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Coleco Chameleon .... hardware speculations?


phoenixdownita

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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.

 

^That. Coming here to say you care for your reputation, saying you was scammed and are a victim? Not once you offered an apology to anyone you offended and called a hater all this time, shows little to no remorse and zero humble attitude at all.

 

People keep asking here who removed the photos in Facebook, we will hear Sean was also weasel his way in to the admin page and was him? more blame shifting on the way? So much you are not answering (more to say you are picking to ignore)

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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.

 

It's exactly like when the JagSNES was discovered, and Mike reported "We're hearing rumors that the CC will only play SNES games..." No, that's not what was being said then. Mike was trying to redirect the conversation because he didn't have a good answer. Just like now, he doesn't have answers to our REAL questions, he just wants to talk about how he and Sean threw back some beers on the porch and made doe-eyes at each other.

 

Mike, if you "heard rumors" during the toy fair, when you're NOW saying that you were alerted to the problem of your mystery prototype the first day of the fair, then clearly you had more than enough reason to question your product and demand satisfaction by opening it. The fact that you instead chose to misdirect the criticism makes DECEPTION and INTENTIONAL FRAUD the only rational explanations for the events.

 

Even if I believe your story, which I don't, you still look guilty as hell.

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Guys, I want you to know that a lot of inexcusable stuff has gone down. I'm afraid my reputation can't be salvaged. But if you take away anything from this adventure, I want you to know one thing...

 

 

 

 

 

Everything that happened was everyone else's fault but mine.

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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.

 

 

You have a lot of nerve coming in here and trying to play the victim.

 

The Retro VGS was your business venture. The fact that this failed is 100% your fault. Nobody believes your lies. I mean, so far, you have blamed everyone else involved in this whole mess, but remember, you hired or brought these people aboard yourself. It is incredulous that you still refuse to take any responsibility.

 

You should count yourself lucky the sleuths on this forum uncovered all this stuff, because if your crowdfunding campaigns had gone ahead and was successful, a lot of people would have been after your head after this system inevitably became vaporware. The way you shuffled money around from your various other ventures, it looked like a Panama Papers style offshoring scheme. I could see lawsuits.

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It's exactly like when the JagSNES was discovered, and Mike reported "We're hearing rumors that the CC will only play SNES games..." No, that's not what was being said then. Mike was trying to redirect the conversation because he didn't have a good answer. Just like now, he doesn't have answers to our REAL questions, he just wants to talk about how he and Sean threw back some beers on the porch and made doe-eyes at each other.

 

Mike, if you "heard rumors" during the toy fair, when you're NOW saying that you were alerted to the problem of your mystery prototype the first day of the fair, then clearly you had more than enough reason to question your product and demand satisfaction by opening it. The fact that you instead chose to misdirect the criticism makes DECEPTION and INTENTIONAL FRAUD the only rational explanations for the events.

 

Even if I believe your story, which I don't, you still look guilty as hell.

That's the reason the stories don't add up... sadly, they can't.
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Let's repeat:

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/235430-how-has-this-not-been-posted-yet-retro-vgs/page-81?do=findComment&comment=3328286

 

5-11under, on 23 Sept 2015 - 10:11 AM, said:
I am curious what the near-term and longer-term plans for the RetroVGS team are, though.

GroovyBee, on 23 Sept 2015 - 12:13 PM, said:
Resignation en mass and restraining orders if they come within 100m of each other? :ponder:

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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? The plan WAS TO HAVE SOMETHING TO SHOW for the Kickstarter. A unit that we could take the top off of or run straight from a cartridge on a bare board showing it all up and playing in front of a neutral audience. And showing at least two game platforms running - SNES and Intelli for example. That was what we were trying to accomplish at the Jag Bar set. I was told by Sean all along we would have a prototype unit that could be shown in that fashion prior to the Kickstarter going live and being an integral part of the campaign sizzle video.

 

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? Of course. Keith Robinson is a personal friend of mine and was excited to have an Intelli multicart on the system from the start. Remember, I thought I had bought an Intelli FPGA from Sean and he told me he was getting Intelli games running on our software/hardware. For Coleco we were lined up to either attempt to buy the FPGA core from Kevin or license the emulator from Oscar - CoolCV. Coleco being a partner obviously wanted a multi cart available for launch as well. So yes, these were both real collections coming on the system from the start. The reporter from Gizmodo happened to be in our booth waiting to interview us while we were all having a lengthy conversation with Atari who had come to the show specifically to talk with us. They wanted to have a multi cart available at the launch of the Kickstarter as well and we all shook on it in the booth - Ben, Chris and myself. She heard the whole thing. It was then after the show we were in further discussions with them when they said to do this they would need a guarantee upfront of like $50K to do the deal -- something they didn't mention in our booth. We were in the process of working through this when the clear proto fake was shown which ultimate ended all communications with them. And they weren't happy with the news of the SNES in a shell, obviously.

 

3. What were the plans for the USB versions of Colecovision and Intellivision controllers that never came to light? We were going to contract with Interworks Unlimited to create these controllers.

 

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? We were all led to believe this. If I had known before going to the show that my $4k that I paid Sean in January was getting me a SNES in a shell, I wouldn't have gone to the show and cancelled. It was a big expense and it was very public. It was the start of the end and what has led to the uncovering of Sean's ways. We had no reason to distrust him at that time, remember.

 

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? At the time I was convinced that we had real software running the games. I felt these comments were false based on what I was being told by a master manipulator. I will apologize again for this. I had complete and total trust in this guy, as did Steve Woita who had lots of phone interaction with Sean. It was inconceivable to us at the time that he was lying all along about everything he was or wasn't working on.

 

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? Nope. It was all for equity until I started paying cash to Sean. John Carlsen started the first RetroVGS company with me shortly before he quit and we were almost equal partners. That company was started and dissolved a few weeks apart. When I needed to make sure Sean was able to work full time the month before the fair to make what I thought was going to be a real prototype we discussed what would be needed to make that happen and we agreed on the $4K.

 

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? There contributions weren't small. Ben was securing retailers, Phil Adam was working with Interplay and Blizzard to secure deals on HD remakes or 16-bit cart collections of their earlier hits (Phil used to be President of Interplay back in their hayday and is also very close with the execs at Blizzard). Paul Wylie has a logistics background and was working to setup all our domestic and/or overseas manufacturing. I was setting up relationships with Arrow Electronics and others to begin supplying us our parts, etc. There was a lot going on while I thought I had a competent hardware team working on the hardware. Lots of wasted effort and I can assure you none of us knew the crap Sean was pulling. And remember, Sean didn't want to be mentioned as working on this project, wanted to remain "behind the curtain". Steve Woita was mentioned.

 

8. Who paid for your trip to the NYC Toy Fair? That come out of a small investment by a family member.

 

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. The magazine is running great right now. I removed those that were cause for our delays the first year and we have been trying to catch up. We are printing issue #11 this week and they mail out directly from the printer so most subscribers will be receiving their second to last issue. We have a 200 page RETRO Replay: Best of Years #1 and #2 coming out next followed by Issue #12. We will be continuing with year #3 but not using crowdfunding to do it. Here is a free discount code (used during checkout) so any of you can download any of our issues and check them out at http://www.ShopReadRetro.com. Code: atariage. I will remove the code in a week so get them while you can and see for yourself if you like it or not. They look much better in person.

 

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? Partners in GameGavel aren't really partners, they are friends and family passive investors. And then they bought in Oct 2010 there was no magazine only the auction site. I have continued to try and add value to that company by adding similar revenue centers, the magazine, media and auction site fit together well. The console was a separate venture because manufacturing a console is completely different than running a web/media/magazine site. This is still a growing venture so none of them have lost their investments which were minimal dollar amounts at best. I have offered to buy Scott out, but he never returns my calls or email. My two "partners" in RETRO Magazine were let go for various reasons, one of them not being able to produce a magazine within a deadline which led to our constant delays. As for GameGavel/RETRO it's still growing. And one of my minority owners has been doing his best to crater the company.

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Steve even was so fooled by Sean that he told me to do whatever it takes to make sure Sean stays with the project

 

whatever-it-takes.jpg

 

Now if that dog was surfing it'd be the perfect photo.

 

 

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.

 

fucking lolol

 

 

-

It wouldn't be a MK post without at least 2 people hoisted busward! Nice one :lol:

Edited by sh3-rg
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Laying low was a helluva better option rather than "I have made the decision that my reputation is worth protecting".

 

And let Sean off the hook? I chose to expose this guy after I what I learned. And it's a service to the community for doing so.

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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? The plan WAS TO HAVE SOMETHING TO SHOW for the Kickstarter. A unit that we could take the top off of or run straight from a cartridge on a bare board showing it all up and playing in front of a neutral audience. And showing at least two game platforms running - SNES and Intelli for example. That was what we were trying to accomplish at the Jag Bar set. I was told by Sean all along we would have a prototype unit that could be shown in that fashion prior to the Kickstarter going live and being an integral part of the campaign sizzle video.

 

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? Of course. Keith Robinson is a personal friend of mine and was excited to have an Intelli multicart on the system from the start. Remember, I thought I had bought an Intelli FPGA from Sean and he told me he was getting Intelli games running on our software/hardware. For Coleco we were lined up to either attempt to buy the FPGA core from Kevin or license the emulator from Oscar - CoolCV. Coleco being a partner obviously wanted a multi cart available for launch as well. So yes, these were both real collections coming on the system from the start. The reporter from Gizmodo happened to be in our booth waiting to interview us while we were all having a lengthy conversation with Atari who had come to the show specifically to talk with us. They wanted to have a multi cart available at the launch of the Kickstarter as well and we all shook on it in the booth - Ben, Chris and myself. She heard the whole thing. It was then after the show we were in further discussions with them when they said to do this they would need a guarantee upfront of like $50K to do the deal -- something they didn't mention in our booth. We were in the process of working through this when the clear proto fake was shown which ultimate ended all communications with them. And they weren't happy with the news of the SNES in a shell, obviously.

 

3. What were the plans for the USB versions of Colecovision and Intellivision controllers that never came to light? We were going to contract with Interworks Unlimited to create these controllers.

 

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? We were all led to believe this. If I had known before going to the show that my $4k that I paid Sean in January was getting me a SNES in a shell, I wouldn't have gone to the show and cancelled. It was a big expense and it was very public. It was the start of the end and what has led to the uncovering of Sean's ways. We had no reason to distrust him at that time, remember.

 

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? At the time I was convinced that we had real software running the games. I felt these comments were false based on what I was being told by a master manipulator. I will apologize again for this. I had complete and total trust in this guy, as did Steve Woita who had lots of phone interaction with Sean. It was inconceivable to us at the time that he was lying all along about everything he was or wasn't working on.

 

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? Nope. It was all for equity until I started paying cash to Sean. John Carlsen started the first RetroVGS company with me shortly before he quit and we were almost equal partners. That company was started and dissolved a few weeks apart. When I needed to make sure Sean was able to work full time the month before the fair to make what I thought was going to be a real prototype we discussed what would be needed to make that happen and we agreed on the $4K.

 

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? There contributions weren't small. Ben was securing retailers, Phil Adam was working with Interplay and Blizzard to secure deals on HD remakes or 16-bit cart collections of their earlier hits (Phil used to be President of Interplay back in their hayday and is also very close with the execs at Blizzard). Paul Wylie has a logistics background and was working to setup all our domestic and/or overseas manufacturing. I was setting up relationships with Arrow Electronics and others to begin supplying us our parts, etc. There was a lot going on while I thought I had a competent hardware team working on the hardware. Lots of wasted effort and I can assure you none of us knew the crap Sean was pulling. And remember, Sean didn't want to be mentioned as working on this project, wanted to remain "behind the curtain". Steve Woita was mentioned.

 

8. Who paid for your trip to the NYC Toy Fair? That come out of a small investment by a family member.

 

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. The magazine is running great right now. I removed those that were cause for our delays the first year and we have been trying to catch up. We are printing issue #11 this week and they mail out directly from the printer so most subscribers will be receiving their second to last issue. We have a 200 page RETRO Replay: Best of Years #1 and #2 coming out next followed by Issue #12. We will be continuing with year #3 but not using crowdfunding to do it. Here is a free discount code (used during checkout) so any of you can download any of our issues and check them out at http://www.ShopReadRetro.com. Code: atariage. I will remove the code in a week so get them while you can and see for yourself if you like it or not. They look much better in person.

 

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? Partners in GameGavel aren't really partners, they are friends and family passive investors. And then they bought in Oct 2010 there was no magazine only the auction site. I have continued to try and add value to that company by adding similar revenue centers, the magazine, media and auction site fit together well. The console was a separate venture because manufacturing a console is completely different than running a web/media/magazine site. This is still a growing venture so none of them have lost their investments which were minimal dollar amounts at best. I have offered to buy Scott out, but he never returns my calls or email. My two "partners" in RETRO Magazine were let go for various reasons, one of them not being able to produce a magazine within a deadline which led to our constant delays. As for GameGavel/RETRO it's still growing. And one of my minority owners has been doing his best to crater the company.

 

Quoted for posterior or posterity or something like that.

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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? At the time I was convinced that we had real software running the games. I felt these comments were false based on what I was being told by a master manipulator. I will apologize again for this. I had complete and total trust in this guy, as did Steve Woita who had lots of phone interaction with Sean. It was inconceivable to us at the time that he was lying all along about everything he was or wasn't working on.

 

 

 

And yet, you had an entire forum full of people, the same people you wanted as customers, and whom collectively knew more about console development than your entire team put together, telling you it was fake. The JagSNES was shown to be a total sham in less than 36 hours (very generous estimate), and yet you decide to put your faith in the guy who doesn't want his name on the project and doesn't even want you to look under the hood. We know you were actively browsing this forum trying to get feedback, so all the information we had, you had. Mike, either you knew exactly what was in that box, or you actively chose NOT to know because that made it easier for you to continue lying. Both options are equally dishonest.

 

At least admit that each time you said "All will be revealed at the Toy Show", or "All will be revealed at the Kickstarter", you were lying through your teeth and actually had nothing to show, and knew it at the time. Your own words in the past two days indicate there is NO reason you should have thought you could put together a prototype in between the Toyfair and Kickstarter.

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The reason Mike is done with his "drunken commentary" is that we've convinced him that rattling his can around here won't net him more pledges for Year 3 of his SUPER-MEGA-SUCCESSFUL-AND-PROFITABLE-FOR-REALS magazine.

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And this is why I won't be answering any more questions. Just for the record.

 

Hey, you hear the one about the supposed Retro gaming expert enthusiast who walked into a toy fair with a Jaguar covered in electrical tape not knowing what he had?

 

If you truly are this clueless, you have no business running a magazine centered around legacy hardware you know nothing about.

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The reason Mike is done with his "drunken commentary" is that we've convinced him that rattling his can around here won't net him more pledges for Year 3 of his SUPER-MEGA-SUCCESSFUL-AND-PROFITABLE-FOR-REALS magazine.

Which is definitely not in debt, definitely on time, definitely arriving in your mailbox with no issues and definitely good now. Definitely.

PS; buy the best of, coming soon...!

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