mechanized

At risk of sounding like a dick, the power-up/power-down item element doesn't really stick out to me - hell, the colors are what really caught my attention. It's not a mechanic that really seems to lend itself to refreshing Space Invaders, but more than that, it's like applying a more modern and commonplace shooter convention into one of the founding fathers of the genre. At risk of sounding like ...something else, the first thing that I was hoping to see from the game when I read the tentative Rainbow Invaders title was a game in which one's ship cycled through the colors of the rainbow, and each color would be either the Weakness of a particular color of ship or the ship would be Invulnerable to the color, or even reflect it like Light actually works. Such that: -In the first instance, the Green Ship would be vulnerable to only Green Blasts -In the second instance, the Green Ship would not be affected by Green Blasts -In the third instance, the Green Ship would reflect Green Blasts back at the player I mean, with a Rainbow theme, that is a focal point that really needs to deliver Color, ya know? Sheer ... colorliness. Above all that, though, something different would really need to be done with the enemy formations and behaviors to really bring something new to the table, and exploit any of the above. So I'm sure all of this is way too late to ever be useful, nevermind it was entirely unsolicited, but these were a few things that came to mind. Maybe someone out there can use it, anyway... it's a gameplay mechanic I've been kicking around for years, despite my entire ignorance to game coding and high unlikliness to be able to ever pursue utilizing it.

Yeah, Al actually saw the thread and was cool enough to PM me about it! I guess once he gets home and catches up with the other orders, I'll see what he can do with my response to him. Woo!

Arrrrgh! I forgot to order yesterday! Damnable New Year's Eve partying! Son of a bee sting, I even had the Post-It note on my monitor! ArrrrrGH!

I just wanted to say, after checking up on this contest some weeks after its conclusion, I've never been happier to be utterly stomped in a contest. Justin, your knight truly is head-and-shoulders above the crowd, despite his apparent short stature. His bounding walk speaks confidence, the sway of his shield is reminiscent of the roll of a steam train chugging along (and that flowing plume is additionally evocative of vented steam, I'll note), and I can almost hear the comical, metallic clap of his visor. It's truly an inspired icon and I love it and thank you for coming up with it and winning a deserved place in the game. (And of course, I thank the cafeman for setting that place aside, heh!) The icon's so endeared itself to me that I started imagining it in its own little side-scrollery sort of game, thrusting out a little sword or lance to beat back the forces of evil, maybe with a jump animation for some platforming... hell, there should be a platforming Adventure game! Climbing a tower and such! The 5200 has buttons for it! I have never, never been more glad to lose. Very nicely done!

I really geared mine toward being simple, myself. It seemed encouraged due to memory constraints. Here's hoping my Blockhead can hold his own against the square-shielded knight. Ken-iggit.

Many impressive entries!

I loved that game... I haven't played it sine Middle School, though. I don't have a computer to run it and if there's a console version, I don't have it or the console, heh.

As soon as I saw this I read all I could find on it. Let's say I'm .. Excited. Yeah, that's the word... Excited. I've been looking forward to Adventure II for a long time, and to see it nearing completion *and* bringing on a contest, oh... count me in. Count me in five times plus a set of twenty rankings, already sent. Oh yeah. Oh ... Yeah.

Did anyone look at the list of games on it? In particular "Adventure II" is cited. Is this another game, or the one that cafeman was working on? The information does say that some Homebrew games are involved.

Any word on if the next Nintendo console will also be compatible with the GameBoy Player?

I have the DX cart, I'm pretty much just waiting to be in the mood to play a game, and then being in the special mood to take on a more time-consuming game. The last hefty chunk of time I dropped on a game was for Metroid Prime 2 (and I got all the damn Journal and Creature entries, ha!). I still need to finish Oracle of Ages and then do Oracle of Seasons, too... and I haven't, again, been in the mood for the more time-consuming gaming lately. Was never a problem with the Summoner games, for instance, or Baldur's Gate, since they keep a play log/journal... boy do I wish more games did that.... I'm sure I'll eventually give Majora's Mask another shot, once I've got a concise walkthrough in hand (or on screen) and feel like dealing with being a damnable bush shrub again.

You've got plenty of replies by now, but I guess one more can't "hurt" .. can it? Like others have said, don't consider the games chronologically, since not only do the games jump around in time periods, but also in generations, and even worlds. The games that do happen in the same world, for instance, would be generations apart with recurring characters in a sort of reincarnative cycle. For the most part, there is always a Princess Zelda, heir to the Hyrule Kingdom, with the princess in each game being, at least, named in homage to the original Princess Zelda who had been cursed into a deep, magical sleep. How we always have a "Link" available is a bit more tricky and has never officially been touched upon... it's possible that young boys get named in homage to the original Link, or blonde kids, or the Triforce or the Gods themselves (Nayru, Din, Fayore) preselect the hero at birth and inspire the boy's naming... I dunno, it's all supposition. There is, nevertheless, always a Link and a Zelda, and a handful of others are involved with their intertwined fates and reincarnations, or whatever (Impa, Zelda's nurse/guard/handmaiden, and King Jabu-Jabu/Jabun for example) and most of the time Gannondorf is involved with whatever is wrong, notably as the King of the Gerudo, King of Thieves, Dark Magician, or in his more corrupted form, Gannon, a hulking brute of a pig-monster. Often, the King of Hyrule is involved in some manner, but it's uncertain (like much of the uncertainty of LoZ) whether it's a particular recurring kingly presence or just the king du jour. Chronologically, the games were released as: Legend of Zelda (NES), Adventure of Link (NES), Link's Awakening (GB), A Link to the Past (SNES), Link's Awakening DX (GBC; Slightly expanded and in Color), Ocarina of Time (N64; and likely thereafter the OoT Master Quest edition), Majora's Mask (N64), Oracle of Seasons/Oracle of Ages (GBC; these two games go hand in hand, with different plots and play that affect one another via link cable {note: extra features if playing with a GBA}), Wind Waker (GC), A Link to the Past w/ Four Swords (GBA; a slightly modified Link to the Past with four player link cable support), Four Swords Adventures (GC) .... and of course, this totally ignores the bastard games that were released for the Phillips system. Sequentially, it's hard to discern what goes with what. It appears that Legend of Zelda and Adventure of Link are connected, but it's hard to tell which came first, though likely LoZ happened first (I say it's difficult to tell because there's no mention of the Princess Zelda that Link would have saved in LoZ during the events of AoL, in which Link is trying to revive the original Princess Zelda, which seems pretty odd). Prior to both of these is supposed to have occurred A Link to the Past, where we learn more about Gannon's origins and how he became the pig-monster magician fought in the other two. Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, and Wind Waker also seem to be linked together, but on a potentially different version of Hyrule than the other games; Majora's Mask in particular has little to no association with Either world, but involves young Link from OoT being trapped in a sort of tangent universe and having to escape. Many, many years later, the events of Wind Waker unfold, long after Hyrule is little more than a memory. (There is supposed to be a direct sequel to Wind Waker in the works, reportedly.) Link's Awakening seems to stand entirely on its own as well, but it could tie into another game. It involves a Link's adventures in a dream world (I hope that wasn't a spoiler... ehh..). Oralce of Ages/Oracle of Seasons seem to involve another, different Link as well. I haven't finished these, so I can't really say much on the plot. Were I to rate them, I'd have a difficult time. Legend of Zelda is a stellar game for its time. Adventure of Link, while very different than its predecessor and the games to come, is very good in its own right with solid gameplay all around. A Link to the Past is, for many, the definitive top-view Legend of Zelda game, and for good reason - it's colorful, the world is pretty damn big, the gameplay is solid all around, and there's a lot to find and do with upwards of ten full-fledged dungeons and many smaller dungeons. Link's Awakening was hard for me to get into the last time I played it, but I suspect it's because I just can't seem to get into it with the original release's pea soup colorations - I expect I'll find it much more palatable once I play the DX version. Ocarina of Time is a great game, and one of the defining titles for the N64. The world, while large, doesn't quite seem large enough, to me, but the dungeons are inventive and well-executed, and there's a lot to do. Majora's Mask, though, I personally loathe... I hate the entire time limit thing (you have a certain number of "days" to complete the game) and I found it to be the sort of game I require a walkthrough to manage - very little was intuitive, and finding clues on what to do and where to go was extremely frustrating with that timer ticking down. Oracle of Ages/Oracle of Seasons have so far proven to be a great time, though I haven't picked them up in a while (though I blame that on my current disinterest in games... I just want more to do than sit and play a game, so don't think it's because the game was boring). Wind Waker is a great game, too, but a lot of people find the sailing to be tedious; me, I see right through the sailing and believe it's a result of the developers wanting a "big" game world but not having a lot of space to make it on the GameCube discs.... it's still a great game, though, with fun characters, things to do, nice dungeons, and good plot. .... instead of rating them, I'll say which ones I find myself going back to after all these years. Legend of Zelda, since it's a great, fairly quick play (by fairly quick, I mean if you know what you're doing, you can breeze through it in a few hours) and loaded with nostalgia. Plus, that Second Quest, that's some replay. I still haven't finished that one, heh! A Link to the Past, I pick this one up every few years and do it start to finish and am consistently entertained to the end, where, once again, I'm a little sad that the ride is over. Adventure of Link, I never played much as a kid (I didn't own it) so I'm sort of discovering it for the first time and I like it. I pick it up infrequently. Wind Waker, which also has a second quest that I'm currently working through, but its second quest isn't really a second quest... it's mostly being able to play through the game again in a different outfit with a few new features available, like being able to understand ancient languages that certain characters speak, et cetera. Ocarina of Time has some replace in its Master Quest, too, but I'm usually hesitant to pick it up again because it's a big, time-consuming game, and these days I'm mostly looking for a quick fix before I do something else.

Top-Loader RF output will improve by cleaning the connection surfaces on the NES itself, then using a short male/female gold connector to connect to the RF box, and then to the television. As for Backwards Compatibility, that was one of the big selling points for the PS2 for me. First, the convenience and space-saving of only having to have one system out. Then, various improvements in processing and display (which largely didn't happen, but there are a few here and there) were attractive. Finally, a PS2 has two libraries of games to play, the PSX system's entire library and then everything that comes along for the PS2. My only want now is for reliable PSX "mega" memory cards. It's similarly the reason I actually bought a GameBoy Advance, and then a GBA Player for the GameCube. I don't play games on the go that much, so I certainly didn't "need" a GameBoy these days, but a GameBoy Advance can play all the old GameBoy Games I enjoyed when I was young, all the GameBoy Color games I mostly missed on, and all the GBA library of games that are essentially the next generation of the Super Nintendo in a handheld (which.. I don't really want to play on a small screen, so I got the GameBoy Player, heh {It's the only way to play Castlevania and Metroid!}). If the GBA didn't play the earlier GameBoys' games, it's very doubtful I would have ever touched it or the GameBoy Player, no matter how bad I wanted to play Metroid: Fusion or MegaMan Battle Network 2. It just would not have been worth the money to this consumer (well, pair of consumers, since my girlfriend was mostly interested...heh).

My only problem with the NES Top-Loader is the crevice between the incline with the buttons and the raised area with the controller ports. It's a bit of a pain to clean well... can't just wipe it down, have to whip out the brush and everything. Blargh. That aside, I look forward to your review and further information on the NES Clone.

And for all you PC Doom 2 players, keep in mind the player-made mod levels. In particular, I recommend getting the Osiris mod... it's one of the best, easily, with a sort of Star Gate feel to it. Good stuff all around.

Yeah, I'm really hopeful for a Volume 2. There are a lot of other games they could tap for it, too. (Oh, and uhh.. in my little list? Keep in mind I'm not totally sure on the publisher/developer, so they might not be totally Sega entries...) Kid Chameloen, revamped, with a slightly less misguided ideal of what's "cool" going on (he's one bad dude! rad! BARF) and a real ending, that'd be nice. Perhaps an Alex Kidd? Perhaps a Sonic the Hedgehog? That'd be neat, look like a modern day version of the 16 bit classic... it'd be *hard* to mess that up. ToeJam & Earl? Considering the third game didn't do so hot, it just might be the case that the franchise isn't really a franchise anymore, making it pretty viable for compilation. Altered Beast? I know they did one for the GameBoy, but that's like... not the same as what they're doing here. ALIEN STORM?! This is one of the best Golden Axesque games, ever. I love this game. LOVE IT. Streets of Rage?! What about Phantasy Star 3? It wasn't mentioned in the Phantasy Star compilation (I only saw 1, 2, and 4 cited) so perhaps room is being left for PS3...? Comix Zone? This is a pretty decent game that could really use a style overhaul. Dude was supposed to look cool and bad-ass, but I swear ... even by the standards of the day, I'm pretty sure dude looked like a tool. A huge one. Cyborg Justice was a game I really liked back in the day, but it was so, so simple. Not just a hack and slasher, but the levels were ultra-repetitive, the area bosses were nothing to marvel at, even the end boss and ending were lacking. This game could severely benefit from revisitation. Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine? Got a puzzle game with Columns in the first one, so perhaps the Mean Beans could work their magic. Eternal Champions....arguably one of the best fighters made, but it wasn't very widely received on the Genesis at that stage in its life, and its sorta sequel was nearly doomed into oblivion on the Saturn as people lost faith in Sega consoles. I'd love to see this fine game make a comeback, with an improved color palette and graphics. Out of This World, anyone? Vectorman? There was going to be a new Vectorman game made a little while back, but it never happened.... So there's my list of hopes, and I didn't even touch on the bigger arcade-oriented titles.

On another note, this is probably the last day one can purchase Sega Classics Collection at Circuit City on sale for $14.99.

Star Fox 64, too. The four-player is a little skimpy (just vs battles, but it's good) but the rest of the game is top-notch. There's also a good Bomberman game for the 64, I want to say it's Bomberman 64. It's not graphically awesome or anything, but it's kinda like if Bomberman mixed with Mario 64 a bit. It has some multiplayer battle kind of thing, and you can collect costume pieces for your multiplayer persona (sadly, these costume pieces do not affect the normal game ... a *huge* oversight on the developers' part, I'd say, which would have made the game all the better, because personalizing your character is priceless). Lot of people like Harvest Moon on the 64, too. Kinda a predecessor to Animal Crossing in a lot of ways. A lot of people don't like the game, but I highly recommend Castlevania: Legacy of Darkness. Taking Castlevania into 3D has been a mixed bag, but I think this game stands fine on its own. It's fun, has four playable characters (one of which has a different quest entirely) and plenty of unlockable stuff. *Do Not* get the Castlevania 64 game, though; Legacy of Darkness is basically the same as C64, but with more content, better gameplay, the new characters, and improved resolution with the expansion pak. Legacy of Darkness is like... the special edition/director's cut of C64. Super Smash Bros, Mario Golf and Mario Tennis are pretty good games, too. If I had my games out in front of me, I could come up with a more substantial list of titles, but... going on memory as I am, that's all I can think of for now.

Steve, do note that the injunction was stayed pending the appeal. Sony will still be selling PS2s and other infringing items, but will be paying compulsory licensing fees to Immersion during that interim.

Your best bet is to use some sort of vacuum thing and a brush, hold the controller upside down, wiggle the stick, move it around, vacuum, brush, repeat. I would not advise dissecting the controller - the stick housing in particular is tricky to reallign, and you don't want to mess that up no matter how gritty the controller may feel. N64 controllers are some of the best analog sticks out there, with the smallest dead zone (area of stick movement before stick movement registers within the game) of modern console sticks. Also, next time you have the N64 in front of you, take a look at the panel in front of the cartridge insertion area and see if you have the expansion card. There should be a small plastic panel you can lift up... lift it and take a look at the card in there. Is it just a small black cartridge? The official expansion pak has a holy red grill-looking thing on the top of the card, and I think the third-party paks also have a red plastic thing on top of their cards.

I have the Sega Classics Collection. Here's a quickie review. Golden Axe - Looks like a PlayStation Game, which isn't a bad thing - it can at least be said that it looks better than it did on the Sega Genesis. The problem, though, is that the game still plays like it's on that Sega Genesis or in the arcade. It's a basic hack-and-slasher, so one would be in the wrong to look for a lot of innovation here, but the problem is that the original games' occasional lack of response (for instance, Jumping and Attacking takes some getting use to in order to hit the fairly poor timing window) wasn't a 'classic' feature that should be retained. Also, sadly, the thieving gnomes are gone, excepting a brief but amusing cut scene. They do appear during the stages, though. Largely, I like the game, though I really think going with the old gameplay mechanics (aka wonky button response) wasn't a great idea. Virtual Racing - Spent a little time with it. It looks as archaic as the first polygonal game should look, but with a much smoother frame-rate. I'd say this one is ultimately More playable than the Arcade version, once one gets used to the new control interface. G.P. Monaco - Neat game, and I like it, but it's sort of needlessly tricky with its 45 and 90 degree turn mechanics, and their assignment to the shoulder buttons is awkward at best. It's still playable, but it'll take a bit of getting used to. Kinda Spy Hunter-ish in speed, with some Mario Kart-esque weapon and item pick-ups. Alien Syndrome - I haven't played through it yet, but I love it. Everything moves smooth, has the appropriate feel of charging into space stations overrun with aliens and saving the crew, all that. The game looks like a really good PlayStation game, handles a lot like Smash TV/Total Carnage/Robotron, and handles very well at that. Weapons look good, two-player cooperative supported, with 'cutscenes' of story that look like mission files. All in all, good stuff. Space Harrier - Weird, weird game. It looks good and all, but it doesn't feel like it plays quite right. Aiming is a bit difficult, since much of the time your character is going to be obscuring some part of the screen. Some enemies have specific weak points that are even harder to target due to this. It's a playable game, it has its fun, but it's generally lacking. Outrun - It's basically just Outrun with a better framerate, some better graphics, music, et cetera. It's solid, but in that enjoyably bare-bones way that Outrun always was solid. Columns - It's a worthy version of Columns. Nothing risky was tried, so they didn't risk anything to get to where they got the game. It's essentially an improved graphics version of the Genesis/Arcade game, bu with some extra side play involved. Fantasy Zone - It's always been a pretty tricky game, and this is no exception. It'll take a little getting used to the interface, but it looks good and plays "right" so far. Bonanza Bros and Tant R - These feel mostly like Filler. I'd also say that, despite their being generally good/amusing games, they're Not "classics" by any stretch of the word. Bonanza Bros is a pretty old school game where you take a tubby robber guy through a place to steal stuff, while subduing guards and such, hiding, and getting out of the place with the loot. It looks good and handles alright, for a semi-free roaming 3-D playing game (it's mostly left-to-right-to-left again, side-scrolling, but you can move along planes for the different floor levels). Tant R is like Wario Ware's grandfather.. a bunch of minigames you can pass the time with. I don't know why the hell anyone would pay to play this in an arcade, though.... it really baffles me. Like I said, mostly Filler in feel, but there Is content here... it's just not worthy of being a "classic" ...perhaps it would have fit as an uncredited "extra" with another couple games taking up the 9th and 10th spots in the collection. (Oh, did I forget to mention that? These are the 9th and 10th Games cited on the case, but they both run out of the same single game thing. This is like if Nintendo had billed Animal Crossing as 20 Games in One.) All in all, I paid $14.95 for it at Circuit City (it's on sale this week) and it was a fair purchase.

Like was noted earlier, the problem is in the vibration (and/or the communication between vibration mechanism and game software). I've never opened up an N64 Rumble Pak, but I have broken a PS2 controller and have seen the mechanism... it's a very efficient design for what they were looking for (causing vibration/rumbling) and it's pretty easy to see how that design was most attractive to Sony. It has relatively few moving parts, consisting of mostly a weight that resembles a stack of nickles skewered with a small rod, with about a third of the stack removed along one edge, such that when the rod spins (and spins the nickle-stack thing) it will not spin in a balanced manner. It's one of those things that's not terribly complicated, but certainly took an innovative spark to create. The official court order is supplied below. (NOTE the list of game titles supplied in the court order!) **** Full text of the court order: IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA IMMERSION CORPORATION, Plaintiff, v. SONY COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT AMERICA, INC., SONY COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT, INC., and MICROSOFT CORPORATION, Defendants. No. C 02-0710 CW JUDGMENT This action came on for trial before the Court, the Honorable Claudia Wilken, United States District Judge, presiding, and the issues having been duly tried and the Jury having duly rendered its verdict as to the claims presented to it, and the Court having entered its findings as to the defense of inequitable conduct, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED: That judgment is entered in favor of Plaintiff Immersion Corp. (Immersion) against Defendants Sony Computer Entertainment America, Inc., (SCEA) and Sony Computer Entertainment, Inc., (SCEI) (collectively Sony) on Immersion's claims of infringement of U.S. Patent Nos. 6,424,333 and 6,275,213. Judgment is also entered in Immersion's favor on Sony's counter-claims for declaratory judgment of non-infringement. Immersion shall recover of Defendants SCEA and SCEI jointly and severally the amount of $82,000,000.00. This sum shall be paid directly to Immersion forthwith; no escrow account is required. In accordance with the portion of the Court's January 10, 2005 order awarding Immersion pre-judgment interest at the prime rate, Immersion shall recover of Defendants pre-judgment interest in the amount of $8,703,608.00.1 Immersion shall recover its costs from Sony. In a separate order, the Court also issues a permanent injunction against Sony, stayed pending appeal to the Federal Circuit, and a compulsory license fee for the duration of the stay. IT IS SO ORDERED. Dated: 3/24/05 CLAUDIA WILKEN United States District Judge IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA IMMERSION CORPORATION, Plaintiff, v. SONY COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT AMERICA, INC., SONY COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT, INC., and MICROSOFT CORPORATION, Defendants. No. C 02-0710 CW ORDER ENTERING PERMANENT INJUNCTION AND GRANTING DEFENDANTS' MOTION TO STAY INJUNCTION PENDING APPEAL For the reasons set forth in its January 10, 2005 Order, and having entered judgment in favor of Plaintiff Immersion Corp. (Immersion), the Court hereby PERMANENTLY ENJOINS Defendants Sony Computer Entertainment America, Inc., (SCEA) and Sony Computer Entertainment, Inc., (SCEI) (collectively Sony) from manufacturing, using, and/or selling in, or importing into, the United States the infringing Sony Playstation system, including its Playstation consoles, Dualshock controllers, and those games found by the jury to infringe. {FN1: The jury found that the following games, in conjunction with the Playstation consoles and Dualshock controllers, infringed either the '213 patent, the '333 patent or both patents: A Bug's Life; Amplitude; Ape Escape; Atlantis: The Lost Empire; Bloody Roar 2; Cool Boarders 3; Cool Boarders 4; Cool Boarders 2001; Crash Bash; Crash Team Racing; Drakan: The Ancients' Gate; Emperor's New Groove; Extermination; FantaVision; Final Fantasy X; Formula One 2001; The Getaway; Gran Turismo; Gran Turismo 2; Gran Turismo 3; Grand Theft Auto: Vice City; Grand Theft Auto 3; Grind Session; ICO; Jak & Daxter; Kinetica; Kingdom Hearts; Legend of the Dragoon; The Mark of Kri; Medal of Honor Frontline; Medievil 2; Metal Gear Solid 2; Monster's, Inc.; Sly Cooper and the Thievius Racoonus; SOCOM Navy Seals; Speed Punks; Spyro: Ripto's Rage; Spyro: Year of the Dragon; Stuart Little 2; Syphon Filter 2; Syphon Filter 3; Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3; Twisted Metal: Black; Twisted Metal 4; Twisted Metal: Small Brawl; Treasure Planet; and War of the Monsters.} As described in the January 10 Order, no recall is required of products already sold, but Sony will pay a license fee on all products already placed in the stream of commerce. The Court GRANTS Sony's counter-motion for a stay (Docket No. 1370) of the injunction pending appeal, pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 62©. In making this determination, the Court considers the strength of Sony's showing that it is likely to succeed on the merits of its appeal, whether Sony will be irreparably injured absent a stay, whether the stay will substantially injure Immersion, and where the public interest lies. Standard Havens Products, Inc., v. Gencor Indus., Inc., 897 F.2d 511, 512 (Fed. Cir. 1990), quoting Hilton v. Braunskill, 481 U.S. 770, 776, (1987). The Court finds that on balance, these factors weigh in favor of granting a stay. None of the authority cited by Immersion suggests that a stay of the injunction pending appeal would be an abuse of discretion. As long as the injunction is stayed, the compulsory license remains in effect. Sony has filed with the Court a "supplemental submission" of updated sales data for the year 2004. Sony's evidence shows that the games found by the jury to infringe now represent a smaller proportion of overall game sales; for instance, none of the top ten best-selling games for 2004 were accused. See Mehta Decl., Ex. D, TRSTS Report for December 2004. On the other hand, Immersion has provided the Court with supplemental evidence from its expert, Dr. Colgate, showing that Sony has continued to release games that contain the complex vibration found by the jury to infringe. See Colgate Decl. 5-6. As Sony notes, "the video game industry is driven by trends," and "games go in and out of style in months." Sony Supplemental Submission Re: Updated Sales Data Relevant to Motions for Injunction and Stay at 2. Absent evidence from Sony that it has redesigned its products so as to avoid the systems and methods found by the jury to infringe, the Court declines to revise the scope of its injunction based on the introduction of new games and the decline in popularity of the accused games. IT IS SO ORDERED. Dated: 3/24/05 CLAUDIA WILKEN United States District Judge **** The following is an excerpt from Reuters: *** Sony Fights $117m PlayStation Ruling Sony's game unit has been ordered by a court to pay about $117 million in damages and to halt game machine sales in the US in a patent infringement case against Immersion Corp. Sony Computer Entertainment said it disagreed with the decision by a federal district court in California and would appeal to a higher court. SCE said it will continue US sales as the suspension order, which covers PlayStation and PlayStation 2 consoles, two game controllers and 47 software titles, will not go into effect before the appeal and because Sony will be paying compulsory licence fees to Immersion, an SCE spokeswoman said. Immersion, a California-based developer of tactile feedback technology, claimed Sony Computer Entertainment infringed on its technologies that make a game controller vibrate in sync with actions in games, the Japanese game maker said. The court's decision confirmed a ruling by a California jury last year that ordered Sony to pay damages. Shares in Sony were down 0.45 per cent at 4,380 yen, underperforming the Tokyo stock market's electric machinery index, which rose 0.46 per cent. In another intellectual property-related lawsuit between Japanese and US technology companies, Toshiba Corp was ordered by a California jury last week to pay a total of $US465 million in punitive and other damages to Lexar Media Inc for stealing trade secrets. Toshiba, the world's seventh-largest chip maker, suggested it would appeal the decision. *** Summarized: Sony was found to have been infringing upon Immersion's vibration mechanics/mechanisms regarding its controllers and nearly fifty games and found in favor of Immersion. Immersion was awarded millions (though the exact amount is a little hard to pick out). Sony was granted a stay of the injunction as the appeal goes through, based in part on the court's findings that a total injunction would irreparably harm Sony, that many of the games cited are past their prime, that the injunction as it would be would not particularly benefit Immersion, and .. something else. I tried to Bold the most notable bits for easy skimming. (And if anyone has the proverbial wild hair, this isn't about inciting some PlayStation Fanboy riot... it's just news, from one PS2 owner to a bunch of other people.)

1. Backwards compatibility with predecessors 2. For relevent consoles, hardware accessories that allow play of other games for the company's other systems, and especially if these hardwares do not require a disc for use (such as the Game Cube's GameBoy Player, which irritatingly requires a disc in the cube to function). 3. For handhelds, a means of playing the handheld's game library on a television. For the current handheld generations, quite a lot of games are featured in the handheld format that simply play better on a big screen (Metroid and Castlevania games are good examples). 4. Four Controller Ports - I personally loathe having to get a connector thingy to do this sort of games, and when a connector thingy is involved, there is much less support for multiplayer titles that involved upwards of four participants. Four Controller Ports as a standard to the system relieves both issues entirely. 5. Standard On-Line Function in the console, with appropriate support, and with *minimal* fees associated. It should be more than enough that we bought the game and system, and while I understand that bandwidth and hosting does not come free, that does not mean developers/companies should unreasonably profit from charges to players - they should "profit" in only as much as it takes to cover usage to break even and have enough left over to pay those tending the hosting/on-line functions. Otherwise, they have received their profits *from the initial sale of the game* and that should be plenty. 6. Industry Standard Discs - GameCube has proven through its overwhelming desire to not be pirated that making small discs for its system does two things: a) Minimally Reduces Piracy, and b) fits less game on the disc. I do not want to see this repeated, personally. 7. Secondary Disc Drive, or Hardware Accessory Option. Imagine a console that had a secondary drive option that could facilitate Expansion Pack-type game enhancements. Sure, a Hard Drive is great, but even when it's standard equipment in a console, it means juggling data periodically. A secondary disc drive can get that Expansion Pack flavor and then use a Hard Drive as a largely peripheral entity, non-requisite and never in fear of glutting the memory. And that's what comes to mind for now.

Well, I don't think anyone here would really suggest you take on any task you did not care to take on (such as taking the time to prepare and ship all that stuff) but those cartridges in particular could have been pretty useful. I guess I'd just advise saving cartridges from now on, since those are nearly universally useful to Albert and they help keep homebrews and such coming out of the shops. The consoles are certainly more iffy, since they're crappy dead things and finding that select few people who would be interested in them would likely be more hassle than it's worth (no offense, you select few!), but the cartridges... they're a different thing entirely. But that's just the advice from a stranger.

I just did some searching for these on eBay and could not find a single one. Anyone know definitively if they have been banned from eBay? I know eBay periodically takes a stand against certain items being sold, be it based on legality or bad taste, and considering the grand copyright infringement that these controllers represent, it seems a real possibility.