Mockduck

I have now completed the Speed Run and also completed the game on Normal difficulty. Hard is unsurprisingly: hard! We will see. This game is great. Would love to see a high score runoff on this one.

Here's a Clear run including the locations of all the Extra Bonus spots:

Released 4/12/24: Tanks, But No Tanks 7.99 Tile Cross 2.99 Two releases today from Set Sail Games, a small indie studio. Tanks, But No Tanks is an update of the original top-down tank shooting game released by Zimag for the Atari 2600 back in the 80's, and Tile Cross is a small tile puzzle game where you need to cross every tile exactly once.

So, short version is easiest best six bucks you'll spend. Another great game from Pixel Games, one of the best developers on the VCS:

The AtGames Blast! is NOT the worst, but only because their AtGames Pong Blast! is even less functional and playable. Truly the worst retro games thing I've ever seen.

A few days late on this one as I was out of town: Released 4/4/24: Block'em Sock'em: 7800 $8.99 The latest homebrew release on the VCS from publisher and YouTuber John Hancock! This is a homebrew developed by Adam Welch from Second-Dimension, published by John Hancock, that was originally released for the Genesis and then later the Jaguar, then the 7800. This is the 7800 version in the VCS Store.

Game is cool, maybe too hard. I thought donut dodo was tough but this is brutal! "Easy" difficulty is most definitely not.

Released 3/29/24: Cash Cow DX $5.99 The latest arcade game release from the makers of Donut Dodo! Pixel Games SARL-S' Cash Cow DX looks to be a bit like original Genesis Sonic the Hedgehog with a Donut Dodo-familiar art style. Supposed to be super tough!

Given that Donut Dodo is one of the best arcade games released in the past 20 years I am instantly in on this one.

The standard edition was done by Plaion, my understanding is that Limited Run Games is doing the LE. So, typical Limited Run Games timing on this one...

Turnament, one of the games that kicked off a quick succession of third party releases over the summer. Developed by one person in 2006 with Flash, remastered recently for Unity as a learning project prior to working on a bigger game now under development:

I've long wondered why some company in the retro games scene hasn't tried following in the footsteps of the vinyl record audiophile community and released some kind of cart cleaner machine. I'm thinking some kind of ultrasonic bath like object where you plug the cart in and all the activity is contained within the space where the cart plugs in, plug in a cart, hit a button, wait 15-20 seconds, take out the cart, put in the next, repeat til it's done. Seems like it would save time and hassle if it worked well enough.

Released 3/22/24 (see notes below): Space Duel: 7800 8.99 Crystal Quest: 7800 8.99 Space Duel is an AtariAge 7800 homebrew version of the third in the Asteroids arcade series. Crystal Quest: 7800 is a renamed version for the VCS of the AtariAge 7800 homebrew called Bentley Bear's Crystal Quest, likely renamed due to the developer not having the rights to the Bentley Bear IP from Atari. Classic platformer! *Crystal Quest was initially briefly released on 2/9/24 before being quickly removed from the VCS Store. The game has now returned to the Store catalog.

There was the somewhat limited "Sega Classics Collection" for Playstation 2 which included some arcade games, but the PS2 also has the Sonic Mega Collection and Sega Genesis Collection (28 games).

The PS2 was the era of Atari as a third party publisher, so the rights to a ton of those games are long gone. I think the PS2 may be the secret best console for retro gaming due to how many extensive collections are available. The Taito collections. Capcom collections, Namco collections, etc put it towards the top in terms of getting a ton of retro games cheap that play well. Atari's collection is good, and the PS2 still got the Activision collection.

Just FYI these were in fact released, they work pretty well given the time they were released. Used radio frequency.

I never had a Lynx because it was for the rich kids, best I could get was the Tiger/LJN portables.

Can't say I loved qomp2, but it's not really my kind of thing. Well made with a unique core mechanic set against a fairly familiar challenging puzzle platformer background:

Awesome, excellent price for that given today's prices. Enjoy! I seem to recall seeing a pic online of someone with literally hundreds of E.T. carts, so that's a goal.

Having a real CRT TV makes a big difference in terms of recommendation. Were I to start fresh, I'd see if my budget and opportunity allowed for the purchase of a so-called "Heavy Sixer", which is the original version of the console released. Or, keep an eye out for any boxed four or six switch Atari. I'd get the ones with the wood grain rather than the all-black or junior units, but they work well too. I actually like my Jr. a lot, main advantage is it has a removable RF cable port on the back, which can be nice. Also, slightly newer given when it was released. Mostly, I'd keep an eye on local Facebook marketplace style opportunities, and pick up the first cheap one that seems good and has with it the power supply and controllers.

I think Asteroids and Centipede will at least do well, they are among the best-ever arcade machines, so a cool new looking version with fun lights and sounds seems like it'd sell at an arcade.

Have fun with it! You should be basically fine whichever Atari 2600 you end up with. If it isn't modified, you'll need to figure out how to get a picture from it. If you have an old CRT TV use that, if you don't, you can get a connector to hook it straight into the Coax/"cable" port of your newer TV. The 2600 doesn't look great unmodified on a modern TV, but it'll work. Get one or more of these: https://www.amazon.com/Maxmoral-Female-Connector-Straight-Adapter/dp/B07X9LFS1Y/ref=sr_1_1_sspa This avoids needing to use an old style switch box to take the RF into Coax. Depending on how "retro" you want to go with it, I'd probably suggest picking up the new Atari 2600+ from Plaion/Atari as it has HDMI output and still plays the old carts. It's great, and might be the easiest way to get into the 2600 in 2024. But if you are set on vintage hardware, you'll have fun with that too.

Yeah, and that bodes well for the Recharged arcade games, because it was working and feeling GREAT on Avian Knights. They talked a bit on-site about what it takes to sell Avian Knights cabinets to arcades, one of the things being flexibility in terms of taking credits, quarters, and spitting out tickets either through a card or physical. These are definitely being made for arcades in addition to wealthier home collectors (the Avian Knights cabinets are about $6-10k depending). Yes, Alan-1 knows their stuff for sure. Great match for these Recharged games IMO.

Some pics I took of the Avian Knights four player cabinet at Flynn's Retrocade in Roy, Utah for the tournament by Alan-1. The lights, wind, pinball knockers, etc. worked really well and I thought it added a lot to the experience, I loved it myself. The knocker in particular was sweet for Avian Knights.

Team glue stick, or clear elmer's school glue.