FujiSkunk

I'm old fashioned. I still give positive feedback as soon as the buyer (or seller) has finished things to my satisfaction. I don't charge handling fees, either. [shameless plug]In fact, I have a number of PC and Mac games up for auction right now if you want to take advantage of my generousity. Go here.[/shameless plug]

Welcome to "Fecal Matters." I'm your host, John Fecal!

You could say Radar Lock, but that's kind of cheating.

Those would come in handy for those willing to shell out for a portable 2600.

My most amusing episode of frying was with Outlaw. The game officially has 16 game variations. Frying usually produces a 17th variation, #0, that features two players, a wall, and the "getaway" trick. Once, however, frying gave me variations #26 through #99! Each of these was some new mix-up of the game's available features, including many that were amusing, yet unplayable. There were walls that couldn't be shot through. There were one-player games that used the six-shooter, and after those six shots, the player could never replenish, since the target never fired. There were moving cactii. And other such fun. After #99, the game cycled back to #0. Sadly, only the original 16 could be cycled through after that, and I haven't seen those variations since. Frying is another way to get the two-shot ability in Space Invaders. Sometimes your base ends up invisible, also. Frying Asteroids yielded a rather monotonous version where the asteroids were always white, and the enemy ships always followed the same path and fired in the same direction. Frying E.T. will give even people who like the game reason to despair. Only one zone ever appears, the call Elliot zone. Poor little E.T. is stranded! Frying Centipede was often a scary experience. You started above the playfield. If you came down, you could be anywhere you wanted on screen, at least until you went below the invisible barrier that keeps you in the lower third of the playfield. But if you went higher, you went through some weird warp that either wrapped you back below the playfield, or completely crashed the game, giving the impression something was actually wrong with your Atari. I've fried plenty of other games, but those are the ones that stand out in my memory. By the way, user "batari" is working on a stella hack that emulates frying. Check out this thread.

Problem with the picture, try reattaching/reuploading if you can.

My first attempt at posting mentioned that compilation. But I hear the emulation of Paperboy on Midway Arcade Treasures aint so hot. Anyone shed light on this? 836175[/snapback] I haven't played the XBox release, but if the PS2 release is any indication, the game is emulated decently, in my opinion. The graphics and gameplay are there, at full speed. The problem is in sound. It is a little too muffled for my taste, suggesting they're emulating (or using canned samples) at a reduced sampling rate. Strangely, one sound effect, the musical riff you hear when you have lost customers, is missing altogether. Sound problems aside, I consider the collection worth getting, especially since it can be found for $10 new now.

Chill out skunkworx. You misuderstood what I wrote. I did? If so, I'm afraid it was mutual: I wasn't trying to be touchy. Make it a Dr. Pepper. I doubt this is the best example. The 7800 offered backwards compatibility for a machine that, by then, not many people were interested in anyway... Comparatively, the PS1... still had heavy third-party support at the time [of the PS2's release]. I don't see how that comparison relates to the success of a backwards compatible console. My opinion is that B.C. is a nice thing to have, but it's not necessary for a console to include. If a new console has it then great, but if it doesn't it is still fine. I wasn't exactly disagreeing with you, and in fact I would also say that the success of a console isn't dictated by its backwards compatibility (though I would also say that its success can be helped by such a feature). At the same time, I was pointing out that the 7800 arguably is not a good example, because it was boasting backwards compatibility for a system that many people (and almost all third-party developers) had already moved away from, whereas the PS2 boasts backwards compatibility with a system that was still popular at the time. The SNES almost was, which is why this thread started in the first place. One reason the Gamecube isn't is because Nintendo realized there were more pressing issues, such as finally moving out of the cartridge age and into the disc age. And while the Genesis is not backwards compatible, Sega did see fit to tap into SMS owners' desires to keep their SMS game library with the Powerbase Converter. In fact, some later SMS games had packaging notes mentioning playability on the Genesis with the Powerbase Converter. So, Sega obviously thought it was a helpful feature to have. Backwards compatibility by itself hasn't been, and probably will never be, the deciding factor of a console's success, but I think there are enough examples to show that it can be the difference in whether and when an extra unit or two get sold.

Whoops. I stand corrected. I guess it's been longer than I thought since I last played the Atari 8-bit version. I'll have to dig it out again.

I thought we were discussing more than arguing. Some of us like the advantage backwards compatibility gives. Others are indifferent. Can we talk? Of course, if you want to argue, we could point out that the 5200's sales were arguably hurt by a lack of backwards compatibility. Obviously, that was before the sheep population was trained to lust for a new console every three or four years, but still... I doubt this is the best example. The 7800 offered backwards compatibility for a machine that, by then, not many people were interested in anyway. The 2600 was nearly a decade old by the time the 7800 was offered, and Atari was about the only company trying to keep the 2600 alive. Comparatively, the PS1 was five years old when the PS2 was released, and still had heavy third-party support at the time. Not out of the box, no, but they did offer the Powerbase Converter.

The weird thing is, I can remember wanting Solaris more than I can remember the first time I actually played it. Around 1987-1988, my local Kay-Bee Toys still had a relatively decent selection of 2600 games. Even so, finding any particular title was a hit or miss affair, and the selection was always churning. So, one day I see Solaris, a game I hadn't seen before. Being an Atari-obsessed geek even back then, I had to have it. I had no clue what it was about, I just knew I had to have it. Unfortunately, they only had one box, and I didn't have the money for it when I first saw it. Even more unfortunately, a friend of mine, also an Atari gamer, vowed he would buy it before I would. Naturally, this meant war. At one point I hid the game in the display, hoping it would stay hidden until I could save up enough money. Later, when I finally got the money, I started begging my mother every which way I knew how to take me to the mall. She promised she would that following week, but that wasn't enough to stop me from begging. Finally, some friends of hers said they were going to the mall and offered to take me along. I cheerfully agreed, and rubbed my friend's nose in it. The only problem was, this happened to be Easter Sunday; the mall was closed! The good news is, when Mom finally did take me, my precious Solaris was still there. Bought and paid for, it was now mine! Not my friend's. MINE!! The game itself didn't disappoint. I don't remember my first play, but I do remember later bragging about how the graphics were as good as any NES game's.

I like backwards compatibility, especially in modern systems. I will agree that it shouldn't be an absolute requirement, but it's a nice thing to have. I still have plenty of PS1 games that I play on my PS2. Since I'm not nostalgic for the PS1, I was happy to only keep one console instead of two.

The second button lets you draw stix at a slower pace. If you complete an area using only the slower speed, it fills in with a different color (orange) and you get more points. It adds more strategy to the game, not to mention more faithfulness to the arcade version.

Cuttle Cart 2.

That's a trademark of MAME. The sound will skip and back and forth like that if the system cannot emulate the game at full speed. MAME can also be configured to drop frames automatically if it detects a slow-down; that may be the default setting of the port you're using. Like Dav said, Paperboy uses a higher resolution than Outrun and Final Fight. That alone will require more processing power. You could just go out and buy Midway Arcade Treasures 1, you know.

I'm seeing 67.15.129.36 for atariage.com, but 66.98.164.184 for www.atariage.com. It's about 10 AM Central Daylight Time.

You make me sick!! The only good deal I found last weekend was a Win98SE new-computer license (not the upgrade), still shrink-wrapped, for $5.

It almost looks like a NES game! Have you seen Battlezone on the NES? The 2600 version blows it out of the water! As for my opinion, the first few red-label games were definitely the pinnacle of 2600 programming and graphics, and Solaris is the stand-out among stand-outs.

Just get a TV that can automatically adjust it's vertical hold, or at the very least, a TV that has an adjustable v-hold. Unfortunately that won't stop the colors from being wrong, but it will at least make the game playable.

As I understand things, hooking into the left audio port only gets output to both speakers. Hence the occasional double-labelling of "left/mono". It depends on your receiver. While some receivers are intelligent enough to pipe the input through both speakers if only one side is hooked up, other receivers aren't.

"Bleep Bleep Bleepity Bleep" I like this name, too. If it has to change, why not make it amusing?

I've only ever bought one system at launch, and that was the Dreamcast (though I was still a few days late to the punch). I wanted to play Sonic Adventure when it was new.

Depending on your sound card and the drivers available for it, you could do this in under a minute with MAME. Just set your sound card to record "what you hear", start up a recording program, then fire up MAME.

Most of the red-label re-issues are PAL. The only two exceptions to my knowledge are Space Invaders and Yars' Revenge which also had NTSC red-label reissues. I don't collect them because they're PAL, I collect them because I think the red label designs look cool.

Actually, here you go.