DegasElite

Well, what can I say....it was free and I love old stuff....
 
There is a pretty lively Laserdisc collector community here, and recently a really nice person in the group offered up a player for free.  I've always been curious about the format.  I've owned a few discs over the years just for the cool giant label art.  And the player was slightly broken...I think you all know my fondness for fixing stuff. 
 
So now I'm the owner of a gigantic top-loader Pioneer Laserdisc player.  It's been fixed, and seems to work great.  Here are some pics along with 3 movies I also received. 
 
I've got to be honest, I don't know what to make of the technology.  I surely do appreciate the evolutionary steps for home video...but this player is absolutely enormous!  It must weigh 30 pounds easily.  Takes up my entire workbench.  These movies come on two discs, which means 2 side flips and 1 disc swap for one movie!
 
Anyways, I'm very thankful for the generosity of the guy who gave this to me, and I'm going to keep and enjoy it. 
 
Anyone else have any opinions or memories of this technology?
 
 

when atari was first developing the jaguar after dropping the panther, what i was told was that the unit was going to be sorta compatible with the falcon, so that the games when ported over, did not have to be extensively reprogrammed for a proprietary jag only unit. jack said no, he wanted a unit that no one could put games on, without going through atari license agreements. he feared developers could bypass atari, and have a working jag game converted from the falcon or ST. which in my mind would be awesome.
 by making the unit with out enough ram, and proprietary, it was title starved. and of course, that was the history of jacks atari. we see today, there are those clever enough, to see that there is some compatibility there, and port st games over to the jaguar anyways.
 they are not 64 bit, but nether was theme park or cannon fodder. i do not know how far atari went with this discussion of compatibility, it seemed not to have lasted very long, along with making the jag lynx compatible.

I was wondering. Even though I have looked at this site before, I am wondering if there is a DIY way to manufacture and record a new issue CED video disc. Perhaps, the CED could be 3D printed. Vinyl records have been 3D printed before, and a CED is basically a record. I wonder if someone could manufacture a CED recorder just for the heck of it. But, the recording process was sold and it has not been released to the public, as far as I know. But, maybe this site has been updated with new information that I have not previously been aware of. Is this something new on the site that I may have missed, Kamikazi20012? Thanks for the information.

I have I-War for my Jag and have had it for over seventeen years. Completed the game, too. Fun game, but it needs work on the graphics, of course. But, needless to say, despite the visage of the game it plays quite well. I like it and I am sure it may have a following. But, bear in mind that the Jaguar is obscure and was under-marketed. It should have cheaply been upgraded to four megabytes of RAM or more instead of two. Better hardware and software support would have made the Jaguar a real beast to contend with. Did you know that third-party game developers for the Atari Falcon030 computer had 300+ titles ready to be converted for the Jag? It could have been easily done. But, Atari CEO Jack Tramiel put the kibosh on it, and that was part of the death knell of the Jag and, ultimately, Atari Corporation. We all know the rest of the story. However, one person has found a way to port Atari ST games to the Jaguar, as most of you already know, I am sure. So, by hook or by crook, I am sure someone will figure out how to port Falcon titles to the Jaguar. I am almost positive it is inevitable. But, people can learn Raptor BASIC+ from CJ. It is supposed to be easy to learn, but I am, alas, a noob and know really very little about game coding. So, that is another avenue for games to be released for the Jag.
 
Sorry for being long-winded. Atari games, however seemingly "obsolete" that they are, will still be my fave choice in gaming preference. I am just waxing passionate about it and, maybe, somewhat rambling on. No worries. Thanks for letting me share.

That is true. I would never really advocate piracy. No. But, there are people that have ported copyrighted titles to the Jag. I will not name names. So, Lost Dragon, you are correct on that statement. I am talking about making new home-brew games from scratch, of course. Plus, it would have helped to make commercial ports by the actual developers for the Jag, no doubt.

Thanks for the link. I will take a gander at this.

Yes, Ishar III was coming for the Jag. It was released also for the 3DO.

Hello, all,
 
Been a long time. Sorry about the hiatus. I am one of the beta testers for V61 and Tempest Elite, listed in the end credits as Artisan21. It is a spot-on game that will live up to players' expectations. We have tested various controllers, as it will have multiple controller support. So far, the best controllers that I have tested are the joystick, the European joypad, and the driving controller, with the driving controller being the best. You guys will love to play this game. It will be great. Thanks for letting me share that tidbit of information.

That looks like a fantastic port to the A8! The 7800 could really use a Tempest release too.

This is a game we have been working on for almost 5 years. Tempest Elite runs on a standard 64K Atari computer and has the ability to detect VBXE and Stereo Pokey. When detected it loads the subroutines (drivers) to take advantage of the upgraded hardware in 320x192 256 color mode. If not detected it will run with original Atari 8-bit Antic GTIA player/missile graphics in 160x192 4 color mode.
 

 

That's the Tempest 2000 music! 

I have never owned laser discs myself, but I remember when they were popular. I also remember a similar type of movie that you all have heard of: CED (Capacitance Electronic Disc), which is a movie disc that was really a record. They were popular around the time of Laserdisc. However, they phased out as well. The process of making CEDs is well hidden. No one knows how to do it anymore. I think RCA still has the writing technology, but they have not shared it with anyone else. They are just resting on their laurels with it when they could find an advanced way of producing it for the populace. I am sure that it can be done. but, that is just me. Laserdisc, however, was still being produced in the 1990s. I remember "Down Periscope" in widescreen format on Laserdisc. It was and is a great format for watching movies. I also like the Laserdisc games, Like "Dragon's Lair", and "Space Ace". Those were the best games I played in a long time. I could not beat them in the arcades, but did on the Atari Jaguar. Pretty cool stuff.

Truly, "Altered Beast" looks great on the Genesis. It could have looked better, granted, but that is all they could have done at the time. Sure, the arcade version was better, but we are dealing with a video game system that had the power of an Atari ST computer at the time. But, there were better looking games for the Genesis later on. But, for a 16-bit conversion, it is still a bang-up job. I liked it. When a game system is first developed, no programmer knows exactly the power of that system until they work with it. That can take several game writes. I mean, look at how much better "Street Fighter II: Special Champion Edition" looks on the Genesis than on the Super NES. It is almost a perfect carbon copy of the arcade version. Then, there is also blast processing on the Genesis. Sure, the Genesis in today's standards is primitive. But, I would rather play that than the PS4 or the XBox One. It is still a fantastic system, and "Altered Beast" is a fantastic game.

I have never owned laser discs myself, but I remember when they were popular. I also remember a similar type of movie that you all have heard of: CED (Capacitance Electronic Disc), which is a movie disc that was really a record. They were popular around the time of Laserdisc. However, they phased out as well. The process of making CEDs is well hidden. No one knows how to do it anymore. I think RCA still has the writing technology, but they have not shared it with anyone else. They are just resting on their laurels with it when they could find an advanced way of producing it for the populace. I am sure that it can be done. but, that is just me. Laserdisc, however, was still being produced in the 1990s. I remember "Down Periscope" in widescreen format on Laserdisc. It was and is a great format for watching movies. I also like the Laserdisc games, Like "Dragon's Lair", and "Space Ace". Those were the best games I played in a long time. I could not beat them in the arcades, but did on the Atari Jaguar. Pretty cool stuff.

Truly, "Altered Beast" looks great on the Genesis. It could have looked better, granted, but that is all they could have done at the time. Sure, the arcade version was better, but we are dealing with a video game system that had the power of an Atari ST computer at the time. But, there were better looking games for the Genesis later on. But, for a 16-bit conversion, it is still a bang-up job. I liked it. When a game system is first developed, no programmer knows exactly the power of that system until they work with it. That can take several game writes. I mean, look at how much better "Street Fighter II: Special Champion Edition" looks on the Genesis than on the Super NES. It is almost a perfect carbon copy of the arcade version. Then, there is also blast processing on the Genesis. Sure, the Genesis in today's standards is primitive. But, I would rather play that than the PS4 or the XBox One. It is still a fantastic system, and "Altered Beast" is a fantastic game.

I have never owned laser discs myself, but I remember when they were popular. I also remember a similar type of movie that you all have heard of: CED (Capacitance Electronic Disc), which is a movie disc that was really a record. They were popular around the time of Laserdisc. However, they phased out as well. The process of making CEDs is well hidden. No one knows how to do it anymore. I think RCA still has the writing technology, but they have not shared it with anyone else. They are just resting on their laurels with it when they could find an advanced way of producing it for the populace. I am sure that it can be done. but, that is just me. Laserdisc, however, was still being produced in the 1990s. I remember "Down Periscope" in widescreen format on Laserdisc. It was and is a great format for watching movies. I also like the Laserdisc games, Like "Dragon's Lair", and "Space Ace". Those were the best games I played in a long time. I could not beat them in the arcades, but did on the Atari Jaguar. Pretty cool stuff.

Truly, "Altered Beast" looks great on the Genesis. It could have looked better, granted, but that is all they could have done at the time. Sure, the arcade version was better, but we are dealing with a video game system that had the power of an Atari ST computer at the time. But, there were better looking games for the Genesis later on. But, for a 16-bit conversion, it is still a bang-up job. I liked it. When a game system is first developed, no programmer knows exactly the power of that system until they work with it. That can take several game writes. I mean, look at how much better "Street Fighter II: Special Champion Edition" looks on the Genesis than on the Super NES. It is almost a perfect carbon copy of the arcade version. Then, there is also blast processing on the Genesis. Sure, the Genesis in today's standards is primitive. But, I would rather play that than the PS4 or the XBox One. It is still a fantastic system, and "Altered Beast" is a fantastic game.

I'd give it a chance.  It would be nice to have an animated series on this classic that takes the series a bit more serious than the Simon character we were stuck with in Captain N.  I loved that show, too, but the personality the show creators gave Simon just never seemed right to me.  At times it was annoying.  I'm all for this if it is good.

http://www.retrocollect.com/News/new-atari-jaguar-controller-in-development.html?utm_content=buffer52ea0&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer
 
And WOAH NELLIE, it also says "5200 compatible!" 

That looks great! Very unique design too!
 

HeliCommander
A New Arcade Game for Atari XL/XE Computers
 
 
 
 
 
 
An Arcade Action Game in the style of Chopper Command and Choplifter
  Game Cartridge requires an Atari Computer with 16K of RAM and 1 Joystick
  Parallax Scrolling creating a great 3D effect and colorful scrolling objects and background
  Enemies - Choppers, Tanks, Bombers, Trucks, Bunkers, to challenge you.
  Many Challenging Levels to play
  This game was extensively beta tested to assure quality
  See video for more  

Actually it is joystick and keyboard. Up-Down-Left-Right to move the helicopter. Use the Left-Right Arrows on the keyboard to point the helicopter left or right. Press Down Arrow to point the Center the Helicopter to shoot at the ground.
The trackball is just about the only other controller that has up-down-left-right. I did add optional controllers to Megaoids - Joystick, Paddles, and anything that uses that "grey code" to rotate the ship left or right. So the trackball should work with that game.

To further answer that question, it will work with a trackball if the trackball has joystick mode. If I was to add trackball mode, it would end up playing the same.

Hi, all,
 
Sorry again for the long hiatus, but I am here with some special and exciting news. I have heard on AtariAge that the Vampire2 accelerator for the Commodore Amiga line of computers has been fitted for the first time in an Atari 1040STF computer. It looks to have a 68080 processor that can perform like a Falcon with a 68060 clocked at 150 MHz (the fastest 68060 was 75 MHz), and has 128 MB of fast RAM onboard the accelerator. Here is the link for that forum topic:
 
http://atariage.com/forums/topic/257989-apollo-68080-new-68k-core-running-on-atari-stf/
 
Please feel free to read on about this developing situation. I do not know when this accelerator will be fully ready for the ST/TT/Falcon line. But, thanks for letting me share this information anyway.

Hi, all,
 
Sorry again for the long hiatus, but I am here with some special and exciting news. I have heard on AtariAge that the Vampire2 accelerator for the Commodore Amiga line of computers has been fitted for the first time in an Atari 1040STF computer. It looks to have a 68080 processor that can perform like a Falcon with a 68060 clocked at 150 MHz (the fastest 68060 was 75 MHz), and has 128 MB of fast RAM onboard the accelerator. Here is the link for that forum topic:
 
http://atariage.com/forums/topic/257989-apollo-68080-new-68k-core-running-on-atari-stf/
 
Please feel free to read on about this developing situation. I do not know when this accelerator will be fully ready for the ST/TT/Falcon line. But, thanks for letting me share this information anyway.