What have you actually PLAYED tracker for 2021 (Season 14)

[zetastrike]

Also: logged an hour in Killing Time for the 3DO last night.

[oyamafamily]

ATARI 2600:

Millipede (for HSC) - 45 minutes

Pooyan (for HSC) - 15 minutes

Strategy X (for HSC) - 16 minutes

 

ATARI 7800:

Fat Axl - 10 minutes

Pac-Man Collection - 48 minutes

 

COLECOVISION:

Donkey Kong - 68 minutes

[+thegoldenband]

My very modest time for the week:

 

PlayStation:
Star Ixiom - 12 min.

[agb]

Arcade

Dig Dug 26

 

Atari 2600

Circus Atari 29 for FB HSC - fun game

Demons to Diamonds 15

Eggomania 13

Millipede for HSC  28. Coming in last this season. still having fun. 
Popeye 36 for FB HSC 

Solar Fox 151

All fun. 
 

 

 

[twoquickcapri]

FM Towns:
Raiden Densetsu - 30 min.

 

Spent most of the week completing the story in Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order for the Xbox. I'm also redoing my computer room so I may not have any times for next week.

[carlsson]

3 minutes ago, twoquickcapri said:

Spent most of the week completing the story in Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order for the Xbox.

In case you want to, since a couple years there is a modern tracker to report such times as well.

[Skippy B. Coyote]

It was a real big week for Sega games around here this past week! I started off the week by finishing Lunar: The Silver Star on the Sega CD (which I apparently had just over half an hour left to go in), which should put that game in the 2,000 minute club, then got together with the misses to do a playthrough of the original Sonic the Hedgehog trading off controllers between levels. We beat it with all the chaos emeralds collected, and once that was done I decided to check out Lords of Thunder on the Sega CD for the first time via the Mega SD and holy fudging Norse god fish sticks Batman, that game is metal as all heckin' get out! I don't drink alcohol but Lords of Thunder makes me wanna take off my shirt, put on a bandana, drink a beer and smoke cigarettes!  It's also a fairly easy game as far as shoot 'em ups go and I was able to finish it on my first try, so highly recommended for any fan of the genre who likes heavy metal themes and doesn't mind playing via emulation or flash cart, since a real physical copy of Lords of Thunder will set you back $300+. I think I'll stick to playing on the Mega SD for that one. 

 

Next up I put a bit more time into Snatcher, which I keep trying to like but gosh darn is that game obtuse as all get out. The atmosphere and story is great, but I have no idea how anyone managed to beat this game back in the day without a guide since so much of what the game seems to want you to do is really cryptic and difficult to decipher... either that or I'm just not good at point and click adventure games lol Continuing the Sega theme, the spousal unit and I did a play through of Sonic CD and got the good ending by destroying all the robot generators the in the past in every level, then she did a solo playthrough of the original Streets of Rage with Blaze and beat it on normal difficulty by herself for the first time; which was pretty dang impressive if you ask me. Finally, wrapping up the week, I played through the original Mortal Kombat on the Genesis then just last night sat down with the misses again for more Sonic time and played through Sonic the Hedgehog 2; nabbing all the chaos emeralds along the way. 

 

At this point the plan for next week is to play through Sonic 3 & Knuckles, and I'm thinking I might play Silpheed on the Sega CD as well then start in on Lunar: Eternal Blue. I was really trying to like Dead Space 3 on the Xbox 360, but it just doesn't feel at all like the first 2 games so I think I'm just done with it at this point. The first two Dead Space games were really moody atmospheric survival horror at it's best, but Dead Space 3 just feels like a cash grab crafting fest designed for co-op play that's constantly screaming, "Buy our DLC! Buy our DLC!" right in your face. It's just... not fun, to me at least. So, back to Sega I go!

 

P.S.: I was apparently so distracted by all the Sega games this week that I totally forgot to play in the Atari 2600 High Score Club and missed the round entirely! Doh! >_<

 

 

 

 

 

Ineligible

Dead Space 3 (Xbox 360) - 45 minutes

 

Sega CD

Lords of Thunder - 89 minutes

Lunar: The Silver Star - 38 minutes

Sonic CD - 420 minutes

Snatcher - 38 minutes

 

Sega Genesis

Mortal Kombat - 24 minutes

Sonic the Hedgehog - 137 minutes

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 - 229 minutes

Streets of Rage - 90 minutes

 

 

Total Video Game Play Time This Week

1,110 minutes (18 hours 30 minutes) [1,065 minutes eligible]

 

Individual System Play Times This Week

Sega CD: 585 minutes

Sega Genesis: 480 minutes

Xbox 360: 45 minutes

[digdugnate]

My times for Classic Gaming are going to be a little odd because they were in a collection but ROMs- (Capcom Arcade Stadium).  The total was about six hours so I divided the time between the games I played.  

 

@carlsson - if you'd like me to post these differently that's no problem at all. 

 

Arcade:

1941 -- 28 minutes
1942 -- 28 minutes
1943 -- 28 minutes
19xx -- 28 minutes
Battle Circuit -- 28 minutes
Carrier Airwing -- 28 minutes
Commando -- 28 minutes
Final Fight -- 28 minutes
Ghouls n' Ghosts -- 28 minutes
Ghosts n' Goblins -- 28 minutes
Gigawing -- 28 minutes
Progear -- 28 minutes
Senjo no Okami II -- 28 minutes

[carlsson]

As long as those appear to have been genuine emulations of arcade games, the times look fine.

[digdugnate]

2 minutes ago, carlsson said:

As long as those appear to have been genuine emulations of arcade games, the times look fine.

i can't vouch for the Japan-specific ones, but the Western/English ones are pretty spot-on from what I remember from either the machines themselves or MAME.   Thanks!

 

(The conspiracy theorist in me would say that Capcom is just using the same romsets that you can find in MAME, lol)

[Atarian7]

Atari 2600

Kaboom! - 69 minutes

Millipede - 17 minutes

Solar Fox - 65 minutes

 

 

[carlsson]

1 hour ago, digdugnate said:

Arcade:

Progear -- 28 minutes

I feel like splitting hairs today, so I'll move this entry for Progear Storm Of Progia (2001) into the modern tracker.

[Steven Pendleton]

2 hours ago, digdugnate said:

1941

I'm guessing that's 1941 Counter Attack... and damn I love this game. I love the SuperGrafx version, anyway, as I've never played the arcade version.

[+wongojack]

Colecovision 

BC's Quest Tires 71 

Dragon's Lair 11 

Ghostbusters 20 

Gorf 15 

Oil's Well 18 

Spy Hunter 18 

Squish 'em Sam 10 

 

Gameboy Color 

LoZ Oracle of Seasons 774 

 

Nintendo 64 

Madden 2002 10 

 

Because of display lag, 2x this week I had to switch from playing Gameboy games on the Gamecube enabled GameBoy player to playing them on an actual Gameboy Advance.  In the case of Oracle of Seasons, I tried to defeat the final boss at least 7-10 times before I gave up and switched to a handheld.  I defeated that boss on my first attempt after switching . . . 

[carlsson]

As some of you may have figured out, I spent some time going through the list of arcade games against Klov and other sites. Mainly I wanted a definitive way to tell which games are pre-NES and not, but also combine duplicate entries under different names. Some fun stats:

 

The oldest arcade game currently listed in this tracker is Computer Space (1971). To find something older, we need to consult SpaceWar! on the DEC PDP-1 (1961) or for that matter Hammurabi on the DEC PDP-8 (1968/1971) and possibly Adventure on the PDP-8 from 1970.

 

The newest arcade game in the Classic Tracker is Dragon Blaze (2000) due to the definition that games up to year 2000 can go here, but arcade games from 2001 and onwards go into the modern tracker.

 

There are a total of 572 confirmed arcade games with minimum duplicates. The average release year turns out to be 1985.547, i.e. July 19, 1985, which happens to be almost exactly 3 months before the US release of the Nintendo Entertainment System (October 18). It means that half of the arcade games qualify for pre-NES and that the average year is almost on the point of the cut-off. Now I know that release years can vary between listings and we don't account for exact launch month of each arcade game, but rather interesting nonetheless.

[+thegoldenband]

3 hours ago, carlsson said:

As some of you may have figured out, I spent some time going through the list of arcade games against Klov and other sites. Mainly I wanted a definitive way to tell which games are pre-NES and not, but also combine duplicate entries under different names.

Oh man, you're doing something I always meant to do but never did -- explicitly differentiating within the database (or spreadsheet) between pre-crash and post-crash arcade games. I feel your pain, or at least empathize with the headaches involved in your effort!

[carlsson]

Actually it was kind of fun, at least for the entries that were easy to look up. A few arcade games were so obscure that I had to use Google and other means to find them. Some of the modern hacks obviously are hard to date so in that case I based it off the original game (e.g. Pac-Man and Donkey Kong hacks).

 

Additional stats: Number of games per year (which have been featured in the tracker, not games ever made)

 

1971:  1
1972:  1
1973:  1
1975:  1
1976:  6
1977: 10
1978: 12
1979: 16
1980: 47
1981: 54
1982: 61
1983: 45
1984: 43
1985: 34
1986: 23
1987: 29
1988: 24
1989: 24
1990: 27
1991: 19
1992: 16
1993: 17
1994: 12
1995: 11
1996:  9
1997:  8
1998: 11
1999:  9
2000:  1

 

We have heard of the video game crash in 1983, but I thought it mainly related to consoles like the 2600, Intellivision and ColecoVision. It seems even on the arcade side, the decline begun in 1983.

Edited February 23, 2021 by carlsson

[+thegoldenband]

9 hours ago, carlsson said:

Actually it was kind of fun, at least for the entries that were easy to look up.

The struggle for me would have been determining the cut-off. We use the platform hardware for console games, but every arcade game is potentially unique, and some may have been released post-crash using pre-crash hardware (either in terms of capabilities, or literally in terms of "take this board and make it into something else").

 

Of course all arcade games are out-of-sync with the console mainstream anyway. Take Markham: a 1983 release on hardware that's extremely similar to the Master System! In any event however you decide to cut up the baby, I trust in your Solomonic wisdom.

[carlsson]

Well, the intro message which I believe you once wrote says:

We also have a separate top 10 list for games released on platforms that predate the US release of the NES (i.e. roughly the tail end of 1985)

which to simplify matters, simply would suggest that all arcade games released 1985 or earlier qualify. The arithmetic average I calculated above was mostly for fun. However I agree that it would be an interesting challenge to go through all 572 entries to determine which hardware base those have and categorize them accordingly.

 

On the other hand the Nintendo Famicom was released in Japan in July 1983, several years before "tail end of 1985" so that is yet another example of when it gets complicated. I'm borderline if the SG-1000 is pre-NES or not. On one hand it has the same hardware as ColecoVision which clearly is, but on the other hand it was released on the same day as the Famicom, which by definition isn't before itself.

 

Regarding arcade games, some of the more common border cases we see are Bubble Bobble (1986), Commando (1985) and Ghosts 'n Goblins (1985) where thus the later two are pre-NES.

[carlsson]

Here's the summary for Week 07, running from February 15 - 21. We logged 4008 minutes of eligible play, playing 54 games on a total of 16 systems.

 

Top 10:

 

1. Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons (Game Boy Color) - 774 min. (#2)
2. Sonic Adventure (Dreamcast) - 440 min. (#6)
3. Sonic CD (Sega CD) - 420 min.
4. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (Genesis) - 229 min.
5. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 216 min. (#3)
6. Shining Force CD (Sega CD) - 210 min.
7. Sonic the Hedgehog (Genesis) - 137 min.
8. Millipede (Atari 2600) - 90 min.
8. Streets of Rage (Genesis) - 90 min.
10. Lords of Thunder (Sega CD) - 89 min.
 

Pre-NES top 10:

 

1. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 216 min. (PN#1)
2. Millipede (Atari 2600) - 90 min. (PN#7)
3. B.C.'s Quest For Tires (ColecoVision) - 71 min.
4. Kaboom! (Atari 2600) - 69 min. (PN#8)
4. Qix 5200 (Atari 8-bit) - 69 min.
6. Donkey Kong (ColecoVision) - 68 min.
7. Pac-Man Collection (Atari 7800) - 48 min. (PN#6)
8. Popeye (Atari 2600) - 36 min.
9. Circus Atari (Atari 2600) - 29 min.
10. 1942 (Arcade) - 28 min.
10. Commando (Arcade) - 28 min.
10. Ghosts 'n Goblins (Arcade) - 28 min.

 

Top 10 systems:

 

1. Sega CD (795) (#1)
2. Game Boy Color (774) (#3)
3. Dreamcast (541) (#5)
4. Atari 2600 (499) (#2)
5. Genesis (480)
6. Arcade (362) (#4)
7. ColecoVision (231) (#10)
8. Atari 8-bit (69)
9. 3DO (60)
10. Atari 7800 (58) (#9)
 

While Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons is the #1 game this week, places 2-4 and 7 are held by four different Sonic games on three different Sega consoles. The two first letters also is the same for the pre-NES #1 Solar Fox, which is the only game on that list to exceed 100 minutes. Systems wise the Sega CD by a margin of 21 minutes fends off the Game Boy Color for most played system, and an uncommon visit from the 3DO at the end of the list.

 

No new entries to the 1000, 5000 or 10000 Minute Clubs, though Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (Genesis) exceeds 4000 minutes.

[Nintendo64]

On 2/21/2021 at 9:52 PM, thegoldenband said:

My very modest time for the week:

 

PlayStation:
Star Ixiom - 12 min.

Same here, I could only play a few minutes of retro gaming this week and forgot to post it on time again. That game looks interesting and kind of reminds me of an older star wars game or movie.

 

On 2/22/2021 at 3:44 PM, carlsson said:

There are a total of 572 confirmed arcade games with minimum duplicates. The average release year turns out to be 1985.547, i.e. July 19, 1985, which happens to be almost exactly 3 months before the US release of the Nintendo Entertainment System (October 18).

Wow that is really interesting statistics to know. Thank you for looking into all that information, and for adding up the times for the week.

 

On 2/21/2021 at 10:30 PM, agb said:

Millipede for HSC  28. Coming in last this season. still having fun. 

That's the only thing that matters with these retro games: after all these years, these old games are still fun to play.

 

On 2/22/2021 at 11:08 AM, wongojack said:

Nintendo 64 

Madden 2002 10 

That's an interesting new game that you played for the week. I used to own the first Madden 64, and remembered how I used to like playing the game with the snowy weather on the field. I also was able to play a little Spy Hunter this week, but forgot to post the times. I actually got an extra life for the first time probably since I was a kid. Thanks for letting me know about how the point system works in the game.

 

On 2/22/2021 at 7:27 AM, digdugnate said:

Ghouls n' Ghosts -- 28 minutes
Ghosts n' Goblins -- 28 minutes

I like to see these games on the list as they are two of my favorite games for the NES and SNES/Genesis. I don't think I've ever played the arcade versions of either of these games though. They both look really good and remind me of the SNES and Genesis games in terms of graphics.

 

On 2/22/2021 at 4:08 AM, Skippy B. Coyote said:

Sonic the Hedgehog - 137 minutes

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 - 229 minutes

I am definitely going to try to play some of this series for the week. I remember last year I really enjoyed playing Sonic 1 and Sonic 2.

Edited February 24, 2021 by Nintendo64

[digdugnate]

18 hours ago, carlsson said:

Here's the summary for Week 07, running from February 15 - 21. We logged 4008 minutes of eligible play, playing 54 games on a total of 16 systems.

 

Top 10:

 

1. Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons (Game Boy Color) - 774 min. (#2)
2. Sonic Adventure (Dreamcast) - 440 min. (#6)
3. Sonic CD (Sega CD) - 420 min.
4. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (Genesis) - 229 min.
5. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 216 min. (#3)
6. Shining Force CD (Sega CD) - 210 min.
7. Sonic the Hedgehog (Genesis) - 137 min.
8. Millipede (Atari 2600) - 90 min.
8. Streets of Rage (Genesis) - 90 min.
10. Lords of Thunder (Sega CD) - 89 min.
 

Pre-NES top 10:

 

1. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 216 min. (PN#1)
2. Millipede (Atari 2600) - 90 min. (PN#7)
3. B.C.'s Quest For Tires (ColecoVision) - 71 min.
4. Kaboom! (Atari 2600) - 69 min. (PN#8)
4. Qix 5200 (Atari 8-bit) - 69 min.
6. Donkey Kong (ColecoVision) - 68 min.
7. Pac-Man Collection (Atari 7800) - 48 min. (PN#6)
8. Popeye (Atari 2600) - 36 min.
9. Circus Atari (Atari 2600) - 29 min.
10. 1942 (Arcade) - 28 min.
10. Commando (Arcade) - 28 min.
10. Ghosts 'n Goblins (Arcade) - 28 min.

 

Top 10 systems:

 

1. Sega CD (795) (#1)
2. Game Boy Color (774) (#3)
3. Dreamcast (541) (#5)
4. Atari 2600 (499) (#2)
5. Genesis (480)
6. Arcade (362) (#4)
7. ColecoVision (231) (#10)
8. Atari 8-bit (69)
9. 3DO (60)
10. Atari 7800 (58) (#9)
 

While Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons is the #1 game this week, places 2-4 and 7 are held by four different Sonic games on three different Sega consoles. The two first letters also is the same for the pre-NES #1 Solar Fox, which is the only game on that list to exceed 100 minutes. Systems wise the Sega CD by a margin of 21 minutes fends off the Game Boy Color for most played system, and an uncommon visit from the 3DO at the end of the list.

 

No new entries to the 1000, 5000 or 10000 Minute Clubs, though Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (Genesis) exceeds 4000 minutes.

Thanks @carlsson!  I could've done my times/info less slapdash so I'll try to make it easier for you next week.

 

11 hours ago, Nintendo64 said:

Same here, I could only play a few minutes of retro gaming this week and forgot to post it on time again. That game looks interesting and kind of reminds me of an older star wars game or movie.

 

Wow that is really interesting statistics to know. Thank you for looking into all that information, and for adding up the times for the week.

 

That's the only thing that matters with these retro games: after all these years, these old games are still fun to play.

 

That's an interesting new game that you played for the week. I used to own the first Madden 64, and remembered how I used to like playing the game with the snowy weather on the field. I also was able to play a little Spy Hunter this week, but forgot to post the times. I actually got an extra life for the first time probably since I was a kid. Thanks for letting me know about how the point system works in the game.

 

I like to see these games on the list as they are two of my favorite games for the NES and SNES/Genesis. I don't think I've ever played the arcade versions of either of these games though. They both look really good and remind me of the SNES and Genesis games in terms of graphics.

 

I am definitely going to try to play some of this series for the week. I remember last year I really enjoyed playing Sonic 1 and Sonic 2.

I played the arcade version of Ghouls N' Ghosts at our local Skaggs Alpha-Beta when I was a kid- my folks while they were checking out on grocery day would give me a handful of quarters so they could keep an eye on me.    I really stink at those games, lol.

[Steven Pendleton]

Damn, that's a lot of Sonic entries in the top 10. Always great to see Sonic show up, especially that many times in 1 week. I wonder how frequent it is to see the same franchise show up with that many entries or more in 1 week like that.

Edited February 25, 2021 by Steven Pendleton

[carlsson]

I'm not sure how many other franchises would qualify. Mario, Pac-Man and Donkey Kong of course, perhaps Zelda/Link, Metroid, Castlevania etc. Sure if you dig deep you could come up with something obscure like 6-8 games all about Cuthbert, but you need to split your times wisely so they all end up in the top 10.

 

Officially there were only 3+1 games about Horace but if you include fan made games including strict crap game entries, you would include at least another half dozen games like Horace goes Seal Culling, Horace goes Snowboarding, Horace and the Boulders, Homeless Horace, Horace goes Peeing and Horace goes to the Tower, but on the other hand this poor character was the tool for some rather nasty publicity a little over a year ago which took quite some fun out of it.

[Steven Pendleton]

41 minutes ago, carlsson said:

I'm not sure how many other franchises would qualify. Mario, Pac-Man and Donkey Kong of course, perhaps Zelda/Link, Metroid, Castlevania etc. Sure if you dig deep you could come up with something obscure like 6-8 games all about Cuthbert, but you need to split your times wisely so they all end up in the top 10.

 

Officially there were only 3+1 games about Horace but if you include fan made games including strict crap game entries, you would include at least another half dozen games like Horace goes Seal Culling, Horace goes Snowboarding, Horace and the Boulders, Homeless Horace, Horace goes Peeing and Horace goes to the Tower, but on the other hand this poor character was the tool for some rather nasty publicity a little over a year ago which took quite some fun out of it.

Yeah, there are not a whole lot of other franchises that I can think of without putting a bit of thought into it. Sonic is easy since you have Sonic 1, 2, 3, & Knuckles, 3 & Knuckles, Knuckles in Sonic 2, Spinball, the Game Gear and Master System versions of Sonic 1 and 2, Tails' Skypatrol, Sonic Labyrinth, Adventure 1 and 2, 2 versions of 3D Blast, and a few more. They really did crap out a lot of Sonic games on Sega hardware, and that doesn't even cover the PC releases, CD, or that one crazy and unexpected time when Sonic was on the Neo Geo (Pocket Color, but it's still Neo Geo!).

 

Other than that, and interestingly enough since I just mentioned the Neo Geo, Fatal Fury can do it, even without including Art of Fighting, which is a prequel to Fatal Fury, so maybe Art of Fighting doesn't even count, even though Geese shows up in both. So can The King of Fighters, as well. Got 10 on the Neo Geo, so...

 

Still, the chances of it happening are probably really low. Still interesting to see Sonic up there in 4 places at once, though.

Edited February 25, 2021 by Steven Pendleton