AtariHero
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Posts posted by AtariHero
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Looks like the Jag might be getting another frog themed homebrew for it called Frogz 64. It's still rough by this quick video but it looks to be in a playable state. Being developed by Wave 1 Games
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My main thing is arcades and unfortunately without any Atari on the market these days, that limits discussion there. But for new arcade stuff, there is plenty going on.
There is an annual trade show called JAEPO that takes place every February in Japan. Here, all of the game makers for the market there show off their latest ideas, games and tech. The event has a strong focus on VR this year but many amusement places / arcades aren't really jumping on the bandwagon yet as amusement VR is still expensive, you need an attendant to watch the game/help people and earnings are not showing amazing ROI.
Here is news that I've compiled for JAEPO so far:
http://arcadeheroes.com/2017/02/09/jaepo-2017-begins-bombergirl-konami-soul-reverse-sega/
http://arcadeheroes.com/2017/02/10/jaepo-2017-day-2-new-arcade-videos/
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If all of the components in the cartridge were made from super-rare precious metals and the rest of the empty cart space was made out of diamonds, then maybe.
Otherwise, I find it difficult to justify any old game costing 4-digits, much less six
- Rowsdower70 and Retro Play
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Great thread! Some thoughts:
Rescue on Fractalus - (just operating off an assumption here) So if this was in development under Atari Inc., I would imagine that it was being made with the 7800 Keyboard in mind. That keyboard was going to have an additional 48k of RAM so it would have worked for both. That doesn't answer how they were going to do other computer ports that needed a bunch of keys though, since the keyboard was effectively shelved after the sale.
Speaking of lost hardware, biggest shame for me is the cancellation of the high score cart. Such a neat concept for the time
Missing In Action - Not sure why I never watched stuff on this game before. I guess it was made by the same team who did Midnight Mutants as there are some graphics and sound similarities. Real shame it got so far then was axed. It would have filled one of those niches on the systems.
KLAX - I also never watched this in action for whatever reason. What a port it would have been! It seems to play perfect to the arcade. It just needed something like the Pokey and it would have been great.
Pitfighter - no loss there although the character sprites do look nice. I'm not sure how this game made it in the arcade.
Electrocop - Still holding out for the day when the source or ROM on this one is found.
Plutos and Sirius - I picked these up when they were on sale. Great shooters for 8-bit platforms, certainly better than Trevor McFur
Another case of needing Pokey or some other sound chip to fill it out.GATO - I never could get into this style of game myself (kind of reminds me of Ace of Aces, which I don't care for).
Toki - I haven't followed the news on this one - still waiting for something or did they already do a limited run? The 7800 sorely needed platformers as that was the hot item in the late 80s. Weird that it was in development around '93 though.
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Even with save stats, which would help, a guide is almost necessary!
I actually think this is some of the best TIA music ever written. Yeah, Pokey could help with almost any TIA game, but some of the late releases really pushed what the TIA sound could do.
Yeah, I could agree with that. Excluding the 7800 pokey releases, I'm hard pressed to think of any game with music and sound as good as what MM does.
It still is unfortunate that Atari didn't really bother to do things like throw in more RAM or a different sound chip onto more games
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Thanks to whoever fixed the post
It seems like the cabinets were able to hold up over the years although I doubt that many have been on location since the 70s ended. It would make for a pretty cool space game - maybe Star Raiders arcade
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There is a discussion going on a closed 'arcade' Facebook group where a user there found a very rare Atari arcade game from 1975 called Hi-Way. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong but I believe that this was the first true sit-down driving game; it also would precede and influence the likes of Night Driver a year later.
The user will apparently be restoring the game but the thread has also generated another picture of a Hi-Way that I'll share here. In all of the research I've done about Atari & arcade history, this is the first time I've seen this game 'live' as opposed to old promotional materials. Here is the first pic attached:
- Yo-Yo, Arenafoot, Rowsdower70 and 3 others
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I can't that I wouldn't enjoy having an Asteroids cab or even a cocktail table version would be nice. And that is some interesting info. Out of all of the "Speed" games I think Rush 2049 was my favorite. As far as early to mid-80's games from Atari...Tempest & Centipede would have to be my top picks. Owning one cab or table would be nice...but there is no way I could afford one let alone have room for such a thing right now.
Keep and eye out for deals and you might get lucky - I have an Asteroids Deluxe that was my 3rd game. A friend of mine found it being thrown away so he picked it up and held it for me as I was out of the country. Would have been free if not for the repairs required!
Rush 2049 is my favorite racing game period - I set one up back when they were new at my first arcade job. After that, it was almost exclusively playing Rush during breaks and after-hours. I understand that people love Daytona a great deal but Rush 2049 is a bit more interesting to me with the changing details between each lap, the way the shortcuts were setup, the difficulty/handling, the cars, etc.
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Thanks for the welcome everyone!
Welcome to the forums AtariHero!! I remember Kingdom Atari, so cool to have you join us! People here are great, I hope you really enjoy the forums. WELCOME!
Wow, someone remembers that site that isn't me! Granted, if there was a copy of it around somewhere, it would probably be embarrassing to look at it now.
But you've got to start somewhere Glad to have ya here. If you have the time please post some pics of those arcade games over at the video game room topics. Im sure we would all love to see em
Certainly! I did a video tour several months ago but I will be moving the business soon so it will probably be best to wait. I wouldn't mind putting all of my Atari games right next to each other
- Lost Dragon and jmjustin6
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I had Viking Child on the Lynx since '98 or so and I tried REALLY hard to the like it...but Wonder Boy was certainly the superior game. I replayed it recently and if it had a soundtrack that Imagitec was known for at least later on, that would have helped tremendously.
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Hello all,
I should have started here first but went ahead posting elsewhere.
I have been around different Atari forums since '97 - Jaguar Interactive II, Jaguar Sector II, AtariAge, groups on Facebook. Never been banned from anywhere.
I just want to talk about the systems and the games - no real penchant or time for personal dramas Names were generally under Shaggy or some variation on that. I haven't really been active on an Atari forum since JS2 closed...I do some occasional posts on AA or a Facebook group here and there.I own the Atari 2600, 5200, 7800, 800XL, XEGS, ST, Lynx, Jaguar and presently 9 Atari arcade games (one of which is their pinball machine Space Riders).
Long, long ago when Geocities was a thing I ran a site called "Kingdom Atari". That all seems to have been lost but it was fun for learning HTML and such things. I also ran a site called Castle NUON for a couple of years to discuss and report on that hardware, which felt a lot like the Jaguar 2 that we never got.
Currently I operate a site called Arcade Heroes where my focus is on real arcades and the current market surrounding those. Been doing that for 10 years and it is a lot of fun.
Professionally I own and operate a business in Utah called the Game Grid Arcade which will turn 9 this year. I also do website design and writing for an arcade distribution business and have done writing for a pinball mod company at the end of last year. I sold arcade games for five years while at a major online distributor but I quit that job last year to move onto brighter, greener pastures.
I look forward to hanging out!
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One of the coolest little...surprises in I-War was going into the 3rd person behind-the-tank view when activating the shield. You get a 3D reflective sphere (not a perfect sphere, early 90s 3D chunky sphere) with reflective textures! To me, that is one of the coolest special effects on the Jaguar but it seems to get overlooked a lot since most people just play the game in first-person. Granted, the frame rate suffers when this shield is on...still looks very cool.
I liked I-War - didn't love it as I'm not a huge fan of teleport room mechanics and trying to keep track of that. That said I always had more fun with I-War than Hover Strike. Sure HSCD looked better but I-War felt like you were playing one of the tanks in TRON and I have a soft spot for tank games.
And yes, the soundtrack was great as the tempo and style fits this kind of game, just like the track in T2k was more energetic to fit with that faster pace of a game.
Given that this thread was started over a year ago I'm sure no tips are needed but as I can recall, playing with the heavy tank was the best way to start. It was slower but could take a beating. When you have you 'I-war legs', then the other tanks are good to use. Remember to use your map and you won't get lost; use your missiles for packed rooms but watch where you aim since those could collide with something else and blow up prematurely.
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This may not be new news to anyone, I'm not sure, but I had the opportunity to speak with one of the guys recently that was working on the project with them. Turns out that Tetrisphere really is a'bit of a different game than what was originally being made for on the Jaguar. Some things to highlight or note:
-Game play on the Jaguar version is bolder and simpler, which makes it more entrancing and faster-paced than Tetrisphere.
-It uses all flat-shaded polygons and the frame rate was always about 60.
-The game play is faster on the Jaguar because you could not/did not produce 'combo chains' or drag pieces around, you just focus on moving the sphere to align with the current piece. Part of the reason this changed for the N64 is because the producer, who was of Killer Instinct fame, seemed to be obsessed with 'combo' move game play. As a result, the game play has to be slower as a result to provide enough time to move pieces around to align before dropping a piece. It takes away from the core mechanics a bit. Also, since it became a more complex game, it almost couldn't be played without some sort of explanation to a new player where as on the Jaguar version, you can just pick it up and go!
-Graphics - the textures got a bit noisy and heavy on the N64 - there is something much punchier and clear about the flatter style of the shaded polygons for the Jaguar version.
-The team continued working on Jaguar stuff for a bit during the development of Tetrisphere but more because it was a pet fascination given the imperative to ship Tetrisphere. They had a very interested and talented programmer at the time that found the Jaguar to be really powerful for making sprite based games but felt it was oversold as a 3D platform - they kept experimenting but never settled or committed to anything else.
-Music was done in XM format ( fast tracker ) and was roughly around 75% accurate and sounded all kinds of messed up. Soundtrack would have been very similar to what was in Tetrisphere but more constrained in terms of number of voices due to cartridge rom size. XM could have up to 64 channels vs MODs being limited to 4.
Maybe said person I spoke with may find their way here to further elaborate and share even more detailed experiences/memories.
Awesome stuff Clint. That's more info than we've ever heard about the game in 20 years. I like the sound of a faster (i.e. more arcade like) game that they had going on. I really hope some build of this shows up in the near future.
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I received mine a few months ago. It is an awesome product, well-designed and with a 3D printed cart shell to boot.
I usually run it in my LCD upgraded Lynx. I've been able to enjoy Dracula again - while also discovering Shanghai (guess I'm a sucker for a decent puzzle game...Lynx version is hard though), Desert Strike (wow) and Double Dragon (one of those you always read about but rarity makes it pricey).
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This game really deserved the Pokey sound treatment - shame they didn't use it and or cheapened out on probably the most unique title for the Atari 7800, unless you're into that weird golf game...;-)
While that could be said for 95% of the 7800 library, it was especially true here. Although there is a certain charm to MM using the TIA like it did. I'm probably just saying that because I've played this one to death.
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It's been a while since I setup the 5200 (sorry SuperSystem...my XEGS gets most of the 8-bit love) but when I do play it it's usually:
Space Dungeon - I'm not sure what it is about this one but this is my favorite game on the system
Adventure II (guess this doesn't count as it is a homebrew but IMO, it was done in a such a professional way that it is worthy in my book)
Star Raiders
BallBlazer
I have Berzerk for the Atari XE/XL so haven't sought out a 5200 copy; BallBlazer is kind of the same thing. It's great on the computers but even better on the 7800.
I've heard great things about RealSports Baseball but never have come across the 5200 version.
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I'm coming in way late to this discussion but off the top of my head (and using the AA site as a measuring stick):
Quest for Quintana Roo - Sunrise (R8)
Also rarish:
Mines of Minos (R6)
Threshold (R6)
Earth Dies Screaming (R5)
Laser Gates (R5)
Artillery Duel/Chuck Norris double (R5)
All loose so no bonus points there. I do have a Frogger II in box with all the originals for the 5200 though. One of my nicest finds at the thrift store years ago
I'll have to look through my collection again to be sure...I have a Starpath cart but can't remember which tapes I had for it apart from Communist Mutants. I have to imagine that few of those tapes survived as more than a couple were probably erased.
- RickR, Rowsdower70, Kid A and 3 others
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Hello all - just joined the forums after hearing about it elsewhere. No worries about where but I've been around the community for ...crap, twenty years now that I think about it. Started in 1997 with Jaguar Interactive II and have bounced around many a forum since. Generally I went by Shaggy or Shaggy the Atarian. Now AtariHero.
Anyways, I own and operate an arcade in Utah and along with the blog Arcade Heroes, most of my focus is on the arcade side of things these days. I see the arcade forum here is a bit slow so perhaps this might help a tiny bit:
http://atarigames.com/atarinumbers90s.pdf
That right there is the only list I have ever seen for any game manufacturer that shows potential sales numbers and original MSRP. It isn't complete as you can tell off the bat with no production numbers until Breakout; also no production numbers after Radikal Bikers. I know that Marty of Atari Museum has also commented on it being inaccurate although to what degree I do not recall him elaborating on that.
That said, it's "better than nothing" by a long shot and no other, more up-to-date list exists that I have seen. It sure would be fascinating to see similar documents for Exidy, Midway, Namco, Sega, etc...or if such a list exists for Atari's home consoles and what the cartridge production numbers were.
Taking it at face value, Star Wars was the last game in the 80s to achieve 5-digit numbers for the company, until you come to Area 51 and combine all of the numbers to reach over 11k (not counting the "Duo Kit", which I'm 99% sure was the Area 51/Maximum Force kit). Gauntlet might have also achieved above 10k but the 2 player model is missing a number. Atari Games did change ownership a few times over this period and that certainly affected things along the way. Then other outside changes in the market, etc. You can also see where Rush and California Speed did well for the company...it's too bad the numbers are missing on Rush 2049 and War as I've always been curious about those.
Also at face value that puts Asteroids as their best-selling arcade game of all time (56,565 when including cocktails; cabaret is missing the number though so it could mean Asteroids was around/above 60k depending) with Centipede not far behind (56,006, all cocktail & cabaret models included).
So there we go...discuss!
- Rowsdower70, Justin, RickR and 4 others
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Atari / Namco F-1 1976 arcade game
in Atari Arcade Games
Posted
I've never had the pleasure of seeing an F-1...it's another rarity. I have come across various EM games that pretended to be video games however and I really find the ingenuity to make them work fascinating. Too bad they are generally enormous and I'm not quite technical enough to figure out how to fix them. Otherwise I wouldn't mind having a couple in my arcade.