pboland

It's nice to know that I was not the only one that choose the SMS back in the day. I understand the love for the NES people have. For a lot of people it was the only thing there was. Especially when you are under the age of 10 and that's what your parents brought home for you. It would be mind blowing. Like you I was an early teen when I got my SMS and I tried all three at the store in Oct of 1986. I got my SMS for X-mas that same year as I choose it over the NES (yes, after playing on all three consoles 7800, SMS, NES). I already had a buddy that had the NES, but I too thought the colors and graphics looked better on the SMS. Plus I figured he already has the NES, I want something different. Again, BITD most only had money for one system and I'm glad I choose the SMS. Cutting grass helped pay for many of my games and I really liked Sega Scope 3-D. As time went on most of my friends would end up at my house because SMS was something different to play and their NES (which they all liked a lot) still didn't offer some of the same game experiences that I had on my SMS. I like the NES, I just like the SMS better. Heck, the SMS was just a gateway to the Genesis I bought in X-mas of '89.

I said I would make an overlay for this game. Assuming nothing has changed since I last copied the info for the keypad function, Here's the overlay: Here's the print version (be sure to print at 100%): SotA_overlay.pdf

That is very difficult to do. The truth is most games actually have many different labels back in the day. That's mainly do to the time in which a label was manufactured for a given title (which in many cases was several different times). I've seen at least three different (meaning text alignment, slight font differences, placement of the main image, color variances) on Pitfall alone. All of which were considered the same label. The biggest issue with making 100% true replicas will be the "offset printing" method. That is the way it was done back in the day and in order to make that cost effective you would need to have tens of thousands printed of just one title. It's that printing method that also gives the game it's shine/texture. Making small runs of reproduction labels will never be 100% replicas, but some come darn close (I'd like to think mine do). As to them being too shiny, that has to do with the laminating process which is necessary if you want the label to last any significant amount of time and if it is going to be handled more than a couple of times. What I mean by that is, you could just color laser print the labels and not laminate them. The result would be a much closer look to the original shine/texture, but the truth is non-laminated labels flake and rub off and are very susceptible to moisture and oil from your fingers over a short amount time. Not as bad as you think. Here's a video that show just how to do this:

Info coming in the next week or so. Stay tuned...

Yes, my label media is acid-free also the ink used is UV resistant. I don't want to clog up this topic, so I'll just say if you are interested in reproductions labels please PM me.

I'm waiting on the mouse PCB's. I'm hoping to have them by the middle of October. The price will be under $60.00, I just have to nail down a couple things yet. I should know actual price in about 2 weeks. More to come...

I'm moving forward with this spinner project and it now has a name: The name "Hotz" is a fictitious company name that I tend to use from time to time. On a side note, I was asked if it could work as a driving controller within MAME/MESS (or other emulators). I'm sure it can assuming the software lets you use a mouse for steering control. I'm hoping to make a couple videos showing the controller in action. For now here's a couple pics of the assemblies waiting for a couple more parts:

The thing with keyboard creations is, it isn't really a game. Back in day however, it was a good tool for making videos if you didn't have a computer. It basically allowed you to make title screens for your home movies (if you were lucking enough to have a camcorder back then). Or if you just wanted to use your TV as a sign. Like saying "Happy B-day Bob!"

Wow! I just now saw this RPG for the O2. It's very impressive. Even the sounds are really good for an O2! Does it use any keyboard function other than inputting your name at the beginning?

This question is based on this Topic: DIY: USB Rotary Control w/Atari style knob I'm basically trying to figure out if the is enough interest in making these available to the community. If so, let me know with your comments.

To be honest, I thought this topic would have gotten a little more interest. Maybe I should have posted in the emulation area? After looking at the costs and time to make the controller, I'm looking at the $50-$60.00 range if I was to sell it. It would really depend on how many people are interested. The more people the closer to the $50.00 mark.

I was looking for info on this too. I found this topic in a google search: http://atariage.com/forums/topic/275757-budget-atari-and-capcom-arcade-cabinets-to-see-release-this-fall/

Something like this would have worked: @BassGuitari: Your right, it's styled to match the XE/ST lines. Now that I see the controller it even looks like a mini XEGS.

I think you are right. They should have went with Star Raiders II instead of Flight Simulator II. It would have made for a much better commercial and at first glance would have made the system look closer to the NES. A much faster paced game that would have fit better in that time frame. If they really wanted to show off the computer aspect of the console, they should have just showed a kid writing a program in basic and then typing RUN and it would be some rudimentary arcade game. You could have shown that in 3 seconds. I really think Atari should have packed the XEGS with a 2 button controller. Even if there were just grey 7800 pro controllers. I know most don't like them, but they really should have packed in a two button controller. Reason being is, they already knew that it's what modern systems had at the time (7800, SMS, NES). The best option would have been the 7800 euro pad (in XEGS grey of course). Again I know these aren't as good as the NES controllers, but it would have fit with Atari's recycling of products at the time and would have made the system look more modern. Yes, even if they didn't plan on having games that used the second button.

The controller is designed to be mounted in a standard arcade control panel, but there is no reason you couldn't put it in your own box. Right now the only USB arcade spinner that you can buy is priced around $85.00 (plus shipping). I know my spinner will be less than that, but I doubt it will clear the forty dollar bar. I haven't really went through all the cost analysis yet to come up with a price. Right now this is mainly a personal project. I would need to figure in my time/energy to the cost part before I can come up with a price. I can tell you if I do decide to sell the controller, it will be up to the end user to put it in a box. That is not something I'm interested in since I'm building these to fit in my arcade control panels.

Here's four more I've gotten done:

I’m currently working on a personal MAME arcade project and a couple of the games I’m thinking of using would need a spinner control. I know I could just buy a USB spinner control but, I thought I would come up with something for my own use that was a little cheaper to build yet still felt like a Tempest arcade spinner. This is my beta test unit and I still have a couple of minor changes that I want to make to it. I designed the knob to mimic a standard Atari spinner knob. Since I’m 3D printing the knob I had to design it in such a way as to be more friendly with my 3D printer. The other 3D printed part is the USB PCB bracket. This spinner control is basically a modified USB mouse mounted over a mechanical spinning disk. Since it is a standard mouse PCB the computer sees it as just that, a mouse. To keep with an authentic feel I made the mounting the same as a standard Atari arcade spinner control. I sized the disk to match the mass feel of an arcade spinner control as well. I've seen other DIY USB spinners on the web, but they never seemed all that robust and I’ve never seen anyone try to match the actual weight of an arcade spinner. So, this is what I’ve got. Let me know what you guys think.

And that's what I suggested over in the 2600 topic about the same thing. That is my preferred method as well. With that said, you sometime will still have some sticker residue left on the cart and that cleans off with a little goo gone. I have had a couple cart that the hair dyer trick didn't work. The adhesive had dried rock solid, but it was only a couple carts.

There's a good topic about this in the 2600 area of the forum: Cleaning and Relabeling Atari Cartridges I highly recommend that topic.

That may be true, but to be honest, by X-mas season of 1988, NES had a total lock on the market. So sales of all Atari products by that point would have been abysmal. Keep in mind I'm not trying to say the XEGS was some great success in the market as a whole BITD. I'm saying, I think Atari was just trying to make a profit with it (and move some old inventory) and I think it served it's goal. That is how I'm judging success. Basically did Atari make money or loose money on the XEGS line. We know that Jaguar sold about 200,000 units (which is considered a fail) in it's life time and Atari most likely lost money on the platform, but if the XEGS only sold 200,000 (or even 150,000) units total that might have been a success in the eyes of Atari at the time. Remember Atari didn't spend a lot of money developing the XEGS like they did with the Jag. So the threshold to profit would have been much lower for the XEGS. Has anyone shown the total number of game consoles (2600 jr., 7800, XEGS) Atari sold in the time frame of 1986-1989?

I couldn't help but notice you listed Swallen's as a store. That puts you in a very specific area of the country. That's one store I miss and yes that is were we got one or two of our O2 games back in the day. Most of them however came from Shillito's (For those that don't know it's basically Macy's) as my dad worked there part time for a second job and got a store discount. We got the O2 for X-mas 1979. In our neighborhood I knew three households that had Odyssey2 and about two households that had Atari 2600. I didn't know anyone that owned Intellivision (going all the way up to 1984). I only knew one household that got ColecoVision (around 1983). At school more people had Atari (obviously), but it wasn't unheard of to hear of someone with the O2 (but that's basically because we had Shillito's and Swallen's in the area which carried that stuff). Take that for what it's worth.

I remember seeing the XEGS at Children's Palace toy stores back in the day and I clearing remember the commercial advert for the XEGS because it ran along side the NES and Sega commercials on USA's Cartoon Express. As to how well it sold. If you are comparing it to the overall market at the time, your right it most likely didn't sell well. I have a feeling however that it sold well enough for Atari and I'm sure they made money on it. I believe that was the entire marketing strategy Atari had at that time. As long as it makes money. That also explains why they had three different systems on the market at the say time. They were just trying to get as much of a foot hold in the video game market as they could. As a person that owned a Sega Master System BITD, I thought Sega was #2 next to NES. Sega ran almost as many commercials and had fairly good magazine coverage BITD. I later found out (after the web) Atari was actually #2 during that time. Why? mainly because they had three different systems that they lumped together sales of to show how much of a percentage of the market they "owned". Looking back at it now, we tend to think, "How could Atari be so stupid as to compete with itself"?. That's wasn't what they were doing. They were shoving this stuff out because they could and it made them money and in the end that what mattered to keep them afloat. I would bet the XEGS sold fairly well for Atari overall, but then again they most likely didn't make as many as the 2600jr or the 7800.

My understanding was Atari (at the time) still had a lot of 8-bit computer inventory and wanted to move it. I can say that at the time I wanted an XEGS over the 7800 do to the amount of available games. I didn't get one back in the day (I already had a master system). But I did get an XEGS in the late 90's and find myself playing the XEGS more than the 7800. The XEGS is really the Atari 5200 done right IMHO.

I want to thank everyone who participated in the poll, as I use these polls to help decide the direction I take next on my different label/overlay projects. Based the poll results and the comments made in this topic, I will only be pursuing the next set of 84' style 7800 cart labels.The standard 7800 labels will be put on the back burner for now. I will update this topic as to my progress on the new 84' style labels as time goes on. Once ready to go, I will let you guys know. Here's a sample of some I have done so far: