[img align=right]https://i.ibb.co/B6gLZbS/PSX-20210728-150832.jpg[/img]The first REAL computer sport?
Back in May 2020 an article appeared, somewhat bizarrely, on the BBC Sport website about a 1985 videogame designed to teach people how to surf.
It was a fascinating piece that I'll link at the bottom and I thoroughly recommend you read, but with little interest in surfing my imagination was particularly captured, so much so that I tracked down and bought myself a complete copy of the game, by the game's bespoke controller; a plastic surfboard shrunk down to a size a little smaller than the original model of ZX Spectrum. This device was designed to sit on top of the rubber keys and claimed to offer the player scientifically developed 'realistic' movement.
It's a brilliantly bonkers concept, but how does it work? And is the game any good?
Well, perhaps unsurprisingly (especially if you've read the aforementioned article) the game has the air of being put together by someone who's never made entertainment software before. It's worrying enough when the loading splash screen looks to be comprised of the in game graphics which were, it should be said, very simple even by 1985 standards. But furthermore, once loaded, you're immediately presented with the questions "Choose your board 1-5?" and "Gear Selection 1..5", the latter of which inexplicably requires you to enter more than one number and then, for some reason, enter an "X" to move to the next screen.
This is a menu system that is entirely impossible to navigate without constant reference to the game manual, and once you're in-game things only slightly improve.
First up, you have to plod up and down the beach as you choose the best time and place to paddle out... or risk being washed back the way you came. How far you paddle is a variable, as is when to mount, how to turn, how to re-mount... and all this is must be achieved while watching an energy bar that constantly depletes, and is impossible to refill.
On the underside of the game's 19cm surfboard controller are a central pivot, and several little nubs around the edge that press down onto certain keys. Placing a hand on the board, you press in the various areas, relative to where you would press with your feet when real-world surfing, to perform turns, dip the nose over waves, and replicate other surfing moves that I have little knowledge of... I think you can even "hang ten".
[img width=427 height=299 align=right]https://i.ibb.co/Jp10HwH/PSX-20210723-100137.jpg[/img] It's the sound, I think...
More than the sandy beaches and palm trees. More than the branching routes and agonising countdown. More, even, than the girl and the Ferrari. It's the sound that really makes OutRun special.
It's fairly unlikely that I encountered Yu Suzuki's iconic driving game 35 years ago but it was then, late in 1986, that the bright red and vaguely car shaped cabinets first arrived in Japanese arcades.
It's more likely, however, that a couple of years after I would have discovered it when my grandparents took me and my brother on holiday to Great Yarmouth, a popular seaside destination for people living, as we did, on the outskirts of London. This was largely thanks to its Pleasure Beach; a collection of aging arcade machines, roller coasters, and other death-trap rides and attractions jutting out into The Wash.
Posted on Jul 28th 2019 at 12:00:00 PM by (jjGames) Posted under retro, gaming
[img width=450 height=600]https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-BqLOhoOitjE/XG77tTP8ENI/AAAAAAAAYL4/pu_Gp0GLYm0ps0U50e9t_g06CKNgeyqoACPcBGAYYCw/s600/IMG_20190220_164649.jpg[/img] View inside 3 camera photo light box with no item
JJGames.com sells used video games for retro systems like NES, SNES, PS2, etc. Some of the items are 30+ years old and each one has a slightly different condition. Many of our customers are game collectors and they really care about the condition. The best way to show the condition is with high quality photos.
Taking photos can take quite a bit of time though and we have 500-1000 games coming through the warehouse per day. A fully manual process takes about 50 seconds per game (take three photos, upload to servers, and update database with photo info). With 1000 games, it would take 14 man hours per day to take all the photos.
How could we give customers photos they wanted, but not spend so much time taking them? We developed a multi camera light box and wrote a program to take multiple high resolution photos at the same time. Here's how you can cheaply create your own!
I really dig summer, especially for writing (did I mention I love writing?). This time of the year I typically spend a goodly amount of time not playing games but rather thinking about them, diving back into the glory days of the late 80's and early 90's, back when Metro D had a respectable amount of arcade games located in every conceivable place, save government buildings and banks (and I am sure they secretly wanted them).
What does this have to do with the article? Early this year I spent a fair amount of time running my mouth about the past as my fourteen year-old son and I sat on the couch in the game room and played our way through the ninety (!) titles available on the Retro-bit Super Retro-cade. And man, was it amazing.
Another episode of Stuck in the 80's means another chance to dive into some awesome 80's themed nostalgia, this time it's all about Halloween! Will Duke be able to repair enough time fragments to get back to his own time? Put it on Channel 3 to find out!
After a brief Chicago vacation, Duke is back repairing time fragments. This time, it's the lovable, 80s phenomenon the View Master. What memories will this blast from the past unlock? Watch and find out!
Folks on this site likely know the feeling; You and three 'friends' are in a heated Super Smash Bros. Melee when someone cries out, "My "R" button isn't working! Hey guys, wait!" Or that heated Joust versus match with the controller that just doesn't 'flap' as fast, or the time you were excited to show off your rare Sega CD Snatcher on one of the four days of the week that the drive tray doesn't want to work...
If you are a retro gamer that plays as well as collects, you know the effort it takes to upkeep your library. Vintage video game collecting is like classic car collecting or pinball machine collecting; it's more than just having space for the stuff and the ability to find and pay for the games and hardware. If it is going to remain playable, there's some know-how and some elbow grease that will become part of the hobby. From notorious controller wear and faulty optical drives, to analog drift and bad capacitors, every retro player/collector has to get comfortable with just how far down the rabbit hole they are going to go. Perhaps you are fortunate enough to have a passion for a console that seems immune to all but psyonic attacks (SNES, Game Boy Color) or maybe you've fallen for a glass snowflake (Famicom Disc System, a Turbo Duo with good sound), but either way there is always some basic maintenance needed.
[img width=630 height=480]http://www.nintendo.com/images/page/wiiu/what-is-wiiu/panel-1-hardware.jpg[/img] I guess it makes sense that Nintendo.com has pictures that makes me want to buy a third one.
Isn't it funny how we easily get caught in a trap of thinking that, because things have been a certain way for awhile, that is how they will stay? For years and years and years, Atari games were a dime a dozen at yard sales. NES games were everywhere, and a copy of Contra was $5 to $10 tops. Final Fantasy VII and Symphony of the Night were both twenty bucks new everywhere. Collecting N64 and Atari Jaguar games seemed like a silly idea. PS2 games were never, ever going away.
And before that a Coke was a nickel and gas was a quarter and yada yada, I get it. Different times.
My point; How many of us are kicking themselves for not buying that complete Earthbound from Blockbuster, or those last few Saturn games like Panzer Dragoon Saga and Burning Rangers on clearance? Wish we knew then what we knew now, right? Queue the classic discussion about time machines and grabbing retro video games.
Hey everyone! It seems that I'm getting out a bit more often as of late, and what better way to spend time out than playing video games! It just so happens that this past Saturday, Yestercades of Red Bank, NJ was there to feed that craving with a delicious smattering of all things retro to right now.
Yestercades is a pay by the hour/day style arcade featuring a large array of classic arcade cabinets, a decent chunk of modern pinball machines, and a set of gaming stations for console gaming. As of the time of this writing, $25 nets you a full day pass, which allows for full play on any of the aforementioned machines, as well as come-as-you-please access to the arcade (which is super useful to go snag pizza from the amazing place across the street).
Join RF Generation Playcast hosts, Rich (singlebanana), Shawn (GrayGhost81), Floyd (Fleach), and special guest, Duke.Togo from the Collectorcast, as we discuss our August NES playthroughs, Jaws and The Legend of Zelda. In this episode, we discuss whether each of these classic games hold up in the modern generation. What's different about playing these games now and playing them when they came out? Were these games good picks for a monthly playthrough, or were they a bit too polarizing for our audience? You won't want to miss this fun and entertaining episode of the RFG Playcast!
As always, we are happy to hear your thoughts on this games on our discussion page (linked below). We will respond to your comments and are always happy to discuss these games more. We hope you enjoy our show. Please be sure to rate and write a review of the show on iTunes to help us increase our listenership. Thanks for the listen!
If you're as old as I am, go take a nap. Are you back yet? Sorry, I didn't want you falling asleep while reading, as folks our age tend to do. I may have yet to hit the big four-oh, but it feels like the world is a different place than in my youth, and it sure is spinning faster these days. Yeah, when you've been into video games this long, you see quite a few things change over time.
For example, it doesn't seem like too long ago that once a game was released, it was as simple as walking into any major retailer to nab a copy. Sure there have always been obscure titles with small print runs, but preordering felt like an extravagance, online retailers felt like they had unlimited inventory, and unless you were importing or looking for a game more than a few years old, most relatively modern games seemed pretty easy to get. Although I do remember the challenge of trying to ask for Katamari Damacy at a GameStop during the week of release (or just explaining what the game was.)
Join RF Generation Playcast hosts, Rich (singlebanana), Floyd (Fleach), Steven (Disposed Hero), and special guest, long-time member and RF Gen contributor, Addicted, as we discuss our April playthrough of Ys Books I & II. In this episode, we discuss the various versions of the games we played, the story, music, and the peculiar gameplay "bump" mechanic that makes Ys stand out among its contemporary RPGs. If you played Ys Books I & II with us last month, or are thinking of getting started on this classic series, this podcast will be a welcomed listen. As always, we are always happy to hear your thoughts on these games and our podcast on our discussion page (linked below) and are always happy to respond to and discuss the game more. So, how do these games match up to their contemporaries? Are the Ys games RPGs or do they take more from the classic action/adventure games of their time? And, what memory did one host "make" while finishing Book I? You can get the answers to these questions and more by listening to this month's podcast this month!
We hope you enjoy our show, and please join our discussion on the thread linked below. Also, be sure to rate and write a review of the show on iTunes to help us increase our listenership. Thanks for the listen!
Join RFGeneration Playcast hosts, Rich (singlebanana), Shawn (GrayGhost81), Floyd (Fleach), Steven (Disposed Hero), and special guest, Doug (nupoile), as we discuss the ever so popular, and participation-breaking, January playthroughs, Super Mario Bros. 3 (NES) and Super Mario World (SNES). You might be surprised at some of our takes on these classics, so you really don't want to miss this episode. Again, we hope you enjoy our show, and please join our discussion on the thread linked below. Also, be sure to rate and write a review of the show on iTunes to help us increase our listenership. Thanks for the listen!
Join RFGeneration Playcast hosts, Rich (singlebanana), Shawn (GrayGhost81), Floyd (Fleach), and Steven (Disposed Hero) as we discuss December's run n' gun competition games (Contra, Rolling Thunder 2, and Metal Slug 3). Also, be sure to stick around as we also discuss our favorite/least favorite playthrough games of 2015 and even mention a few that surprised us. You really don't want to miss this episode, since it's our favorite to record during the year and a few of us have broken into the "spirits" to celebrate another successful season! Again, we hope you enjoy our show, and please join our discussion on our discussion thread linked below. Also, be sure to rate and write a review of the show on iTunes to help us increase our listenership. Thanks again for the listen all!
As some of you may be aware, the first episode that we recorded for our podcast wasn't "Episode #1 - Phantasy Star & The Last of Us," but was instead, a pilot episode for February 2014's playthroughs of Parasite Eve and Kingdom Hearts. After coming up with the idea to do a podcast, we approached the "powers that be" about the idea and were asked to give them a sample of our proposed show. Since then, only the site administrators, a few friends who we got feedback from, and those of you who donated over $20 during the last fundraiser, have gotten to listen to the show. As a gift to all of our members here and listeners out there, we have decided to release this "Episode Zero" in full, with a new intro recorded by our very own GrayGhost81. I think you'll find it fun to go back and listen to how raw and inexperienced we were, and how much we have improved the show since our beginnings. I think you'll also enjoy the games discussion and maybe even decide to add one or both of them to your collection. Myself, Grayghost81, Fleach, and Disposed Hero would like to wish all of our members here at RF Generation a safe and happy holiday season! Thanks for listening and we hope you'll stick around for what promises to be an exciting 2016 of gaming.
