ColecoVision Flashback System

[+save2600]

Saw these in Walmart yesterday:

 

FlashBacks.JPG\

 

It seemed like an odd place to display them. I was looking for them along the toy aisle where they had a plug-and-play Walking Dead shooter. I just happened to go to the section of the store for computer peripherals to see what is new with WiFi routers (I have a 7-year-old LinkSys), and there they were with the keyboards and gaming head-sets.

Yeah, the marketing of these at Walmart, etc. is strange. I've seen them wedged in by those Skylander toy/videogame sets too (? next Pokemon-like thing I guess). Weird though that your Wally World has them by computer gear. Personally, I'd expect to see them marketed by the other plug and play things as you mentioned.

 

Last time I visited my local Walmart, I inquired about the Flashback systems when they said that the SKU's had been deleted. For whatever reason, my Walmart's deciding NOT to carry them from here on out. Probably couldn't decide where to place them.

[bkrownd]

At the walmart in our town the Atari flashbacks were in the Nintendo Wii section

Edited November 15, 2014 by bkrownd

[Greg2600]

I tried one of the Walmart's here, and they didn't know what I was talking about. Hence, couldn't find them.

[mckafka99]

So far, I haven't seen these in the Portland, ME area yet (though I haven't checked Toys R Us). Sam's Club and Walgreens have the Atari, Sega and Intelivision FBs.

[+HatNJ]

Rec. Mine this week just had a chance to play it and 100% thumbs down

 

the games listed quite a few are missing and a 4 are Super Sports titles Football and Soccer not in Manual or box are the same the homebrews some are missing

 

and the menu lists 6 pages with 10 on each except page 6 with just 6 so my unit has 56 games not 60

 

ordered on line from Bed Bath Beyond website WILL NOT Spend another 40 bucks to see if there is a unit out there with the right games AtGames dropped the ball and lost a customer

[Bill Loguidice]

Rec. Mine this week just had a chance to play it and 100% thumbs down

 

the games listed quite a few are missing and a 4 are Super Sports titles Football and Soccer not in Manual or box are the same the homebrews some are missing

 

and the menu lists 6 pages with 10 on each except page 6 with just 6 so my unit has 56 games not 60

 

ordered on line from Bed Bath Beyond website WILL NOT Spend another 40 bucks to see if there is a unit out there with the right games AtGames dropped the ball and lost a customer

 

It's hard to parse your post, but it sounds like you have a defective unit. It's not supposed to have what you say it has on it (frankly, that sounds like one of the pre-production ROMs). Exchange or return it.

[NIAD]

Rec. Mine this week just had a chance to play it and 100% thumbs down

 

the games listed quite a few are missing and a 4 are Super Sports titles Football and Soccer not in Manual or box are the same the homebrews some are missing

 

and the menu lists 6 pages with 10 on each except page 6 with just 6 so my unit has 56 games not 60

 

ordered on line from Bed Bath Beyond website WILL NOT Spend another 40 bucks to see if there is a unit out there with the right games AtGames dropped the ball and lost a customer

If this is the ColecoVision Flashback and as Bill stated, it's not supposed to have those games and is missing others... I WOULD KEEP THAT ONE as it's probably a one of a kind unit and will be very valuable now and even more so in the future.

[+nanochess]

Rec. Mine this week just had a chance to play it and 100% thumbs down

 

the games listed quite a few are missing and a 4 are Super Sports titles Football and Soccer not in Manual or box are the same the homebrews some are missing

 

and the menu lists 6 pages with 10 on each except page 6 with just 6 so my unit has 56 games not 60

 

ordered on line from Bed Bath Beyond website WILL NOT Spend another 40 bucks to see if there is a unit out there with the right games AtGames dropped the ball and lost a customer

Interesting! Could you elaborate about the missing homebrews?

 

My Colecovision Flashback has everything from the box.

[SoulBlazer]

 

It's hard to parse your post, but it sounds like you have a defective unit. It's not supposed to have what you say it has on it (frankly, that sounds like one of the pre-production ROMs). Exchange or return it.

Bill, did you say that you wrote the mini instructions for the Colecovision games that AtGames used on the Flashback? Sorry if you said that earlier, the problem with a thread this size is that it's hard to find stuff like that.

 

If you did, my hats off to you. The instructions are so good I don't even need to consult the original manuals. They provide enough information so that you can read it and play the game in a few seconds. And the overlay choices were well done....not sure if you had any input on that, but the games that needed the overlays got them. Makes me glad I held out for the Sam's Club version....Gateway of Apshai is one that I think REALLY needs one.

 

The only fault is with the modern homebrews -- since those games are more complicated and bigger then anything put out for the CV 'back in the day' the mini instructions are just not enough for most of the games. I've gone looking for some of the original instructions for those, but not always found them.

 

It really is a fun system and I can see why the Colecovision was praised so back when it came out for it's arcade ports. Zaxxon and Frenzy are just about perfect, as is Jungle Hunt. The computer conversions are very good also, like Choplifter and Jumpman Jr.

[Bill Loguidice]

Bill, did you say that you wrote the mini instructions for the Colecovision games that AtGames used on the Flashback? Sorry if you said that earlier, the problem with a thread this size is that it's hard to find stuff like that.

 

If you did, my hats off to you. The instructions are so good I don't even need to consult the original manuals. They provide enough information so that you can read it and play the game in a few seconds. And the overlay choices were well done....not sure if you had any input on that, but the games that needed the overlays got them. Makes me glad I held out for the Sam's Club version....Gateway of Apshai is one that I think REALLY needs one.

 

The only fault is with the modern homebrews -- since those games are more complicated and bigger then anything put out for the CV 'back in the day' the mini instructions are just not enough for most of the games. I've gone looking for some of the original instructions for those, but not always found them.

 

It really is a fun system and I can see why the Colecovision was praised so back when it came out for it's arcade ports. Zaxxon and Frenzy are just about perfect, as is Jungle Hunt. The computer conversions are very good also, like Choplifter and Jumpman Jr.

 

I did, yes. Unfortunately, I wrote the mini game instructions based on the idea that it would work like a real ColecoVision, i.e., with the buttons not reversed and the speech working in Squish 'em Sam. Given the space allotted, I can understand your frustration with the lack of more detail for some of the games. Ideally, there would be a master online resource that consolidates all of the original instructions. I'll see if I can get AtGames to do that for the next version.

 

As for the games you mentioned, I'd argue they're even a little better on a real ColecoVision, since the colors are truer (e.g., brownish versus rainbow mountains in Choplifter). It is amazing what the ColecoVision could pull off with just 1K of RAM. If only they could have allocated 8K, it likely would have been even more impressive.

[Bill Loguidice]

If this is the ColecoVision Flashback and as Bill stated, it's not supposed to have those games and is missing others... I WOULD KEEP THAT ONE as it's probably a one of a kind unit and will be very valuable now and even more so in the future.

 

It's almost certainly the pre-production ROM. When I was preparing the game descriptions for the manual, I noted to AtGames that the sports games (and one other game, which slips my mind at the moment) couldn't be included because the stock controller didn't support the functions needed. They swapped out those ROMs for more homebrews before it went to production (and I replaced the descriptions in the manual with those). I'm actually not surprised that a few might have slipped through the cracks, because when I was sent a final review unit of the Atari Flashback 5, it had the Flashback 4 ROM on it.

[Andromeda Stardust]

Saw these in Walmart yesterday:

 

FlashBacks.JPG\

 

It seemed like an odd place to display them. I was looking for them along the toy aisle where they had a plug-and-play Walking Dead shooter. I just happened to go to the section of the store for computer peripherals to see what is new with WiFi routers (I have a 7-year-old LinkSys), and there they were with the keyboards and gaming head-sets.

Walmart employees are idiots. Did you honestly expect them to place it in the gaming depatment, or the toy isle, where one might expect to find them???

[Andromeda Stardust]

Rec. Mine this week just had a chance to play it and 100% thumbs down

 

the games listed quite a few are missing and a 4 are Super Sports titles Football and Soccer not in Manual or box are the same the homebrews some are missing

 

and the menu lists 6 pages with 10 on each except page 6 with just 6 so my unit has 56 games not 60

 

ordered on line from Bed Bath Beyond website WILL NOT Spend another 40 bucks to see if there is a unit out there with the right games AtGames dropped the ball and lost a customer

Dude man, if you've got one with a pre- production ROM on it, that thing's and inverted Jenny. Hold onto it. Some obsessed variant collector will shed mega bucks for it someday.

[mmervine]

I ended up exchanging my unit as the will it or will it not boot was too fustrating, My replacement unit works great. I also picked up a second one for a friend. I hope that they sell enough that we get a CVFB2 next year with 75 games and improved emulation!

[+HatNJ]

Will try to get screen shots later on of each menu page

 

Now I am conflicted keep it or send back

[+HatNJ]

 

It's almost certainly the pre-production ROM. When I was preparing the game descriptions for the manual, I noted to AtGames that the sports games (and one other game, which slips my mind at the moment) couldn't be included because the stock controller didn't support the functions needed. They swapped out those ROMs for more homebrews before it went to production (and I replaced the descriptions in the manual with those). I'm actually not surprised that a few might have slipped through the cracks, because when I was sent a final review unit of the Atari Flashback 5, it had the Flashback 4 ROM on it.

 

I did notice when I selected football or soccer the controller acted like it was defective but worked in other games so that explains that one

Am watching Chiefs game then wife wants to got out to Watch her Eagles game so will be later tonight til I can post pics

 

but off top of head the 3 search for jewels games are missing will have to look at screen and box/manual to list out the others

[+Tarzilla]

Picked up one today from Bed Bath Beyond (used the 20 percent coupons,) along with the Intellivision version. I was very surprised by how hit or miss the video output is.

First tv I tried was a recent LG LCD 3d tv. Horrible flickering of certain colours.

 

Second tv was a 3 year old Samsung LCD. Image is solid, but black and white.

 

Next I tried a 6 year old Samsung LCD. Image is exactly as I would expect for video in, stable and nice colors.

 

I get the same results with both devices

 

Just for comparison, I hooked up my XBox first gen using video in and it works perfect on all 3 tvs

 

I'll try my Panasonic plasma later tonight. I wonder how many people will be returning these as not working with their tv?

[Andromeda Stardust]

Second tv was a 3 year old Samsung LCD. Image is solid, but black and white.

 

Next I tried a 6 year old Samsung LCD. Image is exactly as I would expect for video in, stable and nice colors.

You'll get similar mixed results for various classic consoles with off-spec video signals. Chips in older HDTVs are generally more compliant than newer sets but really it's a crap shoot which consoles will display on what TVs. If the flashback is indeed emulating the Coleco hardware (not just software emu) then like original console the signal may not be 100% to NTSC specs. Hardly anything from the earliest PONG consoles up through 5th generation was.

[+HatNJ]

Could not get images to upload right in post so I posted in my gallery

 

http://atariage.com/forums/gallery/album/1296-colecovision-flashback-menu/

 

 

Also here is list of Differences

 

MISSING

 

Ms. Space Fury Bankruptcy Builder

Destructor Monster Masher

Module Man Shunting Puzzle

Princess Quest Search for the Stolen Jewels 1, 2, 3

Mecha-8 Schlange

 

Diff. Name than Manual

Oil's Well on menu Oil is Well

 

On menu but Not Manual

 

Slither Super Action Football, Boxing and Soccer

Facemaker Antarctic Adventure

 

Hope this helps and I called Bed Bath and Beyond and was told since it works not returnable (Associate prob. did not understand what I was trying to convey)

I want one that is right but leery about risking another $ 40

 

Opinions appreciated

Mike

[Bill Loguidice]

Boy, that game listing is different even from the version I was originally writing the manual for. I don't recall Facemaker or Boxing making the early cut.

 

Assuming someone here doesn't want to take it off your hands, then I would simply tell them it's broken, i.e., nothing displays on the screen or some other issue indicative of "broke," and then leave it at that and either get a new one or get your money back. It's obviously not supposed to be like that, particularly since several of the incorrect games aren't even playable.

[+HatNJ]

Nah the Sports ones were not playable Slither worked but could not move Facemaker did to a point but Whats the point of it

Antarctic adventure worked that was a fun little one with a penguin Which I just saw is a Dollar General exclusive and they have them in stock so maybe Ill keep this one and get that

 

Were you able to see Photos of menu I posted in gallery?

[Bill Loguidice]

That's what I meant, not fully playable since they require special controllers. The manual for the version I was preparing was going to have Super Action Baseball, Super Action Football, and Victory. I had AtGames replace them because I knew they wouldn't be playable. I didn't have access to any early hardware, so I don't know what ROM version yours would be. Clearly it was before the version I was going to write the manual for, which again was different from the one they went with since they replaced those three games with homebrews (that I had to write descriptions for as well).

[+evg2000]

Isn't there a trick at startup to get information about version?

[+HatNJ]

Well I took the risk and ordered one from Dollar General

 

I thought the chances of a another one from a different vendor having the same ROM in it was slim

Thanks for replies and info Bill I wonder how many in the BB and B shipment had the ROM in the systems like I got

 

At the least I got a unique one until others report of same deal

and will have 2 spare controllers since I read/saw reviews of them being delicate

[adamcon]

Well I took the risk and ordered one from Dollar General

 

I thought the chances of a another one from a different vendor having the same ROM in it was slim

Thanks for replies and info Bill I wonder how many in the BB and B shipment had the ROM in the systems like I got

 

At the least I got a unique one until others report of same deal

and will have 2 spare controllers since I read/saw reviews of them being delicate

Should have no problem with Dollar General. I purchased mine at ToyRus and ordered online 2 more for others from Dollar General with no problem, they work fine.