socrates63's gaming collection and setup

[socrates63]

A little background on my physical gaming setup... gaming has been a retrofit into existing living spaces. I have gaming areas in two places in the house. First, a large room upstairs started out as the toy room for kids and my library. Now, half of the room is used for home theater with a very large old sofa in front of the 65" 4K TV and audio equipment. Modern consoles and some older ones are hooked up to this TV. I'll share photos in the future. Second, in a small corner of the office/den on the main floor, I've set up a 27" CRT TV with 2600, 5200, 7800, and PS2.

Most of my Atari 8-bit collection is on a single shelf in my office along with the CRT TV and Atari consoles. My small 5200 CIB games collection is also here (double stacked). Not shown are my 2 800XL and in-the-box 800. Fort Apocalypse by Synapse was the first commercial game that I bought for my childhood 800, and I believe Temple of Apshai may have been the second. EA's early games are also my favorites. I have a small collection of games from those three companies because they represent a lot of A8 nostalgia for me.

The CRT TV setup is something I'm actively thinking about. I need to find a way to have access to all 3 Atari consoles. Right now, the 7800 is sitting in the back of the bottom shelf on the stand. I also have a PS2 here but that takes minimal space. I'll probably have to go with a different TV stand.

In the room upstairs, I have two shelves where all the 2600 games and homebrews are kept. Everything is double stacked. This room also contains shelves (not shown) of games for all generations of Playstation and Xbox.

[HDN]

Nice collection, dude! If you are looking to streamline your Atari things, I would recommend moving your 2600 somewhere else and just playing the games on the 7800. Maybe hook it up in a different room so you can play in more places. That's what I plan to do when I get a 7800 someday. What kind of 5200 do you have?

[TrekMD]

That is a nice collection, indeed! 

[socrates63]

1 hour ago, HDN said:

Nice collection, dude! If you are looking to streamline your Atari things, I would recommend moving your 2600 somewhere else and just playing the games on the 7800. Maybe hook it up in a different room so you can play in more places. That's what I plan to do when I get a 7800 someday. What kind of 5200 do you have?

Thanks kindly.

About the streamlining, that was my original intent (to play both 2600 and 7800 games on a 7800) so I started off by acquiring the 7800 first. However, I ran into an issue where Space Rocks was incompatible with my 7800. That prompted me to get a 2600, and I actually prefer using the sixer with its switches over the buttons and switches on the 7800.

Until recently when I acquired a CRT TV, the 7800 was hooked up to the 65" 4K TV upstairs. But there's nothing like playing older games on the display that they were designed for. I'm in love with gaming on the CRT.

I have a 4 port 5200 that was heavily modded and calibrated by @CrossBow. You can read up on what he did here. Short summary from the link:

• UAV has been installed to provide great composite and s-video video outputs
• Because I've had them on hand and wasn't using them, I installed gold plated RCA jacks to the expansion plate along with the s-video output
• Audio is tapped and filtered properly and connected dual mono to L/R RCA jacks
• Original power inductor and filter cap removed and replaced with a console5 power conversion kit. Only change is that I use a different wire harness that provides a way to easily disconnect the power so the main board can be removed in the future if needed.
• New DC barrel jack installed next to the channel select switch so the 4-port switch box is no longer required to power this 5200.

I was looking for one with s-video and I feel very lucky to have gotten a 5200 from CrossBow. It should last for a long time 🙂

[CrossBow]

I'm just glad to see it found a new home where it will can really be appreciated! For the record, it ended up being modded as much as it was due to all the issues it came to me having. It didn't have a pokey, the CPU and ANTIC both ended up being bad and the audio section on the mainboard had been damaged quite a bit by the previous owner attempting some repairs. So that 5200 ended up being an excellent candidate for several videos I did featuring the 5200. 

[HDN]

38 minutes ago, socrates63 said:

I actually prefer using the sixer with its switches over the buttons and switches on the 7800.

I can totally understand that. Buttons do kind of suck. Plus, I've heard you can't play games like Starmaster that use the B&W switch.

[socrates63]

Yes, forgot that Starmaster uses the switches. Game compatibility/playability gave me the perfect reason to get a 2600, and I'm very happy to have gotten a six switch 2600.

[HDN]

Just now, socrates63 said:

Yes, forgot that Starmaster uses the switches. Game compatibility/playability gave me the perfect reason to get a 2600, and I'm very happy to have gotten a six switch 2600.

I own two 2600s, both four-switch models: vader and woody. I use the vader model mostly. It matches my desk and I've always liked playing 2600 with the joystick set down on a table or something.

[socrates63]

Nice! Vader models look cool. I don’t have a desk but I like playing sitting on the floor with the controller on the floor. That means the TV stand can’t be too tall so that’s the challenge. 

[HDN]

4 minutes ago, socrates63 said:

Nice! Vader models look cool. I don’t have a desk but I like playing sitting on the floor with the controller on the floor. That means the TV stand can’t be too tall so that’s the challenge. 

Only problem with the vader model is that dust shows up really easily. I clean it out weekly. When I'm not using it for a while I'll put on the dust cover, but that hasn't been the case recently as I've been playing a lot of Defender, Pac-Man, and Tunnel Runner.

[CrossBow]

Starmaster is still playable on the 7800. I seem to recall that if you have a second controller you can use the fire button on it to activate the star chart. I believe you can also use the player 2 difficulty switch to activate the start chart.

Point is, that Activision included some additional features into their games that do make playing them on the 7800 still very possible even if they aren't advertised in the manual. It is almost like Activision knew the 7800 was coming? Or could it be due to the 2800 / Sears Video Arcade II console? 

Space shuttle was one game I used to play a lot on my 4-switch woody and was sad I couldn't play it on the 7800 due to having to use the BW/Color switch to turn the Ohms rockets on and off as part of the deorbit burn process etc. Well, once again in reading the manual you find out that the player 1 difficulty switch is  backup ohms rocket switch? Backup switch? Why would that have a backup for that one and only function for the entire game? Seems they again knew there was a chance of trying to play this on a system without the switch or only being momentary and not static.

Does the VCS adapter have a BW/Color switch on it? Could have been these games included these little known options for the VCS adapter?

 

[HDN]

On August 18, 2020 at 11:17 AM, CrossBow said:

Does the VCS adapter have a BW/Color switch on it?

I know the ColecoVision Expansion Module does. Not sure about the 5200 adapter if that's what you're talking about.

[socrates63]

I added some sealed 5200 games to my collection, but more exciting to me is the CX30 Evolved paddle controller and the fact that I've discovered a store for Atari stuff that I didn't know about before! Everything arrived today from @Video 61 and atarisales.com. I initially found out about the CX30 Evolved controller through @btbfilms76's 7800 paddle controller giveaway post. Being a controller guy, I couldn't wait until December to score the CX30 Evolved from BTB's giveaway and had to order my own pronto.

Go see BTB's post and video linked in the post for details on the CX30 Evolved. This is the best paddle controller that I've used -- velvety smooth movement and very comfortable to hold. I've stored away my 2600 paddles.

[CrossBow]

Fractalus is one of my favorite games on the 5200. And it is a good game to pop in for burn in testing of lots of things. It has an attract mode so you can leave it in and turn on the system and just let it run to verify all the logic is working and graphics etc. It uses quite a few buttons on the controller so it is good to test with refurbed controllers as well. And it is a really fun game to boot! Although I tend to start on a higher level like around 6 or so since that is when it starts to get more interesting.

 

[socrates63]

A fun game with utility! Win win! LucasFilm made some terrific games back then. I remember being amazed by the graphics of Rescue on Fractalus. 

[HDN]

For me, Lucasarts (renamed at the time these were released) will always be the Indiana Jones SNES and Super Star Wars people. Two great childhood games I never got far in. I should play those again.

[Atari 5200 Guy]

I've never played Rescue but I have Ballblazer...just not on the 5200.  I played it first on the 7800 and later the Atari 8-bit computers.  It's great to see the 5200 get some love once in a while.

[socrates63]

To commemorate the 21st anniversary of the Dreamcast release, here's my modest collection. Sadly, I haven't gotten around to hooking it up although I've owned it for a year.

[CrossBow]

Which DC game is that between Lodoss War and Ghost Blade?

I own only 2 Japanese games in my DC collection. Rez and the JPN release of Space Channel 5 because the cover on their released version is the best!

I need to find an official SC5 Part 2 someday though. 

 

[socrates63]

1 hour ago, CrossBow said:

Which DC game is that between Lodoss War and Ghost Blade?

I own only 2 Japanese games in my DC collection. Rez and the JPN release of Space Channel 5 because the cover on their released version is the best!

That would be this one.

 

I haven't played SC5 yet (I have it on PS2) but I love the art. I recently picked up the 25th(?) anniversary soundtrack CD.

Edited September 10, 2020 by socrates63

[CrossBow]

I first played SC5 on the Dreamcast after reading all the positive reviews it got back in the day. I also own the SC5 collection for the PS2 but I still find the DC original to play better. The PS2 version is actually easier until you get to the end bosses where the timing then seems to go to pot for some reason? The DC version is less tolerant on timings but it at least seems more consistent. The Part 2 was never released in the States in English so a DC version of that would all be in Japanese. But the story doesn't matter as the game play is the same and the simon says speech is all the same. So regardless Up, Up, Chu, Chu still sounds the same LOL!

What kind of game is Ganryu? I don't think I've heard of that one although I only recently found out about JoshProd releases about a year ago when I picked up Finding Teddy, Volgar and some other games.

 

[socrates63]

3 hours ago, CrossBow said:

What kind of game is Ganryu? I don't think I've heard of that one although I only recently found out about JoshProd releases about a year ago when I picked up Finding Teddy, Volgar and some other games.

It's a side-scrolling platformer NeoGeo arcade game. I looked up a couple of reviews and it looked fun. I bought it in NYC when I was out there for work. This store carries several JoshProd releases. 

http://videogamesnewyork.com/ganryu-sega-dreamcast/

Volgar is one I want to pick up.

Edited September 11, 2020 by socrates63

[CrossBow]

11 hours ago, socrates63 said:

It's a side-scrolling platformer NeoGeo arcade game. I looked up a couple of reviews and it looked fun. I bought it in NYC when I was out there for work. This store carries several JoshProd releases. 

http://videogamesnewyork.com/ganryu-sega-dreamcast/

Volgar is one I want to pick up.

If you are okay burning your own, the Volgarr image actually was released publicly for that purpose. I bought all of my JoshProd games from PixelHeart so far an wasn't aware of a US Distro for them so thanks for that! Too bad they are sold out of Gunlord as I would recommend that game in a heart beat! I picked up Gunlord, Fast Stryker, and Lost Hope as a bundle when NGDEV was clearing them out about 2 or 3 years ago. 

 

[socrates63]

4 hours ago, CrossBow said:

If you are okay burning your own, the Volgarr image actually was released publicly for that purpose. I bought all of my JoshProd games from PixelHeart so far an wasn't aware of a US Distro for them so thanks for that! Too bad they are sold out of Gunlord as I would recommend that game in a heart beat! I picked up Gunlord, Fast Stryker, and Lost Hope as a bundle when NGDEV was clearing them out about 2 or 3 years ago. 

Thanks for the recommendations!

I'll need to look into a setup to burn discs. I haven't done it for years and with my current main computer (iMac), I don't have an optical drive although that could be remedied easily enough with an external drive.

[RickR]

It might be cool to set up a forum post with a DC burning guide.  I also haven't done one in years, and I don't remember much about it.