Ballblaɀer

First off, thanks to Mr. No Swear Gamer, I have reached 111/125 in my collection!

I didn't notice that until you mentioned that! They are the exact same, except the Sega shell has no logo where the Imagic logo was. My guess is Sega made a deal with Imagic to use their shells, so they didn't have to make their own. A similar arraignment was made between Absolute & Activision in the late 80s. 

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).

I recently archived this from programmer Todd Marshall.  The prototype only shows a static screen with no sound or animation.  It's possible this matches up to one of his source code listings that I archived, which are available in my interview with him:
 
http://www.ataricompendium.com/archives/interviews/todd_marshall/interview_todd_marshall.html

QBERTS_QUBES demo.Bin

https://www.si.com/longform/2017/nba-jam-oral-history/index.html
 
A very interesting article from Sports Illustrated about the arcade game NBA Jam. It has commentary from the development team (Mark Turmell!) and many others involved. I found it a very entertaining read about a truly great and innovative game.

If you've been following me over at @AtariSpot then you've seen me post these things already, but 140 characters doesn't leave much room for blatherin' on about things! 
 
A little while ago I completed the CBS collection of games for the 2600:
 

 
Is Wizard of Wor the only Atari cart that explicitly spells out your game objectives right on the label?  I can't think of another one off the top of my head.  Tunnel Runner is probably my favorite of these games in terms of gameplay, but I'll always love Gorf having played that one as a kid.  I didn't get to play it in an arcade until relatively recently, so I never knew what I was missing with the 2600 version.  Four unique screens of gameplay was never not awesome!
 
I picked up a nice copy of the Atari 1983 Coupon Calendar in an eBay lot:
 

 
I should have taken the photo with something else in the picture for scale.  It's about as big as a standard magazine.  Then you open it up, and... wow!  Before Art of Atari was released, this was one of the only ways to see some of Atari's best artwork in a larger format.
 

 
I'd never seen this particular artwork anywhere before...


 
...and until the other day I didn't notice that it had a signature:
 

 
Any ideas?  I've asked Tim Lapetino about it and will update should he be able to tell me more.
 
One final thing for this post -- the second-to-last Atari 5200 title I was missing:
 

 
I need to get a photo of my entire 5200 collection now (since I likely won't have the last cartridge I'm missing in the near future given its typical asking price).  A few of my carts could use an upgrade, and I'm still in search of a number of manuals and overlays, but having QFQR was my last *major* goal for 5200 collecting -- so I'm happy to have finally crossed it off!

I've been waiting for these to arrive for quite some time, and they finally showed up today.  More Atari 2600 cartridges from New Zealand, including THE ONE that I've most wanted for ages!
 

 
AIR.  SEA.  BATTLE.
 
YESSSS!
 

 
I first mentioned the weird artwork for Air-Sea Battle toward the start of this thread.  The same unusual cartoon-y artwork can be seen on the box for the Japanese Atari 2800 release of Air-Sea Battle -- I'm still on the hunt for one of those.  My guess is that the new artwork was created because the original artwork design calls to mind the Japanese flag and the Naval battles of the Pacific theatre, and it wouldn't have gone over well in Japan.  As far as I know, however, this Atari Monaco release is the only instance of the artwork being featured on a cartridge label, since games that came in Atari 2800 boxes were just the standard U.S.A. releases.  Unfortunately, this particular masterpiece was not one of those featured in Art of Atari... 
 
Edit: just realized, this is made even weirder by the fact that the silver Atari Monaco box for this cart features the original artwork!
 
Pac-Man is a new addition to my silver/gray label collection, and like I said the first time I had Atari Monaco carts to share, there's just something jarring about it to me... like... it's a dream where things aren't quite the way they normally are.  Outlaw is also a unique label from NZ, with a brownish-purplish-red title in the same Harry/Hammer Fat font that graces some of the late Atari Corp picture label carts.  Pole Position has a black Atari 2600 logo, which I can't recall seeing elsewhere.
 

 
Let's talk fine print.  Air-Sea Battle features a copyright date of 1978 -- no other Air-Sea Battle cart that I'm aware of does this, though the launch/gatefold and early boxes do.  Pac-Man has two specific oddities worth pointing out -- it features a copyright date of 1982 (which no other 2600 Pac-Man cart does) and also mentions Bally Midway Mfg. Co. (which no other Pac-Man cart does).  Not too much to say about Jungle Hunt except it lists the wrong Atari product number (2668 instead of 2688).  Very odd since it seems to otherwise be a carbon copy of the original silver label release.
 
As mentioned in my first NZ post, all of the Monaco carts have their main rounded-corner labels upside-down compared to what we're used to, too.  Then you get to the end labels...
 

 
Air-Sea Battle and Pac-Man have some fading going on, and none of them are perfect, but all in all... I can't express how excited I am to have these.  Rarity of PAL games is tough to pin down, especially when you're talking about a country as relatively small as New Zealand... but either way, I can't imagine that very many of the Atari Monaco carts were made.  Monaco Distributors still exists, though... I wonder if they have any old production numbers or sales figures they could share?  Might have to send 'em an email to ask!
 
With Air-Sea Battle and Pac-Man now added to my collection, there remain four Atari Monaco titles of the silver/gray style that weren't released in the same style elsewhere: Adventure, Haunted House, Missile Command, and Yars' Revenge.  And with Outlaw crossed off the list, there remain at least two titles with unique black/picture labels from NZ I'm still hoping to track down: Dodge 'Em and Surround.
 
The hunt continues! 

Recently completed 2600 set: M-Network.

 
Check out those amazing, exciting, labels!
 
*crickets*
 
Favorite three to play are Bump 'N' Jump, Dark Cavern, and Kool-Aid Man.  Frogs and Flies is super simple but super awesome to play every once in a while -- don't let anyone tell you otherwise!  Air Raiders is the only entirely original game; all others are related to an Intellivision release (even if in name only, like Kool-Aid Man).  Star Strike is no doubt the hardest to find, but it's not so rare that you never see it.
 
Not much to say about the carts themselves.  Minor cartridge shell variations are nothing to write home about!  INTV white-label versions (released after Mattel nixed M-Network) exist for twelve of the games, but, again: yawn.  I'd like to know why He-Man didn't get the same kind of special logo/font treatment that Kool-Aid Man and the Tron games got.  Or why BurgerTime has the arcade logo, but Bump 'N' Jump doesn't.
 
Final country of manufacture tally:
Singapore: 13    /    Korea: 2    /    Philippines: 1    /    USA: 1

Here's another completed publisher set for the 2600 -- Absolute Entertainment.
 

 
Pete Rose Baseball came from Atari.IO member StormSurge, Skate Boardin' came from Atari.IO member nosweargamer, Title Match Pro Wrestling was a local flea market find, and Tomcat: The F-14 Fighter Simulator was an eBay pickup.  These games were released during the 2600's minor retail resurgence under Atari Corp.
 
Absolute was founded by brothers Dan and Garry Kitchen, David Crane, Alex DeMeo, and John Van Ryzin.  I believe they were all previously employed by Activision.  They named the company Absolute to be alphabetically in front of Activision, just like Activision was named to be in front of Atari.  Absolute only produced four games for the 2600 before moving on to making games for what was a more popular system at the time, the NES (e.g. A Boy and His Blob, Space Shuttle Project, etc).
 
If the cart shell design looks familiar, well, have a look at the back -- they use Activision shells!
 

 
I think Pete Rose Baseball is the best-looking baseball game on the 2600 by far.  The computer seems to be able to win every time I play -- probably with some extended practice I'd be much better.  But really, even with its limitations (fielding a ball in the infield, for one!) the game is far preferable to other baseball games on the VCS.  Skate Boardin' is decent fun but not fun enough to keep me playing long enough to learn where all 30 obstacles are, and certainly not fun enough for me to want to make a map.  Title Match Pro Wrestling is... well... it's a wrestling game.  It's a bit more fun with two players, I think.  I haven't played Tomcat for very long -- it's a game that uses console switches during gameplay, and I'm generally not a fan of those (Space Shuttle being one exception).  But the little I've played so far has been great -- I'm amazed at the amount of game that can come from 16K of ROM.

The thing I really like about Gravitar on 2600 is that it feels like an Asteroids sequel.  The ship and controls are almost the same.  Space War/Asteroids/Gravitar should have been linked together as a trilogy by Atari...and then the ship and controls re-used for other games. 

In a post on FB, Atari said that there will be 2 editions, 2 boxes and details will be revealed in 2 weeks. They also indicated in the comments that they are calling the project "Atari Box" but that wouldn't be the name of the product. Mark your calendars folks,
 
https://www.facebook.com/atariboxofficial/posts/326047647833158

Don't throw your controller against the wall!
It's just Ep 348: Gravitar 

This would have been one more 5200 game that used all four ports on the original SuperSystem units.  Making a grand total of... three.  Four, if RealSports Basketball had been released, too.

This would have been one more 5200 game that used all four ports on the original SuperSystem units.  Making a grand total of... three.  Four, if RealSports Basketball had been released, too.

A not-bad day for me at Goodwill.  It was "blue" day -- those blue prices were 50% off! 
 
 

Thanks to RickR who came through with a power adapter, I have a TI-99/4A that I know works. I'm now looking for a cheap set of joysticks (or an adapter so I can use standard 9-pin joysticks) and some common games.  Mainly I'm looking to play a few of the games that I played at a friend's house as a little kid -- Microsurgeon and Alpiner -- but if you have any spares of other games laying around, let me know!

Man, you are firing on all cylinders lately!  Leave some free consoles for the rest of us, eh? 

I hate to say it, but this seems to be another 5200 game like breakout that doesn't do enough graphically to really make you want to drop the 2600 version of the game to play it.

here is my Atari 5200 Asteroids prototype for your enjoyment. Asteroids part number is CX5201 and was the first game atari planned to release for the 5200 but they put the kibosh on the game because it didn't play well with the new 5200 joysticks. this is an official original prototype that came out of atari and is not a reproduction game. this is what Asteroids would have been had atari put it out in 1982. look at the game and you will see its not a big improvement or very different from 2600 Asteroids. it's the same Asteroids as the Atari 400/800 game. would this have been enough to entice 2600 owners to jump ship to the 5200? enjoy,
 
thanks,
 
lance
www.atarisales.com

This was done last year but you get the idea. Few games here and there have been added but essentially this is my room of fun for the whole family!
 

Gravitar.

Dangit!  Had I gotten here earlier, I would've had a meaningless point
 
LOL, Gravitar's one of my favorites on the 2600.  In fact, I think I'll go play it right now

Time Pilot is correct!
And since you were the first with the correct answer, you get the point!

Just finished eating breakfast on our cape cod vacation and saw an interesting store (Greg's used books), figured I'd kill some time while my wife went into a shoe store. Place was very cool, other than used books they had some records, movies, board games and best of all games. Picked up these carts, all pretty rare. It's not often I find carts I dont have in the wild, especially this many. Owner was very cool also.

From 4000 miles away across the Atlantic to my little ol' collection, one of the toughest Atari carts to acquire, NTSC *or* PAL:
 

 
That there is CX26190, the Atari-branded re-release of TNT's BMX Airmaster, in pristine condition.  This was the one red label title released as NTSC that I didn't have, and... well, I still don't have it.    This particular cart is PAL format.  If I ever come across an NTSC red label cart I'll naturally swap this one out of the collection, but it's a low priority given that 1) I have the original TNT version of the game in NTSC format, 2) the labels for the NTSC and PAL Atari releases are identical, and 3) there's some absurdly low number of NTSC carts that have surfaced.
 
CX26190 is the highest Atari 2600 game product number to have both an NTSC and a PAL release.  Klax (CX26192) was only ever released as PAL.  It's not known whether CX26191 was ever assigned to a title.  As for the game itself, BMX Airmaster is one that I really enjoy.  It was programmed by Adam Clayton, who also did Dark Chambers.  Fun fact: at age 15, Adam was the one who first wrote to Atari about having found Warren Robinett's easter egg in Adventure.
 
As for this latest acquisition... even better, it came with the Atari manual!
 

 
Since I generally don't collect game boxes (but I do like having manuals!) it was the perfect score, and I got it for an amazing price.  It's a great feeling when a tireless search pays off!