So recently I was in talks with a fellow maker, he had asked if I would be willing to make a trade once I finish one of my soon to come figures. I looked over his shop and noticed he sold one of his figures in a kit form. I inquired about maybe doing a toy art swap where I sent him a raw casting of one of my figures and he would send me one of his. Here is the build video of that trade.
STRONG LANGUAGE!
I thought it may be interesting to share what happens when my pager goes off for a fire call.
Thankfully, I've only had false alarms to respond to, aside from two minor car accidents. (Since October 2017).
We average one call per week. Thankfully, most of them are during the day, but there have been the occasional middle of the night calls. (The pager also goes off for any ambulance calls, which I only assist if the EMTs need help lifting the stretcher onto the ambulance boat.)
Te
World Tour Racing
Published: 1997 by Telegames
Developed: Teque London
Polygonal racers were all the rage in the mid-90s. At the time of the Jaguar’s release, Sega’s Virtua Racing ruled the arcades. Atari’s answer was the lackluster Checkered Flag; a game notorious for its low frame rate and horrible controls. The innovative but visually bland Club Drive also failed to impress gamers. By 1994, the Sega 32X had an excellent port of Virtua Racing. The release of the Sega Saturn
2018 Homebrews:
A Very Galactopus Christmas (bB) by Ric Pryor “KaeruYojimbo”
Alien Attack by Edward A. Smith “easmith” - available at Good Deal Games
Alien Greed 5 by Chris Read “atari2600land” – available thru 2600connection NO “Public” ROM available
Alien Revenge! by Edward A. Smith “easmith” - available at Good Deal Games
Apollyon (bB) by Fehér János Zoltán “MemberAtarian” will be available thru Retronics
Asteroid Rescue (bB) by Ross Adkin “TidusRenegad
It took me a little over a week, but I've poured through the 50+ offerings from Free Comic Book Day (FCBD) 2018, and these, in no particular order, are the top 10 titles that have my interest piqued for the coming year: Barrier (Image) I assume the entire series will be printed in the landscape format and I am totally ok with that (as long as I don't have to keep turning the book). This is a captivating story with a dual perspective across the Mexico/United States border. The Mexico story i
Climber 5Developer: Dennis DebroAvailable: https://atariage.com/store/index.php?l=product_detail&p=261 The turn of the century truly was the Golden Age of 2600 Homebrewing. All of the big names were active and working to break all the conceptions of what could be done on the VCS. This was the era of Thomas Jentzsch, Andrew Davie, Manuel Rotschkar, Peiro Cavina, Paul Slocum, and Dennis Debro. Those other guys, I have no doubt you’ve heard of. The list of incredible games they developed
LeadDeveloper: Simone SerraAvailable: https://atariage.com/store/index.php?l=product_detail&p=932 Simone Serra games are completely and utterly underrated. I said it. I started this whole Homebrew of the Month thing off with Omicron, another really great game from Serra, and now, having played Lead for over a month, I can confirm that Serra is one of the top developers you’ve probably never heard of in the 2600 homebrew field. I don’t know why these two games aren’t on the tip of the to
A common sentiment found among retro-computing enthusiasts is that there's nothing quite like the real thing. It's understandable, computers and game consoles (i.e., computers disguised as toys and appliances) are physical items and our happy nostalgic memories are complimented by recollections of touch and heft: the feedback of button clicks, shunting cartridges into slots, and so on. However, there's a particular aficionado - we've all met him, he's a member of every fan group and forum - whos
Recently, in the Atariage High Score Club, we played a game called Red Sea Crossing. This game is one of the rarest, most hotly debated games in recent Atari history, however when it was created it did not have a manual. What follows is my effort to correct that 34 year old mistake. The unofficial manual created below was created by me with some very helpful contributions from community insiders like Rom Hunter who runs the wonderful resource Atarimania.com, and fellow gamer who goes by Leto
In this 3 video series, I go over the basics and understanding of the Roland MT-200 sound module. It is an excellent multifunction sound module that can act as both a sequencer and sound module. This means that in addition to being a very nice general MIDI and Sound Canvas sound module, it also has the ability to record MIDI songs from the MIDI in port and save them to diskette to be played back in a standalone fashion later, making it a MIDI Jukebox as well! The first video goes over the basic
As some might know by now, I've got an MT-200 that I picked up over a month ago now. Really cool little device from Roland that was originally intended for use in teaching music. But these devices have the ability to play back midi files through built in disk drives that use IBM formatted 3.5 inch disks. They can also be used as sound modules and with modern day computers can still be made to be used with ScummVM and Dosbox for classic gaming. Anyway I was getting frustrated with my disks seemin
OystronDeveloper: Piero CavinaAvailable: Atariage Let’s go back, way back to the dawn age of modern Homebrewing. A time when sitting down and punching out code for a new Atari 2600 video game was more than just a labor of love, it was an act of self-sacrifice and skill. These were the days of the Stellalist: a small, cloistered corner of the internet where those few who possessed the knowledge and talent for writing in a coding language more obsolete than Latin is to human languages swapped se
Drive!Developer: Nick WilsonAvailable: https://atariage.com/store/index.php?l=product_detail&p=1095 In the Big Atariage Homebrew Release of 2017 there were heavy hitters like Assembloids and Scramble that made everyone ooo and aaah. There were also unassuming games that flew right under everyone’s radar. Games that you really shouldn’t overlook. Previously for the HotM I examined one such game: The Gizzle Wap and the Strange Red Tree. This week we take a look at another hidden gem: Dri
Busy month, but I'm elated to have, finally, nailed down the hardware design and have working firmware!
A few words on USB ...
In ye olde' days, such as when the Jaguar was developed, connections with the outside world were often turn-key and very simple. On the Jaguar controller, a selection of pins are used as address selectors and each data pin is tested in turn. Easy to code for and cheap hardware to build, little more than latches and diodes. However, such interfaces are not
Gingerbread ManDeveloper: Fred QuimbyAvailable: https://atariage.com/store/index.php?l=product_detail&p=867 I had not intended for this review to coincide with any cookie appropriate holidays, however it timed out so that I was playing Gingerbread Man during the Christmas season, so I’ll let you decide if that’s timely or trite, whichever suits your fancy. There was considerable hype around this game when it came out and it still gets a nod now and then as a top notch platformer for the s
Development environment
To start writing code for our STM32F07 series uC via an ST-Link programmer (embedded in a cheap Nucleo board, see previous entries) all we need are a few easy to obtain tools: a C compiler (although Rust is becoming more interesting as an embedded language), a debugger and a tool for handling communication with the uC over the ST-Link. ST provide several options for fully integrated IDEs with varying levels of platform and license support but my personal preference is
AtureDeveloper: BeoranAvailable: (ROM ONLY) Atariage.com Pulling from the archive again this month as I await some excellent new games to arrive in the post. Ature was a game I picked up at an East Coast gaming convention back in the days when that was a thing. The game had just been released and Beoran, the developer, had granted a few folks the rights to distribute physical copies of the game. I picked up a boxed copy for around $45 American, I believe. It was very exciting to pick up a
Justification
In recent years the retro-gaming community has taken a revisionist view of the Atari Jaguar. What was once a console marred by failure is now more regularly being perceived as a missed opportunity. Rather than maintaining a reputation as a broken console the Jaguar is becoming more highly regarded as a technical innovator failed by a lack of capital and business acumen of the company who developed and marketed it. Consequently, demand for Jaguar consoles and peripherals has inc
Swordquest #5 landed this week, and the comic series that started with a whimper goes out with a sigh. If you were hoping the whole thing would marshal in the closing chapter and redeem the four issues of blechhh that preceded it, you were sadly mistaken and extremely naive. Chad Bowers and Ghostwriter X stay true to their formula of bland characters, grade school level art, and dull storytelling to grind this terrible comic to a close. I would warn you that this review contains spoiler alert
I never could figure out what this game was. Based on the initial interface it looked like a Shadowgate style game where you interacted with the world through a window using commands. But the next series of screens acted more like a world-exploring RPG with a party of characters and turn-based battles. Honestly, every time I popped it in, I rarely got much farther than the first few screens. It just looked like more than I cared to unpack in a casual gaming session. Despite its awesome Mayan
I am only a hobbyist and NOT an electrical engineer. As such I'm sure my terminology and explanations of things will be off or perhaps completely wrong. As such, please let me know in comments on such mistakes as it helps me and all others who might view this video to learn. With that, this is my basic intro to my BK 1474 O'scope that I got some time ago and some ways it can be used. This video is only meant for fun and not as instructional as most of my other videos are. Enjoy!
View the f
