.

I use paddles, and deliberately lost the balls so I could stop and take pictures of my screen I've made it up to nearly 250,000! I *think* it happens when I hit reset to start a new game (after I've finished one) rather than the fire button.

Stand-alone cart, bought at the Digital Press store. Happened again tonight.

I've tried at least half-a-dozen times to attach two pictures from my digital camera, and they don't appear. Sigh.

Playing Crazy Brix last night, and this happened. I don't know how. The second paddle didn't move and did not affect the movement of the balls in play. They disappeared on the third board.

I hate Adventure, Asteroids, the original Pitfall!. Seems like everyone who hates games that everyone else likes hates the same games.

The pirates even went so far as to use the same type of glue, perhaps knowing that Actiplaque would result 30-odd years later.

I've just realized, by going through my posting history here, that it's been more than five years since both of my 7800 consoles developed problems. Last night, thanks to my brother, one of them is working again. What happened on this one was that the little thing on the back of the console where the power cord connects broke off. His solution was to solder the two leads from the power cord onto the main PC board in some way -- don't ask me how as I'm no expert. So it powers on now. Imagine my surprise on connecting it to my 1985-vintage Toshiba TV that not one of my 6 joysticks - 5 "Pain-line" and 1 original 2600 - worked properly. I systematically tested the Pro-lines and found one that refused to go down, but everything else worked. I tried putting some packing tape on top of the connector on the brownish PC board inside. That worked for about 2 minutes before the stick refused to register down again. Then I thought of something - why not use two of those foam disc things inside to create more pressure inside so the white plastic "feet" of the shaft from the exterior stick touches all the contacts? I tried it and it worked. Only problem is, I didn't align the fire buttons properly when I rescrewed the casing. Tomorrow I'll give it another go, as it's after midnight here and I'm tired after playing various versions of Pac-Man from the Pac-Man collection.

Glad mine has worked fine so far, apart from when the little disc thing broke off the joystick. Luckily it snapped right back into place. Have only used the one so far, the second controller is still in the box.

Well, having used mine for a few days, about the only game on it I do like is Frenzy. Many of the third-party games, especially the SpectraVideo ones, and just awful and feel like cash-ins. Don't care for any of the Imagic games; Dragonfire and Moonsweeper are better on the 2600, and I can't figure out what to do with Wing War. Tried playing Squish 'Em and Bump 'n' Jump (also played this last week on an NES emulator), but again prefer the 2600 versions. Keep trying to get decent scores on Pepper II and Zaxxon, but so far have failed. I'll try some of the other games eventually. It's just that I find Frenzy so addicting, though not quite as much as 5200 Berzerk.

Toys R Us in Totowa, NJ has loads of these, bought one yesterday. I already had my FB2 connected to my old analog television so just swapped cables on the TV, and used the power supply from the FB2 and it worked fine. I also plugged one of the Coleco controllers into the FB2, and the 2 key works as the fire button, and down on the joystick is the same as Atari left. Anyway, played a bit of Frenzy (the main reason I bought the unit), Zaxxon (I'm still horrible at it) and Dragonfire (couldn't even get across the bridge.) They also had at least a dozen each of the Genesis and Atari 5 Flashbacks, but only a handful of the Intellivision ones.

"Back in the day," only one of my friends had a ColecoVision, and I think I only ever used it once. I've played a few games in emulation, and am considering getting my hands on one of these. What's the 61st game, and is it a deal-breaker? There's a Family Dollar within walking distance of where I live, just may check this out tomorrow. Are these well-made? The only other Flashback I have is the FB2, and my joysticks didn't last long, luckily I had a bunch of original sticks to use once the ones that came with it broke. Can I expect the sticks in this to last, or are pieces likely to break off after a few months...?