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Cabbage Patch Kids (Super Adventures in the Park) 128k


SILKIE

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The so called "Super CPK Adv. in the Park 128K" is a graphically enhanced prototype/unreleased ColecoVision cartridge that is only 16K in size (the rom dump file size is 31K, but only the first 16K of the file contains data) that someone was lucky to acquire back in the mid-80's and dump. I'm not sure who did it, but then someone placed this CV rom dump on a self-booting ADAM media (disk and DDP) with a nice title screen and added the "Super" and "128K"... probably to try to make some money if you know what I mean.

 

There are also numerous rom dumps of CPK Adv. in the Park that contains subtle differences like title screen copyright text, name of character displayed at the bottom of the screen, etc. and all of these are 16K dumps.

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Thanks for the info on this! Stargunner. I have played the rom dumps of it on emulators. Main reason i was asking?

Is that Twin Galaxies has a World Record score of it for the ColecoVision. And if it was never officially realeased?

How could this be? Since they have strict rules and such for this type of thing?

 

I actually submitted a question about this game to them? And letting them know, I thought this was never officially released.

Or if it was? It was probably for the ADAM, And they didn't have the ADAM platform category.

And i never received a response back.

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  • 2 years later...

The so called "Super CPK Adv. in the Park 128K" is a graphically enhanced prototype/unreleased ColecoVision cartridge that is only 16K in size (the rom dump file size is 31K, but only the first 16K of the file contains data) that someone was lucky to acquire back in the mid-80's and dump. I'm not sure who did it, but then someone placed this CV rom dump on a self-booting ADAM media (disk and DDP) with a nice title screen and added the "Super" and "128K"... probably to try to make some money if you know what I mean. ..

 

Super Thread Bump! :)

 

I know this is an extremely old thread, but I thought I'd reply just the same so as to put down for record exactly what the deal was regarding the "Cabbage Patch Kids 128k Park Adventure".

 

For no particular reason I found myself tonight thinking back to my days working at Coleco, on the ADAM computer... And thanks to the wonders of Google, I referenced "Cabbage Patch Kids 128k Park Adventure", & found myself here.

 

I worked a number of different jobs at Coleco, in a few different buildings, but all ADAM related. The whole toy manufacturer making a computer thing really showed internally. It was a crazy place to work for.

At one time I worked as a non-union quality control person on a few ADAM assembly lines. Most all jobs at Coleco were union, except for higher-ups in management and a handful in Q.C.. (You know .. the whole "union can't oversee union work" thing.)

While working in their Mayfield building, I discovered if I carried a clipboard and walked meaningfully, I could go almost anywhere unquestioned. No union person would ask a non-union what he/she was up to .. & that just left the rare other non-union person,

who never questioned me & my clipboard. :) So, I'd regularly go into one of the R&D rooms where a lot of software testing was done. I'd explore for tapes/carts looked new/different/interesting/whatever.

If I found something, I'd bring it back to my station & see what it was. If it was interesting, I'd make a copy on DDP & return it. (I had the in-house Rev.22 cartridge, which was used to copy DDP's & Carts to DDP).

Most test carts were just ZIF-socketed eproms on a pc board .. no case. On one occasion a cartridge I came across was what's now know as the "Cabbage Patch Kids 128k Park Adventure".

 

The only identification for what the cart. might be was a sticker that had "CPK" written on it. I loaded it up & noticed right away the difference in that game vs the release version of Cabbage Patch Kids Adventure in the Park,

so I dumped a copy to DDP. What caught my attention most though was that the eprom used on this cartridge was a 27128. A way bigger eprom than would be needed to store this game. Eproms were expensive back then,

& Coleco treated them like gold .. erasable or not. One certainly would not want o have been caught wasting a large capacity 27128 on a game that would fit on a chip less than half that capacity.

Odd or not, that's the way they were back then .. so the 27128 really stuck out to me.

 

I had a side-business selling ADAM hardware & such. I could get things form the company store (disk drives, memory cards, etc) that were near impossible to find retail or mail-order .. and buy them at near cost. (I Had other great

sources too .. like the local dump, where Coleco tossed TONS of ADAM stuff .. but that's a whole other story .. heh.) Anyway, through that business I'd developed a small network of friends around the country with our common interest in ADAM. I decided to try a little

experiment using them, & see how far this new version of the Cabbage Patch Kids game might travel. (and back then, even a BBS was rare .. so travel mostly meant copies being made & mailed.) The game originally loaded up with EXACTLY the

same title screen as the release version of the C.P.K. game. I changed it to "128k Park Adventure" in reference to the 27128 eprom. Sometimes when I gave friends in-house type things, it was under the condition that they not copy it for others.

In this case, I told them they could share it if they wanted. Absolutely no one knew of the title change but me. I knew the name would add to the excitement as a 'new release' item, and with absolutely no one knowing I changed the name, no one would feel

inclined to change it to anything else .. and I'd be able to see if & how much it spread. My business was mail-order, & I'd occasionally ask people who I knew shared/copied stuff if they'd heard of it or had it. That was my non-scientific way of monitoring it spread.

I was surprised back then to find it moved around quick .. especially after mail-order places started selling it. And that was pretty much it. It was just one of many things I'd found over time, & I'd forgot about it 'till now.

 

Which I guess brings me to tonight. I remembered that old game & wondered what, if anything I'd find if searched for it. Figured since I'd found this thread, I'd come full-circle & tell how it came to be named & released.

 

One more small story in the ADAM history book. :)

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Quartex, thanks for joining AA and posting about some of your experiences working at Coleco and clearifying where exactly this version of CPK Adv. came from... I guess I wasn't too far off with the exception that you didn't try to make money off of it. As I'm sure you can tell, around this forum, there are A LOT of CV & ADAM nuts and it truly means a lot to us when someone such as yourself comes forward and shares with us their experiences working at Coleco and hope there are more to follow.

 

Hmm, trying to recall some of the Northeast Coast mail-order firms for the ADAM in the early days and I'm drawing a blank besides In-House Service Reps, Alpha-1 and M.W. Ruth Co. I guess I'm going to have to do some research. :P

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so I dumped a copy to DDP. What caught my attention most though was that the eprom used on this cartridge was a 27128. A way bigger eprom than would be needed to store this game. Eproms were expensive back then,

 

hum.. may be i'm wrong , but the 27128 is 128 Kbits eprom = 16Kbytes => exactly the size of CPK rom. no?

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So what were they trying to do with the proto you found then? Was this the first stages of a true ADAM enhanced version of CPK that never got any further, or was it just one of the programmers screwing around? Seems odd that there are so few differences from the regular version.

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I would venture a guess that the powers that be at Coleco were looking for any software title (especially game oriented) which they owned the rights to via ColecoVision release to enhance and improve for an ADAM specific "Super" release... in the shortest time frame possible seeing as Coleco was all alone in supporting the ADAM with DDP and Disk based software.

 

It could also be as simple as being another version of the game that ended up not being used for the CV cart release but from the story shared by Quartex, it sounds like something that was in the works for an ADAM specific version.

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Thanks for sharing Quartex! Like Niad said, there are a handful of us who love these kinds of stories still to this day! :)

Curious though, as the conversation turns to possible Adam version development, was it common place for Adam software development to be done on ROMs? Seems odd to me that it wouldn't all be done on DDP and Disk, considering the cost and Quartex's 'gold' analogy- especially once you started breaking certain size thresholds.

 

I guess the mental image of it makes me want to seek out stories of the development process and see at what point they may have had other Supergame versions on cart first, when they moved it over to DDP/Disk, how long it took to burn a prom versus reload from Disc/DDP. The advantages/disadvantages of potentially developing this way. Not that any of it matters, it's just my mind wandering and maybe getting a little OCD. :)

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So what were they trying to do with the proto you found then? Was this the first stages of a true ADAM enhanced version of CPK that never got any further, or was it just one of the programmers screwing around? Seems odd that there are so few differences from the regular version.

 

I doubt they were actually doing much of anything with the version I found. The release version of C.P.K. had been out for a good while, and we know they never released an updated version. If I had to guess, the version I found was likely a pre-release/early version that for some reason never made it to production. The software R&D room I would regularly visit was used for a variety of ADAM software related tasks .. I know a lot of the in-house test programs were developed in there. Also, a good deal of lot-testing carts & ddp's that were ready for packaging was done there. It wasn't the most organized looking area .. the C.P.K. version I found was just laying around in a pile of assorted carts.

After I found it & realized it was a different version, I kept an eye open for other different versions of existing games. The only thing similar I ever found though was a slightly different version of Super Subroc. (A red 'X' was drawn over lives(ships) you lost, instead of them vanishing as you died .. And the octopus looking ship was drawn slightly different & with different colors.)

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... Curious though, as the conversation turns to possible Adam version development, was it common place for Adam software development to be done on ROMs? Seems odd to me that it wouldn't all be done on DDP and Disk, considering the cost and Quartex's 'gold' analogy- especially once you started breaking certain size thresholds.

 

For whatever reason, burning games & such to eprom seemed very common in the buildings I worked in .. far more common than ddp's. Possibly 'speed' was a reason? When parts of the ADAM were being tested, a test cartridge was primarily used (as compared to a ddp). It was much faster & more reliable to boot from rom .. especially on an assembly line where speed is important. I remember a special room where gang-burning was done, but it was way more common to use an ADAM Eprom Burner and make cartridge copies than it was to see someone make a tape-to-tape copy of something. Come to think of it, it was kind of unusual to see an in-house ADAM with dual DDP drives at all.

 

Coleco had a number of cool in-house items. I still wonder why some never saw production. Many in-house ADAM computers had 128k memory expanders in them .. and they were in use long before any 3rd party company produced them. The ADAM Eprom programmer was great .. I still have one here somewhere. (Though I understand why this was never a commercial product.) It connects to the expansion bus .. It's about 2x the size of an Auto-Dialer .. and uses software written in CP/M 2.2. . It's almost entirely done in wire-wrap. I'll dig mine up & take some pics.

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hum.. may be i'm wrong , but the 27128 is 128 Kbits eprom = 16Kbytes => exactly the size of CPK rom. no?

 

You know .. I never actually looked the exact size of the release vs this beta type CPK. It was more a matter of noting that almost every game & utility I came across was on a 27C64 or even 27C32, so finding one on a 27128 stuck out. If one needed a blank eprom & requested it through a formal/company route, size definitely mattered. I remember an engineering friend telling me how he'd spend a half hr. or more digging through old carts he could erase rather than have to justify to the powers-that-be he needed an eprom of any large capacity.

I guess there's some sense to that though .. in 2014 a 27128 will still cost you about 4 bucks. Jump back nearly 30 years & I bet that price is much higher.

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I would venture a guess that the powers that be at Coleco went with the 64K M.E. over the 128K due to the high cost of Dram. IIRC the 64K M.E. had a suggested retail price of $149.95, but I seem to recall seeing it selling for around $100 at Toys 'r Us.

 

Looking forward to seeing the pics! Thanks!

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Quartex, thanks for joining AA and posting about some of your experiences working at Coleco and clearifying where exactly this version of CPK Adv. came from... I guess I wasn't too far off with the exception that you didn't try to make money off of it. As I'm sure you can tell, around this forum, there are A LOT of CV & ADAM nuts and it truly means a lot to us when someone such as yourself comes forward and shares with us their experiences working at Coleco and hope there are more to follow.

 

Hmm, trying to recall some of the Northeast Coast mail-order firms for the ADAM in the early days and I'm drawing a blank besides In-House Service Reps, Alpha-1 and M.W. Ruth Co. I guess I'm going to have to do some research. :P

 

The business I had was called 'The ADAM Connection'. (Though if I recall right, there was more than one 'Adam Connection') While I sold a good deal of stuff to individuals, I typically sold in bulk to MW Ruth & Alpha-1. (They were both major buyers of ADAM disk drives .. couldn't get enough of 'em)

 

When dealing with MW Ruth, I did business under the name 'Scott Software'. Jay Forman didn't like me/my business because I wouldn't sell hardware to them exclusively .. he especially didn't like me selling to Alpha-1. So, he flat-out wouldn't do business w/me or my company.

He had one of the larger ADAM mail order businesses, and paid good money for disk drives, memory expanders & the like .. and it was a distribution house I needed, because few others could handle the amount of hardware I'd get in. I met with Jay a few times at his house in NJ, and used a fake name ('Tom Scott' .. after the sax player, lol) so I could sell to & through him. (No Google or internet back then .. so no practical way for him to know that wasn't my name.) Ahh .. those were the days!

 

mwr.jpg

Edited by Quartex
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I do recall your mail-order "The ADAM Connection" as well as your incognito "Scott Software" listings in M.W. Ruth Co.'s catalogs... I always wondered about that SubRoc Super Game listing, but for some reason never acquired it. I don't recall any other companies using T.A.C. name, but an ADAM to PC and vice versa DOS based program by David White was/is called "The ADAM Connection".

 

We used to buy disk drives directly from Coleco in the early days along with anything else that we could acquire, but once that dried up, I recall Lyle Marschand working out deals to buy hardware (mostly disk drives) from both Alpha-1 (the name Ben comes to mind for some reason) and M.W. Ruth Co. until they became such a hot commodity that both companies kept whatever they could acquire for themselves. I know what you mean about Jay although he wasn't as involved by '88 when I took over operations of NIAD and I mainly dealt with his wife.

 

Those were the days indeed!

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Is that Subroc Demo available somewhere? I'd like to see it.

 

I know I still have it around somewhere .. If no one else comes through first, I'll dig up a copy for you.

 

It's funny .. I hadn't thought about ADAM stuff in a long time. Now I find myself wanting to dig out all my old hardware & such and hook it all up! :)

I'm still surprised I was able to locate an old MW Ruth catalog.. It was quite nostalgic looking back through that.

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For whatever reason, burning games & such to eprom seemed very common in the buildings I worked in .. far more common than ddp's. Possibly 'speed' was a reason? When parts of the ADAM were being tested, a test cartridge was primarily used (as compared to a ddp). It was much faster & more reliable to boot from rom .. especially on an assembly line where speed is important.

 

Makes complete sense in the hardware testing environment to have the quick boot carts. I was thinking more on the software development side that they'd likely use traditional media or some sort to program, then test on the occasional eprom. But that was just speculation. :)

 

And as much as I bought from MW Ruth (Baker's Dozen DDPs, Controllers, Keyboards, barebones system baords, etc), I don't think I ever saw a catalog from them in person. I really thought all they had was what was in the Pop-Sci ads for the longest time! Of course, maybe this is because most of what I got from them was via Christmas and Birthday gifts, so I didn't open the shipping packages myself. Or maybe I was late in the cycle of their Adam years by the time I was ordering from them. Still a great read, Mr. Scott. Haha :)

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I know I still have it around somewhere .. If no one else comes through first, I'll dig up a copy for you.

 

It's funny .. I hadn't thought about ADAM stuff in a long time. Now I find myself wanting to dig out all my old hardware & such and hook it all up! :)

I'm still surprised I was able to locate an old MW Ruth catalog.. It was quite nostalgic looking back through that.

This is exactly how it happens! My friend, you have caught the Retro-bug and we didn't even have to bait the hook, wait for you to bite and then reel you in! :P

 

I'm pretty sure that I don't have this alternative version of SubRoc in my disk image collection, but will double check as well.

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Here is the proper rom image you are looking for. You will notice that the title screen text is different, the all too familiar skill level select screen is used although I never tested it out to see if there are actually skill levels programmed into the game, the wall in the start screen states "Babyland General" and of course the name of the CPK character is displayed at the bottom of the screen. I'm not sure if it can really be called a prototype as it may have been an alternative In-House version that ended up not being used as the release candidate for cartridge production.

 

A couple of other Konami titles that Coleco worked on experienced similar situations. Monkey Academy was a drastic change in the screen layout as well as skill level selctions while Video Hustler was simple a title screen change.

Cabbage Patch Kids - Adventures in the Park (1984) (Coleco) (Prototype).zip

Edited by NIAD
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