What have you actually PLAYED tracker for 2022 (Season 15)

[onlyinajeep]

Acorn Electron

Thrust - 20 minutes

 

Amstrad CPC 464

Thrust - 15 minutes

Thrust 2 - 5 minutes too long

 

BBC Micro

Thrust - 45 minutes

 

Commodore 16

Thrust - 10 minutes

 

GameBoy (via GBC)

World Bowling - 140 minutes

 

Vectrex

Thrust - 40 minutes

Vector Patrol - 45 minutes

 

ZX Spectrum 

Thrust - 15 minutes

 

 

[DragonGrafx-16]

15 hours ago, TheGameCollector said:

This week I played

 

Defender II for Arcade (via Williams Arcade's Greatest Hits for SNES) - 44 minutes

 

Gex for Playstation - 34 minutes

 

Joust for Arcade (via Williams Arcade's Greatest Hits for SNES) - 137 minutes

 

Pokemon Blue Version for Game Boy - 955 minutes

 

Robotron: 2084 for Arcade (via Williams Arcade's Greatest Hits for SNES) - 15 minutes

 

Sinistar for Arcade (via Williams Arcade's Greatest Hits for SNES) - 58 minutes

 

Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 64 - 191 minutes

 

X-Men: Children of the Atom for Playstation - 43 minutes

 

 

I'm still not quite sure if the SNES version of Williams Arcade's Greatest Hits is close enough to arcade perfect to count as the Arcade version or not. I'll leave it up to you, but I'm listing the four games' separate times so you know which games I played and have the option of putting the minutes where you want them. The SNES version does have the ability to set dip settings for the difficulty and extra life bonuses which I took advantage of.

 

Progress:

Defender II - played a few times on default settings and didn't get very far. I changed the dip settings to max starting lives, most frequent bonuses, and lowest difficulty. Then I abused smart bombs to get to level 61.

 

Gex - played thru the first area

 

Joust - played a few times on default settings and didn't get very far. I changed the dip settings to max starting lives, most frequent bonuses, and lowest difficulty. I rolled the level counter back to 0 and decided to stop playing at wave 2 (102)

 

Pokemon Blue - obtained more Pokemon by playing and trading with other files of Pokemon Blue, then leveling some of them up

 

Robotron: 2084 - played a few times on default settings and didn't get very far. I changed the dip settings to max starting lives, most frequent bonuses, and lowest difficulty. The furthest I made it was wave 13. A new record for me.

 

Sinistar - played a few times on default settings and didn't get very far. I changed the dip settings to max starting lives, most frequent bonuses, and lowest difficulty. I was able to smash 14 Sinistars. Another new record for me.

 

Super Smash Bros. - First I completed 1 player mode on very easy with Jigglypuff then Ness which were the last 2 characters. Then I played vs mode as every character vs every character once. I unlocked item switch in the process. I also unlocked sound test by redoing Mario's board the platforms challenge. So basically everything is unlocked on this file.

 

X-Men: Children of the Atom - Beat arcade mode on difficulty 1 as Wolverine, but had to use save states on Juggernaut and Magneto.

Those SNES arcade games from Williams Arcade's Greatest Hits are ports and not emulation and so are not listed under arcade.

[+wongojack]

16 hours ago, onlyinajeep said:

Acorn Electron

Thrust - 20 minutes

 

Amstrad CPC 464

Thrust - 15 minutes

Thrust 2 - 5 minutes too long

 

BBC Micro

Thrust - 45 minutes

 

Commodore 16

Thrust - 10 minutes

 

GameBoy (via GBC)

World Bowling - 140 minutes

 

Vectrex

Thrust - 40 minutes

Vector Patrol - 45 minutes

 

ZX Spectrum 

Thrust - 15 minutes

 

 

Sensing a theme here

[carlsson]

18 hours ago, DragonGrafx-16 said:

Those SNES arcade games from Williams Arcade's Greatest Hits are ports and not emulation and so are not listed under arcade.

Agreed. Those were tracked already back in 2015-16 as a single SNES game (considering all subgames different "tracks") so that is how I do it now as well.

[carlsson]

Here's the summary for Week 14, running from April 4 - 10. We logged 5163 minutes of eligible play, playing 75 games on a total of 24 systems.

 

Top 10:

 

1. Pokemon Blue Version (Game Boy) - 955 min.
2. Same! Same! Same! (Genesis) - 498 min.
3. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III: The Manhattan Project (NES/Famicom) - 378 min.
4. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 300 min. (#2)
5. Williams Arcade's Greatest Hits (SNES) - 254 min.
6. Super Smash Bros. (N64) - 191 min.
7. Guardian (Atari 2600) - 178 min. (#8)
8. Kaboom! (Atari 2600) - 155 min. (#4)
9. World Bowling (Game Boy) - 140 min.
10. Thunder Spirits (SNES) - 120 min.

 

Pre-NES top 10:

 

1. Solar Fox (Atari 2600) - 300 min. (PN#2)
2. Guardian (Atari 2600) - 178 min. (PN#6)
3. Kaboom! (Atari 2600) - 155 min. (PN#4)
4. Tail of Beta Lyrae, The (Atari 8-bit) - 94 min. (PN#8)
5. Reactor (Atari 2600) - 73 min.
6. Donkey Kong (Arcade) - 45 min.
6. Space Mountain (SG-1000) - 45 min.
6. Thrust (BBC Micro) - 45 min.
6. Vector Patrol (Vectrex) - 45 min.
10. Thrust (Vectrex) - 40 min.

 

Top 10 systems:

 

1. Game Boy - 1095 min.
2. Atari 2600 - 857 min. (#1)
3. SNES - 634 min.
4. Genesis - 625 min.
5. Arcade - 471 min. (#2)
6. NES/Famicom - 426 min. (#7)
7. N64 - 191 min.
8. SG-1000 - 115 min.
9. Handheld/Tabletop - 95 min.
10. Atari 8-bit - 94 min. (#3)

 

Pokemon Blue Version is back as #1 after one week's absence. This week features more post-NES games that last week, but Solar Fox on the 2600 sails into 4th place overall and 1st place pre-NES. Again we have lot of variation on the systems list, which is headed by the Game Boy thanks to the Pokemon game.

 

No new entries to the 1000, 5000, 10000 minute clubs. Pokemon Blue Version however just exceeds 6000 minutes = 100 hours, which still is far from Solar Fox' 640+ hours, not to mention Kaboom!'s nearly 3900 hours. Actually the latter is just short of 500 minutes away from that small milestone.

[Steven Pendleton]

I wasn't planning on playing Same! Same! Same! again, but I recently received a challenge to clear the game using the worst weapon in the game, so I got curious and started practicing just to see if I could do it. With this entry, I seem to have also single-handedly tracked the entire Toaplan Genesis/Mega Drive library, as Daisenpuu and Wardner finally show up.

 

G/MD
Daisenpuu - 26
Kyuukyoku Tiger - 11
Same! Same! Same! - 308
Vampire Killer - 5

Wardner no Mori Special - 3 (estimate)
Zero Wing - 33

 

PC Engine
Kyuukyoku Tiger - 10

 

FC/NES
Kyuukyoku Tiger - 15

 

Arcade
Same! Same! Same! (2P version) - 10
Tatsujin - 25
Tatsujin Ou New Version (ROM hack) - 85 (estimate)

Yes, that's right, a ROM hack of an arcade game. This is a great hack that fixes most of the problems with the game. It's still insanely difficult, but with this hack it's because it's an insanely hard game rather than because it's an insanely hard game that also happens to be broken.

Thunder Force AC - 5
Zero Wing - 228

 

Neo Geo AES/MVS
Andro Dunos - 7
Garou: Mark of the Wolves - 6
Neo Turf Masters - 7

[carlsson]

Atari 8-bit:
Mr. Robot III (Krzysztof Orlop) - 16 min.
Mr. Robot Plus (Goochman & TRBB) - 10 min.
Serpentine - 8 min.

 

Since the last poll in the A8 HSC ended with a draw, we're playing multiple games. First off are two custom level packs for Mr. Robot, a game I used to like around 12 years old but not so fond of today. In total those are 1 + 3 packs of levels x 26 = up to 104 screens to clear. The other game we're playing is Serpentine where you bite the tail off the opponents.

 

[carlsson]

5 hours ago, Steven Pendleton said:

G/MD
Wardner no Mori Special - 3 (estimate)

Interesting. I saw from Wikipedia that the Japanese version by Dragnet, published by Visco Corporation was out in April 1991 while the US version by Mentrix Software was out in May 1991. I suppose the later isn't a translation or adaption of the former, but two different versions of the arcade game?

 

@thegoldenband played Wardner in two sessions 2 + 119 minutes back in 2013 and @Eltigro tried it out for 5 min in 2019. I suppose in both cases it may have been the US version?

[Kurt_Woloch]

Here are my times for this past week (April 11th through 17th, 2021)...

 

Arcade:

Jr. Pac-Man - 12 min. in 2 sessions

 

TI-99/4A:

Chisholm Trail - 248 min. in 8 sessions

 

I had this week off from work, so there was a little time for gaming again. First I tried myself at Jr. Pac-Man, but didn't get very far (only to Level 2) and gave up quickly.

Then I saw this cartridge for the TI-99 laying around called Chisholm Trail. I didn't know I had this game, nor do I know where I got it from, but I played it intensively this week. It's actually a variation on a topic already beaten to death by Tombstone City, Blasto and The Attack. Again you are a ship that can be controlled on a single screen and shoots in 4 directions between a set of blocks. This time there are 4 enemies shooting at you plus a 5th, non-shooting one which you have to shoot 12 times (16 times in later levels) to advance to the next day. You only have 50 to 100 shots with each ship which makes things harder. It's a typical TI-99 game with heavy references to Texas, and again the enemies are animated and change their appearance with each day. The sound effects are actually mostly the same as in Tombstone City, and the way the player ship is btought out reminds heavily of TI Invaders. Munch Man also has its fair share of similarities with this game. My objective here is to make 20,000 points like in the Youtube video I watched of that game before trying it myself.

Edited April 17, 2022 by Kurt_Woloch

[+neogeo1982]

Sega Genesis:

StarFlight - 200min

Centurion Defender of Rome - 120min

 

Sega Dreamcast:

Phantasy Star Online - 600min

 

Nes:

Super Mario Bros - 45min

[Steven Pendleton]

4 hours ago, carlsson said:

Interesting. I saw from Wikipedia that the Japanese version by Dragnet, published by Visco Corporation was out in April 1991 while the US version by Mentrix Software was out in May 1991. I suppose the later isn't a translation or adaption of the former, but two different versions of the arcade game?

Typically with Toaplan, for both the arcade versions and the home versions, the Japanese version is more difficult than the international versions. Not sure about this game, though, as there are exceptions, and one of these is actually the US arcade version of Wardner, which they called Pyros for some reason. Apparently the US version is way more difficult than the Japanese and European versions, as they greatly reduced the amount of time you have to play each level in the US version.

 

There are a few other exceptions where the US version is harder, like Genesis Hellfire and apparently arcade Fire Shark is harder than the 2P version of Same! Same! Same!, but I'm not sure of the details of either of these 2 US versions. That's why I've always tracked them separately by country, as most of the time they are different, but I usually don't know the specific details beyond the Japanese version typically being more difficult.

 

I do know some of the differences between Tatsujin Ou and Truxton II, though: Truxton II = player weapons are considerably stronger and enemy aggression is reduced. Then you have things like V-V and Grind Stormer, which are completely different games, and the 1P version of Kyuukyoku Tiger and both the game's 2P version and Twin Cobra, which are radically different from the original 1P version, although I don't yet know if there are differences between those versions.

Edited April 18, 2022 by Steven Pendleton

[Eltigro]

Played some TurboGrafx this week... used emulation because I was too lazy to hook up my system, but still...  These were all during the same stream.  I didn't have a particular game I wanted to play so I just did some random TG games.

 

TurboGrafx-16

Blazing Lazers - 60 min (Got to the final stage, but didn't make it to the final boss.  One day I'll beat this on stream, but that day was not today.)

Gradius - 8 min (It didn't take me long to figure out how much I sucked at this one...)

The Legendary Axe - 15 min (I beat this once back in the day, but can't even get back to the final boss now.  I started having trouble in the waterfall area and quit.  lol  I wonder if it was a timing thing?  Lag from emulation?  Dunno.)

Military Madness - 60 min (Got to level 4 and lost.  Moved on.  I've gotten much farther in the past, but wasn't feeling like moving on.)

Parodius Da! - 20 min (I can never get past that Las Vegas showgirl thing... as far as I can tell, you can't "kill" her... you just have to survive as she moves back and forth.  I always get stepped on...)

Shanghai - 15 min (Cleared a table and stopped.  I think the dragon you see after you clear the board is kinda meh.  The one on the Master System is better.)

Parasol Stars - 20 min (Never played much of this one, but I'm not that good at these games.  Simple as they are, I just don't seem to get far.  Guess it's one of those things I just need to practice more with.)

P-47 - 2 min (lol, every time I try this one, I'm reminded of how bad I am at it.  It only took me 2 min to get to a "continue?" prompt.)

Magical Chase - 15 min (Another game I'm terrible at!  Imagine that!  This game is one of those super expensive games that I'll never be able to afford, so of course I'm emulating it.  Side scrolling cute-em-up with a shop like Fantasy Zone or whatever... )

Bonk's Adventure -  60 min (Did a run of Bonk's Adventure before ending the stream.  Beat it.  Didn't time it, though.  Just a casual run.)

[+thegoldenband]

4 hours ago, carlsson said:

Interesting. I saw from Wikipedia that the Japanese version by Dragnet, published by Visco Corporation was out in April 1991 while the US version by Mentrix Software was out in May 1991. I suppose the later isn't a translation or adaption of the former, but two different versions of the arcade game?

 

@thegoldenband played Wardner in two sessions 2 + 119 minutes back in 2013 and @Eltigro tried it out for 5 min in 2019. I suppose in both cases it may have been the US version?

I played the US version, but it's definitely the same port. No idea if there are any regional alterations besides the obvious translation/language factor, but it's clear the underlying codebase is the same.

 

Meanwhile, my times this week:

 

NES:

DuckTales 2 - 43 min.

Ikari Warriors - 5 min.

Sky Kid - 1 min.

[DragonGrafx-16]

C64:
Zeta Wing - 16 mins
Beam Rider - 23 mins

SMS:
Power Strike II - 21 mins

PC Engine:
1943 Kai 19 - mins

PC Engine CD:
Super Raiden - 15 mins

SNES:
Axelay - 21 mins
The King of Dragons - 32 mins
Raiden Trad - 23 - the worst Raiden game I have ever played (other than Raiden V) 
not terrible but it is rather slow and boring at times compared to Super Raiden on PC Engine CD

Dreamcast:
Trizeal - 20 mins

arcade:
Sorcer Striker - 23 mins
Terra Force - 12 mins
 

I just got my monitor that can rotate vertically and it is great for playing shmups in MAME. Though Terra Force was actually played using my Switch.

Edited April 18, 2022 by DragonGrafx-16

[oyamafamily]

ATARI 2600:

Jr. Pac-Man - 46 minutes

Reactor (for HSC) - 45 minutes

Smurf: Rescue in Gargamel's Castle (for HSC) - 35 minutes

 

ATARI 7800:

Midnight Mutants - 90 minutes

 

GAMEBOY:

Tetris - 25 minutes

 

NES / FAMICOM:

Al Unser Jr. Turbo Racing - 23 minutes

 

SEGA SG-1000:

H.E.R.O. - 40 minutes

Q*Bert - 6 minutes

Sega-Galaga - 5 minutes

 

SEGA GENESIS:

Ms. Pac-Man - 25 minutes

Edited April 18, 2022 by oyamafamily

[+jgkspsx]

Aw yeah, more SG-1000 submissions!

 

Atari 2600:

 

The main thrust of the week.

 

Cracker Pet - 20 minutes

 

 

I am not sure if this Taiwanese bootleg of Crackpots should be listed separately or not. They at least edited out the Activision logo, so they might have made other changes.

 

Infiltrate - 15 minutes

Juno First - 25 minutes. Great port.

Nexar - 15 minutes. I don’t get it.

 

Reactor - 210 minutes for HSC.

 

 

I know how to play the game now!

 

Smurf Rescue in Gargamel’s Castle - 75 minutes

 

 

I know how to play this game now too! I don’t think I ever cleared the second screen before.

 

Sorceror - 25 minutes.

 

Pretty fun proto-horizontal shmup but I am not sure what is happening.
 

Star Fox - 10 minutes

 

 

I don’t get it.

Tank Battle - 20 minutes

 

 

This is a Taiwanese bootleg of Sega’s Thunderground, but again with some changes to remove the Sega logo and maybe some color palette changes…

Time Pilot - 15 minutes

 

 

I get the sense that this is not a well-loved port but it seems at least as good as any port that Konami did themselves…

 

Zarkstars I - 20 minutes

 

 

Atari 7800:

 

Food Fight - 90 minutes for HSC

 

Recorded an embarrassing longplay video of my high score if you want to see how the magic happens.

 

Does anybody recognize this end screen?

 

Atari Lynx:

 

Eggsavier’s Cackleberry Rescue - 25 minutes

 

Milton Bradley Microvision:

 

Cosmic Hunter - 75 minutes

 

 

Kind of have this figured out, but it is HARD!

 

Nintendo Entertainment System:

Star Trek 25th Anniversary - 90 minutes

 

 

Am I the only one who detects a distinct similarity to King of the Hill here?

 

Nintendo SNES:

 

Taco: Princess from the Moon - 75 minutes

 

 

Also known as Nekotako in the Japanese release.

 

Sega Genesis:

 

Mega Turrican Score Attack - 25 minutes

(it’s called out as a separate game here and in the multicart menu)

[onlyinajeep]

CoCo2

Crystle Castle - 40 minutes (yes, it's spelt that way:) )

Mrs. Pac - 35 minutes

 

Gameboy (via GBC)

World Bowling - 65 minutes

 

Odyssey2 

P.T. Barnum's Acrobats! - 190 minutes

Turtles! - 20 minutes

[TheGameCollector]

This week I  played:

 

Pokemon Blue Version for Game Boy - 261 minutes

Pokemon Red Version for Game Boy - 295 minutes

 

Progress:

I now have all the Pokemon you can get in Blue version and an extra of one off each Pokemon that will needed to be exchanged with Red version to get the ones needed from that game.

 

In my 3DS Red version file, I caught Articuno, Zapdos and Moltres then started collection coins from the slot machines to try to get Porygon eventually. In my new emulator file (to go along with the Blue version I just completed) I just started with Charmander and have been catching everything I've come across up to Pewter City. Still trying to find a 3rd Caterpie to evolve into my main Butterfree that could be used to beat Brock.

[+wongojack]

@jgkspsx I am also picking up a "King of the Hill" vibe from that Kirk and Spock - hilarious

 

NES/Fami

Pooyan 43

TMNT III: The Manhattan Project 341

 

I'm getting my strategies down for all the bosses in TMNT III, so I can (hopefully) finish the game without savestates or codes etc.  More updates on my progress to come.

[digdugnate]

No time for love, Dr. Jones, and also no time for Classic Gaming tracker this week.  I'm hopeful that I'll have some this week with wanting to replay some old favorites.

[Atarian7]

Atari 2600

Kaboom! - 74 minutes

Reactor - 40 minutes

Solar Fox - 107 minutes

 

 

[carlsson]

15 hours ago, jgkspsx said:

Cracker Pet - 20 minutes

 

I am not sure if this Taiwanese bootleg of Crackpots should be listed separately or not. They at least edited out the Activision logo, so they might have made other changes.

As it turns out, two other bootleg versions of Crackpots: Boom Bang [228] and Kampf dem Steinfresser [7] have been listed separately before. I suppose the differences may be minimal beyond editing out the Activision logo which any good pirate should do, but I'll add Cracker Pet as a third bootleg entry.

 

When it comes to Thunderground/Tank Battle etc, I didn't spot any previous bootlegs listed, going by the equivalence list over at Atarimania.

[+jgkspsx]

1 hour ago, carlsson said:

When it comes to Thunderground/Tank Battle etc, I didn't spot any previous bootlegs listed, going by the equivalence list over at Atarimania.

I have read reports that they changed the color palette too, but it was unclear whether that was intentional or because of some PAL/NTSC issue.

[carlsson]

Yeah, I listed Tank Battle as a separate bootleg. In a number of other occasions though, all bootlegs have traditionally been grouped with the original game so I guess it is a matter of inconsistency how to handle those. We currently have 989 entries for the Atari 2600 alone, which is well beyond the number for unique games, but includes a number of bootlegs, hacks, demo versions, not to mention homebrews that may or may not be counted in the other lists of unique entries.

[littleman jack]

Atari 800

The Tail of Beta Lyrae---90 minutes

Preppie II----35 minutes

Canyon Climber----20 minutes

Preppie---40 minutes