Justin

For a minute I thought you had a 1986+ red end label on a cartridge from Warner VCS color box! Then I zoomed in and realized it must be red light from the TV reflecting off of the cartridge. Had my jaw drop for a second!

@Shinto I was just thinking about you and the Atari Jaguar Game by Game Podcast the other day when I was launching the Mutiny page and contemplating how best to showcase new podcast episodes in the sidebar. Your contribution to the Jaguar experience is appreciated greatly, and I know that you've been a highlight on our podcasts app for years. Thank you for continuing to put out the podcast year after year! You are welcome to syndicate your AJGBG Blog-flavored companion show notes here anytime.

Now that Star Trek: The Motion Picture is available for purchase I'm considering grabbing it. I've come to appreciate this movie more over the years. Now that it's been out for a little while, have any of you had the chance to see the final product? Were you happy with it or is it inconsistent? How does it compare to the older blu-ray release?

EXCELLENT video @RickR thank you! I've become a big Xon fan over the years. I wish we would've seen a fleshed-out Xon throughout the feature films played by David Gautreaux, if not becoming a recurring character in Star Trek: The Next Generation. David Gautreaux was young enough to have played Xon as a contemporary Vulcan during TNG/DS9/VOY and that would hav worked well. I'm grateful that we received Tuvok though, who is for sure one of the highlights of all of Voyager. The Phase II test footage from main engineering that appears at the 5min mark in the video is what always comes to mind for me when I think of the test footage of that show. It's amazing how everything feels like it's halfway between TOS and TNG in the look and feel of everything. Almost at home in the original Battlestar Galactica. Its really cool to see the central warp core set from underneath the glass that early on. It's probably the first thing they ever shot on that set. I also find it quite interesting that the test footage was filmed in movie format as opposed to television. I wonder if this was normal at the time, or if Paramount was already anxious to see tests of this set, costumes and characters for how they would appear in a motion picture should they choose to go that route. I enjoyed this video and will have to check out some of his others! Okay enough nerding out for today, time to get back to work 😛🖖

For a brief moment this morning I was tricked into believing this was a clip from the unaired pilot to Star Trek: Phase II. ("But they never filmed a pilot for Star Trek: Phase II, only screen-tests" I thought to myself...) I was right of course. But for about 10 seconds I was trying to make sense of what I was seeing. The description to this video says "Scene from the unaired tv pilot "Star Trek phase ii" 1977. William Shatner as Captain Kirk, now married with children, having an existential moment. Robert Reed as his first mate." Again, I thought to myself "Robert Reed as first officer? Never have I heard that "Mr. Brady" would've been involved in Star Trek, let alone the first officer on Phase II". What we're actually seeing is a scene from a movie called "Pray for the Wildcats" about a group of middle aged men on a motorcycle road trip to get away from it all. It featured Andy Griffith as a nasty bad guy who can't control his anger and turns on his friends. William Shatner and Robert Reed also starred in this film. What's so interesting is that in the scene shown above, both William Shatner and Robert Reed are wearing what looks to be appropriate Starfleet uniforms that we might've seen in Phase II, Shatner in Gold and Reed as the "redshirt", then Shatner mentions the name "Farragut" - the ship that James T. Kirk served on as first officer. Even though this isn't from anything to do with Star Trek, I'm surprised I never came across this until this morning.

That's amazing, thanks @Jinroh! We'll always try to keep the Mutiny page streamlined, super useful and fun

One thing I'm most excited about with the Mutiny Community page is Swapmeet! (an obvious homage to Halt and Catch Fire) There are two Swapmeet boxes on the Mutiny page - the main one prominently featured under the Yahoo! search bar, and the second one featured like "classified ads" on the sidebar to the right. Both boxes work as an aggregator to skim the surface of what's new in the multitude of Marketplace forums - including Wanted, For Sale, Ebay, and Trading Post - and displays the most recent results from across the board. It's my hope this will enhance the trading experience and give a lot more value to posting trades here, and make us a place you want to go to buy, sell and trade with friends! Swapmeet is one of those simple things that makes the Mutiny page so useful - at a glance you can see everything going on in our community quickly, in many aspects even better than on the activity stream page alone.

I hope it turns out to be cool AND convenient! 😛 THANK YOU @Jinroh this has been in the works for quite a while. I'll have to share the story. And major credit to Rob A.K.A. @MaximumRD who helped me get the origins of this started in 2010, and was there again in January, 2022 along with @RickR and @Sabertooth when I was asking questions and seeking out ideas. ABSOLUTELY! The Mutiny Community page is a fun way to invite people to check in on Atari I/O every day - just like Atari Day, invite them to visit or make it their homepage YES 🙌 HAHA thank you @MaximumRD and for all the laughs and inspiration, and for always being there along the way.

@Sabertooth I was just about to ask @Video 61 a similar question. Lance has told me before that he saw sales figures for Jaguar games, and I think it was Fight for Life or Ultra Vortek had only manufactured, or only sold somewhere around 6,000 cartridges. I see in his Blog post Lance is talking about faxes from 1985-1990, mainly 2600/7800 and 8-Bit computers, with the Lynx towards the end. I think we all have a sense that the Jaguar was likely a different story with numbers closer to what Lance was talking about with Activision. Makes me wonder if Atari made any money on the Jaguar at all.

@Video 61 This is really good advice for indie developers and the entire homebrew market - especially right now as we move toward an unknown future. I hope everyone developing new games for retro platforms will give your Blog a read. Including the most loved homebrew guys, and new Atari themselves. "Those who don't learn from the past are doomed to repeat it." Lance, I said in your status update that this is an epic win for the entire Atari community - worldwide - to have you Blogging. I've known a number of people who worked at Atari, both under Warner and under Tramiel - programmers, execs, MBA types, designers - but none of them in that building were ever on the ground selling Atari games and systems at a retail level, let alone still doing it today after almost 40 years. You have such a unique story and experience - so much knowledge and stories and legends - that all needs to be shared. I'm so grateful you're here posting and interacting with the community. Atari users worldwide will benefit from this, and I will make sure that these Blogs and your knowledge stays online and gets passed on long after we're all gone. We're all so glad you're here doing this

This seems to be a thing that's been going on for a very long time. 🖖 Sir Henri Charles Wilfrid Laurier was the seventh Prime Minister of Canada from 1896 to 1911, being the first French Canadian to serve as Prime Minister.

⑆ On August 15th we celebrate MUTINY INDEPENDENCE DAY with the launch of MUTINY COMMUNITY! You'll see it in the purple navigation menu where chat used to be. Mutiny is an homage to the communities of the early Web, and at a glance gives us a top-down view of our community, emphasizing our grassroots that bring us closer as we once were in the chatroom. Mutiny highlights trades and swaps, Blog discussions, news, chat, High Score Squad, Clubs and so much more. Mutiny includes a classic Yahoo! Search Bar to make surfing the net a breeze, and Swapmeet aggregates recent topics from For Sale, Wanted, eBay and Trading Post, so you can see at a glance what's up for grabs. Special attention is given to the Clubs and Squad Challenges, and encourages you to build your own I/O Blog. New YouTube and Podcast posts are displayed in the sidebar. Mutiny evokes the friendly, quirky vibe of the early web, and replaces our chatroom with a living webpage that is in a constant state evolving and cuts deep into to the heart of our community - and I hope you consider making it part of your daily routine as your new homepage for every time you log onto the Web. Let's go! ⑆

I wish we had seen more of that! I always felt the Atari 7800 could do almost anything with an extra chip or two on the cartridge board. @Video 61 explained to me that GCC developed the Atari 7800 to be extremely capable in this area through adding additional RAM to the cartridge board, which was something Jack Tramiel didn't want to do very often as he was competing on price. Maybe Lance has more to add to this?

For me, the most NES-like Atari 7800 game is one that was never released: Atari 7800 ElectroCop, which has absolute NES Metroid vibes:

@Atari 5200 Guy If someone were to do a Top Gun game or sound demo for the Atari 7800, right now would be the best time. Imagine that Top Gun song on the 7800 playing through a Yamaha chip or even POKEY. @Atari 5200 Guy ABSOLUTELY!! Somebody needs to get on that. Not just port Mega Man, but create a new character and new game with gameplay dynamics that are satisfying to the player in similar ways.

@RickR I literally went to bed last night thinking "You know, it would be pretty amazing if Rick could program an Atari 7800 game." @Jinroh do you have experience programming for the 7800? Either 7800BASIC or MARIA?

@TrekMD @RickR @Jinroh I didn't realize what I posted earlier was an abbreviated version. Here is the full event: Jack Tramiel mentions the "Pet Jet" plane crash, discusses Steve Ross approaching him to take Atari off his hands and how Jack was frustrated that Atari was so oriented to video games when he was trying to develop a new computer. Atari's Al Alcorn is in the audience and speaks for a moment as well. Enjoy!

What's the most NES-like Atari 7800 Game? In terms of: Gameplay Quality Some might say Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr. or Mario Bros which would be an "on-the-nose" choice. Others might say something like Ikari Warriors or Midnight Mutants. An unreleased title like KLAX would be another one to consider. What game do you think shines the brights on the Atari 7800 and elevates it to the level of Nintendo?

@TrekMD You're welcome 🖖 It's definitely more Commodore than Atari but fascinating to watch.

Interesting conversation with Jack Tramiel, featuring Steve Wozniak, at the 25th Anniversary of the Commodore 64. This conversation presents another side of Jack Tramiel that many here may not have seen. An interesting watch:

I love this picture of you holding the colecovisison joystick!

What's the story with this AV modded Atari 7800?

WOW! Marked down from $80! I'm going to grab that right now.

I will 🙂 I'm in Naples but it would be worth the drive. I'm usually over your way about once a month anyway. Best wishes!