River Raider

I second that! I want to get on the list too. Must acquire Kroko Kart!

Sweet! Thanks for the responses guys. I'll put some of these on my list!

I recently acquired Berzerk VE and have been playing and enjoying the heck out of it. I think my next purchase will be Thrust Platinum. What other hacks or homebrews do y'all recommend? In particular, what other hacks or homebrews would be great multiplayer games like Warlords, Combat,Indy 500, etc.? I am going to be hosting some Atari parties and want to have a wide selection of great multi-play games on hand. However, if you know of a great single-player hack or homebrew don't hesitate to mention it. Thanks fellow gamers!

Just got one of my old Genesis controllers out of storage. Geez! These things are soooo much more comfortable than the ProLine controllers. I am going to have to look up how to mod them for 7800 2-Button goodness. Unfortunately, the Sega controller doesn't seem to get along with my 7800 Asteroids cartridge. Too bad too, if it did, I would bust out one of my Sega controllers with the Turbo buttons....Mmmm rapid fire....

Yeah, I tried to mod the Tac-2, but I must not have the wiring right, because the fire button goes into auto fire (and you can't stop it)...And then video artifacts appear on the screen. As soon as that happened I shut off the machine. No damage seems to have been done. If anyone knows how to mod the Tac-2 to be used as a two button 7800 controller, some help would be appreciated. I think the Tac-2 would be a great 7800 controller.....or a heck of a lot better than the ProLines....

I would love to see a 7800 version of Blaster Master. I am almost tempted to get an NES just to play that game again. Although, with my previous experience with our NEW NES back in the day, I don't know if I can put up with the Nintendo Voodoo that has to be performed to get a cartridge to work. My 7800 and 2600's are more reliable now than my NES was out of the box....

Just got my first Atari 7800 from an Ebay auction yesterday, and here are some of my thoughts on the 7800.... The Good: Very attractive and sleek console design that would look good next to today's high-tech video and audio equipment. Also, the console is easier to keep clean than the venerable 2600 with all of its ridges. Controller ports on the front of the console....which when you think about it, makes one heck of a lot more sense than having the ports on the back! A detachable RF cable instead of being built in like on my 2600's. This allows the cable to be replaced more easily if damaged or worn out, or in my case, it allows me to use an RF to Coax adapter and a short Coax cable instead of the noise-ridden original RF cable. Very clean picture using this slight modification. Thanks for the suggestion, Danno! My particular 7800 doesn't seem to have any problems playing some of the 2600 titles that I have seen mentioned here at Atari Age.... Pitfall 2, Robot Tank, and various Imagic titles. I don't own a Supercharger, so no big deal to me whether or not the SC works on my 7800. How sweet is it that you can play all (or almost all) of the 2600 titles on the 7800? As far as I am concerned, you just can't beat that! Ok, you can beat that...if you get a Cuttle Cart 2. Having the entire 2600 and 7800 library on one cartridge is way cool. Unfortunately, I will either have to wait for a price cut for the CC2 or save my money for a while. $200 dollars is a little out of my price range at the moment. I mean, after all, I did get my entire 7800 system, 12 7800 titles, and multiple controllers for around 30-35 dollars off of Ebay, so 200 smackaroos is little hard to justify right now. The Bad: Really not too much to complain about with the 7800...In my opinion anyways... But here are a couple of the things that do bug me with the 7800... The channel selector and difficulty switches on my 7800 seem to be unmarked. Ok, the channel selector switch is marked with a circle on one side and a square on the other, but what the heck is that supposed to mean? Channel 2 is square and channel 3 is circle?? What kind of Chronic were they smoking when they came up with that? The cartridge port seems to have been designed by the same stoners that labeled channels 2 and 3 as square and circle. You just about have to use a mallet to seat some of my non-Atari produced cartridges. And I don't know about you, but I am a little leery of using brute force on any electronics...let alone electronics housed in 20 year old plastic. I guess I will Dremel out the cartidge port a bit to get a better fit, but you'd think they would have made the port compatible with ALL Atari 2600 cartridges since backwards compatibilty was one of the selling points for the 7800. The Ugly: Now I have read other AtariAgers posts about how atrocious the ProLine controllers are....But just how absolutely horrible those ProLines are cannot be appreciated until you actually hold one in your hand. Just holding them and trying to hit the buttons makes me hear Tuco's voice say "Ergonomics?!? We don't need no stinkin' ergonomics!!!" But like many things, there is a silver lining to the ProLines...They give me a whole new appreciation for my CX-40's and Tac-2 joysticks. In fact, I think I will crack open one of my Tac-2 joysticks and see if there is a way to modify one of the fire buttons to be the second fire button on the ProLine. If anyone knows if this is possible, let me know. Having a decent controller to use will go far to enhance my 7800 experience.... All in all, I am very happy that I have finally acquired my own 7800 system and have joined the ranks of the Atari Elite. Now, if only I can scratch up enough money to snag a Cuttle Cart 2.....Mmmmm, Cuttle Cart goodness...Ooooohhhhh!

This one time, I got a FB2 from Wal-Mart, and I Modded the case and installed a cartridge port, and then I tried to do the soldering for the cartridge port, and I pulled off some of the solder pads off of the motherboard, and then I put the wires back where they went originally, and I tried to fire up the FB2 and it didn't work anymore. So then this other time, I won an Ebay auction for an Atari 7800 and several cartridges and I resolved not to do any mods that required soldering to the 7800, because I didn't want to EFF it up like I did my beloved FB2.

Loderunner! Yeah man! That game freakin' rocked! I remember playing that game for hours on my friend's green screen PC. Also had a lot of fun designing levels for Loderunner.....Ahhh memories.....

Yup, Missile Command is one of the classics. It's one of those games like Asteroids, Berzerk, Seaquest, and Stargate that I find myself going back to again and again. I got a question....Do y'all have the same strategy I do? As in, when the missiles start dropping fast enough and you've lost a few cities, do you start to protect 1 or 2 cities neighboring your missile base? That's what usually happens to me....then I'll get a bonus city way out in the hinterlands, and I'll say "Sucks to be you!".

Yikes! I see what you mean about Tank Command for the 7800, Shadow. I just checked it out on eBay, and they have 2 copies for sale....$120 and $400....too rich for my blood! Agreed, Room 34. The "Crash 'n' Score" and "Tag" variations freakin' rock. Indy 500 is much like Combat and Pong to me.... They all have primitive graphics,(even compared to other 2600 titles) but they make up for it with great gameplay. And to me, the gameplay is what makes many of these Atari titles so memorable....Unlike much of the glitzy-graphics trash that modern game programmers are pumping out.....

Cons: Karateka Wow that title must really REALLY suck to be mentioned specifically as a 'con' to buying a 7800 system! I have noticed a couple of other AtariAgers mention Karateka with disgust during my lurking in the 7800 forum area....lol In spite of that particular con, I think I am going to acquire a 7800. The arcade ports, from what I can tell, look spot-on. Heck, it's almost worth it to me to get the 7800 just to be able to play one of my all time arcade favorites, Xevious. It looks sweet! I wish the 7800 had been given more of a chance to succeed, it would have been good for all of us if the NES had been given some more competition....And who knows what sweet 7800 game titles may have come out had the 7800 system been around longer.... As far as the controller issue with the 7800, I think I have that covered, I have a couple of TAC-2 joysticks and some FB-2 joysticks from a failed FB-2 cartridge mod attempt...(At least I got some sweet joysticks to use after destroying my FB-2 with a solder gun... )

Thanks, Shadow! Your post about repairing the driving controllers was the one I used. It was exactly what I needed to know, and now my controllers are working like new! It kinda gives you a feeling of satisfaction to make a 20 to 30 year old piece of equipment work again. Almost like refurbishing a classic muscle car....but fortunately for me, working on Atari equipment is much cheaper than working on muscle cars! So you have a 7800? Do you recommend getting a 7800 to a 2600 fan? What are the advantages or disadvantages of the 7800 system? (Or the 5200 system for that matter.) I do like the backwards compatibility of the 7800 to the 2600 cartridges.....

Unfortunately, the Cuttle Cart seems to have been discontinued. Too bad, seems like a great accessory for a 2600 fan to have. Of course, I guess I could get an Atari 7800 and get the Cuttle Cart II to use with it. (Oh great...an excuse to start collecting for another Atari system! lol ) Thanks for the game suggestions. I'll check 'em out! Anyone know of any other good multiplayer games for the 2600?

Just played Indy 500 yesterday after about a 28 year hiatus. (Last time I played Indy 500 had to be as a little kid way back in '77 or '78.) I got the Indy cartridge and one driving controller on Ebay. Then I snagged another controller from the 'bay and it arrived yesterday. This second controller was a bit dirty and didn't work right. (The first controller I got is practically mint) I opened it up and saw that one of the wires had broken loose....I soldered it back in place. Then, following directions from AtariAge's forums, I cleaned out the controller's 'pot' with Q-tips and alcohol. I put everything back together and cleaned up the exterior of the 'troller with more alcohol. Looked great and tested great. My brother, who is 25 (I'm 35) dropped by yesterday afternoon for some reason, and I had him join me for some Indy action. Man! That game is friggin' awesome!! We went through each game selection, and by the time we got to the 'grab the dots' version, I was laughing my butt off. I could tell my bro was enjoying the games too....even though he kinda gave me that "Aw man, Atari? With those archaic graphics?? Don't make me play that!" attitude before we started. Yessir! Indy 500 is one sweet 2-player game in my opinion. Right up there with some of the 2-player (and 4 player) greats like Outlaw, Warlords, and the much maligned (but still fun-as-heck) Combat. Does anyone know of any other simultaneous multi-player games I should check out? I am going to composite video mod one of my 2600's for party use, and I would love to know of some other games like Indy 500 that are chock full of multi-player goodness!