socrates63

As strange as it may sound in this community, my answer is the 2600. I can say with certainty that I am more excited by it now than I ever was as a kid. Sure, I loved it and practically begged my parents to get me one as a kid in the early 80s, but the mainstream 2600 games couldn't compete with the coin-op games of the arcades. While some games were a lot of fun (Activision Starmaster immediately comes to mind), I don't recall a game that really held deep interest or love. I think I owned eight to ten 2600 games as a kid (I had to save for three months to buy one game). Video games that I have most fondness for as a kid were all arcade games. The writing was probably on the wall when I got the Big Trak for Christmas, and I had a lot of fun programming it. By the time I discovered computers and programming in sixth grade, I lost interest in the 2600. I practically ignored all consoles after the 2600 because I was playing games on computers. While I briefly owned the Vectrex and GameBoy during the late 80s and early 90s and got a PS1 in '98 to play FF7, I played very little on consoles until I got a Xbox 360 in the late 2000s. After learning about this thing called retro gaming four years ago, I started learning about all the consoles and games that I passed on, in particular the PlayStations and Xboxes. A year ago, I started looking back on the 2600 and started playing Atari games again only this year. I bought the 2600, 5200, and 7800 just prior to joining the I/O in August and have since added an Intellivision, Jaguar, SNES, Genesis, and CoreGrafx to my console stable. My ability to appreciate past consoles has grown significantly the past year or two, and I now see I missed out on a lot of console gaming goodness especially during the 90s and 2000s.

2' 32" 34 I was regressing hard yesterday night, but finally saw an improvement today. Woohoo!

🤣 ❤️ haha me too

Thanks for posting the video link, Rick. It was a fun nostalgic trip. I had no idea that there was a remake -- very nice!

Making some changes to my CRT setup... this morning I picked up from a local gamer his JVC AV-27F577 TV to replace my Sony KV-27FS12. I think quality-wise, it's a lateral move. I did it primarily because it's in better physical shape, and I like the aesthetics of the JVC over my FS12. Another change to the setup is the addition of the Denon AVR-3806 home theater receiver. This particular receiver up converts composite and s-video signals and outputs a component signal, so I'm excited about that. But that aside, I added the receiver for two reasons. The first was to expand the number of inputs because my console stable has grown recently. Second, I wanted better sound. The speakers on the Sony were not good. I'm not sure how the JVC sounds as I hooked it up immediately to the receiver. I had a pair of unused Paradigm speakers. They're currently sitting on top of the TV until I can figure out a better placement. My CRT setup is in a small corner of my office, so there's not much room to work with. I also intend to watch DVDs using the PS2, so the speakers will help with that as well. This CRT A/V setup will serve up goodness from Atari 2600, 5200, 7800, Jaguar, SNES, Genesis, CoreGrafx, PS2, and later on, Wii and Atari 800XL. The Atari 2600, 5200, and 7800 output s-video, PS2 and Wii output component, and everything else is composite. I am currently using a passive switch box to handle the 2600, 5200, and 7800. I am getting another passive switch for the composite consoles. The passive switch boxes are connected to the receiver. PS2 and Wii will connect directly to the receiver. I also have a passive component switch box if I decide to add more component devices. The area is a bit of a mess right now, but things are finding their homes, and I'm happy about that. One last thing to note is the small Ikea desk that is sitting above the TV stand. The TV stand is an inch too wide to fit between the legs of the desk, so it is turned slightly to fit under it. I moved the desk out of my home theater room where the more modern consoles are, and the vacated space will be occupied by a new standing desk when I get a chance to put it together.

2' 34" 54 Logging in my first score!

I grew up watching the Rudolph stop animation and Frosty cartoon. The Frosty cartoon was always a bit of an emotional experience when he melted. As an adult, I always plan to do something on the day of a holiday, but things never turn out the way I envisioned. I realize now that that's been my mistake. Something always come up on that day -- family get togethers, impromptu errands to go to the grocery, etc. EDIT insert--> I should have scheduled to do things leading up to the day and not on the day of. <--| And to think that my day job is a program manager who manages risks and unexpected interruptions. But then again, at home, I just do what my wife tells me to do, so there is that 🙂

Actually, loose cart prices for these seem to have come down in recent months compared to a year or two ago especially for Cosmic Commuter. Boxed copies, however, looks to have gone up in price. I've heard good things about Cosmic Commuter. Take a look, Harry.

With the addition of HERO and Cosmic Commuter, I have completed the NTSC Activision games for the 2600. All my other Activision games are complete in box copies, and I hope one day I can upgrade these with CIB copies at a reasonable price.

I got a Core Grafx from a local gamer/collector this morning. He gave me a nice deal, and it came with an AV adapter that outputs composite and RGBs. It was $25 more than a PC Engine, but I was willing to pay a little extra to go with the dark gray case. Very nice looking console and it is tiny -- just the size of a CD case. This is the second console I bought in order to play in the I/O high score challenges. The Everdrive should arrive in a few days.

Was there an option to send it in? I'll have to go back and re-read. I've had an extra Ball Blazer set aside to serve as a POKEY donor for a while.

Nice! Looking good, Rick. The best thing for me is that using an SD cart means I don't have to deal with the death grip of my 7800.

I don't recall pulling off any feats worth remembering in all my years of playing video games. Sad, but then again, I've never considered myself much of a gamer skill-wise. The only thing remotely in-game feat-worthy is something that's not really a feat 😂 I've been playing Halo Reach in Firefight mode (waves and waves of enemies, no story) for about ten years. Earlier this year, I finally up the difficult from Normal to Heroic (Easy --> Normal --> Heroic --> Legendary), and I managed to finish classic firefight mode (set to one round) a couple of months ago. I felt pretty good about that, and it gave me the courage to try Legendary difficulty (that experiment was extremely short-lived).

Me, too -- loved Gorf in the arcade. It was quite the departure from Space Invaders gameplay. I remember being thinking "what's this?" back in the early 80s. I hear ya about the wallet. It doesn't help that Al releases all the new games in practically a single batch.

I haven't watched any ST series outside of TOS and TNG. I started rewatching both of them earlier this year and stopped. I'm planning to rewatch them next year. "Picardo" -- interesting name 🙂

No backpedaling allowed! 😇 😈 Go for 🥇 You're currently in first 🙂

Yes, this was the most surprising thing when I re-discovered the 2600 -- the passion of the home-brew community and the talented folks still coding for a 40+ year old platform. Some of the games rival NES games in graphics quality (to my eyes anyway). I've no doubt Champ Games will release an amazing version of Gorf. I'm also curious about their work on the 2600 Qix port, and their nearly done port of Robotron looks amazing.

Great job, @Sabertooth! I wonder whether this competition set the record for the highest point differential between first and last place 😄 It was very fun round, and I walk away with a story on why I acquired a Jaguar.

Superman II! 👍 Nice!! I don't know why I don't have any Christopher Reeve Superman movies in my movie library. Need to fix that. Thanks for opening 😇 and sharing the lovely photos! NSG's giveaways are always packed with a lot of geeky goodness.

In case @RickR's post wasn't clear enough, let the people's will be made more explicit to you @SuperTrooper: Open...

Added some NES games (couple of games with bad asses and some sports titles) and I don't even have an NES or a way to play these (yet?) 🙂 A local gamer was selling some stuff so I picked up some cartridges for future trades or junk box. He also tossed in some free displays/marketing posters(?).

I don't remember which game it was but I had to have a 2600 after playing it at my friend's house. I got it in 1981 or 82. That one TV in the house was definitely real back then 😆 Luckily for me, my parents didn't watch TV. I didn't have equipment conflict with them until several years later when I got into BBS and would tie up the home phone line. I always wondered why people would buy those black boxes with the boring looking cartridges, but that makes total sense -- if you're a Sears shopper, you bought your games there. I'm also about the colorful packaging, and it was the reason why I got into collecting 2600 games. And now, it seems like a lot of the Sears games are all the rage for serious collectors.

Hmm... I remember paying $300 for my 800 from Toys R Us because that was my dad's weekly net pay at the time. I suppose I could be wrong about the price. I gave zero hesitation about getting the 800 and gave no thoughts to anything else because it was Atari. It felt natural and obvious to me as a kid to get another Atari product. Yes that big price diff between the C64 and 800, and 5200 and CV for that matter, would have been a deal breaker for mom and pop. I guess when you've been the big dog in the market, it made the company feel like it can call the shots. Looking at those game prices now, they were very expensive! Game prices have only doubled since the 80s. I guess that's pretty good relatively speaking, but then again, the modern gaming market is so huge compared to back then.

Yes! Patches can definitely enhance the physical presentation of a game. What I like about these patches is that they're not reproductions of the actual Activision patches. They pay homage to the official patches while infusing some humor and are made for games that did not receive official patches. @RickR I actually haven't thought about how to display the patches, and it sounds like maybe a trip to Michael's or some other craft store is in order -- maybe Pinterest for some ideas 🙂 For now, they are sitting in the envelopes that they were sent in.