CrossBow
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Posts posted by CrossBow
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A top 10 on 7800 ehh? This might be tough for me to list. And I wouldn't say I have a particular order for them either. But these are the games that impressed the heck out of me when I had my 7800 in the late 80s and still impress me today.
Double Dragon - yes I know the music is ear grating and the graphics could be better. But at the time I preferred it to the NES version as I felt the 7800 version was more like the arcade in the level layouts. Plus some of the levels did have some pretty great detail in their graphics and it was really just the character sprites that were lacking most.
Xevious - This was one of the games I got pretty early with my 7800 and I still feel this is the best home port of the arcade game.
Joust - Again, this was an early game I got for the 7800 and after my mom and I had played the 2600 version so much, this was QUITE a step up and still great to play.
Rampage - Again it doesn't compare as well to other releases such as the SMS version, but at the time, it was one of the games I saw coming out soon that made me want a 7800. I played it all the time in the late 80s. But it doesn't get much if any play time these days.
Xenophobe - Again the Lynx version of this just trounces the 7800 version. But between the 7800 and NES versions, I always preferred this one and I still play this game today as I like how quick it plays and find it impressive still.
Food Fight - I had never seen the arcade game when I was kid, but I was enticed by the screen shots on the back of the box back in the late 80s when I bought this. I was NOT disappointed and played it much more than I ever though I would.
F-18 - Yes it is a sad excuse for being a flight simulator. But at the time I found it very impressive and still fun to play given the graphics and the odd stuff I would try and do when playing this game and had a lot of fun playing it and mastering the challenges.
Pole Position II - yes it was the pack-in for the console. But it was also one of the games that made me want the console because I felt at the time that the graphics were amazing! I don't play this one much these days but I sure did when I was kid!
Crossbow - well, it shouldn't surprise anyone that this one is on my list. After all it is indeed part of why I have my online handle. The arcade game was always a fascination to me so when I saw this was on the 7800, I had to have it. And I still play this one from time to time even today. I actually prefer the joystick controls with this game because that was how I leaned to play it in the late 80s when I owned it. I still find this game to be pretty graphically amazing on several of the scenes. The volcano and castle scenes for instance were quite something back then.
Commando - This was NOT a game I originally owned in the late 80s and would only come to know of its existence on the 7800 years later when I got back into retro gaming and started collecting. Not sure how I didn't know about it back then but I did own the 2600 version and played that a bit. But once I got Commando on the 7800, it is and has been my favorite home port of the arcade game. And I'm quite familiar with the arcade game as I own the actual arcade cab. The 7800 version is very close to the arcade gameplay and ups it a bit with the hidden POW spots to find. However, I've found at least one spot where it is easy to just farm enemies over and over so high scores on this game are stupid easy to amass. Still, I play this quite a bit and it is sure to be played at least once, anytime the 7800 is powered up for any extended session of play.
So I guess I lied and I did kinda make this as a top ten with Crossbow and Commando being my two top faves for the system of original releases. The 7800 is easily my favorite Atari console I own and my second favorite console to play and collect for next to my Sega Genesis.
- 7800 Pro Gamer and RickR
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@Scott Stilphen I wasn't implying that what you said wasn't truth. I was only stating that Matt was present at the 2010 CGE. And yes I'm pretty sure here was there as part of the AA setup and booth. I've had a few dealings with Matt and he has been cool with me but it wasn't related to protos and was more about upgrades and services on his consoles.
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Except that Matt was there at the 2010k even I know for a fact as he was assisting Al with the AA booth and somewhere he had his plexi cases up with his protos in it. Might have been loaned to the museum now that I think about it for the show. It was the last year I think AA was part of CGE though? I don't know for sure as I never attended CGE again beyond that. the 2010 event was the last one before I went to PRGE in 2018 and 2019.
- RickR and Sabertooth
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These just a few more recent pickups from last month and this month so far.
The cable on the lower right is an s-video and audio output cable for the Atari 8-bit computers that I had made from Hercules cables out of Canada. Was hoping it would resolve or help with my vertical bars issue on s-video output from my 130xe, but sadly that was not to be...
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12 hours ago, Clint Thompson said:
@CrossBow Want to say I had checked but since the price was almost double, I didn't mind waiting.
Price was double? How much did you pay then if you don't mind my asking? I think when I bought m UNO from TBA it was only about $50 at the time and just a tad more with shipping so I felt that was a pretty good price.
The UNO is really nice but I've found a few disk images that it just simply doesn't seem to want to work with. As a result, I've found myself using my FujiNet more these days. But I still pop in the Uno when I need to load up something fast! I also ended up getting a replacement case for mine as the original case from TBA.... didn't last long. The case on the one you received looks pretty nice!
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14 hours ago, Clint Thompson said:
Finally after about a month shipped from Slovakia, the UnoCart for my XE/XEGS arrived so now I can play a ton of XEX, ATR and other goodies....
Why didn't you just order one from The Brewing Academy? Are the out of stock there or something? That is where I got my Uno for my 130xe, but found out later it has some issues with some ATRs and XEX and so I find myself using my FujiNet 90% of the time now.
My only issue besides the compatibility, is the 3D printed case that TBA provides. I ended up spending more money for a much better quality 3D printed case to house both my Uno and FinalGrom carts in.
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1 hour ago, nosweargamer said:
I love how the NES and Genesis are called too complicated in this picture from their StartEngine page.
Honestly, nothing in that complicated pile is complicated. You put in a game and turn on the system and start playing for the most part. Sure the Xbox had updates etc. but it was part of the start of online stuff back then. And while those controllers in the later gen consoles shown might have quite a few buttons, how does it compare with the original Intellivision controller or with how many possible buttons could be created on that touchscreen that the Amico is using on the controllers?
Pretty sure it will still be quicker to power on and be up and gaming even on that Xbox in that complicated systems picture than it will with the Amico or any of the current modern systems today.
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This says quite a lot right here:
NM. I see that this was already known but I just found out about it so my apologies.
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Well, while I don't have enough for a full controller build, I did use some of the older 3 contact domes like those found on CX-40 controllers to replace some missing buttons for my test 5200 controller in the lab and while it took some fiddling to get them to line up and work, they do work and seem to work well.
Ideally it would be nice if some slightly smaller domes could be made with the 4 contract points even smaller than the ones that C5 sells to make them easier to install and be usable.
Not sure how well they would work on the graphite coated mylars though as I would suspect the metal dome to eventually wear aware the conductive graphite coating.
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Isn't Cosmic Carnage kinda in the same genre? But yes I do really like Smash T.V. and I do own Xenocrisis for my Genesis. Wonderful game but I'm awful at it as I can't progress very far. Likely because it really wants and needs a twin stick setup to really get far in the game and I just haven't been able to acclimate to the control schemes for the game.
- DegasElite, Justin and Chubbz
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11 hours ago, Scott Stilphen said:
Who else is using Melody boards? Who else has means to even program (flash) them? There's a reason no such information about them has ever been made available, or that you can't even purchase them for your own projects. The Melody is (unofficially) exclusive to Atariage.
I understand that, I meant... going through AA to make these up as again the work there has already been done and it likely would have been much cheaper to just procure Al's services to make these up or possibly license whatever from Al to sell them the boards and program them up themselves.
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In my case, I found that my game carts read better through the jagCD cart slot than they do on the actual jag itself. So... yeah I keep it on there and even got a dust cover specifically for the jag+jagCD combo since I always have them together.
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I've got a working JagCD but rarely use it. Battlemorph is probably the one game that has the most hours of use from the JagCD. When I first got my Jag and JagCD combo back around 2002 or so, the JagCD didn't work at first. But a small tweak on the laser diode trimmer took care of it and it has been working since. Although again, I don't really use it that much although it is always attached to the Jag.
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I'm more curious why they didn't reach out AA to get boards for this purpose? AtariAge already has the Melody boards that can pretty much do what their board design claims to do so I'm not sure why they went to reinventing the wheel. Unless the current Atari just has NO idea about the existence of AA?
Either way, it looks to be a good design so I'm going to be more curious about how well it works with not just the 2600, but all the various clones, and the finickiness of the 7800 console revisions.
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No. My wife and I do not currently own any pets nor the desire to do so. When I was younger, I grew up around dogs and cats always present in our house. But once I moved out and got on my own I've never owned a pet since. The main issue is that my wife and I don't want to have to worry about leaving a pet with someone to look after if we should go out of town for a bit. Heck, we don't even like asking for friends to come by the house to get the mail and bring it inside when we are out of town.
So, no pets at this time.
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Hmm... probably been since around October maybe? Trying to remember when I bought the replacement case shell for my FinalGROM cart as that is when I finally setup the SDcard to check it out. But was kinda limited on what I could actually play as I still don't have a sidecar for it.
- RickR, - Ω - and RobertLM78
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On 1/22/2022 at 11:11 PM, TrekMD said:
Got these this week...
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I didn't pick up Gorf as I'm not a huge fan of the game. But I did pick up Gooninuff and that one is some really good fun! Not sure if there is an ending to it, but I think I got up to level 4 on my last play of the game during a live stream sometime back.
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12 hours ago, Scott Stilphen said:
Some Supercharger games have issues with certain 7800 variations:
http://www.ataricompendium.com/faq/faq.html#software18
There's a mod you can do to the 7800 to make it fully compatible with the Supercharger, but I don't know of any mod for the Supercharger.
VCS Star Raiders was certainly adequate at the time. Not the best, and not the worst. That, Starmaster, and Phaser Patrol all got rave reviews back then, with Star Voyager, Space Attack, and Star Ship bringing up the rear (http://www.ataricompendium.com/archives/reviews/reviews.html) No, none of them are equal to the original 800 Star Raiders. The entire VCS package was impressive for the reasons you mentioned. I had hoped Atari would have utilized the VTP for more games, but much like the Driving Controllers, it was another 'one and done'. Although Star Raiders wasn't the first "1st-person cockpit" space game (Atari's Starship 1 and VCS Star Ship) get the nod, Star Raiders was the 800's first 'killer app' and influenced a slew of similar games, with 800 Rescue on Fractalus and VCS Solaris being the best for those systems IMO (XTAL for the 800 also gets my vote).
Correct, the same fix for the Activision carts work for the SC games as well. Disabling the extra timing circuit by clipping (or better desoldering) one of the legs from C64 on the right hand, middle portion of the main board.
In fact SC games not working or not, can be replicated using the UNO or Harmony since it is the extra timing circuit that makes those games incompatible with the SC. I did a video showcasing all of this sometime back.
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2 hours ago, DegasElite said:
I thought the SuperCharger cartridge needed to be modified itself before it could be used on the A7800. Not the console itself. Interesting. I thought it was an internal issue in the cartridge, not a problem with fitting.
That is what has been reported in the past. But so far every 7800 I've attempted to use my SC with has worked just fine. The main issue is that the dust pegs on the SC are not spring loaded and they extend quite a bit forward. As a result, the SC is not able to be seated in all the way into the cartridge port of the 7800. Even if you have one that has been modified to allow for 3rd party carts to fit, it still won't without further modification.
The issue is that the section on the cartridge port on the ends where 7800 carts fit? You know the extra cart slot section? Well, just off from those is where the dust pegs enter for 2600 carts to fit. But, at the very bottom of those openings is additional molding on the cartridge sleeve where screws are used to hold the sleeve down onto the main board and against the actual cartridge slot. If you remove those sections of plastic, then the SC can seat down all the way to make proper contact and work. Same with Tigervision carts that are similar. However, doing this means that the only way the cartridge sleeve can stay in place, is with the small plastic snap tabs that also lock it down. If those should break, then the cartridge sleeve would have too much slop and move around making it kinda of a challenge to insert games sometimes.
Curt Vendel was supposed to be working on a solution for that but I never got to see the designs he came up with to try and counter again this. The most obvious solution would have been to extend the plastic molding downwards through the main board openings and then use a small piece of plastic that you would then attach the screws into. This way it would be attached below the PCB and not through it and topside of the PCB as it does currently.
- Sabertooth and DegasElite
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I also agree that Phaser Patrol is superior to both Star Raiders and Star Master on the 2600. But I didn't even know that game existed back in the day. In fact, the first time I even heard of the Super Charger was shortly after I got back into retro gaming and a buddy of mine at work at the time mentioned the game and SC and I was like...what heck are your talking about? He then brought it up to work one day for all of us to check out.
I only finally got around to buying a SC with Phaser Patrol as the pack in about a year ago to test with my 7800. Good to report it does work just fine on my 7800 but did require me to modify my cartridge port to allow it to fit all the way in.
- DegasElite, RickR, Justin and 2 others
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I'm not a fan of the 2600 version of the game at all. Like @AtariSphinx stated, Star Master is a better game in this regard. The touchpad was a cool idea to include, but the actual game play was far too choppy overall to be enjoyed. And yes, it was actually the 5200 version of the game along with Fractalus that made me seek out and get a 5200. Star Raiders on the 5200 is even better than the 8-bit as it takes advantage of the analog controls of the 5200 while having the keypad also right at your easy reach for the functions.
- Sabertooth, DegasElite, AtariSphinx and 2 others
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It looks good and seems to play amazing. But I'm not a fan of how they are trying to implement the speech here. I can just make out 'Human' but the rest of it is just garbled beeps that I'm finding sort of grating to my ears.
Still it is very impressive!
I have a few CV home brews, but my experience with them hasn't been that great to be honest. As an example the latest CV 'brew game I picked up was Suite Macabre and apparently that game doesn't seem to want to work on most actual CV consoles?! I have 2 CVs one of which is all stock and my daily driver that is upgraded with RGB, Composite, and the new +5 ram. The game refuses to go past the 3rd screen and locks up the system. But on my stock console it works fine. But on a 3rd console I just installed RGB into only, it too locks up on the 3rd screen.
There are other CV owners who bought the game and have the exact same issue using all stock CVs. But Collectorvision has not responded to any emails about it or comments in forums threads.
So based on my experience with that game and my lovely adventures in dealing with the guys that created Risky Rick... I'm very leary of buying any new 'brews for the CV unless I know it has specifically been tested on several revisions of the console first.
Atari 2600 or Atari 7800 - which one do you use for gaming?
in Atari 2600
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Been using 7800s for both 2600 and 7800 since I got my first one in the late 80s. I lucked out with my original 7800 because it turns out it is an '84 made unit so it doesn't suffer from any of the known compatibility issues nor have I ever had issues with inserting games. It won't seat a supercharger properly, but that wasn't something I knew about back then because I didn't own an SC much less know of its existence back then. Same with Tigervision carts that have issues, I didn't own any Tigervision games back then.
But, even now I still use a 7800 for all of my 2600 and 7800 gaming needs. With some slight modifications, I'm able to play all the tigervision games and use a supercharger if I wanted.