socrates63
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Posts posted by socrates63
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I'm pretty excited today -- I drove about 20 minutes to pick up my very first heavy sixer from its original owner. She had bundled it with several controllers and a bunch of games. This will go on the shelf for display as I have a light sixer for daily use. This was a very pleasant surprise. I've been keeping an eye on FB Marketplace, checking in once in a while, hoping to find a heavy sixer locally. While in bed for the night yesterday, I took a peek and found the bundle posted a few hours earlier.
The console looks to be in great cosmetic and functional shape. The only thing I noticed was that the game select switch did not return to position like the reset switch does. The spring must be missing. I'm thinking of asking Crossbow to take a look and refurb it later.
It also came with some controllers (two sets of paddles not shown) and one of them is wireless. For me, it's more of a novelty as I already have arcade joystick controllers and the two other flight stick style controllers aren't anything special. I'm very happy to have picked up another Wico Bat joystick though. It's in better condition than the one I already had and looks to have gotten little use.
The games in the bundle are quite impressive in terms of diversity -- very nice -- and a couple I've not seen before.
- RickR and sramirez2008
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@HDN I've only bought games that I intended to play. The intention is there, but the execution of those intentions is a separate matter. The mouth is bigger than the stomach, so to speak.
With some very rare exceptions (e.g., Star Wars games from Limited Run Games), I don't buy games for the sake of collecting them but to play them. That's why I don't pay much attention to the market value of games once I've purchased them.
If the intent to play the game is my guiding principle, and it has been, then I think I'm probably at the point where I should review my games library and identify games that I don't think I will play. I can reallocate the physical space and proceeds from the sale to future additions 🙂 That's my thinking right now.
- Sabertooth and HDN
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My SNES library has grown 1,300% from one game to now thirteen total. I thought the old guys were the ones who corrupted the youth of the city, but in the I/O it's the youth corrupting the old. Even a week ago, I didn't think I'd add more games beyond NBA Jam TE to my little SNES collection.
Man, the labels on these huge cartridges are just too small. Here's the list of games:
- Actraiser 1 and 2
- Donkey Kong Country 1, 2, 3
- F-Zero
- Illusion of Gaia
- Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past
- Super Mario World
- Super Metroid
- Super Punch Out
- Zombies Ate My Neighbors
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Loved the video @CrossBow -- your voice, delivery, tone, pace, and the music... so good. I thought I was watching a PBS show. I really appreciate the fact that folks like you are out there keeping the hobby alive and accessible for many of us who'd probably burn a hole in the mainboard if we had a soldering iron in hand and can't tell the difference between capacitors and resistors and all the other electronic doodads. 👏👏👍
But that ending there... of course you'd test the Colecovision with Donkey Kong. Why wouldn't you test the system with the game that put it on the map? For me as a kid, Donkey Kong on a home console was a sore spot. Call it envy. My mind was blown the first time I saw the TV ad for Colecovision and Donkey Kong -- it really looked and sounded like the arcade version, and my 2600 games looked nothing like that.
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Yes, living life! I’m at my parents’ place for lunch. Gaming and my other hobbies have always taken a backseat to family, work, and church.
Totally nothing sad about skipping consoles from the third generation and beyond. I had an incredible time learning BASIC programming and playing games on Atari computers and later on the PC. I wouldn’t trade that for anything as those experiences led to lifelong love for computers and video games. Besides, if I had an NES myself, I couldn’t have crushed on my friends who were blowing on their cartridges. I was like, “What you fools doing?!?”
Now, I’m filling in some of those gaps. TBH, I had no intentions of getting into SNES, but conversations here have nudged me enough. Heck, I’m even thinking about getting an Intellivision and Genesis now.
- HDN, nosweargamer and RickR
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1 hour ago, HDN said:
@socrates63 If I read your post correctly you have only played TWO Nintendo console games? No Super Mario Brothers? No F-Zero? No Mario Kart 64? No Luigi's Mansion? No Super Smash Brothers Melee? No Clu-Clu Land? No Super Mario 64? No Mike Tyson's Punch Out? No Startropics? No Jekyl and Hyde for NES? If I remember from our chat on Wednesday you had a Game Boy, right?
That is correct — I’ve never played any NES, SNES (outside NBA Jam), GC, Wii (except Sports), WiiU, nor Switch games. I have all the consoles except NES though — just haven’t played anything.
I have played a few GB games (mostly Tetris and Mario Tennis) and a couple 3DS games (Mario Tennis and a bit of Nano Assault). I have GBC, DS Lite, 3DS and New 3DS in the house.
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I guess Atari never learned and doomed itself by repeating the same failure with the XEGS. That’s one that I ignored back in the day because I thought it was just an 8-bit computer marketed as a gaming console and an extremely ugly one... those pastel color buttons (I wasn’t a fan of the 130XE either although I had one). The 5200 I skipped as a kid because of money and then I got into the 800.
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9 minutes ago, RickR said:
My main concern with a book like this is that they can end up being a hatchet job on particular individuals. I'd love to read about the games, the designers, how they came up with ideas, the challenges they faced, etc. Instead, we mostly get gossipy stories about Darryl Gates' relationship with Ken Williams. Hopefully, the book you purchased is the former, and not the latter.
It's a bummer there's no pictures. I agree with you, that would really enhance what they have to offer. But there's probably permission and copyright issues to deal with.
I appreciate your post. I was just thinking yesterday about how the early PC doesn't get the "retro-love" that game consoles do...
Totally — I hope this isn’t just gossip and hearsay and development retrospectives are always entertaining and insightful. I found out this morning that Ken Williams is also publishing his own Sierra behind the scenes book. It’ll be interesting to compare the narratives.
As far as retro PC gaming goes, I purchased books by Bitmap Books in UK — one on CRPGs and another on adventure games. I also got their Atari book.
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3 minutes ago, Atari 5200 Guy said:
Why bother??? Its an Atari for crying out loud! 'Nuff said. Period. Besides...what other console has Space Dungeon? None. That one is a 5200-only exclusive. No other Atari console got it. The 5200 is fun but time has not been kind to it.
Exactly! It’s an Atari ❤️
Time hasn’t been kind in what sense? Hardware reliability? -
Out of all the Nintendo consoles, SNES is the one that I have some nostalgia for. It’s the reason got it over the Genesis (the calibration cartridge available for both SNES and Genesis).
While I love Mario and all the Nintendo characters, I never played any of the games. The only Nintendo console games I’ve played are NBA Jam on SNES and Wii Sports. I hope Super Metroid makes a fan out of me for Metroidvania type games. -
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A few weeks ago, a local gamer made a pick-up post on Facebook, and he showed this book. He backed it on Kickstarter. I asked him where I could get a copy and promptly ordered it. The book arrived today. I haven't read it yet, and these are just first impressions of the physical book.
First, I did a double-take because I thought it was a literary book when I first glanced at the cover. I thought I ordered the wrong book and double checked the receipt. It had been a few weeks since I ordered it, and I forgot what the book looked like. The cover design is very uninspiring and dry which is in stark contrast to the Kickstarter campaign and the website for the book that prominently feature the colorful graphics of the company's games. Second, this is a thick book -- a 9" x 6" book packing around 350 pages. Third, there are no photos or illustrations, not a single one. I know this book is about the history of the company, but I still expected to see photos of the people involved in the narrative and the company buildings/offices and illustrations/screen captures of the many Sierra games. Had I known before I ordered the hardcover that it was text only, I would have ordered the ebook edition and saved some money.
Yes, my first impressions are a bit of a downer, but I won't let that dampen my initial enthusiasm that spurred the purchase. I got the book to learn about the behind the scenes of a video game company that was a prominent part of my video gaming experience during my younger days. I hope the narrative will make up for what's missing graphically, an irony given that Sierra On-line made a splash in the industry by making graphic adventures during a time when text adventures ruled.
I hope additional stories are written about the video game companies that played prominent roles during the 80s and 90s. I recently found a link to Polygon's article about Electronic Arts and Trip Hawkins and read with great interest. I had always wondered what had happened to that promising innovative company 🟥🔴🔺 which produced unique and wonderful games like M.U.L.E, Archon, and Seven Cities of Gold (my three favorite EA games). I'd love to learn about Infocom, Synapse, Br0derbund, Epyx, and Strategic Simulations Inc. among others.
Perhaps the stories are already out there, and I just don't know about them. If you have links, please share them.
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@HDN a sale? I don't think there's anything going on in particular with Pink Gorilla and local retailers although PG posts photos of interesting stuff that comes in. A few days ago, the store got a huge stack of Saturn games.
A couple of guys in the local retro gamer FB group did run an online sale yesterday. I was going to surprise you but since your curious, I'll have you know that I'm almost done with your homework. I will be picking up a stack of SNES games on Monday. I think I should get extra credit for alphabetizing the list 🙂 ✏️
- Actraiser 1, 2
- Donkey Kong Country 1, 2, 3
- Illusion of Gaia
- Super Mario World
- Super Metroid
- Super Punch Out
- Zelda Link to the Past
- Zombies Ate My Neighbors
I'm setting aside Zombies Ate My Neighbors to play it during Halloween next month.
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Oooh, sounds fun! I'm in @RickR.
Thanks for the video @nosweargamer. You seem to have a video on everything 👏👍
- nosweargamer, RickR and HDN
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Great job, Harry! Creating something is a special act unlike any other.
This reminds me of Justin's notes that he posted somewhere his creations and notes he made as a kid.
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1 hour ago, HDN said:
@socrates63 remember how we talked about Mario Kart last night in the chat and how I said that I liked the old flat-style games? Well, guess who called today with Super Circuit! Quick, mention Lode Runner or Pilotwings! They might call about that too if you mention it like you did Mario Kart!
Who called? Your local game store?
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1 hour ago, CrossBow said:
For 13 years I organized and hosted my own small classic game convention here in the Tulsa area that was known as OVGE (Oklahoma Video Game Exhibition). But due to a lack of interest in my attendees and exhibitors in smaller cons, I stopped after the 2015 event. We have another that was started last year known as NYGE for Name Your Game Expo that is video games, card collectable games, Table RPGs and LARP that I was involved with last year. Specifically I helped to setup and maintain the retro systems and arcade cabs before, during and after the event. We had another scheduled for this year but have postponed it due to the pandemic.
But there are lots of other cons that take place much close to me and therefore much less expensive around that time frame so it does make PRGE seem less attractive at that time. Honestly it cost my wife and I about $2000 to attend last years PRGE with airfare and hotel costs even booking that 3 or 4 months out. That didn't include what I spent at PRGE which, was a separate considerable amount.
Yes, traveling and lodging isn't cheap. It's cool that your wife travels with you though.
For a city of Seattle's size and the large populations of gamers in the area, the lack of retro gaming conventions is surprising. Or, maybe it's just me because I only know about two or three small conventions in the greater Seattle. I've only been to Seattle Retro Gaming Expo.
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There’s a compass? I tried it a couple of times but got hopelessly lost. I’ll give it another look.
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Wow @HDN it's pretty rare for me to run in 7800 games in the couple of stores that I go to. There are a few more stores but I stick to two, and I go to two more a couple of times a year. I picked up a local copy of Commando for the 7800 only because I posted in a Seattle retro gamer Facebook group. I say "local" but it's 1 1/2 to 2 hours away including a short ferry ride.
I've caught your bug and have been playing some 7800 lately.
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Space Invaders
Atari 2600
Difficulty: B, Game 1
High Score: 13,740
September 16, 2020- Justin, James Campbell Jr. and HDN
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22 hours ago, Scott Stilphen said:
I was expecting 'socrates' to come storming back at the end. I posted in the scoreboard thread. Let's see who can break 100k first!
I gave it one final run after seeing your score 🤠 but didn't have it in me. But as you said, there's still the high scoreboard waiting for the 100k score 😉
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8 minutes ago, CrossBow said:
Unfortanately for me, it looks like PRGE 2019 will be my last to attend. The new timeframe makes it way way more expensive than it was prior and that time of the year is when other closer cons take place near me that I might be invovled with etc.
So I was not a fan of the move to August...
Me, too -- not a fan of the August date. I hope it gets moved back to the fall.
What cons have you been involved with in the past?
Members: What video game related stuff do you regret selling the most?
in Classic Gaming General
Posted
As a matter of personality, I generally don't sell stuff that I buy. However, I have given a couple of video gaming things away, one of which I regret.
1️⃣ Back in the early 90s, my church commissioned a missionary to Africa. His wife and little son went with him. I gave the little boy my OG GameBoy, bunch of games, and a whole lot of AA batteries. While I lost touch with him after his family left for Africa, I have no doubts that the GameBoy provided him with many hours of entertainment on the plane ride and in a foreign land. He always enjoyed playing with it when I let him before.
2️⃣ In the late 80s when I was in high school, I owned the Vectrex and several games (don't remember how many). I love vector graphics to this day. I take care of my stuff and everything was in pristine condition with the overlays and all. I had a friend who was like a younger brother to me (he later became one of my groomsmen in my wedding). His family wasn't as well off as mine financially during those days. I gave him my entire Vectrex collection since he didn't have any video games. He never became a gamer, and I always wondered what happened to the Vectrex. I never asked him about it because I don't want to know. It saddens me to this day to think that I sent away a system to a home where it was not appreciated.