Ballblaɀer

That's the Sears label -- they're common. I'm looking for the Atari label. I've only seen one on eBay in the last year or so and it got snapped up in a quick Buy-It-Now.

The year was 1984, and I had just turned four years old a few weeks before Christmas. It turned out that Santa Claus not only brought a 5200 for me that year, he hooked it up to the console TV in our living room overnight! I later heard through the grapevine that Santa had bought the 5200 pretty close to Christmas, but didn't realize until he got it back to his workshop and opened it that the included pack-in game was Super Breakout and not Pac-Man. OH NO. Apparently I was a Pac-Man fiend even at that early age -- I think the neighborhood club where my parents often dated in the late 1970s had a Pac-Man cabinet, and they must have taken me there at times to play on it. I definitely recall playing arcade Pac-Man at a very young age, but couldn't tell you where or when. I certainly remember watching the Pac-Man cartoon on ABC when it aired in '82 - '83, and I *was* Pac-Man for Halloween one year, too. I'd love to find a photo of that -- I was this enormous, bulky, yellow, homemade cardboard monstrosity -- but so far no luck... Anyway, at the 11th hour, Santa and his helper were scrambling around trying to find a store and/or elf that still had Pac-Man in stock. It came down to the wire, but long story short: I was a very happy kid on Christmas morning. I can't recall what other games were under the tree that first year -- I'll have to dig out the old family photos to take a look. For Christmases every year after that for the next 6-8 years, there would be at least a game or two under the tree. I'd guess that I played Joust, River Raid, and Star Raiders more than any of the others over the years, but 5200 Pac-Man was the start of it all for me. I never had another console in the house growing up, so video gaming at home was Atari 5200 or nothing until we saved up and bought our first computer (a Mac LC).

As I've mentioned before, I don't collect a whole lot of PAL games, but this one was on my hit list for sure. Why? Atari Corp strikes again... Oh man, Atari Corp, what are you doooooinnnnnnng? One run of Midnight Magic cartridges had their label sheets cut backwards, meaning that the end label doesn't show the title of the game and the main label shows it twice. Here it is next to the correct release: I'm not sure how many of these got to retail. They come up for sale every now and then, but they don't seem to be in big demand -- Midnight Magic is not a rare game, and the label variation (if you want to call it that) is essentially just a printer's (dumb) error. For someone who loves the quirks and mistakes of Atari Corp, though, it's a perfect collection piece. Still has the PAL sticker on the back.

Just added a pretty scarce game to my 2600 collection: One of two released games by Wizard Video Games (i.e. the same Wizard Video that produced The Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie, among others), this is probably one of the five rarest NTSC 2600 titles in my current collection. It's not so rare that it's never seen for sale, but one often seems to need to pay a premium to pick it up since its unique place in gaming history makes it desirable to many game collectors. There are a number of different repros and otherwise unofficial variations of TCM floating around for sale, but this one is the real deal. How to tell? There's a few things to look for. All original TCM cartridges use the same white-colored PCBs that Apollo used for their games: If you see one that's green, blue, brown, mauve, vermillion, or any number of other colors, it's not an original. Another thing to look out for is the unique cartridge shell. A lot of reproductions and fakes use standard Atari cartridge shells, but Wizard used a snap-together casing (no screws) with deep sawtooth grips on the sides and wrapping around to the back: There's also a smooth rounded-off rectangle on the back of the cartridge that you don't otherwise find on 2600 games. I didn't take a photo of the reverse side, but you can check one out over in this AA thread. The print quality on the labels is mediocre, and there are clearly some areas where the ink didn't print all the way to one edge, etc. Now, about the game itself. Wizard Video Games actually marketed their two releases (the other being Halloween) as the first violent games for adults. There was a third Wizard title slated for release (Flesh Gordon) but it was never sold, and a prototype has not yet turned up for it. In any case, their marketing and interviews in the media seem to make it clear that they were trying to carve out a new demographic for gaming: adults. Adults that liked to be "stimulated" with violence and such things. More than one of their advertisements refers to people being tired of "childish pastimes" like "eating dots and chasing ghosts". Apparently these games are largely rare today because retailers would not display the games along with the rest of their products, or advertise them much if at all. If you wanted a Wizard game, you needed to go into a store and ask for it by name, because they'd be kept under the counter or otherwise away from precious, innocent eyes. Not many ended up being sold, and Wizard closed up their gaming venture after only the first two released titles. One thing that I continue to see mentioned in so many articles and blurbs about this game is that there was parental backlash (i.e. actual protests) to these games in particular. Can anyone confirm with first-hand knowledge or an actual source? The only thing close I've been able to find so far is this Sept. 9, 1983 article from the Deseret News, and it's really just one guy who doesn't enjoy the idea of violent video games. I've seen a few more primary source articles and things that definitely refer to people protesting the other adult games (Custer's Revenge, Bachelor Party, etc.) but I'd love to know more about how Wizard's two games were received by the general public.

One person's attempt to improve the explosion particles rendering code: http://playermissile.com/tech/starraiders/

Lots more about this, including very comprehensive design notes, over at the Atari Museum. And they "said it could not be done"... ha!

Star Raiders on the 5200 is probably a top-3 game for me in terms of how much I played it. The only game deficiency I remember is the lag when an enemy explosion was on-screen, especially one close to your ship. But that was a minor annoyance -- the quality and complexity of the game more than made up for any little detriments. I wish I'd kept track of some of my rankings from back in the day!

Here are some more unique sticks: T Top row: (Radio Shack) Archer Deluxe Competition Joystick, Wico Command Control Joystick (5200)*, Gemini Gemstick-Pro Bottom row: Coin Controls Inc. Competition Pro**, Championship Electronics SuperChamp (with 10' retractable cord), Wico "Famous Red Ball" *This has a 9-pin cable, but it's meant to plug into a Y-cable for the 5200 and is not compatible with the VCS without an adapter cable. It snuck into the photo when I wasn't looking. **The Competition Pro is the regular one with leaf switches, not the "5000" model with microswitches. Last but certainly not least: I've never seen these referred to with an Atari CX- part number, and the 2800 owner's manual doesn't seem to list one either. If they have an official name, I'm not aware of it. Edit: Confirmed, these are CX28 controllers. In case anyone's interested, the Gemstick-Pro and CE SuperChamp are available for trade/sale. They're tested and work just fine, I just don't like them as much as some of the others.

The latest trade from one Mr. No-Swear Gamer arrived over last weekend and helped me to complete another 2600 set: 44 Activision NTSC games. This set was a god deal more difficult to compile than the Atari text label carts, but fortunately none of the titles are MEGA-rare. A handful of them can command $20+ each, but I'm glad to be able to say that I traded for a couple of them (Double Dragon, Beamrider) and got excellent deals on a few others (including River Raid II, Rampage, and H.E.R.O.) Honestly, the tough task is finding some of these titles in "collector" condition. A number of them seem near impossible to find without ugly, mottled Actiplaque staining. Robot Tank is probably the worst offender -- I'm not sure I've *ever* seen a completely clean one! I'm generally happy with this set's condition, although it's fairly obvious for which of these I'd still like to find upgrades. This is a set I put together almost completely from scratch -- the only carts I had in my collection from back-in-the-day were Ice Hockey, Space Shuttle, and Pitfall. A few notes about my Activision library: - Boxing has the original foam dust protector still inside. Activision quit including them with their cartridges relatively quickly -- they're not "rare" per se, but you'd have to think that 99.9% of the time they were just discarded. - Carts I was pleasantly surprised to find "in the wild" (at yard sales, flea markets, through Craigslist, or bought from game shops): Cosmic Commuter, Kung Fu Master, Private Eye, River Raid II. - Pressure Cooker is the International version, and has retained the "N" sticker (i.e. NTSC, as opposed to PAL and SECAM). The font used for the game title on the main and end labels is also thicker/bolder than the "normal" version. - You can't really see it in the photo, but my version of Stampede is one of the earlier release carts that mentions the "Atari Video Game System" instead of "Atari Video Computer System™" that got used later -- not entirely sure what brought about that change. I made up my mind early on not to collect the blue label re-release Activision carts, but I'm hanging onto one for posterity (Enduro, my favorite Activision title). Keeping it company is the one known NTSC white-label Activision cartridge, Space Shuttle: One minor label variation I have is seen on the international version of Pitfall II. It features the copyright notice in both English and French along with a different catalog number, but most notably it doesn't have "LOST CAVERNS" printed on the end label like its standard counterpart: Last but not least, the aforementioned, legit rare French-Canadian labels for Boxing, Ice Hockey, Skiing, and Tennis: These pretty much *never* turn up for sale. A copy of "Le Tennis" is currently on eBay, though, and if the seller were asking a reasonable price I'd consider upgrading the one I've got considering that I think these are some of the coolest 2600 labels out there! Activision carts remaining to collect: - Ghostbusters II -- PAL format only - Fighter Pilot -- PAL format only, but it's the same game as Absolute's "Tomcat: The F-14 Fighter Simulator" (and therefore a low priority)

My first complete Atari 2600 set: text label cartridges! The Atari text label library is no doubt the easiest of the various Atari label types to complete. I'd like to upgrade a few of them at some point, most notably Basic Math (which has a faded end label), but all in all I'm super happy with the condition of these. A few notes: - Othello is the only text label cartridge with an all-caps title. I believe this was one of the last text label carts produced, right before they started to introduce picture labels. - Combat is the only text label cartridge that I know of that has a variant with 1) text in multiple colors on the main label, and 2) "Made in Taiwan" printed on it. - My copies of Home Run and Hunt and Score have gold-colored borders on their main labels. For whatever reason, the ink on the color-border labels seems to bleed/fade more than the white-border labels. These are two I'd like to upgrade to the other, sharper style. - There's lots of red and yellow/gold here, and unfortunately, that's just the way it is. I'd like to eventually replace Brain Games with the blue text version, but that's really the only non-red/yellow/gold text label I don't have. - Some of the red labels (Miniature Golf, Slot Racers, and Star Ship) exhibit the fade pattern I mentioned in my post about the numbered text labels, where you can see that the printer laid down a rectangular layer of red ink instead of just inking the text itself. Another complete set: Epyx games. Like the Activision carts, these are tough to find without serious glue staining. California Games is from my original childhood collection, while the other two are recent additions. And one last complete set for now: Mythicon games: Fire Fly and Sorcerer are near mint, with mint manuals. Hoping to find a Star Fox to match. BTW, the "Star Fox" text is not faded -- for whatever reason, this title was printed pink-ish while the other two are red. Similarly, the end label for Fire Fly is the only one that has "by Mythicon" printed in white -- the other two are gray.

Bump.

Well, that was then. Now, it's... now, again. Anyway, here's my next piece of evidence to support my theory. Have a look at this Dig Dug re-release out of my collection, copyright 1986, Atari Corp: Before we get back to my theory about Atari Corp not having the original cartridge label designs at their disposal... holy smokes, look at that text up top! VIDEO in one font (the original Atari Inc font), GAME CARTRIDGE and the rest in another? It couldn't be more Atari Corp! And on top of that, the sideways "5200" in the upper right logo? It looks completely wrong, and nothing like any other Atari 5200 release I've seen -- it's almost as if it was cut and pasted in randomly. Even that ATARI text itself is very slightly different -- if nothing else, it's a bit smaller. Take a look at an older Atari Inc cart that I scanned to see the difference: On Joust, the 5200 logo looks like the 5200 logo should, and like it always does. But on the '86 Dig Dug cartridge? Not so much. I scanned both carts at the same resolution, and I cropped identical areas to compare: The Dig Dug '86 label features the same outside-the-borders artwork that appears on the old box and manual design, just like the oddball Vanguard cartridge, and just like some Atari 2600 re-release titles I mentioned on page 1 of this thread. With Dig Dug, the rectangular "artwork area" (i.e. the art minus the title and surrounding blue field) left space for the title to fit on the label, whereas Vanguard's "artwork area" is square -- again, probably the reason they couldn't squeeze the title on there. To my knowledge, none of the other 1986 re-releases have differences like this, and that's where my theory comes up short. One would expect to see something similar happen with Moon Patrol and Ms. Pac-Man, but they seem to have gotten those right. In a way, though, that makes these strange cartridges even stranger. Why was Atari Corp able to get most of their labels looking like the original Atari Inc labels, but not these few? On that note... if anyone ever spots Mario Bros. or Space Invaders for the 5200 with a 1986 copyright on the game label, please let me know! Those are the two remaining titles where, although Atari Corp boxes exist for them, every time I've seen the boxes they've had the regular old Atari Inc. cartridges inside.

AtariAge is an invaluable site, but it's far from comprehensive. Just as one example: the text label for Brain Games was released in at least four different colors, and AtariAge makes no distinction between any of them. It's a pretty minor difference in the grand scheme of things, of course, but I find it interesting all the same. FWIW, Atarimania lists the outlaw red text as 1978 and the yellow/gold text as 1979. For the most complete guides to what's out there, check out Atarimania.com and videogamevariations.com (still under construction, but 2600 Atari/Activision/Imagic and a number of other publishers are essentially complete now).

Still yes to Beamrider. Sure, it's not perfect, but neither am I. Gonna hold off on 7800 games for now. I have a grand total of one Nintendo game to trade at the moment -- 007: Everything or Nothing (Gamecube). My updated trade list is here.

Nice selection here, NSG! Beamrider is the last Activision NTSC title I need for the 2600. I'm also interested in Impossible Mission, but Beamrider is my top priority. Hope we can make another trade happen!

My guess is that red would be oldest since they continued to use the registered trademark ® symbol from the yellow/gold version on the picture labels. I believe the red outlaw end label also has a symbol. There's one more weird official Outlaw cart that I know about -- this one from New Zealand, distributed by Atari Monaco. Would love to pick one of those up eventually. Now, about this Gunslinger you have... is that a picture label or a text label? If picture, I'm 110% in trading/buying. Let me know!

Back to the 2600... Wacky foreign cartridge time? Wacky foreign cartridge time! I'm not really a collector of boxed cartridges -- or PAL cartridges, for that matter -- but I now have two in my collection, and I haven't yet decided whether I'll keep/trade/sell them. Here's the first one: Wha... what in the name of Nolan Bushnell is that?! Ahhhhh, say no more. "There's your answer, fishbulb!" Taiwan seems to have a fairly convoluted history of producing unique and sometimes unusual Atari 2600 products. Some excellent work has gone into untangling how many of the various manufacturers are related -- the best-written explanation I've come across was published in the Digital Press Guide (and was re-posted over at AA last year). Anyway, let's take a closer look. First, we have the cartridge shell: these are commonly known as "V-Case" games, due to the triangle/V-styled shape at the top of the cart. It's a multi-game cartridge that features three sliding DIP switches, where the user can position them to choose from eight games. Simple yet clever, and especially so when compared to Atari's official multi-cart (32-in-1), where the only way to choose games was to cycle through them one by one BY TURNING YOUR CONSOLE ON AND OFF. Pure insanity, and a fantastic way to wear out your power switch really fast. So, what's actually on this cart? Let's take a look at the box... Oh. Huh. Okay. That's... not a lot of help. Even close-up it's not really clear what some of those are supposed to be. But at least we know it's "FOR USE WITH THE VIDEO COMPUTER GAMES." Let's try the back of the box, instead! If that arrow is to be believed, it's got some pretty familiar titles, except for "Mafia". Man, I wanted to play some "Chinese Konfu", or "Cow Boy", or "Airbone Assault"! Well, guess what? Big surprise: that arrow is not to be believed. It's a generic box, and NONE of those six lists matches the cart that's inside. Let's check the cart's end label -- that'll tell us: Okay, enough screwing around -- WHAT GAMES ARE ACTUALLY ON THE CART?! "Base Attack" is Z-Tack, by BOMB. Unexpected. "Missile Attack" is Missile Control, by Video Gems, a Hong Kong publisher that distributed games in Europe. It's a PAL *original* game, and it's actually quite good, I think! Difficulty ramps up fast, though. "Sky Diver" is Parachute, by Home Vision. Another PAL *original* game, sold in Germany as Vom Himmel durch die Hölle, which translates to "From Heavens, Through Hell". Badass! The gameplay music is... well, it's worth a listen. It sounds a bit of a mess, but it's meant to be the main theme from the 1962 movie The Longest Day -- written by Paul Anka! And... guess who adopted the theme as their own regimental march? The Canadian Airborne Regiment (1968-1995)! That is some stellar work, Home Vision programmer guy. "Circus (See Saw)" is Circus Atari... but it uses a joystick instead of paddles! Yeah, that's not gonna be a good time. It's not as bad as you might think, but it's not good, either. "Mega Force" is Mega Force, by 20th Century Fox. An okay game. "Tank City" is... Thunderground, by Sega. I would have guessed Combat, or Battlezone, or Robot Tank. Or the last few seasons of Philadelphia 76ers basketball! Another somewhat unexpected title. "Volley Ball" is... RealSports Volleyball. Yawn. "Tennis II" is... Tennis, by Activision. Meh. Pretty neat, all things considered! Admittedly, I bought this and the other game (coming soon!) at a great price with a plan to re-sell, but... I'm not sure how I can part with this. It's got an interesting back story, a few fun games that can't generally be found anywhere local, and it's in decent condition, too. Of course, it *is* PAL format, which means my TV cuts off a number of the top and bottom scanlines. But the picture doesn't roll, so at least the games remain mostly playable. I just spent 30 minutes playing Parachute and Missile Control, and I'm heading back for more now!

Blastr has published an excellent interview with Robert Conte, the editorial consultant on the book. http://www.blastr.com/2016-5-16/pop-culture-aficionado-robert-conte-his-flashy-new-art-atari-book

I'm seeing a word there, but it's not "Jaguar". Strange...

Unboxing the 7800-à-la-smoke, from nosweargamer! An Atari Corp. 90-day limited warranty card! 1986 Revision B! But wait, this is for "Cassettes, Cartridges, or Diskettes". I wasn't expecting any... Cartridges! Nice -- three cool 7800 games! Also, Karateka. "FOR USE WITH VIDEO GAME". Just one?! WHICH ONE?! Ahhh, there she is! Smellin' like she just staggered home from a long night at the dank corner bar that still has a CRT up on the wall. Nah, it's not really that bad at all. Noticeable, but tolerable. I can't wait to check out all the cool hardware for the expansion interf... wait, what? Really, nothing? At all? Well, damn. Thanks! Now, who wants to trade me some CX78 joypads?

Let's change gears and look at a few of my favorite carts from my favorite system, the 5200. Many folks are familiar with the two SuperSystem games Atari released with no title on the cartridge. Anywhere. At all. Ballblazer and Rescue on Fractalus, both Lucasfilm Games games, were unleashed upon the world during Atari's mid-80s limbo: after the sale of Atari Inc and after the discontinuation of the 5200, but before the major resurgence (sorta) of Atari Corp. The music in Ballblazer and the 3D/fractal landscapes in RoF were both things that made a big impression on me as a kid -- I could tell that some serious work had gone into these games. They're also both a ton of fun to play. The surprise that shows up in the later levels of RoF! also made a big impression on me as a kid -- but I don't want to spoil it for anyone who's never played it... It's hard to tell with the lighting in these photos, but these cartridges have dull gray labels that Atari Corp was using for their 5200 games in 1985-1987 -- both their new games and re-releases. They were almost certainly cheaper than the previously-used reflective silver style labels. I think the labels look really sharp without a title, honestly, though I think I'd love them even more if they were the older silver labels. And -- if Atari had done the proper thing (in my opinion) from the start and put end labels on their 5200 cartridges... they'd be pretty much perfect. Now, have a look at this beauty! Yep, that's Vanguard -- re-released in 1986 in the same gray, title-less style. I've only ever seen a few of these, though they're probably not as uncommon as I hope they are. By my count, Atari re-released 16 of their games in the mid-80s with gray Atari Corp labels, but this is the only other one known to feature the artwork with no title. My favorite thing about it (other than the clean artwork design): because the game title isn't present on the cartridge, the asterisk next to the the Centuri licensed trademark ends up referring to nothing. Rumors of a Space Invaders re-release in the same title-less style persist, but I'll believe it when I see one. I've never seen a satisfactory answer to the "why no title on these releases?" question. Someone wondered on AA whether it was related to the Lucasfilm license agreement -- I could see that, sure, but then what about the Vanguard re-release? Look closer at the cartridge label design: Ballblazer and Rescue on Fractalus have artwork that's exactly as wide as the text up top, but Vanguard does not. Strange -- why would that be? Now, think back for a moment to my post about some Atari Corp re-releases for the 2600. If you remember, they appeared to be using their own instruction manual covers as the basis for the re-release label artwork. Let's now look at some 5200 boxes/manuals. Ballblazer and Rescue on Fractalus have unique boxes and manuals that were designed in or before 1984 -- that's another story for a different day. The cartridge labels' artwork appear to be square crops of the box art -- they're nearly identical, with just a bit trimmed off the top and bottom. With Vanguard's box/manual design, on the other hand... the square crop can't be as neatly done since the ships extend outside the main artwork border (in that same faux-3D style that shows up on many Atari Corp re-releases for the 2600). But it looks like they did it anyway, as that's exactly how the art appears on the re-release cartridge! So was Atari Corp doing the same thing with the 5200 title-less cartridge label artwork? Essentially lifting the artwork from older boxes and manuals? I say yes. My final bit of evidence (for now!) is subtle. Compare the re-release Vanguard cartridges to the first-release cartridges for Vanguard. One obvious difference was already mentioned: the spaceships are fully contained within the artwork and aren't straddling the artwork border. But on top of that, look at some of the detail in the artwork itself, especially that horizontal orange glow below the lower left of the player's ship. On the originally release carts the horizontal glow appears more sharply defined -- there's a distinct LINE, and some of the background detail even shows through the orange glow. But on the re-release cart, we see the same indistinct orange blotch that shows up on the Vanguard box and and manual. So... what's the deal? My best guess is that Atari Taiwan wasn't given the original cartridge artwork and design files for one reason or another, so they were forced to use box & manual artwork to make their own from scratch. It's more noticeable with some of the 2600 re-releases, but seeing what looks like the same thing happening with the no-title 5200 carts lends stronger support to this theory, I think.

Some 2600 games in BEAUTIFUL condition from Rowsdower70. Had all these titles already, but these looked so good I couldn't pass them up. The manuals are just as nice!

I find that I often feel like I need some "special tablets" after playing 2600 Pac-Man. One thing that I felt was inexcusable in the 2600 port were the sound effects. Or, in the case of Pac-Man doing nothing, the lack of one (i.e. no background siren). Cramming better sound into 2K of ROM may have been a herculean task -- I don't know the programming ins and outs, but I imagine that programming any complex sound just takes that much more valuable code space -- but it was a needed one. The game would almost certainly have been much better received with sound effects that at least seemed to *try* to approximate the arcade sounds. I think people would have been willing to give the graphics more of a pass if they weren't stuck listening to the harsh buzz-pops of eating dots, the boooooops of eating "vitamins", etc.

I have essentially nothing 7800 in my collection. So, that'd be a yes to the power supply, and still yes to the 7800, smoke smell and all.