ADAM Computer Game of the Week #21

[NIAD]

Troll's Tale

(1984) Coleco

 

Troll's Tale was to be part of "The Best of Sierra On-Line" and also include Jawbreaker II... the third ADAM software title in the planned "The Best of" series (the first being the commercially released The Best of Broderbund (Choplifter and A.E.) and the second being The Best of Electronic Arts, which was covering a week ago). However, The Best of Sierra On-Line was never officially released and looks like Jawbreaker II was probably never worked on, so full instructions detailing different play elements are not available, but this adventure game geared for kids is very easy to learn using a hand controller in port #1. Other planned titles in the "The Best of" series that were never released/produced include The Best of Sirius (Grud's in Space, Type Attack and Capture the Flag) and The Best of Synapse (Necromancer and Rainbow Walker).

 

Troll's Tale for the ADAM Computer looks to be a finshed product, but due to Coleco's announcement in Jan. '85 that they were abandoning the ColecoVision and ADAM, Coleco decided not to finish the second game and release it commercially. Even after this announcement by Coleco, they still had plans to release software that was finished or close to it during the 1985 calendar year, but later decided against it. They instead made it available to ADAM Users Groups circa 1985/1986 to share with the ADAM Community with the requirement that all copyright information would be removed from the program. Because of this requirement by Coleco, you will see multiple versions of Troll's Tale available for download that have been hacked to change the title screens or bypass them completely.

 

Here is a short blurb from a Coleco software database program: "Sharpens your child's thinking by combining basic skill-building exercises with fantasy adventures. Vocabulary is controlled, so third-grade level readers can play the game without help."

 

Enjoy

Troll\'s Tale (198x) (Coleco) (Prototype).zip

[lucifershalo]

so sad, I cant play all those games on the real hardware via a SD Multicart or something easy as that

[lucifershalo]

so sad, I cant play all those games on the real hardware via a SD Multicart or something easy as that

[NIAD]

so sad, I cant play all those games on the real hardware via a SD Multicart or something easy as that

Hopefully now that "Else" is back on the forums and developing a horse racing game for the CV, we might finally hear further word of his ADAMnet SD Drive.

 

Other than that, you would need an ADAM 5 1/4" Disk Drive and PC with a 5 1/4" disk drive to transfer the emulator image files back and forth. See this thread, which contains all the instructions and programs required:

 

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/177853-looking-for-specs-on-coleco-adam-floppy-drive-model-%237817-power-supply/

 

There is currently an ADAM Disk Drive for sale on eBAY with a buy-it now price of $350 (WOW!) that is fully tested and includes the box and styrofoam packing, but I did not see the 2 instruction manuals listed/pictured or the Disk Manager program disk that is required for formatting disks. There are numerous other ADAM programs available for formatting disks or you could save wear and tear on the ADAM drive by formatting disks on a PC with "The ADAM Connection" that is available in the thread above.

[+else]

The problem with the SD Drive is that I was hoping to keep the price point at around $75, or at least less than $100. However, despite my best efforts to control costs, when I took a realistic look it was close to $125. I'm just not that sure anyone is willing to pay that much -- what do you guys think?

[retroillucid]

The problem with the SD Drive is that I was hoping to keep the price point at around $75, or at least less than $100. However, despite my best efforts to control costs, when I took a realistic look it was close to $125. I'm just not that sure anyone is willing to pay that much -- what do you guys think?

 

I do think price is fair, those kind of things are expensive to develop/produce

I'm sure alot of people will "bite" even if the price top more than $100

 

ColecoVision SD cart is about the same price, and ADAM SD drive is SO NICE that alot of people (like me) would want to have one.... ADAM floppy drive are so expensive that I think this SD drive worth the price!

I'm sure alot of people will share the same opinion

 

I would say, go ahead and produce some!

[NIAD]

The problem with the SD Drive is that I was hoping to keep the price point at around $75, or at least less than $100. However, despite my best efforts to control costs, when I took a realistic look it was close to $125. I'm just not that sure anyone is willing to pay that much -- what do you guys think?

Hey Else, great to see you back on the forums.

 

As far as the possible selling price of an SD Drive coming in at around $125, I think that is a VERY FAIR price and wouldn't mind if the price had to be set even higher if need be. When you consider that a working Digital Data Drive can fetch around $40 on up and if in the original Coleco box around $100-$125, a working 5 1/4" Disk Drive goes for between $150-$200 and CIB $225-$250... your estimate is very appealing. As we all know as well, the largest majority of these drives that are still working will eventually begin to fail and there are no easy avenues for repairs not to mention the scarcity of finding them in the first place.

 

As Retroillucid mentioned, the AtariMax SD Cart sells for $130 so you are right in the ballpark. The main difference, and this would be a BIG one, is that there are far more people out there with ColecoVisions than ADAMs... so a production run of the ADAMnet SD Drive would be considerably smaller than that of the AtariMax SD Cart. With that being the case, you will not get as good of a price from whomever manufacturers the PCB, unless you just throw caution to the wind and have 75-100 made and keep your fingers crossed.

 

Might be a good time to start a thread specifically asking for committments from people (I know the old thread where you announced the drive has a lot of people saying they would buy one) that would be current to see what kind of numbers there would be... and then take into account that if/when the drive comes to fruition, there will be some who back out.

 

I always hated this side of the business when I was running the Users Group/Mail Order because one wrong move could end up costing you a lot of money and then your stuck with a bunch of stock. Thankfully, we did pretty good for ourselves and for the most part made good decisions/investments that paid off three-fold... for the ADAM owners that where hungry for new products, for us in sales and for the developers who saw their efforts rewarded and therefore inspired them to continue developing other porducts.

 

Whatever you end up deciding, welcome back and thanks for sharing the demos of your Horse Racing game!

[lucifershalo]

Which format(s)the SD drive is going to accept

dsk I suppose

anything else

 

anyway, a $125.00 is quite ok for me like NIAD mentioned, this is the "common" price of most of the multicart

but the number of ADAM users is quite smaller than Atari 5200 or Colecovision....

 

Thanks for all the infos, NIAD but the disk drive is not a solution I want to use...

[NIAD]

Which format(s)the SD drive is going to accept

dsk I suppose

anything else

 

anyway, a $125.00 is quite ok for me like NIAD mentioned, this is the "common" price of most of the multicart

but the number of ADAM users is quite smaller than Atari 5200 or Colecovision....

 

Thanks for all the infos, NIAD but the disk drive is not a solution I want to use...

Here is the original thread to the ADAMnet SD Drive started by Else that contains full details and pics. The Drive accepts all emulator DSK (any size for 160K to 1.44Mb should work) and DDP image formats, but for ROMs you will have to continue to use the AtariMax cart or transfer the rom images to a CopyCart formatted disk/ddp image... CopyCart is the best cartridge copier released for the ADAM.

 

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/161978-the-adam-sd-drive/page__hl__adamnet+sd+drive

 

I hear you re. a disk drive solution... expensive, multiple steps needed to be taken between two computers, no guarentees on how long the disk drive will last, more desk space needed, etc. If the SD Drive is released, you could even mod the Memory Console case and store the unit under the lid behind the Data Drives or in one of the Data Drive Bays and have the Power and ADAMnet Cable run out the left side or back of the Memory Console (there's a lot of room in that area to work with).

Edited May 30, 2011 by NIAD

[Foster]

Else, I'd happily pay that price. I think it sounds completely reasonable.

 

... Foster

[Tempest]

I played around with this a few years ago, it does seem complete but I never bothered to actually beat the game. There are some graphical oddities though like in the last picture you posted that make me think that it might have needed some fine tuning (notice how the Troll's graphics look like they've been pasted onto the background with lots of whitespace around it?).

 

Tempest

[jblenkle]

I am still interested in an SD Drive...it's like a must have to guard against the day when my 2 real disk drives go bye, bye...

 

The problem with the SD Drive is that I was hoping to keep the price point at around $75, or at least less than $100. However, despite my best efforts to control costs, when I took a realistic look it was close to $125. I'm just not that sure anyone is willing to pay that much -- what do you guys think?

[NIAD]

I played around with this a few years ago, it does seem complete but I never bothered to actually beat the game. There are some graphical oddities though like in the last picture you posted that make me think that it might have needed some fine tuning (notice how the Troll's graphics look like they've been pasted onto the background with lots of whitespace around it?).

 

Tempest

The game is actually REALLY easy to finish once you decide to do so... maybe 10-15 minutes. As far as the graphical oddities, I think the troll in the picture is also used in another scene in the game where there is a white background behind him... so the programmers were either to lazy to clean it up, didn't notice it (although that would be a big oversight) or didn't have the time required due to circumstances beyond their control to debug everything.

 

I seem to recall seeing a picture for another computer, possibly for one of the Apple II line, in an old magazine with the same issue.

 

edit: Duh, the troll in question is staring me in the face... the title screen!

Edited May 31, 2011 by NIAD