Jump to content
Have You Played Atari Today?
2600|5200|7800|Lynx|Jaguar|Forums|Store  

jhd

Members
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Content Count

    2,421

  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by jhd

  1. Posted

    I have no solid evidence either way, but I would not be surprised if The Music Machine was sold in specialty, religious bookstores -- the related album most definitely was.

     

    Look at the distribution model used a few years later by Wisdom Tree for religious games for the NES.

  2. Posted

    Here is Feargal's complaint by way of DreamcastGuy, just in case that Mega link goes away. attachicon.gifDoc 1 - Complaint.pdf

     

    Lawsuits offer a great look into the inner workings of a business -- details that the parties would often like to keep hidden.

     

    The only thing I want to add to this discussion is that this is just the initial pleading -- it is not necessarily accurate or true. Atari will, presumably, file a statement of defense presenting "their facts". The objective reality is somewhere between those two points. Given what we know about all of the parties involved, I would view every statement made by both sides with much skepticism.

     

    One interesting (if small) point, the "1.5% of all revenue received" (p. 6) does not specify gross or net revenue. Now, we are not privy to the original contract, so it may just be sloppy drafting in the pleadings, but no competent lawyer would have overlooked such an omission in the agreement between Feargal and Atari.

    • Like 4

  4. Posted

    I think that it is interesting how some of the early releases were dropped from the line-up, while others remained available.

     

    For example, who would purchase Home Run or Championship/Pele's Soccer once the Realsports games were available?

     

    I question how wide a release Asterix received in Canada. I did not have an Atari 2600 in 1984 (I sold it in 1983, then I bought another in about 1989), but the underlying comic series was not normally translated into English. I only knew one person who read it (in the original French). The Asterix character (and thus the game) would have had minimal mass-market recognition. It may have been more popular in Francophone communities.

  5. Posted

    How old would you have been in 1978. Was this before Asteroids, Galaxian, Missile Command, Defender.

     

    I was 7 years old at the time. ;)

     

    Given that 40+ years have passed, my memory is a bit fuzzy about other titles, but it was very definitely one of the first arcade games that I ever played. This one stands out simply because it is one of the very few Japanese cabinets that I have ever encountered. (Many years later, I saw some in Vancouver.)

     

    More on-topic, I am defitely intrigued by these cabinets, but, as an apartment dweller, space is a significant issue for me -- I would have to set it up in my living room.

     

    Do they seem sturdy enough to survive a long-distance move? I will be moving cross-country within the next few years, and that makes me reluctant to purchase anything really large and/or heavy.

  6. Posted · Edited by jhd

    Does it still count if I never actually owned an Atari 8-bit system (other than the VCS)?

     

    I bought a Coco in 1983, which was ultimately replaced by my first PC in 1988 (which itself served until 1993).

     

    In about 1986, a local independent computer store became the first (perhaps only) place in town to sell the Atari ST.

     

    I was intrigued by the hardware, but put-off by the price. I no longer recall the specifics, but I do remember that the external floppy drive was sold separately, and it cost just as much as the computer itself! I was shocked to discover that it was a "required accessory". I was still happily using cassette tape storage on my Coco at the time; a disk drive was an unnecessary extravagance.

     

    The shop went out of business within a few years, but another establishment must have picked-up support as there were two or thee ST-based local BBSs in operation in the early-1990s.

  7. Posted

    And regarding space invaders controls; the promo video looks to be for the Japanese market. A joystick for space invaders in Japan would be correct. I remember the midway version with buttons. Some remember the joystick version in the US. I wonder how that happened. Did midway initially import taito machines to test the market? Did they come over later?

     

    I cannot speak for the American market, but I have very clear memories of seeing/playing a Japanese Space Invaders game here in Canada. (It was located in a short-lived arcade in the Sears store in Halifax.) The specific year is fuzzy -- I was a child -- but I think that it was available before the Midway version. I definitely played it first.

  10. Posted

    Yesterday I went to see the new movie Johnny English Strikes Back; I quite enjoyed it, but then I am a fan of Rowan Atkinson's work more generally.

     

    Anyway, one recurring theme in the film is English's distain for modern technology, e.g. he refuses to carry a cell phone or drive a hybrid car.

     

    There is one brief scene that prominently features what looks very much like an Osborne computer (I do not know enough to identify the specific model). Since the movie is mostly set in the UK, it makes sense to use an old British computer.

     

    One of the jokes involves the very long time that it takes to boot the computer from a floppy disk. There are several shots of what looks like valid C source code shown scrolling down the screen; I look forward to a screen capture of the video to see to what it actually does.

    • Like 2

  11. Posted

    It's not video-game related (nor is it my find), but this article appears in the newspaper today:

    https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/australian-travellers-find-17k-in-diamond-rings-hidden-in-3-board-game-from-p-e-i-thrift-store

     

    A couple from Australia bought a board game at a thrift shop, and found Cdn$17,000 worth of jewelry hidden inside the box (under a false bottom).

     

    I have shopped at that very store (several times), but I never found anything video game-related there -- just books and a framed piece of art that now hangs in my living room.

    • Like 2

  13. Posted

    I didn't include the FM-synth only cards, but some are extremely collectible too.

     

    Adlib = very rare

     

    [...]

     

    Basically, any 8-bit sound card (Adlib, SB 1.0, PAS) will be rare. I sold a no-name 8-bit card a while back for $100.

     

    I had no idea that these old sound cards were actually worth anything.

     

    Back in about 1996, I bought an original AdLib card CIB for like Cdn$5 at an electronics flea market. It was used (and a bit dusty), but it included all of the original manuals and software. Even then, finding Windows 3.1 driver software was something of a challenge -- the default drivers would play music but not sound effects. My PC did not ship with a sound card, so this was my very first experience installing and configuring a card.

     

    That PC ultimately went to friends of the family a few years later when I moved and upgraded my hardware. I assume that it was long-ago recycled.

  14. Posted

    I have a very vague recollection of there having once existed a French-language cartridge for the Coco. Nothing appears on the various lists of "ROM Paks", but this item would have been very obscure. I assume that it was only ever sold in Canada, and probably mostly in Quebec, New Brunswick, and Ontario at that.

     

    I do not recall what functionality it provided, other than (presumably) accented characters. As a cartridge, it would have limited ability to interact with any other software.

     

    Am I confusing a Coco product with something for a related system? Did I just imagine this?

     

    I have quickly looked at the Radio Shack catalogues available online, but there is very little Canadian content.

  16. Posted

    It really depends if the buyer/collector wants something usable or just a display piece. If it is just intended for a static display, then it should be as authentic as possible.

     

    I was recently in a museum that featured a really early 1900s-era "car". It was literally a wooden wagon with a small engine connected to the rear drive wheels. It was a unique item constructed by a local entrepreneur.

     

    Obviously, nobody is going to attempt to drive this thing (or even start the engine). That said, it had been "restored" with very inauthentic modern parts. To me, this significantly reducted its historical value. I want to see what it would have looked like when it was first made. I know what a modern engine looks like; I want to see what a ca. 1905 engine looked like.

     

    Now, if the museum were to build a modern replica (or it had a second example) that was drivable, then by all means use modern engine parts, etc. Nobody expects a working example to be 100% authentic.

    • Like 4

  18. Posted

    "Secondary market" allowed people with low incomes like me to buy and enjoy games (occasionally buy new too because of savings) and in turn allowed people who always buy new to trade theirs and buy more new games. It worked just fine for decades. And the games' quality itself didn't get any "better" or "worse" recently because of digital market.

     

    While it may be less of an issue with video games than with, e.g. books, the secondary market provides access to a much broader selection of titles.

     

    I began collecting for both the original PlayStation and, later, the PS 2 fairly late in their respective life cycles. I purchased the bulk of games on the secondary market simply because the selection at retail was so very limited by that point. I bought new games whenever possible, but many of the titles that I wanted were simply out-of-print by the time that I was looking for them. I had no other option than to purchase them pre-owned. Price was much less of a consideration. (I can count on one hand the number of games that I ever traded-in for store credit.)

  19. Posted

    Nobody from Imagitec lists Panther on online C.V and yet he now wants RetroGamer readers to believe the company had 3 Panther games in development? .

     

    I am unfamiliar with the standards or conventions used by game programmers, but is it possible that they may have just dropped the references to the Panther due to age or the obscurity of the system? Unless someone is very new to the workforce, I assume that a CV will not list every single project or game system that they have ever worked on.

     

    Personally, I worked on the design of an online database back in 2000/01. Because of a shift in funding priorities, that project was never finished and the organization that I worked for has long since ceased to exist. Frankly, I only barely remember the details, and my career has long-since moved in a different direction. That project has "aged off" of my CV, and it is now utterly irrelevant to jobs that I am seeking.

    • Like 1

  20. Posted

    I'm not sure. They have masters for about 200 games for the 2600. Almost all were developed in 1982 and 1983

     

    Are these all original titles? That is a staggeringly large output for one firm, approaching the volume of titles produced by Atari themselves (over a much longer time period). How many employees did the firm have?

  21. Posted

    I would first ask if there is even a need for yet another such facility? I understand that several such museums and archives currently exist (albeit all located in the United States; I would love to see a specialized Canadian institution*). How can you persuade donors to give money, artifacts, and/or records to a new facility rather than one that is well established? Is it feasible to acquire (and maintain) a sufficiently large collection of hardware and other artifacts to attract an audience? How much historically valuable material still remains outside of institutions or private collections?

     

    *Both the University of Waterloo and the University of Calgary maintain teaching collections of video games and related material, and there used to be a privately operated museum located in Ontario.

     

    In terms of specific resources for this proposed institution, I would love to see the archival records of Bioware (from back when it was still an independent studio) preserved. A print library of gaming magazines (not just digital scans) would be a worthy inclusion. I would also like to be able to play an original Space Duel arcade machine again.

  24. Posted

    Who currently owns the copyright (etc.) to the Pink Panther character?

     

    Has anyone made inquiries about the cost to obtain a license so that the game could be officially released?

     

    I very recently saw a new television commercial for Owens-Corning insulation featuring the character, so someone is still actively licensing it.

     

    Oddly, in the commercial, the character was wearing pants. IIRC, he never did so in the original cartoons.

AtariAge
Forums
Store
General
Follow AtariAge

Copyright ©1998-2021 AtariAge

×
×
  • Create New...