Atari 5200 Guy

My cousin had the mesh dish. The receiver was a Toshiba. Once channels were found you could set it and the receiver would automatically adjust the dish.

I'm making a blog entry for the Famicom games I own. I'm going to start ranking them based on how much I play the games. I can't go by like because I simply like all of them. Alright, here we go! Salamander - pure and simple shooter with a unique story behind it and an awesome soundtrack. I also like the distinctive transparent blue cartridge. Route 16 Turbo - developed by Sun soft of Blaster Master fame this arcade style maze game is simply hard to put down once you start playing it. It's that addictive. Parodius - another shooter by Konami but this one is more of a cute em up. Konami took a bunch of their well known characters and threw them in a large bag...and shook it up. This was the end result. Very fun to play but can be a bit challenging Family Circuit - despite being in all Japanese this is a fun top-down racing game and the first one I've seen like it where the player can change a lot about their car characteristics. It even has endurance races that can last a while. Gradius II - the sequel to a popular shooter franchise was very impressive with levels that seem to have no vertical or horizontal limits. Very fun to pick up and play but if you are not familiar with it you won't last ten minutes. I've lasted maybe 12 minutes. Tetris - Famicom's Tetris is different than what Nintendo released on the Western NES. While not as colorful the game stops between levels to add up bonus points resulting in a break for the player. Something the NES version doesn't do. The music is also different. Ill be back later to add the others.

I remember my cousin getting one back in the 1990s. One night after she got it I spent the night with her. She had paid for some of the channels on it but I played around with it and found NBC's channel feed for all its networks. She was getting commercial free programs weeks before they aired. She was very happy I found it. She was able to catch her soap opera a week before her coworkers so it gave her bragging rights. She would tape the shows to watch after work and once a tape was full she would let her coworkers take it home with them.

I liked Mr. Plimpton but hated those intellivision controllers. It's a shame, too, because the games were fun. I just couldn't get over the controllers.

I guess I was a lucky owner. I never had issues with the controllers. I do now from age and my hands don't belong to an eight year old no more but they are still more comfortable than the 7800 controllers us USA gamers got. I still say it is a unique system that tried to do something different. I enjoy playing mine all the time. I have noticed the system goes for a less amount of money than other systems but some games for it go for a ridiculous amount of money.

Where's this at?

Dang! You don't like NFS do you? I see Most Wanted! That one is a lot of fun. I had carbon for GameCube and OG XBOX. Beat it both times. A lot of fun. The Burnout series is a blast! I still say Revenge is best in series. My cousin had ATV Fury 1 & 2. I almost grabbed all four before I settled on GT2. Cool steering wheel!

Thanks. Ill check in a little bit.

This is the steering wheel I had. If I remember correctly it was not that expensive. https://www.ebay.com/itm/Naki-Steering-Wheel-For-Playstation-2-Red-Grip-Tested-And-Working-/264763068156?chn=ps&pageci=f246b7db-7366-4ddc-9c28-e96f9f158e32&redirect=mobile

These are what I'm missing: I forgot how hard MAME is to setup sometimes.

I can't find all of the BIOS files. I have most of the NEO*GEO files but I'm still missing some. I'll get a list and post.

Wow. I don't remember this car I just won. Why don't I remember this? I hope I'm not boring any one with this. This is my favorite racing game and I have not seen it since its initial release.

Another update. This is my progress so far. I just finished all Special Event FR races and won a new RX-7! Geez, playing for a week and only at 9%? I've got a long way to go. Then again repeating a certain race to get money for upgrading a car to race in another race takes time. I'm actually having fun and happy to play this game again. I never thought of that. Cool idea. Let me know how it turns out.

I don't think the NES got any Pole Position game and Namco was cranking out their arcade games or the Famicom like crazy but I have not seen Pole Position. The 2600, 5200, and A8 line got the first one. We don't have to include the SMS. Sega made most of those games. Did I miss any one? The 16-bit era got one Pole Position game but I am not sure if it has any relation to the originals. The 32-bit era is when the Namco Museum collections started showing up. So, yea, I think PPII pack-in was a 7800 exclusive. Kind of neat when you see it that way.

There is one thing I realize about this game and that is how it changed the racing genre of gaming.

I do believe that PPII could be considered a 7800 exclusive. I don't think any other console got it. I'm not counting any Namco museum collections as those are mostly emulation. I'm only talking about ports.

Yes...it made no sense to me to put a cart only in the 7800 box and sell boxed copies of a game every 7800 buyer would already own on store shelves. Made no sense.

I have to agree with this. If released as originally intended, in 1984, PPII as a pack-in mates sense. By 1986 Nintendo already controlled the video game market and had established public expectations to a point. Sadly the 7800 and PPII didn't matter at that point, nor did Atari. I never knew people compared PPII with SMB. That's not how I would base comparisons because the NES was an entertainment system whereas the 7800 was more of an arcade style system. At least that's how I would have approached them considering the majority of the 7800's library was made up of arcade ports. That's my opinion about it. Back when the NES was king I also had the 7800, hooked up side by side. Both got equal amounts of game play. If an NES game was giving me issues I'd take a break and play the 7800. There were times when a friend spent the night with me and even a whole summer. We'd play the 7800 more because the twin player games were more friendly. But I could not rightfully compare the two together as competitors because to me both are from two different generations. At least to me. So, from my perspective, PPII was a nice pack-in. I just wish they would have put a boxed copy in the package. That's my only complaint.

I did not know anything about PPII until I found the 7800. After the 1983 crash, which I now know happened, arcades sort of dried up in my area. I never seen the arcade version until Namco started releasing their museum games. By that time it didn't matter. Pole Position II was a smart pack-in game for the 7800. I don't think any other game would have been as exciting. Pole Position II's multiple tracks could have been the reason as it would have helped the player from getting bored with one game too quick. Think about it. If it had a game like Joust or Galaga, you'd play a few rounds and be done. With Pole Position II you'd play longer as you'd want to explore all tracks. It had more to offer.

I was actually joking, Rick. I was referring to cars in the video games. 😄 I found a car in GT2 I never seen last time I played it. At all. And we collected over 100 cars that time, new and used. I wish I could find a better car as my poor Plymouth needs new brake system all way around, finding those parts has not been easy.

Crazy to think Activision bought up Imagic and now Microsoft owns the whole lot. Who would have guessed?

For the life of me I could not remember how a friend of mine and myself spent so much time with this game and accumulated what seemed like an endless stream of cash and cars. I finally figured it out. I remember now. GT2 gives first place drivers a new car in the more advanced races. If you find a race early on that gives a decent amount of cash plus a car with a decent value you can repeat the event, accumulate cash, and sell off all the prize cars to build up credits. It's time consuming but a great way to build up credits for better cars or to hop up cars already in your garage.

Another update. I just obtained my International C license. IB and IA left to do.

I may need to change the name of this blog title to GT2 Dairy. After a few races, and considering the Skyline I started with exceeded some race regulations, I went on a used car hunt. I'm 20 days in game time at this point and then races I'm after are in the Gran Turismo banner. Here you can pick tracks based on location but each series of races under those has restrictions. I needed a car with at least 195 hp or less. First stop...Nissan. In found a few of interest but at 175 up to 190 hp for a Silvia K and Q series cars would not leave much room for modifications. At those HPs a single mod could put the car over the 195 limit. Next stop Mazda. And, nope, as much as I like Miata the car is just not one I've had much luck with in the past. And that was about the only ones there. I thought I would try Suzuki next and boy was I surprised. Every car there seemed like the size of a smart car with only 68 HP. Naa...I'm good. Moving on. Toyota. Let's see. A few Celicas, a really nice Supra but had too much HP. Half way down I found a MR2. Pretty blue and limited edition with a super charger. Had 142 hp and was barely over 4,000 CR. SOLD! Got a few mods for it, sitting at 150 HP, and it's already tearing up the tracks and I have yet to get any engine mods for it other than a computer chip. Nice little car but with the mid engine setup the rear end gets a little too happy. Still, nice find for what I need it for. Now to go get those 195 HP races.