Coleco Chameleon .... hardware speculations?

[mckafka99]

I purchased the molds from Mike. They are now in my control.

 

..Al

Al - will there be a formal annoucement of some kind and/or front page post on the site that you've acquired the Jaguar molds? Perhaps I've overlooked a post/announcement elsewhere? Whatever the case, this sounds like great news and shows that there is indeed a golden lining to every story.

[toiletunes]

Jaguar: Do you control it, or does it control you?

[triverse]

Some how I'm guessing this is to shift the blame is because Mike is afraid of what happening to his Retro Magazine, since I bet he wants to try another Kickstarter for it.

I would venture to say he HAS to have another Kickstarter to make year three.

[roland p]

Maybe that guy from the video-team could shoot a nice video (MTV's catfish-style) of Sean, explaining his side of the story.

[triverse]

They, since we don't know who is posting, are promoting issue #11 has gone to print as of 7 hours ago. I asked on their FB if they are now monthly. It was just a few weeks ago that issue #10 was released.

 

Rather interesting.

[roland p]

If the hardware guy gives him an SNES and says it's an FPGA system, he's not at fault for for not knowing better is he? I mean, it's not like he's responsible for the project his leading rigt? Would you hold the lead director of a project responsible for it's failures?

Sean found Mike, Mike found Coleco, so...

[+rdemming]

January 8, 2016, check 100 (looks like a starter set, since the account holder name is handwritten, not printed)

$2,500 for "Hardware Design"

January 21, 2016, check 1008

$1,500 for "Prototyping"

February 29, 2016, check 1012

$3,000 for "Product Development"

 

Checks are so retro , I haven't seen them in two decades.

 

In Europe I can send Euros from one bank account to another bank account at another bank, in another country arriving the next business day. And that without transaction costs. Within my country it arrives the same day at the other bank. So why bother with hand-writing checks and thumb prints? Because it is retro?

 

Robert

[Flojomojo]

No,no. There're a legion of unseen enemies and haters. I call call them "dragons."

 

EXPLANATION?!

 

 

SOMEBODY GET THIS FREAKIN' DUCK AWAY FROM ME!

[Flojomojo]

 

Checks are so retro , I haven't seen them in two decades.

 

In Europe I can send Euros from one bank account to another bank account at another bank, in another country arriving the next business day. And that without transaction costs. Within my country it arrives the same day at the other bank. So why bother with hand-writing checks and thumb prints? Because it is retro?

 

 

We have electronic funds transfer in the big dumb United States, too. From what we've been told, Mike and Sean didn't really know or trust each other, and this is how they chose to do business, handing pieces of paper to each other in person, sometimes meeting up at the bank. I wouldn't want either of those people to know my bank account number either.

[Dan Iacovelli]

 

 

We have electronic funds transfer in the big dumb United States, too. From what we've been told, Mike and Sean didn't really know or trust each other, and this is how they chose to do business, handing pieces of paper to each other in person, sometimes meeting up at the bank. I wouldn't want either of those people to know my bank account number either.

there some places that won't take credit cards for payments and only accept cash or checks like the venue where VGS is at this year they only accept checks

[Flojomojo]

there some places that won't take credit cards for payments and only accept cash or checks like the venue where VGS is at this year they only accept checks

 

Yeah, and some people really, really like cartridges. It's still an old-fashioned way of doing business, that's all rdemming is saying.

[Inky]

In a nutshell...

 

Either Mike was knowingly scamming people, or he was too naive to see that he was being scammed.

Neither is a trait that fills people with confidence.

As for Steve Woita, I really don't think, personally, he was scamming anyone. I'd like to believe the only thing he's guilty of is "guilt by association."

[Tempest]

Has anyone talked to Steve lately? He's active in the classic gaming community and is easy to contact. I'd like to hear what he has to say about all of this since from what I know about him, he seems like a good and trustworthy guy. I find it hard to believe he's be willingly tangled up in all of this.

[sh3-rg]

I would venture to say he HAS to have another Kickstarter to make year three complete year two.

 

FTFY

[+rdemming]

Straight from the seanhq.com bio (red emphasis mine):

 

... long list of skills... (plus more from the website).

 

In all the skills he mentions on his website, I'm missing hardware design and/or FGPA experience so why hire him to design a game console and FGPA cores? He must have been very convincing to Mike

 

Robert

[galax]

I confess that I haven't followed this whole tale

That was a very good idea. I tried to quit several times but it kept sucking me back in.

 

How you would go from someone that's done this dozens of times telling you "14 weeks, $70K" to "30 days, $7K" and expect to have any significant chance of success... I dunno. I think enthusiasm and eagerness to get to the finish line trumped rationale thought and prudence.

 

I think that's key- it was totally unrealistic. Without finding someone skilled to work for nothing (a.k.a. 'equity') it had no chance of success. For the money Mike wanted to pay the only way to do it would be to base it on off-the-shelf or at least already designed hardware and software: MiST, FPGA Arcade, BeagleBone, Raspberry Pi, etc.

[Greg2600]

If Albert sells console shells, I'm interested. My SNES needs one.

ROFL!!!!!!

 

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

[Parrothead]

 

In all the skills he mentions on his website, I'm missing hardware design and/or FGPA experience so why hire him to design a game console and FGPA cores? He must have been very convincing to Mike

 

Robert

 

And convincing to Steve Woita. They spent Oct-Jan talking on the phone every week. Steve even was so fooled by Sean that he told me to do whatever it takes to make sure Sean stays with the project. Steve was completely unaware of anything having to do with the SNES in a shell and the PC card. When I told him about Sean he said it couldn't be the same guy he has been talking with all this time and that helped us early on with Clay. Steve is a bit hard to get in touch with but like someone mentioned he has been pretty active in various Facebook classic gaming groups. Feel free to track him down and ask him to confirm what I've said here.

 

Throughout it all, I have done my best to protect Steve from all this mess and take the brunt of the hit. But he was with me right up to the end.

Edited April 6, 2016 by Parrothead

[Greg2600]

Clay Cowgill basically spelled out what I've said all along. Mike ignored common sense and standard practices in a dizzying race to get the project to Kickstarter. This was doomed to fail deom day one because you cant kickstart a device that doesnt even exist. Ben heck reiterated my feeling as well that this project fit too small a niche to ever sell.

 

As for Mike and Sean, it's conceivable that Mike could be duped since he proved he is so out of touch and stubborn, per Clay and Ben's comments.

 

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

[enoofu]

Don't believe anyone believe's Steve Woita would knowing would deceive

But so far Mike, and John Carlsen both claimed he was at the center of everything

 

Maybe possible that he didn't have the role they are claiming and are basically name bombing him into this mess from the start to make the project sound more legitimate and probably had a more minor role

 

What raises these concerns

1. Both Kevtris and Clay have raised questions about their being no know hardware requirements and other standard paperwork from management, Woita should be very experience in doing that with over 30 years in Programming/game design/and some hardware development

2. Woita wasn't used his social media accounts to promote this project past the indiegogo campaign

3. Their apparently is no know hardware platform used not including a few off the shelve hardware devices since the project started in 2014

[godslabrat]

 

And convincing to Steve Woita. They spent Oct-Jan talking on the phone every week. Steve even was so fooled by Sean that he told me to do whatever it takes to make sure Sean stays with the project. Steve was completely unaware of anything having to do with the SNES in a shell and the PC card. When I told him about Sean he said it couldn't be the same guy he has been talking with all this time and that helped us early on with Clay. Steve is a bit hard to get in touch with but like someone mentioned he has been pretty active in various Facebook classic gaming groups. Feel free to track him down and ask him to confirm what I've said here.

 

Throughout it all, I have done my best to protect Steve from all this mess and take the brunt of the hit. But he was with me right up to the end.

 

 

 

Mike,

 

Enough with the spin doctor shit. I, for one, don't care what kind of a Cool Guy you think Sean was or how you hope you can be like him when you grow up. I doubt I'm alone in this. HERE are the questions I'd like to see you answer, and I admit it's not an exhaustive list:

 

 

Hi Mike, I'm late to this discussion. Are you still reading the forum?

 

 

In that case, would you mind answering a few questions? That would take us a lot farther down the road of understanding the whole truth.

 

1. What made you think it was a good idea to ask for money, twice, before having anything to show? Did you figure that everything would take care of itself once you were funded?

 

2. Did you ever actually have the rights to make any of the games you featured in the Chameleon sizzle reel, such as the Intellivision and Colecovision multi-packs? What was the nature of the contract, if any (percentage of sales, up-front licensing, etc)? Did you tell Gizmodo that you had rights to Atari properties? If not, who did?

 

3. What were the plans for the USB versions of Colecovision and Intellivision controllers that never came to light?

 

4. Why was Coleco Holdings led to believe there was a viable product in that shiny Jaguar shell? Should they have gone to the expense of printing flyers and sharing their booth with you at Toy Fair?

 

5. Who made the decision to delete critical comments on the RVGS Facebook page, and block people from commenting? Who took down the bogus 2nd "prototype" minutes after it was outed here on the AtariAge forums?

 

6. Was any money paid to any other hardware engineer besides Sean "Lee" Robinson? If not, what was it about Robinson that made him more worthy of this amount of spending than the people who came before?

 

7. What happened to the "team" that you proudly splashed on the Chameleon page? It seems that their contributions were much smaller than those of the hardware engineer(s). Why were they named while the hardware engineer(s) were not?

 

8. Who paid for your trip to the NYC Toy Fair?

 

9. You ask that we not consider this issue when thinking about the Retro magazine. Why not? The same guy is in charge, and you have already taken money for that venture.

 

10. What happened to your partners in GameGavel and Retro magazine? Have they been cut out of their share of any profits, as has been suggested elsewhere? Will they be compensated in any way?

 

I feel that if you're going to come here and try to explain yourself, you should be able to answer all of these simple, direct questions. I am prepared to believe that someone played you, but from where I sit, it seems likely that you were an enthusiastic participant, every step of the way.

 

[bojay1997]

 

And convincing to Steve Woita. They spent Oct-Jan talking on the phone every week. Steve even was so fooled by Sean that he told me to do whatever it takes to make sure Sean stays with the project. Steve was completely unaware of anything having to do with the SNES in a shell and the PC card. When I told him about Sean he said it couldn't be the same guy he has been talking with all this time and that helped us early on with Clay. Steve is a bit hard to get in touch with but like someone mentioned he has been pretty active in various Facebook classic gaming groups. Feel free to track him down and ask him to confirm what I've said here.

 

Throughout it all, I have done my best to protect Steve from all this mess and take the brunt of the hit. But he was with me right up to the end.

 

So once again in the guise of being a bigger person, you're throwing Steve under the bus as having been there all along implying that he should have seen the warning signs. I'm sorry, but in my opinion, the only one here that did anything wrong and deserves 100% of the blame is you. Your repeated stories about getting scammed are full of holes as others have pointed out. The worst part about all this is that you have never once taken responsibility for attacking the people who had enough common sense to question your absurd claims or for blocking all those who posted warnings on Facebook or urged you to stop the project. Your reputation is gone and I hope for your sake that you finish whatever you owe to the Retro Kickstarter backers and fold the magazine and then disappear from the classic gaming community once and for all. There is simply no way that you get a second chance here or anywhere else. Your lies have literally been exposed in the media around the world and you are completely delusional if you think anyone is going to ever trust you again.

[Pipercub]

 

I confess that I haven't followed this whole tale-- today's really the first day I'm paying much attention to it because Mike emailed me this thread (I assume to try to get my support on it?) I see that I'm now 'unfriended' by Mike today on Facebook, so I assume my commentary earlier today was not appreciated... *shrugs*

-Clay

I want to extend a public welcome to the CC/RVGS dev team alumni here under the bus, we have a great setup, there is a bar over there, a pool, hell the whole place looks like a tailgate party at a Jimmy Buffett show.

[Flojomojo]

I want to extend a public welcome to the CC/RVGS dev team alumni here under the bus, we have a great setup, there is a bar over there, a pool, hell the whole place looks like a tailgate party at a Jimmy Buffett show.

 

I like this many times.

[leods]

 

And convincing to Steve Woita. They spent Oct-Jan talking on the phone every week. Steve even was so fooled by Sean that he told me to do whatever it takes to make sure Sean stays with the project. Steve was completely unaware of anything having to do with the SNES in a shell and the PC card. When I told him about Sean he said it couldn't be the same guy he has been talking with all this time and that helped us early on with Clay. Steve is a bit hard to get in touch with but like someone mentioned he has been pretty active in various Facebook classic gaming groups. Feel free to track him down and ask him to confirm what I've said here.

 

Throughout it all, I have done my best to protect Steve from all this mess and take the brunt of the hit. But he was with me right up to the end.

 

Way to go Mike. Throwing Steve under the bus too. Now throw your wife under there and I guess you're done. No one left.

 

And if you'Re not going to answer ANY of the questions people very clearly stated why bother answering? It just make you look bad, because you're obviously reading this, posting here and still avoiding every single topic anyone actually cares about.