2600 pal games ?

[chriswhit]

I have aquiered a bunch of Atari 2600 pal games throughout the years and am now wondering if I can just get a pal version 2600 or do i need a pal tv to? Any light on the subject would be greatly appreciated.

[Kurisu]

AFAIK, PAL and NTSC machines are virtually identical, save for maybe some channel differences: I know games will work regardless of the system, but to avoid the normal PAL issues when played on an NTSC TV, you would only need a PAL TV, not a new 2600 console.

[Thorsten Günther]

The PAL and NTSC consoles sadly do not only have an entirely different video timing (60 Hz vs. 50 Hz, often resulting in a rolling picture on NTSC TVs when a PAL cartridge is inserted) but also an entirely different palette - so the games will all be in wrong colours.

 

To fully appreciate the games, you will thus need a PAL console and a PAL compatible TV (most TV sets in Europe are not NTSC compatible or at least only through their composite/S-Video inputs, so I assume it's similar in the USA).

 

 

Thorsten

[Frostbite Bailey]

The PAL and NTSC consoles sadly do not only have an entirely different video timing (60 Hz vs. 50 Hz, often resulting in a rolling picture on NTSC TVs when a PAL cartridge is inserted) but also an entirely different palette - so the games will all be in wrong colours.

 

To fully appreciate the games, you will thus need a PAL console and a PAL compatible TV (most TV sets in Europe are not NTSC compatible or at least only through their composite/S-Video inputs, so I assume it's similar in the USA).

 

 

Thorsten

PAL carts will work fine in a NTSC atari 2600 if you have an older style TV that you can control the roll on the screen with the horizontal hold on the back or front of the tv. The color scheme will be different than the NTSC game, but should play fine. Cheers, FB

[+SpiceWare]

The PAL and NTSC consoles sadly do not only have an entirely different video timing (60 Hz vs. 50 Hz, often resulting in a rolling picture on NTSC TVs when a PAL cartridge is inserted) but also an entirely different palette - so the games will all be in wrong colours.

While true for other consoles, this is not entirely true for the Atari 2600. Yes the 2600 controls the color palette, so putting PAL cartridges into NTSC systems(and vice versa) will cause the colors to be off. However, the Atari does not control the video timing.

 

The Atari doesn't have VIDEO RAM - instead the game code generates the display line-by-line, including when to generate the signal to start the next screen. I put up a page a while back that goes into detail on this - Atari NTSC vs PAL vs SECAM.

 

Whether or not you can see the resulting image totally depends upon your display. A lot of PAL displays can easily sync to an NTSC picture, but the converse is not often true. I have my Atari modded for S-Video and use it with a C= 1084S monitor, which can sync to a PAL display. Here's the PAL Ghostbusters 2 on my NTSC Atari:

 

and Ghostbusters 2 via Stella:

[chriswhit]

Thanks for the info guys its much appreciated.

[Dino]

The PAL and NTSC consoles sadly do not only have an entirely different video timing (60 Hz vs. 50 Hz, often resulting in a rolling picture on NTSC TVs when a PAL cartridge is inserted) but also an entirely different palette - so the games will all be in wrong colours.

While true for other consoles, this is not entirely true for the Atari 2600. Yes the 2600 controls the color palette, so putting PAL cartridges into NTSC systems(and vice versa) will cause the colors to be off. However, the Atari does not control the video timing.

 

The Atari doesn't have VIDEO RAM - instead the game code generates the display line-by-line, including when to generate the signal to start the next screen. I put up a page a while back that goes into detail on this - Atari NTSC vs PAL vs SECAM.

 

Whether or not you can see the resulting image totally depends upon your display. A lot of PAL displays can easily sync to an NTSC picture, but the converse is not often true. I have my Atari modded for S-Video and use it with a C= 1084S monitor, which can sync to a PAL display. Here's the PAL Ghostbusters 2 on my NTSC Atari:

 

and Ghostbusters 2 via Stella:

 

The Pal version playing on an NTSC TV actually looks better

[maiki]

I have a serious question about this NTSC/PAL games issue. What about the speed of the NTSC games played on PAL system? And what more: how many games are really reprogrammed for 50 Hz? This is a serious issue that fully affects 90 percent of the Sega Mega Drive games portfolio here in Europe. Yes, most Sega Mega Drive PAL cartridges are simply NTSC timed games with PAL logo, and the hardware syncs to 50 Hz. As a result the games play SLOW on PAL consoles - which is totally incorrect. I would think the same situation applies to Atari 2600 PAL market. But it depends on how the timing is handled on PAL Ataris - maybe different from Mega Drive approach. That's why I'm seriously thinking about importing a US 2600 instead of PAL one. What do you think?

[Thomas Jentzsch]

The conversion quality varies.

 

Activision only fixed the framerate and color, resulting their PAL games to be slower.

Imagic usually had a PAL conversion already in their mind when writing the games, so their conversions run at identical speed.

Atari is somewhere between.