Yeah..."Colecovision " Pac-Man....

[WoodStoner1]

EDIT: to explain...this ad is meant to prove that the 5200 was better than Colecovision. To prove this, they show a clip of 5200 Pac-Man and compare it to..."Colecovision Pac-Man." Which in truth is the infamous 2600 version.

[Paul]

At least the ColecoVision controllers worked...

[tirtefaa]

It's hilarious that the 2600 outlasted the 5200 and technically the 7800. The controller for the 5200 was so terrible...I mean how do you go from a simple 2600 joystick with one button...to a controller with 19 buttons and a terrible joystick.

The 7800 wasn't too bad, but the damage had already been done, and the landscape was clearly different at this point, so still offering the "arcade experience" wasn't so hip in 1986 compared to 1982.

As far as Pac Man 2600? I still maintain that is the worst disaster for the 2600, and practically unplayable, to the point you get a headache after a couple minutes due to the flashing ghosts. E.T. was actually not too bad.

[Dr. T is an alien]

Jan 20, 2023 13:59:57 GMT -5 WoodStoner1 said:

That's actually quite deceptive. That is the 2600 port of Pac-Man played through the expansion module 2 for the Colecovision. That is not an actual Colecovision port of Pac-Man. Colecovision was capable of much more than that.

Having said that, it could be viewed as payback. When Nintendo looked to port Donkey Kong to US consoles, they contracted Coleco to do the ports. Coleco deliberately made the Atari and Intellivision ports look like ass so that the Colecovision port, which was nearly accurate to the arcade, made the Colecovision look to be a vastly superior system. It was vastly superior to the 2600 in many ways (in fact, using the expansion module 2 you can play 2600 games on the Colecovision and almost always they played significantly better - as the fact that the 2600 port on the video did not need to glitch out the optics because the Colecovision could, in fact, display all of the sprites at the same time), though the Intellivision actually was fairly comparable in many ways. Having said that, the Intellivision still required an addition piece of hardware to make speech capable while the Coleco did not.

Intellivision:


Colecovision:


Granted, that game had all of 5 or 6 lines to it, it still was something the other platforms could not do.

[Cyno]

Atari wasn't fooling anyone with those commercials considering how much of a bust the post-VCS Atari consoles were.

[fg]

Jan 20, 2023 16:19:30 GMT -5 Dr. T is an alien said:

Jan 20, 2023 13:59:57 GMT -5 WoodStoner1 said:

That's actually quite deceptive. That is the 2600 port of Pac-Man played through the expansion module 2 for the Colecovision. That is not an actual Colecovision port of Pac-Man. Colecovision was capable of much more than that.

Having said that, it could be viewed as payback. When Nintendo looked to port Donkey Kong to US consoles, they contracted Coleco to do the ports. Coleco deliberately made the Atari and Intellivision ports look like ass so that the Colecovision port, which was nearly accurate to the arcade, made the Colecovision look to be a vastly superior system. It was vastly superior to the 2600 in many ways (in fact, using the expansion module 2 you can play 2600 games on the Colecovision and almost always they played significantly better - as the fact that the 2600 port on the video did not need to glitch out the optics because the Colecovision could, in fact, display all of the sprites at the same time), though the Intellivision actually was fairly comparable in many ways. Having said that, the Intellivision still required an addition piece of hardware to make speech capable while the Coleco did not.

(Computerized voice): “Mattel Electronics Presents…”

(Different voice): “…BEEEEEE 17 BOOOOOMBER!”

[fg]

Here’s the AVGN video of the Atari 5200

m.youtube.com/watch?v=AknyR-kRvLc&t=246s

Here’s his videos on the Colecovisiin and Intellivision

m.youtube.com/watch?v=4yn52NTdV0c

m.youtube.com/watch?v=rBMO8F1I-h4&t=130s

[Saiyanic Panic]

I half-thought the hand in the thumbnail was gonna be Pac-Man. Wow that's yellow.

[The Dark Order Inferno]

Jan 20, 2023 15:14:46 GMT -5 tirtefaa said:

It's hilarious that the 2600 outlasted the 5200 and technically the 7800. The controller for the 5200 was so terrible...I mean how do you go from a simple 2600 joystick with one button...to a controller with 19 buttons and a terrible joystick.

The 7800 wasn't too bad, but the damage had already been done, and the landscape was clearly different at this point, so still offering the "arcade experience" wasn't so hip in 1986 compared to 1982.

As far as Pac Man 2600? I still maintain that is the worst disaster for the 2600, and practically unplayable, to the point you get a headache after a couple minutes due to the flashing ghosts. E.T. was actually not too bad.

To be fair, the keypads were a thing that both Mattel and Coleco had put on their systems so it likely felt like it could become an important feature once they found a good use for it. They never did, but they could have.


The 5200 was a weird game of catchup, taking all the wrong things from their rivals, keypads and controller storage that made the machine monstrously huge, bad ideas that ruined an otherwise capable machine.

[ERON]

Man, my family and I absolutely loved our Atari 5200...for the month or so that the controllers actually worked. After that we had to dig our old Pong machine out of the attic to get our video game fix until the NES came along.

[Ultimo Gallos]

I skipped the 5200. Mostly cause by the time it hit I had a 2600 and a Colecovision.

Did play one a few times back in the day. But it was't until about 95 that a group of us found a 5200 and 10 or so games at a flea market cheap.

Rushed back to a buddy's house hooked it up. And after maybe 3 days we unhooked it and put the 2600 back in it's place.

But for all the crap the 5200 controllers get the Colecovision ones were not much better. Hand cramping mushy buttons and just too big.

One of the best things I learned when I started getting into retro video games in the mid 90s was learning you could use Sega Genesis controllers on @600s. No more having to use whatever janky 2600 controller we found at the junkstore. Nope back then Genesis controllers were still easy to find.

[WoodStoner1]

Jan 21, 2023 11:17:48 GMT -5 Ultimo Gallos said:

I skipped the 5200. Mostly cause by the time it hit I had a 2600 and a Colecovision.

I skipped it cause I was happy with the 2600. That and my parents weren't ready to fork out more money for a new system. I wanted the 7800 more by then too, as I thought it was a compromise...better system and it played the 2600 cartridges. At the time Atari was pushing the Nintendo licenses they still had, conveniently. One 7800 ad started by showing Mario Bros., as if saying, "See you can play Mario here too! Buy it please!" So the 7800 was my go-between the 2600 and the NES, which I'd get like 1-2 years later.

[Ultimo Gallos]

By the time the 7800 hit the mass market,I was far far way from where they limited released it in what 85?

But by the time it hit everywhere I was 13 and working weekends and summers on Dad's shrimp boat. 2600 was still working and I had a NES so I saw nothing on the 7800 that caught my eye.

Wasn't until maybe 2000 I got a 7800. Cool system. But really the 4 or 5 games on it I like playing I can play on my evercade with the Atari collection carts.

[The Dark Order Inferno]

The 7800 was in the 'chickens coming home to roost' era of OG Atari, they shafted people continually on their rise to prominence, mistreating programmers, suppliers and rivals, licensing things they never had any intention of using to block competition, Jack Tramiel took over and the rep he carried over from Commodore was somehow even worse so nobody was lining up to develop for it, even people happily developing for the Atari 8 bit computers so it's library was mostly okay ports of arcade games from years ago. It wasn't bad hardware, soundchip aside, and it could do the add on chips to expand its capabilities same as the NES but since there was no support from 3rd parties, we never saw much that really used that feature nor served as a showcase. Kinda funny how Nintendo ate their lunch with the same tactics, then would also suffer the same near collapse as almost all the 3rd parties abandoned them in the n64 era, fortunately they never brought in someone like Jack so pulled out of it.

I still have my 7800, though I daren't plug it in these days as the cheap power supplies Atari and Commodore used are dying and frying the systems in the process. I need to get a replacement and do the RCA mod.

[CMWaters]

...you know, I kinda feel weird about bashing 2600 Pac-Man since...it's the first version I played.

[WoodStoner1]

Jan 21, 2023 13:46:48 GMT -5 CMWaters said:

...you know, I kinda feel weird about bashing 2600 Pac-Man since...it's the first version I played.

Same. I actually...enjoyed it too? I also had and liked E.T.

[Deleted]

Jan 21, 2023 11:17:48 GMT -5 Ultimo Gallos said:

One of the best things I learned when I started getting into retro video games in the mid 90s was learning you could use Sega Genesis controllers on @600s. No more having to use whatever janky 2600 controller we found at the junkstore. Nope back then Genesis controllers were still easy to find.

Not only that but you could uses the 2600 controller on the Genesis. It pretty much impossible to play most genesis game with it but Sonic is one of the few due to it using only one button expect your screw if you want to pause the game.

[Triangle Lancer]

I had a Sears Tele-Games, same as the 2600. Same games.

My friend had an Atari 400, a very early PC. The joystick was the mouse. Funniest thing we did with it was create a line based on the Energizer commercials. They used to have an ad campaign "It do run run run run run run run..." like the song.
We wrote with the joystick "It do run run run etc." We still bust a gut over that. (We were 9.)
He had Qix, that game where you trap the band of sticks into as small a space as possible. (First game I ever got for the Gameboy was Qix.) I got 100% once. Thats like bowling 300 in a game.

[Dr. T is an alien]

Jan 21, 2023 16:10:04 GMT -5 WoodStoner1 said:

Jan 21, 2023 13:46:48 GMT -5 CMWaters said:

...you know, I kinda feel weird about bashing 2600 Pac-Man since...it's the first version I played.

Same. I actually...enjoyed it too? I also had and liked E.T.

I hated it because I already had played the arcade aplenty. As a result, the unresponsive controls, glitchy graphics, and the crunchy audio just irked me. Even worse, because of how much Atari I had played, I know damned good and well The 2600 was more capable than that. The only limitations that PacMan truly had to get around is that there are two many sprites for the system to display.

[Ultimo Gallos]

Jan 21, 2023 22:53:12 GMT -5 Triangle Lancer said:

I had a Sears Tele-Games, same as the 2600. Same games.

My friend had an Atari 400, a very early PC. The joystick was the mouse. Funniest thing we did with it was create a line based on the Energizer commercials. They used to have an ad campaign "It do run run run run run run run..." like the song.
We wrote with the joystick "It do run run run etc." We still bust a gut over that. (We were 9.)
He had Qix, that game where you trap the band of sticks into as small a space as possible. (First game I ever got for the Gameboy was Qix.) I got 100% once. Thats like bowling 300 in a game.

I had the sears telegames release of Breakout,called Breakthru IV IIRC.

And love QIX. There is a version of it for the Genesis that I discovered on an emulator that is my favorite. Also for years at the local pool hall/arcade/bar I had the top score on QIX ripoff Gal's Panic. Only time I ever saw that machine in a US location.

While I didn't like Pac Man arcade or atari 2600 version I loved Ms pacman. Years back found the 2600 Ms pacman instruction book. In the back we had kept our high scores. Name date then intials of whoever was there to see you get the score.

Tempted to fire up my portable 2600 and see if I can beat not only my old high score but also my dads.