VENTURE - Work in Progress for the Atari 7800

[Video 61]

hi everyone,

 

this is a work on progress, we have a ways to go yet. but we have added some stuff that's different than the A-8 and 5200 versions.

 

thanks for looking,

 

lance

www.atarisales.com

 

[Video 61]

22 minutes ago, intellicolecovisonary said:

I loved this game at the arcade and on the Colecovision but tight control and easy diagonals are a must. 

hi,

 

 agreed.

 

lance

www.atarisales.com

 

[TrekMD]

Very cool!  I love Venture!

[Video 61]

1 hour ago, TrekMD said:

Very cool!  I love Venture!

hi TrekMD,

 

this is the third version of venture i have beta tested. i now dream of venture in my sleep:) its why we made some changes in the game. thanks for the kind words.

 

lance

www.atarisales.com

 

[Jinroh]

So amazing! After hearing about this version for so long, it is phenomenal to see it in action! The extra little touches  compared to the other versions make it seem all the more better. Also the music sounds great, not like a buzzy TIA at all.

Definitely will have to pick this up when it is out. ❤️

 

[peteym5]

Here are the links to the updated videos. The original videos had an Audio issue and dropped several minutes into the video. So I re-edited the audio track and replaced the videos. I did not want anyone to believe there is a problem with the game itself. I had believing this several years ago on another popular Atari forum when members with malice intent and proclaimed games were buggy just from viewing these videos. However, I later discovered issues were coming from the processes of making the videos. Several things can go wrong with recording original footage, using codecs to compress a new edited video, and uploading to YouTube. Along with playing back on a streaming video service. 

 

 

Edited June 2, 2021 by peteym5

[CrossBow]

15 minutes ago, peteym5 said:

Here are the links to the updated videos. The original videos had an Audio issue and dropped several minutes into the video. So I re-edited the audio track and replaced the videos. I did not want anyone to believe there is a problem with the game itself. I had believing this several years ago on another popular Atari forum when members with malice intent and proclaimed games were buggy just from viewing these videos. However, I later discovered issues were coming from the processes of making the videos. Several things can go wrong with recording original footage, using codecs to compress a new edited video, and uploading to YouTube. Along with playing back on a streaming video service. 

I had to deal with this last night when capturing footage from my Intellivision. I noticed in post edit that the audio was behind the video by several seconds?! No idea how it happened. Worse was that once I aligned it up at the beginning of the video, it would eventually drift and start to get behind again. In the end, I had to grab small bits of what I wanted to show, crop both the video and audio for it separately, line it up for the section I wanted to show and repeat the process further down the video.

Next part I recorded, didn't do this and everything was in sync and remained so through the recording? So yeah it can bite you in odd ways.

 

[Jinroh]

3 hours ago, peteym5 said:

Here are the links to the updated videos. The original videos had an Audio issue and dropped several minutes into the video. So I re-edited the audio track and replaced the videos. I did not want anyone to believe there is a problem with the game itself. I had believing this several years ago on another popular Atari forum when members with malice intent and proclaimed games were buggy just from viewing these videos. However, I later discovered issues were coming from the processes of making the videos. Several things can go wrong with recording original footage, using codecs to compress a new edited video, and uploading to YouTube. Along with playing back on a streaming video service. 

 

 

Oh bummer, I did not even notice any glitch with the old video, but great really liked seeing these great videos of the progress. Always love seeing what you guys have going on.

[Video 61]

15 hours ago, Jinroh said:

So amazing! After hearing about this version for so long, it is phenomenal to see it in action! The extra little touches  compared to the other versions make it seem all the more better. Also the music sounds great, not like a buzzy TIA at all.

Definitely will have to pick this up when it is out. ❤️

 

 

15 hours ago, Jinroh said:

So amazing! After hearing about this version for so long, it is phenomenal to see it in action! The extra little touches  compared to the other versions make it seem all the more better. Also the music sounds great, not like a buzzy TIA at all.

Definitely will have to pick this up when it is out. ❤️

 

hi jinroh,

 

thanks for the kind words, and yes peter did a fantastic job with the TIA music, to bad general corporation did not incorporate a pokey chip on the 7800 side. but i understand about the compatibility issues.

 

lance

www.atarisales.com

 

 

[Jinroh]

Yes a POKEY chip would have been great, but agreed, they did what they had to I suppose. I think the TIA music is great however. 🙂

 

[Video 61]

50 minutes ago, Jinroh said:

Yes a POKEY chip would have been great, but agreed, they did what they had to I suppose. I think the TIA music is great however. 🙂

 

hi Jinroh,

back then the pokeys were a dime a dozen, today, hard to find. so we do what we can do with the hardware we have, and the music is good enough.

thanks,

lance

www.atarisales.com

 

[Jinroh]

Yes I definitely think so, I find it really appealing on TIA and it does not sound like the usual TIA fare either. 🙂 It can sound really great in the right hands, and you guys have done it well.

It would be nice if we could have a cheap common POKEY the new POKEY alternative is nice, but very pricey so far.

[peteym5]

I understand games with Pokey or other sound chip are nice, but will drive the price up on the cartridges. TIA is not an easy chip to program for. I see what the 2600 guys needs to deal with. I wonder if anyone tried to put another common sound chip in a 7800 cartridge like Yamaha or something.

[CrossBow]

3 hours ago, peteym5 said:

I understand games with Pokey or other sound chip are nice, but will drive the price up on the cartridges. TIA is not an easy chip to program for. I see what the 2600 guys needs to deal with. I wonder if anyone tried to put another common sound chip in a 7800 cartridge like Yamaha or something.

The answer is yes...

There is the Dragonfly flash/expansion cartridge that includes a YM2151 module as an add on and there is at least one game programmed for the 7800 that uses it. Pac-Man Collection 40th Anniversary. Additionally the game Rikki & Vikki features a custom soundchip on that cartridge called the Bupchip. So yes, there are at least two other carts that exist now that have different sound chips other than Pokey.

 

[Jinroh]

5 hours ago, peteym5 said:

I understand games with Pokey or other sound chip are nice, but will drive the price up on the cartridges. TIA is not an easy chip to program for. I see what the 2600 guys needs to deal with. I wonder if anyone tried to put another common sound chip in a 7800 cartridge like Yamaha or something.

Yes like I mention that new POKEY is available but bleh so pricey. Having one sound channel for music and 1 for SFX was handy for keeping the code in 32K for my 2600 game but not enough ROM space to do fancy mixing. A cheap Yamaha sound chip would be nice, a shame Curt Vandel passed. His expansion would have made that easier for all of us, having both POKEY and YM chip, but I am sure someone can think of an easy circuit to add YM sound to cartridges for new releases.

I still assert that you guys did a great job of with the sound on TIA it sounds like the arcade and not grating like usual TIA fare that cannot be said enough. 🙂

Edited June 4, 2021 by Jinroh

[peteym5]

Another solution that has been tossed around for years was a pass through cartridge with a sound chip on it, but would have to be at a memory location that does not affect 48K, 128K, or larger. I elected not to support the XM for several reasons. One was many years passed and nothing came back from Curt about the progress of the XM, people were calling him out for being a scammer. It would had been a limited market in an already small market, so a game would need to be able to run without it. Plus Curt and I did not get along all that well. He blocked me from his Facebook group for no good reason and did spread some slander about me. I did express my condolences at his passing, but his formal associates can be trouble. 

[Jinroh]

Oh bummer sorry to hear you had bad dealings with he and his associates. I had not dealt with him personally just kept an eye on the XM thread.

 

That said a pass through cart would be a nice idea. A small double ended PCB with injection moulded small shell would be fairly cheap, but yes wiring the memory locations are the tricky thing for the compatibility with different ROM sizes but it would be a neat attachment.

[CrossBow]

12 hours ago, Jinroh said:

That said a pass through cart would be a nice idea. A small double ended PCB with injection moulded small shell would be fairly cheap, but yes wiring the memory locations are the tricky thing for the compatibility with different ROM sizes but it would be a neat attachment.

A passthrough cart is being developed by the same guy that created the Dragonfly cartridge. It will specifically be for the YM2151 but the idea is to have it essentially always remain plugged into the console and all games will plug into it. That way, it works as both the required sound expansion for games that use the yamaha chip, and as a standard passthrough for all other games. It could help with making 3rd party 2600 games be more easily played and allow things like the Supercharger to be used on the 7800 as well. Not sure the status on it, but I know the dev has began working on it.

 

[peteym5]

Maybe a future version of 7800 will support the YM2151. That is the 8 channel chip? Video 61 and I are always looking forward to provide more videos about what is happening with our game development. I just figured out how to customize my YouTube channel and is very easy once you figure all this stuff out. People can always subscribe to our channels and be notified when new content becomes available, even if we do not announce it on the forums and other social media right away. I sometimes will upload a video and let Video 61 and friends look it over before posting links to make sure everything is correct. 

[DegasElite]

9 hours ago, CrossBow said:

A passthrough cart is being developed by the same guy that created the Dragonfly cartridge. It will specifically be for the YM2151 but the idea is to have it essentially always remain plugged into the console and all games will plug into it. That way, it works as both the required sound expansion for games that use the yamaha chip, and as a standard passthrough for all other games. It could help with making 3rd party 2600 games be more easily played and allow things like the Supercharger to be used on the 7800 as well. Not sure the status on it, but I know the dev has began working on it.

 

Cool. I would love to see that work with my Supercharger cartridge. I would love to get an XM, but I don't think I can because of Curt Vendel passing away. Will it be manufactured again?

[Video 61]

On 6/3/2021 at 10:35 PM, Jinroh said:

Yes I definitely think so, I find it really appealing on TIA and it does not sound like the usual TIA fare either. 🙂 It can sound really great in the right hands, and you guys have done it well.

It would be nice if we could have a cheap common POKEY the new POKEY alternative is nice, but very pricey so far.

hi Jinroh,

 

yep, price can be very important.

 

lance

www.atarisales.com

 

 

[Video 61]

On 6/4/2021 at 12:00 PM, peteym5 said:

I understand games with Pokey or other sound chip are nice, but will drive the price up on the cartridges. TIA is not an easy chip to program for. I see what the 2600 guys needs to deal with. I wonder if anyone tried to put another common sound chip in a 7800 cartridge like Yamaha or something.

hi peter,

 

 you did good with the music for sure!

 

lance

www.atarisales.com

 

[theclaw1982]

Looking forward to this one!

[Video 61]

7 hours ago, theclaw1982 said:

Looking forward to this one!

 

 

AWESOME!!

 

lance

www.atarisales.com

 

[peteym5]

On 6/5/2021 at 10:04 AM, CrossBow said:

A passthrough cart is being developed by the same guy that created the Dragonfly cartridge. It will specifically be for the YM2151 but the idea is to have it essentially always remain plugged into the console and all games will plug into it. That way, it works as both the required sound expansion for games that use the yamaha chip, and as a standard passthrough for all other games. It could help with making 3rd party 2600 games be more easily played and allow things like the Supercharger to be used on the 7800 as well. Not sure the status on it, but I know the dev has began working on it.

 

Do you know when it will be ready? Do we know if a future version of 7800 Basic and Emulator will also support this. The way I might design any games that use anything with a passthrough, is they will still work without any extra device, just won't hear additional sounds in this case. That way people can still purchase and play the game.