onmode-ky

The pricing actually varied depending on location. I got my full set of 4, which I've still never opened, at the local Taco Bell in March 2010 for $1.49 (+ tax) each. For more information on these, here is the original thread discussing them, started by Curt Vendel around when they were first available. If I remember correctly, somewhere in there Marty tells a story about being asked to sign a few copies while at a Taco Bell, which he described as "surreal." Ah, found it. onmode-ky

I'd hoped to break through the 20K mark, but I couldn't even get back near it. 19,970 Marvin's Maze last week was my first time topping the scoreboard. Looks like I'm back to my usual performance level now. onmode-ky

88,100 (see "Edit" below) I've only played the game twice (!), but as I may not be able to play anymore today, I'm uploading a score now. While I haven't played this game before today, though, I did know of it already; it's one of SNK's arcade games emulated by developer G1M2 in SNK Arcade Classics Vol. 0 (PSP) and in the PlayStation Store, released there as a Mini and playable on both the PSP and PS3 (unfortunately, it doesn't appear in the PSV's Store). A review of the Minis release is available at PSPMinis.com. So, if you want a "legit" copy of the game, it can be had for $3. Hey, hey, if you're going to include the #6 position, which is 19 points behind the #5 position, I think you ought to include everyone down to #10 in the bunch up, since they're all within 15 points of the #6 position! The score table in the attract mode confirms this, actually. onmode-ky Edit: I got a chance to play a bit more. A few low scores later, I managed to blow away my previous high: 170,400 I managed to get 6 in a row once, and I believe the point value that showed up was 23,500.

Here is a link to the original AtariAge forum topic about this game. The thread was started by our resident arcade owner, Shaggy the Atarian, who's also the guy running the excellent Arcade Heroes blog on arcade industry news. onmode-ky

Over the years, when investigating recent plug-n-play systems, I have occasionally come across something on the Internet that sounds like a system not recorded in my files--but then when I go to add the system, I realize that it's actually already in the list, albeit with a different name from what I just saw. This has happened enough times that I finally decided to make a reference list for alternate names by which certain systems are known. For many of these entries, the alternate name just adds a subtitle which may or may not be written on the packaging. Now, this info is likely of interest to very, very few people, but I figured I ought to make it available just so future confusion can be avoided, even if only by me. So, here is the list (left side is how the system is recorded in my files; right side has the alternate name(s)): - jakks pacific alternate names blue's clues blue's clues coloring with blue winnie the pooh disney piglet's special day scooby-doo scooby-doo and the mystery of the castle power rangers power rangers spd escape of the five fugitives avatar avatar the last airbender book one challenges thomas the tank engine thomas & friends right on time sesame street sesame street beat featuring elmo go diego go go diego go rainforest animal rescue namco pac-man arcade gold arcade gold featuring pac-man pirates of the caribbean pirates of the caribbean islands of fortune cheetah girls cheetah girls passport to fame dora smart cookie dora the explorer dora saves the mermaids go diego go smart cookie go diego go aztec abc adventure thomas smart cookie thomas the tank engine learning circus express hannah montana hannah montana one in a million hannah montana deluxe hannah montana best of both worlds disney princess sleeping beauty disney princess sleeping beauty tales of enchantment spider-man sharp cookie spider-man great math caper high school musical high school musical all together now scooby-doo sharp cookie scooby-doo smart cookie (misnomer), scooby-doo the pirate's puzzles g2 hannah montana guitar hannah montana pop tour namco pac-man retro arcade retro arcade featuring pac-man disney princess cinderella disney princess cinderella once upon a midnight taito space invaders retro arcade featuring space invaders I will be replicating this info at my plug-n-play data website, and like much of the plug-n-play data I post at AtariAge, any subsequent updates will be made there only (since I'm not inclined to go requesting indefinite edit privileges on a bunch of AA forum posts). Speaking of updates, if anyone has further name equivalences they think should be added to this list, please let me know. Incidentally, a few weeks ago, I added a new pnpgames.*.txt file to the first post in this topic. Its only differences from the immediately prior file are a few AtGames systems (including the addition of their upcoming ColecoVision system) and the data I scrounged together recently about SMS/GG systems from around 2006/2007. I'm already working on the next pnpgames.*.txt file, what with the research I did on alternate names having also resulted in a few updates and new-old finds. onmode-ky

Lest anyone actually believe that article you cited was true, it would be prudent to note that that website is a satirical site, not an actual news site. Judging from the comments in various articles there, a lot of their readers don't realize that they're basically channeling The Onion, but focused on video games. Maybe Microsoft really did feel that way about Rare, maybe not; either way, no one actually flat-out said anything like that in an interview. I understand your sentiment about companies buying other companies for less-than-honorable purposes, but for the sake of clarity, let's just keep in mind that the article linked above was only for entertainment. Back on topic, Nintendo could certainly buy and/or utilize mobile developers, but that's unlikely to boost hardware sales significantly. Look at Sony and the PSV; over the past year, Sony has successfully wooed a large number of indie developers to port their games or even build new ones for the PSV, but hardware sales have seen no noticeable impact from that. Download-only titles don't seem to draw new buyers. If you meant that Nintendo ought to get mobile developers to make full-retail titles for them, I'm not sure that's a good idea, since mobile devs don't have experience in that arena. Heh, imagine a game where the disc is free, but all the content on it is behind IAPs. "Unlock main menu: $0.99" onmode-ky

r.v.g.c.? Hmm. Is that rec.videogames.general.collecting or something? One last question about your cels: do you remember if they came alone? Or did they come with other stuff? You didn't mention anything else, so I'd guess not, but at least in my experience, animation cel purchases often come with pencil drawings. They're often not for the cel they've been bundled with, maybe not even from the same show/movie/whatever--and sometimes they're as mundane as a drawing just of a character's mouth--but they're pretty cool to find, too. In a way, they're "more original" than a cel; whereas most of the work on a cel is just painting predetermined areas, the original pencil-on-paper drawing that was photocopied onto the transparent sheet contains not only the original handiwork of the line art in the cel, but also the coloring directions that resulted in the fully painted cel. So if you got any pencil drawings, those would be great to share, too. But again, if you just got a mouth or some random debris, maybe not. By the way, now that you know your layers are from different parts of the commercial, do you plan to frame them separately? Here's my suggestion: frame each layer with a printed-out mini screen cap of the frame in the commercial from which it comes (there's plenty of empty space in each layer where that could go). I, uh, suppose this would leave the piece of cereal unframed, unless you can find a clear enough rendition of the commercial for identifying where it is. Mind you, I've never done this myself, but I've thought about it. Also, if your cels have become stuck to each other, it might be better to leave them stacked together. Nitpick alert: these are not film cells. Animation cels are, for one thing, much bigger than film cells, and rather than being the result of photography, they come prior to any photography (animation cels are hand-painted, then assembled with a background, and then photographed, in traditional non-digital animation methods). But, I agree, his cels do look quite good. There doesn't seem to be any fading (the photocopied black lines can deteriorate over time, particularly with exposure to sunlight). onmode-ky

37,800. No change in ranking, unfortunately. onmode-ky Post-eligibility edit: And of course, NOW is when I get 49,050. Argh! Not going to bother with uploading the screen cap.

You're welcome . . . but wow, I . . . don't have a clue what's up with those markings. Why are there so many and seemingly in different formats? I'm afraid I'll be no help interpreting those. I only know how to read layer/sequence numbers (A3, D28, B35/END, etc.) in the corner, most often upper right. Of those cels, only the Donkey Kong one seems like it could really be layer A and sixth in its shot's sequence. And the piece of cereal being layer A seems unlikely. It definitely is cool seeing the actual footage in which a cel you own was used. In particular, you get to see how much more is visible in your cel, before the camera came in and cropped the image (and that's even before SDTV sets' inherent overscan). Note that a lot of your girders cel's image is actually not visible in the commercial itself. Granted, it's much more exciting when it isn't girders. Sometimes it's kind of sad what amount of detail in a cel was left out of the on-screen image. Do you remember where/when/how you got those cels, by the way? I assume they all came together; I wonder if the previous owner thought they were all from the same shot, or knew they weren't but neglected to tell you. onmode-ky

I know it won't last against this crowd, but it's nice to have the high score, even for a little while. 36,650. Was close to the second boss. For the record, I'm using the "zaxxon" ROM set with default settings: 3 starting lives, bonus life at 10,000. onmode-ky

Actually, that commercial is indeed the source of what you have--except that the layers that you have do not all come from the same shot. Here's a somewhat clearer rendition of the commercial (FYI, I enclosed the clip's URL within BBcode "media" tags to get it to embed): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nj5Lncx4IBU My first clue, prior to seeing the commercial itself, was that Mario's shadow in your picture doesn't align with the girder on top of which it lies. Sure, it could have been just an animation error, but it seemed a bit too obvious a mistake for a professional commercial, so I went looking for the footage. Here are your layers and where they appear in the commercial (using timings from the clip directly above): - ladder and girders: 7-second mark - Mario: 18-second mark - Donkey Kong and Pauline: 27-second mark - piece of cereal: can't tell, and don't really care If you freeze-frame just right, you can see the exact moment where your individual layers are used. Can you post the sequence data for each layer, the stuff written at the top and bottom? It does look like you have two A-layer (bottommost) cels. I have a small (anime) cel collection myself, along with some original source pencil drawings. Most of my cels are single layers, but I do have a multi-layer shot from the opening titles of El-Hazard: The Magnificent World, which is my single most expensive cel purchase. I've gotten a couple of my cels signed as well (not by that given cel's particular artist, no, but by notable staff members for the given show). onmode-ky

I have no modding experience, and I thought at first you just meant using a real Golden Tee ball--as in replacing only the ball, not the whole trackball assembly--but yes, I think it could be done. At least, as long as the real GT ball assembly's current and voltage requirements can be met by the Jakks product. That's a consumer product that runs on 6V (4 AA batteries), right? An arcade trackball runs on whatever comes out of the AC/DC converter in that cabinet. I've never installed an arcade trackball in anything, so I don't know what the numbers are, but if it all fits and you can figure out how to match up the pinouts (another potential hard part), I'd guess it's doable. onmode-ky

I imagine that after a few more years of being an elementary school teacher, Deteacher will be immune to even computer viruses. 37,620 42,390. Weird game, not very "arcade" in feel, yet also not much of a "sit and think" experience, either. onmode-ky

I have one UMD Video disc, the first two episodes of Trigun, and I bought it from RightStuf a few years ago specifically just to have a UMD Video disc. The PlayStation Store was already offering video content by then, so it wasn't that I wanted to check out video on my PSP, but rather the curiosity that was UMD Video. That was how I discovered that their video resolution was a full-SD 480 lines, even though the PSP itself only had a 272-line display; this was before the PSP had AV-out cables, too, and there were obviously no UMD-format devices ever released besides the PSP. At any rate, if you have AV-out cables for your PSP, UMD Video is the same visual quality on your TV as a DVD without upscaling. UMD Video overall was a failure, but in the realm of anime releases, it looks like Samurai Champloo may have been an unusually good seller. For most anime TV series released on UMD, there was only ever a single volume put out. Samurai Champloo had a volume released every 2 months, ending at Vol. 4. Of course, the way Geneon did their UMDs, this only meant 8 episodes total, in comparison to the 4-5 episodes per UMD that Bandai did in their brief venture into the format (in which they never released more than one volume of any series). A nice touch, I thought, with my Trigun volume--and I don't know how common this was in UMD Video releases, though it was fairly uncommon in UMD games--it takes advantage of the clear UMD case by having an illustration on the reverse side of the cover insert. Incidentally, Metal Jesus, the scrolling screen of Japanese UMDs that you have at the end, when talking about anime releases, almost all of what you're showing are actually visual novel games, not UMD Video. You can tell because they have a CERO (Japan's equivalent of ESRB or PEGI) ratings symbol in the corner of the cover. Also, it's worth noting when discussing other-region UMD Video that, unlike UMD games, there's region coding there, using the same regions as DVD. A certain region (guess which) allowed pornographic UMD Video content, but it won't play on a North American PSP. onmode-ky

I knew I could do better on Pac-Man, so I gave it another go: 54,890 Incidentally, kane's Pac-Man score is 50,260, not 54,260. For most of these games, I was using my Logitech Rumblepad 2, but I almost immediately switched to the cursor keys for Pac-Man. After setting my initial Pac-Man high, I went back to Berzerk and played using the cursor keys, leading to the updated score for it. Outside of a good joystick, I think cursor keys work best for games that require a lot of quick, precise turning. I don't think they could help my Donkey Kong, though; hours of trying, and that's all I got! My crapola ability at Super Mario Bros. is backward compatible with DK! onmode-ky

Berzerk - 5900 6790 (updated) Defender - 21,025 Donkey Kong - 23,000 Pac-Man - 42,160 This is my first time ever playing Berzerk. Entering a new room sure is nerve-wracking. Defender, well, after the first stage, it's nerve-wracking the whole time. I haven't played Donkey Kong since the 80s, at which time I probably played it less than 5 times total. Today was definitely my first time making it past the second stage (the run which set the high score above was the only time I ever reached the fourth stage, my first time seeing the elevators), and maybe even the first time making it past the first stage. I'd known from the Internet that the gameplay changed after the first stage, but the only part of DK that I ever remembered was the first stage. I don't have a clue how you people can get such high scores! Half the time, I don't even pass the first stage! Incidentally, I was surprised that no ROM names were specified for anything here, but I'm using berzerk, defender, dkong, and pacman (with puckman parent). onmode-ky

I'm surprised that no actual owners of a Flashback 4 ever answered your question. I don't have one, but I've been assuming that the Adventure II on the FB4 is the same as the one on the FB3, FB2+, and FB2 (and now also on the ill-named FB64). That is, it's a game created by Curt Vendel, lead engineer on the FB systems done by his firm, Legacy Engineering (FB1, FB2, FB2+), and I believe it was partly inspired by the Adventure II homebrew for the 5200, which was in development at the time (and would not be finished for a few more years). I have a FB2, and I was able to finish Adventure II way back when without drawing a map; it isn't really all that big a game world, though it is bigger than the original Adventure's. You should be able to play through the game just drawing yourself a mental map as you run around. That said, if you are interested in a map of FB Adventure II just for mappiness' sake, I'm not aware of one. onmode-ky

Tried again, but still didn't reach the second boss. 95 onmode-ky

81. Isn't it great how the enemies can walk below the bottom of the screen but you can't, giving them a nice safe zone to use to surround you? Oh, well. onmode-ky

If anyone's curious how the various SMS/GG plug-n-play and handheld systems over the last few years compare, I've updated the Retro Plug-n-Play Video Game System Contents page at my website with the game sets for all the models I know of (searching the page text for "sms" will get you all the systems minus the two by Techno Source). There have essentially been 6 models, plus 2 repeats under different brands, all of which were licensed from AtGames or directly sold by them. - Two of the earliest models were released by Techno Source (who had previously worked with the Blue Sky Rangers on Intellivision plug-n-play systems): one with Sonic Blast alone and another with Sonic Chaos and Sonic the Hedgehog Spinball. Incidentally, these two were remarkably ugly. - Two handheld models with identical 20-game sets were released in or around 2006, one under the Coleco brand name and one under the PlayPal brand name. - Two plug-n-play systems shaped like Sonic's head, one with a joystick (the top of which was shaped like Sonic's fist) and one with a joypad, were released at around that time as well, and these two have the same 20-game sets as each other, but they're different from the handhelds' sets. The joystick model came under the PlayPal brand, while the joypad model was under the FunPlay brand. For a long time, I thought PlayPal was a company that disappeared after releasing the handheld and joystick plug-n-play, but it was actually just a brand; the company behind it was Kobian Canada. FunPlay was a brand of Freetron, which I believe was also manufacturer for the PlayPal-branded model. Edit: the joystick model was also released under the Power Shock brand, by Monolith Industries (it looks like these were sold in Mexico); that's the one Curt Vendel mentioned back in 2007. I haven't been able to tell if the handheld model in Curt's picture (in the post right above that one) was also released, though if it came with Sonic Blast, that would mean it had the plug-n-play game set, not the Coleco/PlayPal handheld game set. - A few years ago, AtGames released a 30-game plug-n-play system and called it "Poga." I'm not sure what part AtGames played in the original Noza SMS-on-a-chip project, I mean beyond the game licensing, but by this time, it seems they owned the chip itself as well. - The AtGames handheld which started this topic is the latest SMS/GG handheld. I haven't included the 3 SMS/GG Arcade Nano keychain systems which AtGames' website lists, because I still have found no indication they ever reached market. The only blip on the search radar is this eBay Buy It Now listing for the model that contains only Sonic Blast. With this being the only one I've found, I think it's probably a marketing sample. If anyone actually buys that, by the way, $40 + shipping for just Sonic Blast on a keychain, please tell us about it when you get it. onmode-ky

331,100. Strange, I remember being disappointed with Strikers 1945 Plus when I played the PSP port, but this was not bad. onmode-ky

Back then, the 32-bit SPG290 was the next generation of Sunplus' gaming microcontrollers, yes. Its descendants are part of the current generation of those chips, like the SPG293 that's in some of Jakks Pacific's post-2008 TV Games systems. The Generalplus GPL16250, which is what underlies most of Jakks' more recent plug-n-play output, has pretty much the same capabilities, as I understand it, even though it's a 16-bit chip; it's sort of like the previous generation but loaded with extra features. For example, it can do basic polygon graphics. Here is some example footage I found of a polygon-graphics GPL16250 game. One of the developers I talked to is recorded in history as never having had any involvement with the Hyperscan--because the game they were working on didn't get released. Unfortunately, because of NDAs, the fact that they worked on something was all that they could tell me about it. If you poke around the Web, there are pictures of boxes for two Hyperscan games which never released, an Avatar: The Last Airbender title and a Nickelodeon Extreme Sports title. Both boxes have an ESRB rating mark printed on the cover, but as the ESRB ratings database itself only contains the 5 games which actually released for the Hyperscan, those marks are not a true indication of those games being finished. onmode-ky

Maybe you're thinking of a different system? Brandon Cobb of Super Fighter Team interviewed a few people (Americans, I believe) involved with developing Game.com games here. And, I've talked to a couple of people either at or contracted by Handheld Games (now defunct), who developed at least two Game.com titles. onmode-ky

As described at Wikipedia, the Japanese and European cover of ICO was painted by the director of the game himself, Fumito Ueda. The game released in North America first, though, and that painting wasn't ready yet (the North American version of the game is also missing the post-game content; the PS3 HD remaster of the game is based on the European release). onmode-ky

A convex surface has depth, by definition; a flat surface doesn't. If you don't get a sense of depth from something that physically has depth, then I don't know what to tell you. So the sense of depth you were talking about really was the corners of the image curving away from the viewer. Hmm, I'd assumed you meant something like tunnels looking deeper on a CRT, as in enhancement of an image's depicted depth, but you're talking about the warping effect applied to all displayed imagery. Well, if you prefer the look of scanlines, I guess this is part of the same package. I prefer the flat image, personally, though LCDs mean I do miss the intense Asteroids torpedoes of a solid vector display. onmode-ky