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Congratulations ZilchSr! A big congratulations and huge welcome to new Atari I/O Member @ZilchSr! ZilchSr takes the top spot in our Final Standings with a mind-blowing score of 10,111,115. Participation in this Squad Challenge was through the roof and we had a number of new Members join the forums to participate. Let's all give a GIANT Atari I/O Welcome to our new friends @ZilchSr @AtariSphinx and @Papa Pete who joined us in High Score Squad this week, it's great to have you guys here! @AtariSphinx showed up with his A-Game, posting a score of 1,734,308 to claim the 2nd Place on our Final Standings. The legend @RickR was hot on AtariSphinx's tail, taking the 3rd spot with a score of 1,455,582. New member @Papa Pete was right behind him with his score of 1,413,706 to take 4th. @Dinobot711 @nosweargamer @chas10e @RadioPoultry @James Campbell Jr. @HDN @Justin @socrates63 @Atari Creep @Marco1019 @Gianna and @LinkYoungPS all shared tremendous scores and gave it their all. Congratulations once again to @ZilchSr for the win, and as always I'd like to encourage ZilchSr to post his new high score on the Scoreboard, and let's make sure this Challenge continues on! And a big congratulations to our community for being such a great group, and for the biggest and best participation we've ever seen in a High Score Squad Challenge. I hope everybody had fun with this early 2600 game! NOTE: Our next High Score Squad Challenge is Q*bert for Atari 2600! Be there!

I made my Demon Attack video a little late for the contest, so I didn't post it here, but I've compared emulation to OG Hardware again for this Video Pinball challenge.....and let's just say, there is NO comparison between the two... 1,413,706

I ROLLED THE SCORE! 1,332,964. Here's a video of the score rolling over (go all the way to the end). I had to stop recording when my wife was making a business call. Picture of final score at bottom of post.

Video Pinball 3A - 10,111,115 The first objective should always be to get the extra ball. Second, clear the diamonds to boost the bumper values to 900. Third, spam the bonus lane. Pardon the cat.

Only have 1 word for this challenge...... YES

OK, I played this last night and here's my score!

My first time playing. 18,410. It took me a little while to get this score, and thought I did well, but after seeing everyone's scores.. jeez!

56,236 A 500% improvement from my last score! 💪

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Mamma mia, @Papa Pete!

Happy New Year all! As I crawl my way back into the content creating/game playing scene, what a HSS challenge to come back to! YES!!!! I'll be trying to get my scores in soon! I'm pumped!

@nosweargamer has an excellent review of Video Pinball. It's a great place to start if you're new to the game!

27,300 Fun 2600 game! I’ve only played the arcade game, and this one took a couple of minutes to get used to the control. Very well done IMO. It’s going to be a fun couple of weeks.

Video Pinball Atari 2600 Controller: JOYSTICK / KEYBOARD / PLAYER'S CHOICE Difficulty Level: Game 3, Difficulty A Play on: Real Hardware / Dedicated Console / Emulation OK! ✔ Squad Challenge ends 11:59 pm PST January 14, 2021 Objective Play for the highest possible score using the difficulty settings defined in the challenge. Post a photo or YouTube video of your score in this thread. Scores must be achieved between January 1st through January 14th, 2021. Screen captures are not allowed as they are more easily manipulated for falsified scores. Multiple submissions are permitted. The player with the highest score at the end of the competition is the victor! Eligibility Anyone can join in. All players are welcome! Play Rules Games may be played on real hardware, Flashback / Mini console, or emulation, using any controller or keyboard, following all rules and game settings defined in the challenge. Choosing between real hardware or emulation, and choosing which controller to play on is part of formulating your strategy. Enhancements, rewinds and hacked versions of this game are not allowed. Difficulty Level Game 3, Difficulty A. This is the most challenging configuration. These settings allow for nudging and applying body English on the ball, TILT, bumper values are reset with each new ball, and two extra drain holes are added at the bottom of the playfield. Fair Play Your integrity is everything. Players should play fairly, be honest, and have fun! Falsified scores will result in your immediate removal from the site. It goes without saying that we will not allow cheats, hacks, cartridge frying, enhancements, rewinds, deceitful photo manipulation, subterfuge, or any other unfair advantage. Everybody hates a cheater. More To review detailed rules on how to play, please visit the High Score Squad page here: Message HAPPY NEW YEAR SQUAD! Welcome to our 95th Squad Challenge! We're ringing in the new year right, starting back at the beginning with an early game for the Atari 2600. What more can you say about Video Pinball? It's a fun pinball game that brought a lot of fun to early Atari Video Computer System players. Although it's more rudimentary than later games such as Midnight Magic on the 2600, and Pinball on the NES, Video Pinball is one of my favorite early VCS games and it has a lot of that early Atari charm. The bumpers, the sounds, the artwork, it's all there. It's a great game for a Squad Challenge. As @nosweargamer says, Video Pinball is very simple with square bumpers and a square ball and targets that look like they were poured out of a box of Chex cereal! This game is widely available as loose original cartridges on the 2600, the ROM is available, and you can go out today and buy this game on a Flashback console at almost any Walmart, Sam's Club, Costco or Target, so everybody should be able to join in. Do you love Pinball games? ROM and Instructions are provided below. Good luck to everybody participating! NOTE: We have TONS of great exciting Squad Challenges coming for the 2021 season! Don't miss a thing! Video_Pinball.bin Video_Pinball.pdf

Ok, here's a real one from a last second live steam I put together! 35,500

Last score. 110,459.

118,825 points 1/11/21 I had to take a picture of my YouTube livestream lol. It wouldn't download the video said the file was too big. If this doesn't get accepted oh well no big deal. The No Swear Gamer and The Atari Creep can vouge for me that I did this. They both watch my channel.

It's been a struggle for me to get past 25,000 in an typical run. I played for a while last night and reached a new person high score: My High Score: 68,843 Continuing to study the great tips everybody has contributed in this squad challenge and am using them in my game.

Agreed, 100%! Once you get the niche down as to how immediately get that extra ball/bonus multiplier, which is basically the same nudge technique that you'll use when you're spamming the bonus lane, you could concievably get whatever score you want, depending on how long you want to play! 👍

Not at all. I suppose a "serious" game would fall in the 50M to 100M range. Try some of the tactics shown in the video. Youll roll the score in no time 😉

One of the things I enjoy doing is revealing tactics so that even first-time players can observe and achieve success by utilizing them. I appreciate the "fun" aspect of the Squad Challenge, thus, the intentional tilting of remaining balls at around the 55-minute mark, rather than continuing for multiple hours. I save the multiple-hours long games for the "take it seriously sites". It would be a thrill for me if a few people or more were able to take what's here and use it to experience the excitement of their first time rolling the score, if not multiple times 😉

Great video & score, it was rather odd the on the bonus count the first time on real hardware so I suspect you score may have been higher but the "squad challenges" here are just for fun to revisit games from when us old timers were young and to expose the young fellows to these games. Another great video, I really liked the super short-plung then getting the extra ball off the slingshot right away! the visit from the cat was hilarious as cats & pinball is an "actual thing" Again the "squad challenge" is for fun but for high stakes tournament physical pinball, when possible extra balls are turned off and if an extra ball is earned without the possibility to turn it off after setting up a skill shot it is plunged and hands off so that great players don't marathon the machine. So lets get along to posting more scores, I thought @ZilchSr had a great idea with a clock running as he played so I incorporated one in the event I rolled it 😉 509,077

77,744 My best so far. Liking the challenge this difficulty setting adds with those extra holes

620,369 I made a video, but the resolution is way too low. Furthermore, @Papa Pete's video above shows you all you need to know.

119,551 After some effort, I managed to break into 6 digits! It's probably been at least 15 years since I used this cartridge. I wasn't the biggest fan, but it's grown on me a little, now. I like how nudging works, and the physics on the flippers isn't bad. The spinners still really annoy me, though.

917,139 Almost rolled the score! Actually I'm kind of happy I didn't. I'm playing on my 3DS and I wasn't looking forward to having to play through viewfinder 😆 About half of my score came from a single ball where I rolled through the bonus lane a ton. Gotta love that nudge!

I got both lower case & upper case , think I was playing the lower case , I imagine the tilt is a little looser :P

I fully expect someone to show up with a rolled score and make mine look pretty low. But thank you. I played this a lot as a kid, and it's funny how it all comes back to me so quickly.

30,024 Played live on IG using Retron77, Hyperkin Ranger controller and original cart

Man oh man this game is challenging. Even though it doesn't match up to Midnight Magic on the 2600 in terms of graphics, I enjoy it just as much. Here's my first score: My High Score: 51,727

Final score, 2’ 42”38

2' 24" 51 shaved a fraction of a second 🙂

The man is on a mission! Best I can do this evening is 2'21"30

I beat you, Phil! Per usual, only by a few milliseconds. 2’18”37 Next up is @RadioPoultry, the Golden Fox to my Fire Stingray.

@nosweargamer has an excellent review of Q*bert for Atari 2600. It's a great place to start if you're new to the game!

Video Pinball (3 A/A) : 1,734,308 Finally got the hang of this. Rolled the score. First picture just before the roll (2nd ball), second picture is when I stopped (still on second ball).

1,455,582. I rolled the score again, but I didn't do a video this time. Nerd's honor. Is that ok?

Video Pinball (3 A/A): 607,668 Saw how much fun everyone was having with this one and decided to join the forum! Never really played this game before and couldn't see why it would be any fun but after spending last two days I really like it now. Took awhile to get the hang of it but once you do you can break that 6 figure score barrier easily.

I've made two "banners" of box art for my real name and my forum name. Most of my boxes are in storage, so looking for them would have been a PITA. 😁 E - Enduro - Atari 2600 U - Up’N Down - Atari 5200 G - Gravitar - Atari 2600 E - Evolution Dino Dudes - Atari Jaguar N - Ninja Golf - Atari 7800 I - Ikari Warriors - Atari 7800 O - Omega Race - Atari 2600 T - Tempest 2000 - Atari Jaguar R - River Raid - Atari 5200 E - Escape from the Mindmaster - Atari 2600 K - Kangaroo -Atari 5200 M - Ms Pac-Man - Atari 7800 D - Decathlon - Atari 5200

A quick review of the "Super Mario Bros Game & Watch". One of my kids got one as a gift, and I've borrowed it while they weren't looking. Quick summary: It's awesome. Worth the price. My opinion is that Super Mario Bros on NES is a masterpiece. The colors, the music, the level designs, the bright graphics. All perfect. And this little device captures all that. At first, the controls seem a little slippery, but that's just because the screen is so small. Once you get used to that, it's all good. The screen is nice and bright. The music sounds great. It's so well done. Bravo to Nintendo for doing nostalgia products with such high quality. I've seen a lot of complaints about "no kickstand". Really? OK. If that's all there is to complain about, I think it speaks highly about this product.

Here is my vid 🙂 Was pretty fun!

361,363. I can do better, but I just can't focus tonight.

My personal experience: my family got the Atari VCS (and Space Invaders) Christmas 1980. So everything available then is "early" to me. It was Space Invaders that made me beg for the Atari. The first games that we purchased in 81 were Adventure, Pinball, Circus Atari, Indy 500, and Basketball.

204,180 Don't tilt ! You'll lose your extra ball as well as ball in play :'(

360,061

Congratulations HDN! Congratulations to @HDN on a triumphant win! HDN has become our 2020 F-ZERO Champion, he takes the top spot in the Final Standings with an outstanding time of 2' 13" 92. Legendary High Score Squad champ @RadioPoultry was hot on HDN's tail with an amazing time of 2' 14" 14, claiming 2nd Place on the Final Standings. Another HSS hotshot @nosweargamer dominated with a superb showing, taking our 3rd spot on the board with a time of 2' 18" 45. I took 4th Place with a time of 2' 18" 88. @RickR came in 5th Place with his impressive time of 2' 19" 95, @Sabertooth takes 6th with 2' 20" 80, @socrates63 takes 7th with 2' 24" 51, and @Gianna gave it her all with her first time playing in the F-ZERO Championship with a time of 2' 42" 38. Congratulations once again to @HDN for the win, and as always I'd like to encourage HDN to post his new high score on the Scoreboard, and let's make sure this Challenge continues on! And a big congratulations to everyone on their amazing runs! Here's to everyone who gave it their all to shave off every last millisecond from their time. I hope everybody had fun with this game over the holiday season, and we'll see you back here on the F-ZERO track this time next year! NOTE: Our next High Score Squad Challenge is Video Pinball for Atari 2600! Be there!

Happy New Year! We are now only 63 years away from the great robot takeover...

2'17"85 Looks like I still have room to cut off a couple seconds. At the starting line, I move to the side to let my opponents hit me from behind so that I get a boost of speed for my first lap.

Small improvement that took a lot of work. Using turbos wisely and a strong first lap are a key for me. 2'18"45