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Scott Stilphen

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Posts posted by Scott Stilphen

  1. Posted

    Jed Margolin (former Atari coin-op engineer) just posted this in the newsgroups:

     

    " Ralph Baer was predated by T.T. Goldsmith, Jr. working at Allen B. Du Mont Laboratories, which was famous for its oscilloscopes and was an early television pioneer. (They even had their own TV network.)

     

    See U.S. Patent 2,455,992 CATHODE-RAY TUBE AMUSEMENT DEVICE issued December 14, 1948 .

     

    You can download the patent at the Patent Office Web site (www.uspto.gov) in a weird TIF format or you can download it in PDF format from: http://www.jmargolin.com/patents/2455992.pdf

     

    Amazing! This is 10 years before Higinbotham....

  6. Posted

    I've rolled the score. There are 4 different-colored buildings: blue, dark blue, orange, and green. The pattern keeps repeating, and the layout is the same for every building (including location of documents). Lights (blocks on ceiling near center elevator shaft) can be shot out to create temporary darkness. Documents are worth 500 points each. Completing 1st building is worth 1,000 points, and goes up 1,000 points for each subsequent building. (up to?) A free agent is rewarded for completing a building (how many can be in reserve?).

  8. Posted

    Turns out Video Gems wasn't the only company to employ "anti-hacking" protection in their code - in Custer, Bachelor(ette), and B.E.& E.E.

     

    Thanks to Thomas Jentzsch helping confirm my discovery.

     

    Btw, what company came first - Mystique or Video Gems? AFAIK, this is the earliest known instance of protection code being used (for games anyway...)

  12. Posted

    As far as 2600 "voice", it's pretty amazing considering the other 2 titles (Quadrun and Open Sesame), not only for having more clarity, but for having 3 different sayings (12 different words total!):

     

    "Intruder Alert! Intruder Alert!"

    "Chicken! Fight like a robot!"

    "The humanoid must not escape!"

     

    I don't know the 'tech' aspect of how he did it, but it sounds as though he digitized the voice from the arcade version (or possibly the 5200 version?)

  15. Posted

    That I don't doubt (long as it isn't obvious, like say writing your name in ANSI text ;) ), but just remember there will always be someone that can undo it if they really want to. From one point of view, you'd simply be delaying the inevitable, which unfortunately is all copy protection ultimately does. Sony recently spent how much money and time trying to protect their CDs from being mp3'd....only for someone to discover they could beat it by using a marker :)

  16. Posted

    I already tried to convince the E-guys to release Pac-Man (check one of my earlier posts in this thread), but that was a few years ago, so give it another shot.

     

    As for Hozer Games, Randy certainly is making some $ with each cart, even if the guy who made the hack isn't. That was my point (somebody is :)

     

    Video Gems checksum- I'm certain I could, if I cared enough to devote the time to it...which I don't

  17. Posted

    Starpath did have another unnamed game for the 2600.

    At the summer CES in Chigago in 1983 Starpath showed

    an untitled Multi load game the pitted the Blue team against

    the red team in high action party games for up to 4 players.

     

    And that one sounds like Party Mix

  18. Posted

    cbypunk: I'm wondering if they didn't just set some variable to display 3 instead of 4. Besides, it's still Pac-Man (K.C. Munchkin, anyone?), so if Namco (or Infograms?) doesn't have a problem with Pesco (I'm guessing they're not even aware of it) then there should be no problem with Ebvision's Pac-Man.

     

    Years ago magazines (Compute, Antic, Analog, etc.) Published a number of knock-off programs. Some gave you the option of buying that month's issue of programs on disk. There were even a few books full of 'freeware'. Featuring a Pac-Man type game in your issue would certainly help sales (say they sold an extra 20K copies above normal), so in effect they're making money off Pac-Man, even though the guy who programmed it isn't b/c he sent it to them for free - just seeing it get published was enough for him. Atari didn't seem to have a problem with it then. So where's the line with that? Well, we know that even a big company like Namco isn't going to bother with someone selling copies of Pac-Man hacks for the 2600. From a $ standpoint, it's just not feasible. Look at Hozer Games - perfect example. He's been selling a Pac-Man hack of Ms. Pac-Man for a couple years now, for $22. Atari would have been all over him 20 years ago. Is Namco going to drag Hozer into court over it, for what a few hundred (or at best a $1K or $2K)? They'd spend 5x that in legal fees- even if they won, they'd lose :)

     

     

    Alex: The Supercade game wasn't very impressive (graphics were so-so and gameplay was extremely aggravating :x ), and nowhere near as good or original as their other games. It was poor Fast Eddie-type of game, of which there's already several (Airlock, Infiltrate, etc).

     

     

    Thomas: As I said, most companies made their money in the first year of a title's release, so is it unreasonable to think that somebody would dump the ROM after 2-3 years? This doesn't seem to be an issue with "new" old games like Elevator Action (which was dumped like 2 weeks after going on sale). If anything, you'd think that having the ROM out before the cart would impact sales, but I think having the ROM out before or after the cart release is negligible. It's been proven over-and-over that someone can sell a few hundred copies of a game in which the ROM was readily available beforehand (Combat Two, Secret Agent, Bugs Bunny,....)

     

    Copy protection - Right, but unless you already incorporated a checksum into your games (I know there isn't one in Thrust), then you can't stop someone from hacking them. And IIRC, Video Gems checksum was very easy to circumvent :)

     

    I look at hacking in the same way that people customize their cars, or remix songs, or whatever. As long as you acknowledge the source and don't try to pass it off as something completely original, then I don't see the harm in it. If someone buys Thrust and decides "you know, I'd like a different ship in there, or different sounds..." they can change it and perhaps get even more enjoyment out of it. The problem I have is when people sell copies of their hacks (for profit). A few hacks are certainly worthy of "cart status", but take a look at Hozer's site. Is anyone seriously going to pay $11 for "Amanda Invaders"? I'm sure Rick Mauer would be real happy to know that people make more $ with hacks of his game than any other.

  19. Posted

    Right, they couldn't legally sell it, but I don't see why they couldn't release it for free. How many countless programs were made (especially those type-in knock offs years ago) for non-profit - you never heard of anyone getting sued over those...

  21. Posted

    Shortly after the book was released, Van Burnham seemed to go into hiding, and the ROM for the game was never released. Did anyone ever receive one of the 100 carts that were to be made?

     

    Here's the press release from her site (www.supercade.com), dated 07.24.00 (yep, over 2 years ago!):

     

    "Following the presentation, the first 26 of the 100 signed and numbered boxed cartridges will be awarded to selected guests who register to win at the Classic Gaming Expo show booth. Winners will be selected from the names submitted, and announced following the game's release on this Website. The ROM image for Escape From Supercade! will later be made available online for free digital download so that videogame fans can play the game via emulator on their computers."

  22. Posted

    NE146: It looks like the blinking ghosts are a result of the "zoned" display algorithm being used (I forget the name that Tod Frye gave the technique...). When 2 or more objects are at the same position horizontally, they begin to flicker. The same technique is used in Ms. Pac-Man and Jr. Pac-Man. Maybe it's more noticeable with Ebivision's since theirs is only 4K? I don't know. Never saw the game in person :(

  23. Posted

    The difference for me is, that all those other ROMs are now easy available. Those companies had 10-25 years time for selling them and new carts aren't produced anymore for many years. Ebivision is still selling their carts and choosed not to make their ROMs public and being a homebrewer myself, I will accept this.

     

    C'mon, they certainly did not have 10-25 years to sell them...I'm sure you meant the games have been around that long :) Except for a few companies like Atari and Activision, a large majority of them only existed for 1-2 years! Using Atari as an example, most of their early or unpopular titles were only produced in small numbers- some even being discontinued or completely unavailable after just a few years, so unless you were buying surplus titles direct from Atari, they only got their $ from it within the first year it was released.

     

    The only reason the ROMS are so easily available isn't because the companies released them- it's because collectors took the time to dump them. So let me ask you- how many years is enough before the ROM can be released by others "guilt-free"? Because technically, except for some homebrew titles, nearly none of them should be available :)

     

     

    And I wouldn't like to see anybody hacking my own games now.

     

    And just how would you prevent someone from doing that? ;)

  24. Posted

    John: Supercade was a tie-in game for the Supercade book. Go here and click on "ESCAPE" for game info.

     

    Thomas: Every other company's games have been open to hacking, so I don't see why Ebivision would be exclusive. The only real violation would be if someone tried to sell copies of the hacked versions. Pretty much the only person doing that is Hozer Games, and they already are "licensed" to sell Ebivision games, so unless Randy choose to do that, what's the harm in hacking them? Certainly hasn't stopped you, or I, or anyone else from hacking games from Atari, Activision, etc, etc, etc......

     

    And before somebody brings up the fact that a hack of Pesco would resemble Pac-Man- what do you think Pesco is? Technically, they've already violated Namco's copyright on Pac-Man :) I've spoken with the Ebivision guys before (interviewed them for 2600 Connection) and I know they won't sell their Pac-Man w/o Namco's blessing (which is totally understandable), so what would be the problem with just releasing the game into public domain (i.e. free)? IIRC, they'd rather wait for Namco so they could sell copies of it. Unless they agressively pursue Namco's "OK" for this, they won't get it.

  25. Posted

    John, check your email :)

     

    Btw, what's the deal with Ebivision lately. Are they working on a new game for CGE, or any of the project ideas listed on their site? The site hasn't been updated in YEARS (honestly - except for a few postings in the forum section, there's no mention of Escape From Supercade or Allia's Quest, and the "hot links" section has a link to CGE '99!). Are they even still honoring the 2 remaining contests? (I know someone won the Alfred Challenge one)

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