Do these ROMs exist?

[toymailman]

I've been reading through some of my old gaming magazines for fun recently and came across a couple of interesting items that made me wonder if the ROMs are available.

 

The first one I came across while reading one of my "Joystik" mags. One article mentioned that a new Imagic game called Argos would be out soon. Did this one eventually become No Escape?

 

The other interesting item was the Championship Edition of SwordQuest Earthworld. In the AtariAge magazine describing the contest it said a special version was coded for the big finals competition. Has this ROM ever surfaced?

[Wickeycolumbus]

The other interesting item was the Championship Edition of SwordQuest Earthworld. In the AtariAge magazine describing the contest it said a special version was coded for the big finals competition. Has this ROM ever surfaced?

 

The contest version of SQ:EW was found in late 2009. Not sure what ever happened to it.

[Rom Hunter]

Escape from Argos was the WIP title of No Escape!

 

The finalists edition of EarthWorld does indeed exist.

 

AFAIK it plays the same as the PAL version of the game, but it's in NTSC format.

 

No dump available... yet.

 

Edited February 20, 2010 by Rom Hunter

[toymailman]

Thanks Rom, that is good news. I read that the winner of the contest finished it in 42 minutes.

[SeaGtGruff]

Escape from Argos was the WIP title of No Escape!

 

The finalists edition of EarthWorld does indeed exist.

 

AFAIK it plays the same as the PAL version of the game, but it's in NTSC format.

 

No dump available... yet.

 

AFAIK the PAL version of FireWorld also plays like the contest version of FireWorld.

 

Which poses an interesting question: Could the *real* reason they called off the WaterWorld contest be because (1) someone among the contestants got their hands on the PAL WaterWorld; or (2) Atari couldn't figure out how to make an "even easier" version of WaterWorld, which is why they never made a PAL version of it? Just kidding!

 

Michael

[Rom Hunter]

AFAIK the PAL version of FireWorld also plays like the contest version of FireWorld.

 

Which poses an interesting question: Could the *real* reason they called off the WaterWorld contest be because (1) someone among the contestants got their hands on the PAL WaterWorld; or (2) Atari couldn't figure out how to make an "even easier" version of WaterWorld, which is why they never made a PAL version of it? Just kidding!

 

Michael

LOL

 

Interesting theory, Michael.

 

BTW: Michael, I always wondered: did you really have to play the game itself to find the solution?

 

Wasn't it much easier and far less time consuming to find the hidden words by "just" examining each picture of the comic with a magnifying glass?

 

[SeaGtGruff]

BTW: Michael, I always wondered: did you really have to play the game itself to find the solution?

 

Wasn't it much easier and far less time consuming to find the hidden words by "just" examining each picture of the comic with a magnifying glass?

Yes, that was the only way I got into the FireWorld contest-- and based on what I heard from most of the other contestants, the same was true for them, as most people found only a couple of clues inside the actual game, and only one person that I heard about (Charles Compton, if I remember correctly-- the winner of Imagic's Riddle of the Sphinx contest) had found all ten clues inside the game.

 

But that didn't quite work with WaterWorld, because the "extra clue" in the comic book-- that helped you figure out which of the words were the correct ones-- didn't work the same way as it had for the first two games. Either the correct words were the ones that did *not* fit the "extra clue"-- a sort of "reverse whammy"-- or else I didn't apply it correctly (e.g., maybe I used it on the page numbers but it really applied to the panel numbers, or something like that). It's as if, after more than 50 people got all the words right for FireWorld-- requiring a runoff to pare the number down to 50 contestants-- Atari figured they needed to do something extra sneaky for WaterWorld! But even so, I think you could still find all the right word clues in the WaterWorld comic book without actually playing the game.

 

Michael

[Rom Hunter]

LOL

 

Can you imagine how incredibly frustrated I was back then, when I found out that the PAL version did not have the comic book included at all?

 

I wanted to play these games so badly.

 

I had cracked Raiders and Riddle of the Sphinks, so I just had to beat these ones too.

 

I read in a VCS games review book that without the comic book the game could never be solved and playing them would make no sense at all.

 

Found some clues, but couldn't do anything with it (kept my own drawn FireWorld maps for a long time, btw).

 

I remember searching for the comic book in second hand Marvel comic book stores back then, even long after I sold my VCS.

 

It just became a sort of habit to ask for this mysterious comic book each time I visited a comic store, but each time the sellers looked at me as if I came from outer space.

 

Eventually, AtariAge was the site that ended my Quest for the Comics.

 

I read each of them very slowly, enjoying and examining each and every picture as much as possible.

 

Edited February 24, 2010 by Rom Hunter