Jolt Country

It wasn't working all these years because the software was in my parent's basement in NY.

But here's what I need to get it to go:

- 2 joysticks. I don't have any. I would like new (or new old stock), "classic" 2600 joysticks.

- 2 sets of paddles. For Warlords, mostly.

- A SIO cable that goes from the disk drive to the 800. I have the disk drive and I have the 800. The disk drive cable is in the basement, or: gone.

- A power supply for the disk drive. Again, in the basement.

- My goddamn box of disks. I lived at Jeff's parents' house for a week copying software. This I have asked my brother to get numerous times. It's killing me that the thing is slowly dying hundreds of miles away. Then again, people are noting that 5.25" floppies are dying. So that leads me to:

- A SIO cable that will go from the 800 to my computer. In theory this should let me run any image I can acquire, but I have no idea where to get the cable or 800 disk images.

- A cable that will go from the 800 to Dayna's extra RCA-plug-enabled TV.

... Whew! I think that's it. If any of you guys have any of that crap and want to "donate" it to the website I'll pay shipping. I wish I could pay more, but I'm broke and this is why I am trying to get an ancient piece of tech like the 800 working instead of, I don't know, getting First Person Shooters 2007 or something from EB.

Handy URLs:

The SIO cable that lets you play disk images off your PC (USB version):
http://www.atarimax.com/sio2pc/documentation/

The Flashcart:
http://www.atarimax.com/flashcart/documentation/

... I got ahold of the dude at Best Electronics and got most of the stuff I mentioned above (including a TV cable, which is cool). I called in my order and the guy pulled off the road to take the details. Whatta guy! Apparently the stuff will be here tomorrow, which is great as I am taking a comp day. I have exactly one disk handy of Atari 800 software, which was left in the drive from years ago. But at least I will be able to get it to run when the shipment comes in.

There are only two reasons to get an Atari 800.

One is to play Star Raiders.

The other is to play DIAMOND ADVENTURE, a BASIC program which I wrote when I was 10, which I of course never finished, and which featured the following scene:

pinbacker wrote:There are only two reasons to get an Atari 800.

One is to play Star Raiders.

I have Star Raiders! As a cartridge! I am reasonably sure that Chris Freemesser gave this to me. Thank you, Chris!

The other is to play DIAMOND ADVENTURE, a BASIC program which I wrote when I was 10, which I of course never finished, and which featured the following scene:

Code: Select all

You hear of great treasure to be found in Costa Rica!  A building lies north.

> n

Inside Building
You are inside the building.  There is a man here.

> shoot man
You kill the man.  A plane ticket to Costa Rica falls out of his pocket!

You know, if you stack all the text game snippets you have produced over the years, an actually pretty entertaining text game would take hold. How about I make this the ending to "Burning Down the House" and release it next week as a Ben Parrish Joint?

Do it up!

pinbacker wrote:Do it up!

It's now on my.... To-do List!!!

Oh.

pinbacker wrote:Oh.

It's practically next on the to-do list, though! I need to test the game of a guy none of you know (he is testing my game, we are swapping services), I need to get the 800 working when the parts come in and then, boom baby, Burning Down the House as a 2007 release! Complete with MURDER AND PLANE TICKETS!

Is it true that the To-Do list will be actually finished around the same time that the national debt is paid off? I ask merely for information. I THINK I have a nice 1541 II drive for the C64 if you need it. I have to actually go upstairs into the attic of boxes and search for it. I know I threw out my non working C64c but saved the drive for some perverse reason. Mind you, this was long ago in a galaxy blah blah blah, so no promises, but there's always hope.



THE
SEARCH YOUR STORAGE, LUKE
AARDVARK

AArdvark wrote:Is it true that the To-Do list will be actually finished around the same time that the national debt is paid off?

It keeps growing bigger and bigger, so yeah, they are headed to the same end date: never.

I ask merely for information. I THINK I have a nice 1541 II drive for the C64 if you need it. I have to actually go upstairs into the attic of boxes and search for it. I know I threw out my non working C64c but saved the drive for some perverse reason. Mind you, this was long ago in a galaxy blah blah blah, so no promises, but there's always hope.

I'll tell you what: no pressure and no hurry, but if you are up there for something else and see it I would be happy to reimburse you for shipping on it. It would definitely be good to have around the house here in Colorado: I am pretty sure that one day I will get a C64 set up, so it would definitely get use.

But I am far away from doing that now that I have made great strides on the Atari 800, so there is absolutely, positively... a complete lack of any rushing.

Sorry. After an exhaustive search, which is to say as long as I could take it up there in the heat, I couldn't find the drive anywhere. I did find a box of Commie games manuals which I also had saved for god knows what reason. Funny how good they make the games sound. You could have those if you want. You'd need to find the actual games tho. I mean on floppy, I have most of them able to run on my emulator (which is why I don't understand why you want to set up the Atari 800 and C64 hardware again)

I can mail them out this week if you are interested.

THE
PAPER GRAPHICS
AARDVARK

The basement is disgusting you asshole. For some strange reason you can't be bothered to come back here ever again. Guess how fun it is plowing through all your old stuff looking for Atari disks? A contents list

1.Boxes and Boxes of college text books of classes you failed.

2. Every cheesy dork fad toy alive including go-bots

3. Random disks that are NOT atari

4. Key chains, gadgets, pencils, game boxes, failed systems (Jaguar anyone!!!!??!?!?) comic books you self produced and god knows what else.

The best part is they are covered in a nice layer of 10 year old flooding musk and spider eggs. And there is only one functioning fucking light in that hell hole.

It's like plowing through John Does (from "Seven") notebooks in that cock tucker from Silence of the Lambs' death pit.

Knuckles the CLown wrote:The basement is disgusting you asshole. For some strange reason you can't be bothered to come back here ever again. Guess how fun it is plowing through all your old stuff looking for Atari disks? A contents list

It's... a lot of fun?? Let's see!

1.Boxes and Boxes of college text books of classes you failed.

Ooh, I'll need those. There's little doubt in my mind that I'll be able to get top $$$ for them, as college textbooks rarely depreciate.

2. Every cheesy dork fad toy alive including go-bots

I had only two Go-bots. "Leader 1" and "Scooter." The Go-bot team eventually realized that "Leader 1" was way too small to be the leader of anyone, so they issued a new Go-bot that was seven times larger. I did not get that one. I have the tiny, shitty one.

3. Random disks that are NOT atari

Yeah, I want those, too. Eventually.

4. Key chains, gadgets, pencils, game boxes, failed systems (Jaguar anyone!!!!??!?!?) comic books you self produced and god knows what else.

Ah, the Jaguar! I was actually psyched to hear that it's still around. If I thought there was a chance in hell, if even given a million years, that you'd be able to deduce what cables and controllers went to it, I'd ask you to send that to me. As it stands we have a better chance of you randomly finding a petri dish with the AIDS cure down there.

The best part is they are covered in a nice layer of 10 year old flooding musk and spider eggs. And there is only one functioning fucking light in that hell hole.

Hahahah!

It's like plowing through John Does (from "Seven") notebooks in that cock tucker from Silence of the Lambs' death pit.

Well, you'll be happy to know that I don't need you down there looking for anything. I bought a cable from the Internet that will allow me to take disk "images" of Atari games and put them on a Flash cart. So consider this mission finished, my brother. Consider that mission... finished.

...

... I would like to know where the fuck my Topps Traded Set "Barry Bonds Rookie" card is, though.

AArdvark wrote:Sorry. After an exhaustive search, which is to say as long as I could take it up there in the heat, I couldn't find the drive anywhere. I did find a box of Commie games manuals which I also had saved for god knows what reason. Funny how good they make the games sound. You could have those if you want. You'd need to find the actual games tho. I mean on floppy, I have most of them able to run on my emulator [...] I can mail them out this week if you are interested.

No no, that's cool - thanks anyway, though. I can tell you that you could probably get $10 + shipping for them from eBay. I have decided that I no longer stand any chance of getting a complete "Wasteland" box and manual set for a reasonable price, so I have been looking over lots of game manuals and such individually. But yeah, I appreciate it, but I am good.

(which is why I don't understand why you want to set up the Atari 800 and C64 hardware again)

Basically, I have the Atari, I have a spare TV and I think playing it on the original hardware is pretty cool. For instance, 4 people can gather round the thing on a TV and do up some Warlords with the original paddle controllers. As far as I know, there is no 2600 paddle - to - USB solution out there, so it really can't be emulated. Additionally, getting some games I've never played like Seven Cities of Gold and Mail Order Monsters and playing them on the real thing is neat because it eliminates distractions. I can't do emulated games on a PC because I'll start browsing the Internet or something. I need to like lock myself in a different room and concentrate on the task at hand.

I don't know, that's probably goofy, but it's proven to be pretty cheap to get the 800 working again, so I am becoming more and more thrilled.

Emulated games play like crap. If you were any good at them at all back in the day, you can't get anywhere near the freedom of movement or responsiveness from them. I'm behind this project 100%.

Thanks you prick. I went down in that shithole for two hours. Now that I know you got all you need.



ITS DUMPSTER TIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Knuckles the CLown wrote:Thanks you prick. I went down in that shithole for two hours. Now that I know you got all you need.



ITS DUMPSTER TIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Whoa! This has backfired. Not so fast, you goddamn clown!

Apparently, it's called fucking "Yars' Revenge," not "Yar's Revenger." I had no idea until just now.

This screws up a homonym joke in Fallacy of Dawn. I don't think I will fix it, however. (I have the spelling as "Yar's".)

Blew my mind. The things you learn on the Internet. Meanwhile, I had no idea that a car's battery needs to have water levels maintained until someone just now told me in person.

A chick, too.

Vitriola wrote:Emulated games play like crap. If you were any good at them at all back in the day, you can't get anywhere near the freedom of movement or responsiveness from them. I'm behind this project 100%.

This is why meeting you is the best thing that's ever happened to me. A lot of people say, "Even when you saw Joe Carter hit a game-winning RBI in Toronto against the Seattle Mariners that one time?" And I say, "yes," because frequently when we were in the Skydome we could only afford seats in the bleachers, and when Joe was in left field you couldn't see him unless you hung over the railing.

With seven cabinets (six working) downstairs, it takes a wonderful woman to come down and say, "You should put more games in."