RETRO consoles in danger of being forgotten

[rez670]

It saddens me so very much when i here about how good the xbox one is or the ps4 or what ever i'm calling all gamers we need to preserve all the old consoles for future generations and these are the console that deserve to be immortalized: SEGA Genesis SEGA saturn SEGA dreamcast NES SNES N64 GameCube Playstation 1 PlayStation 2 XBOX Atari 2600 Magnavox Odyssey these console might very well be forgotten just because there supposedly "Obsolete" well there not we need to save these consoles in 2025 people need to be able to play these consoles cause if we dont who will so post a picture of the Retro console you have.

[Arkanoid_Katamari]

It saddens me so very much when i here about how good the xbox one is or the ps4 or what ever i'm calling all gamers we need to preserve all the old consoles for future generations and these are the console that deserve to be immortalized: SEGA Genesis SEGA saturn SEGA dreamcast NES SNES N64 GameCube Playstation 1 PlayStation 2 XBOX Atari 2600 Magnavox Odyssey these console might very well be forgotten just because there supposedly "Obsolete" well there not we need to save these consoles in 2025 people need to be able to play these consoles cause if we dont who will so post a picture of the Retro console you have.

Colecovision is the only console there is.

[mailman187666]

I don't think these consoles are in danger of being forgotten at all. In fact, I'm sure most of us on this website still own and occasionally play all the systems you have mentioned. If anything, retro gaming and collecting is more popular than it has ever been.

[Gentlegamer]

The high collector prices for everything belies the fear that classic systems are being forgotten.

[YoshiM]

Holy run-on sentence, Batman!

Thanks to the Internet, retro gaming fans, developers that make games that take a deep nod to the past, more gaming conventions now than ever, etc., i think a majority of the gaming consoles will not be forgotten.

No worries there.

[Tanooki]

There's no worry, at least not a rational one. You want a crusade? Go all in for physical media. Remind people what the true value of it is, ownership and control. Nintendo won't be going away, not for a good while I think still, so they'll keep milking their games and companies as long as a virtual console has some profit will be supported too. Perhaps some obscure games will get forgotten, and others people will wish they could because people have made them more expensive than a house payment, but they're not going away. I'm not saying that as a member of a site that talks about dead systems, but looking at what exists today that keep all that stuff alive and it's not dying away.

[Flojomojo]

Um, what? We have virtual consoles all over the place, and a huge treasure trove of ROM files on Archive.org, dedicated British magazines to retro games, and scads of fan sites, not including this one.

Forgotten? No way. As people get older, they like to remember the stuff they liked back when they were younger. It's easier than ever to do that again.

Old hardware? I'm fine with photographs, thanks very much. My cat lived to be 21 years old but I didn't choose to stuff his corpse and drag him around with me.

[Pr3tty F1y]

Emulation is the key to old technology being remembered. From cycle-exact to HLE, emulators provide a conduit for the games and hardware of yesteryear to live on.

Just look at MESS. It emulates more computers and more consoles than I ever knew existed, and some very exquisite ones as well, and it is an ever improving product.

Truthfully, although the games were largely crap, I think games like Tiger's LCD handhelds are the most likely to be forgotten or left behind. I know MADrigal (http://www.madrigaldesign.it/sim/) has a whole line of awesome simulators, but they barely scratch the surface of the number of devices released.

As for proper consoles, with interchangeable cartridges or optical media, even if we never see good emulators (which is unlikely), there is a backup archive craze these days as enthusiasts now have an acute awareness of what can be lost if not backed up. I even have high hopes for the old analog consoles (i.e., the old Pong consoles) being accurately simulated given MAME's netlist structure that has allowed the original Pong to be simulated accurately (in addition to the myriad implementations of analog audio components).

[Gentlegamer]

There's no worry, at least not a rational one. You want a crusade? Go all in for physical media.

You have my axe.

[Rickstilwell1]

You have my axe.

"Swords, axes, hammers... we have more than enough weapons for everyone" (Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance)

[Greg2600]

There are a couple I wish would be.

[ProjectCamaro]

Is this a real thread?!

[celerystalker]

I... yeah. I think I need to go start an Emerson Arcadia 2001 fan page now. That way a passionate treatise on why Cat Trax isn't just another Pac-Man knock-off can be my own personal Alamo.

Yeah.

[Tron 2.0]

I... yeah. I think I need to go start an Emerson Arcadia 2001 fan page now. That way a passionate treatise on why Cat Trax isn't just another Pac-Man knock-off can be my own personal Alamo.

Yeah.
What me worry :rolleyes:

[Niku-Sama]

Is this a real thread?!

nope5

[celerystalker]

Is this a real thread?!

What? Of course it's real. It's super real. You don't just ignore punctuation and grammar like that unless it's so urgent that you have to get it out as urgently as possible... in a classic gaming forum...

[Tanooki]

Classic phone typing panic post. :) Be thankful for the spelling not being murdered by texting shorthand or it would be all over man.

[treismac]

Not to flame any of its fans, but I kinda wish I could forget about the Atari Jaguar. I know it was far from glorious, but the 7800 would have been a far better note for Atari to end on in the home console market. It was no Dreamcast, but still.

[Gentlegamer]

Not to flame any of its fans, but I kinda wish I could forget about the Atari Jaguar. I know it was far from glorious, but the 7800 would have been a far better note for Atari to end on in the home console market. It was no Dreamcast, but still.

I think Lynx would have been a good closer.

[Jorpho]

Magnavox OdysseyYes, there is an urgent need to ensure that Odyssey games will be playable forevermore. :hmm:

[Tanooki]

No one better mess with my Fairchild Channel F or F will mean f'd up! :D (Seriously, mom had one of these forever, it was actually fun.)

[treismac]

I think Lynx would have been a good closer.

Yeah, you're right. The Lynx for its time was a beautiful handheld.

[Tanooki]

I remember around when it was going to come out or just after they did a Lynx tour of various malls like NOA used to do a couple times of year back in that period. I must have sat on one of those for an hour, and the games were decent. I never did grab it, but I really enjoyed the time on the couple games I hit, one I think was Chips Challenge, and another was some arcade like game. The screen was better than the Game Gear had, and it was comfy enough to use too, plus unique in how it could get flipped over. The problem was I was a kid on a small Nintendo and comics allowance, and then also the other games shown didn't looks so hot at that time. I didn't bother peeking a look at one again until after 95 when it was toast, and even then the amount of things I would have liked to play just wasn't there. It was nice, but it just didn't get the support that the two big fish did and might as well throw the TE in there too.

[fluid_matrix]

http://www.troll.me/images/angry-samuel-l-jackson/punctuation-motherfucker-can-you-use-it.jpg

[Steve W]

Emulation doesn't always cover every game console. For example, VCR-based systems like the Action Max can't really be emulated since there wasn't much to them. Also the Viewmaster Interactivision was VCR-based and so obscure that there would be no market for an emulator for a machine only remembered for its lollipop looking controller and a few VHS tapes of kid's shows that were compatible. In those cases, Youtube videos will have to suffice for anybody nostalgic for those systems.

I just discovered there was an RCA Studio II emulator. Wow. Who would have thunk it? And who's actually playing it?

[Dire 51]

Now there's a concept. Hit up one of the oldest gaming forums on the internet and remind us all that these very well known consoles that are still played and enjoyed by many, many people even today need to be remembered! Because god knows none of us remember them! Or have been keeping up with all the ways that these consoles actually have been preserved, like nearly everyone that's posted in this thread previously has pointed out! IT'S A CALL TO ARMS, PEOPLE! THESE CONSOLES NEED TO BE PRESERVED NOW!!!


these are the console that deserve to be immortalized
And just who died and made you the guy to decide what consoles deserve to be immortalized?


so post a picture of the Retro console you have.
And that has to do with... what, exactly? Second, do you even know where you are?

[sloan]

Only Odyssey in OP might risk being forgotten. The rest mentioned are nowhere close to being at risk.

Some that probably are more at risk of becoming forgotten:
3DO, Action Max, Arcadia 2001, RCA Studio II, Virtual Boy, Pippin.

[celerystalker]

Now there's a concept. Hit up one of the oldest gaming forums on the internet and remind us all that these very well known consoles that are still played and enjoyed by many, many people even today need to be remembered! Because god knows none of us remember them! Or have been keeping up with all the ways that these consoles actually have been preserved, like nearly everyone that's posted in this thread previously has pointed out! IT'S A CALL TO ARMS, PEOPLE! THESE CONSOLES NEED TO BE PRESERVED NOW!!!


And just who died and made you the guy to decide what consoles deserve to be immortalized?


And that has to do with... what, exactly? Second, do you even know where you are?

The pictures are so the OP can put them on milk cartons so they don't stay lost. They'll be featured next to the missing children posters at your local retailer. Police will raid garage sales to prosecute delinquent classic console owners. This anarchy will finally be curtailed and everyone will rebuild wood panel TVs for their Odyssey overlays. PCs and Macs will at last revert to Commodore 64s and Amigas. Handhelds will all be made with monochromatic screens. At last, we will all be able to sleep, perchance to dream...

[Dire 51]

The pictures are so the OP can put them on milk cartons so they don't stay lost. They'll be featured next to the missing children posters at your local retailer. Police will raid garage sales to prosecute delinquent classic console owners. This anarchy will finally be curtailed and everyone will rebuild wood panel TVs for their Odyssey overlays. PCs and Macs will at last revert to Commodore 64s and Amigas. Handhelds will all be made with monochromatic screens. At last, we will all be able to sleep, perchance to dream...
Of course! How did I not see that? It all makes sense now. :D

[otaku]

Things aren't all that dire thanks to the cheap consoles that pack games in with cart support available at toy stores and walgreens everywhere. Then you have all the downloadable and remastered games on live and the psn granted many kids don't know the consoles these were on or certainly not what they look like etc. but that is where we come in if they are interested you can buy them one or show them one talk to them play with them buy them some books or show them some sites. most aren't interested but that goes for most of historyyyy

[kainemaxwell]

It's depressing the high prices nowadays.

[Tanooki]

Got that right. Other than something I just couldn't avoid from one flea market shop a couple months back I've not bought NES/SNES stuff in over a year because I'm fed up with the abuses. I instead of sold off junk I don't have an interest in any more, pared back a few other items and decided I'd rather be a PC gamer again and got a balls to the wall big end gaming computer. I'd rather buy stuff on GoG.com and Steam than feed trolls and crooks. If I see a deal though I won't turn it down but I don't expect to see it anymore and definitely not with any consistency. This area in particular doesn't support old gaming well and it turned to the worst when Buy it Now Books (Half Price Books) decided to start pricing all their video games (loose) at the highest paid BINs or more from ebay. As there are chumps online there are less but some offline who eventually feed those bums or they wait it out for the 30-50% off coupons and clean them out when the doors open that day. They caused this formerly killer used game/movies/music shop in town here to have to match their tactics so they weren't picked clean as they used to be cheap and fair.

[Zthun]

The PS4 is the BEST thing since sliced bread!

[kainemaxwell]

Got that right. Other than something I just couldn't avoid from one flea market shop a couple months back I've not bought NES/SNES stuff in over a year because I'm fed up with the abuses. I instead of sold off junk I don't have an interest in any more, pared back a few other items and decided I'd rather be a PC gamer again and got a balls to the wall big end gaming computer. I'd rather buy stuff on GoG.com and Steam than feed trolls and crooks. If I see a deal though I won't turn it down but I don't expect to see it anymore and definitely not with any consistency. This area in particular doesn't support old gaming well and it turned to the worst when Buy it Now Books (Half Price Books) decided to start pricing all their video games (loose) at the highest paid BINs or more from ebay. As there are chumps online there are less but some offline who eventually feed those bums or they wait it out for the 30-50% off coupons and clean them out when the doors open that day. They caused this formerly killer used game/movies/music shop in town here to have to match their tactics so they weren't picked clean as they used to be cheap and fair.

yup, over 60 to 100+ for some nes or snes titles, popular, like final fantasy or mega man, or not is ridiculous.

[Tanooki]

Sad isn't it? It's why I went into Famicom and back into grabbing up some GBA games too and then now most recently I dusted off my GoG and Steam accounts as I'm just not going to play into the trap. You can see my dwindled supply of old gaming goodies in the signature below as I've kept the best of them, and a few that are stupidly priced now I just hold onto because while I barely use them I do and won't pay $200-300 for the cart again (like Earthbound and Wild Guns.)

[kainemaxwell]

Sad isn't it? It's why I went into Famicom and back into grabbing up some GBA games too and then now most recently I dusted off my GoG and Steam accounts as I'm just not going to play into the trap. You can see my dwindled supply of old gaming goodies in the signature below as I've kept the best of them, and a few that are stupidly priced now I just hold onto because while I barely use them I do and won't pay $200-300 for the cart again (like Earthbound and Wild Guns.)

side-note, led modified s/nes?

[armonigann]

It saddens me so very much when i here about how good the xbox one is or the ps4 or what ever i'm calling all gamers we need to preserve all the old consoles for future generations and these are the console that deserve to be immortalized: SEGA Genesis SEGA saturn SEGA dreamcast NES SNES N64 GameCube Playstation 1 PlayStation 2 XBOX Atari 2600 Magnavox Odyssey these console might very well be forgotten just because there supposedly "Obsolete" well there not we need to save these consoles in 2025 people need to be able to play these consoles cause if we dont who will so post a picture of the Retro console you have.


Um, what the heck did I just read...?

[JSoup]

The PS4 is the BEST thing since sliced bread!

When it works.

[Az]

Things aren't all that dire thanks to the cheap consoles that pack games in with cart support available at toy stores and walgreens everywhere.

Seeing that gigantic end cap of AT Games Sega Genesis classic consoles made me sad knowing firsthand how people's ears will react to their utter rubbish sound quality.

Seems like Sega would have wised up like SNKP and got the hell away from that.

[Tanooki]

Sega doesn't care. They've never cared if you look how much work they didn't put into any of their emulation packages on whatever format they creeped out. The AT Games is just the most obvious due to the off key audio, but really when they're blatantly allowing the usage of ROMS on an open SD card port they've basically given up and will take whatever they can get.

If you want the real sad thing about it, those who buy this won't really just be those who had a system long ago, but it will be a cheap system with a crap load of games for some kids who wouldn't know any better so it'll either sound good or drive them away if it's bad enough to their own tastes.

[celerystalker]

I never will understand buying the emulation consoles like that. I guess I get stuff like the Retron 5 if you want a multi-system box for another TV in your house, but if you're just loading up an SD card, why not just plug up a PC to the TV and play everything on it with a nice USB controller? I'm all about legit hardware for me, but if I was gonna emulate, I don't think I'd bother with a Flashback or anything of the sort.

[Jorpho]

I guess not everyone likes to plug their PC into their TV, and suitably nice USB controllers are hard to come by?

[celerystalker]

I guess not everyone likes to plug their PC into their TV, and suitably nice USB controllers are hard to come by?

I suppose. Never did really emulate, and wasn't much of a PC gamer to begin with, so I can't claim to have used a broad range of PC controllers. With stuff like RetroUSB selling PC modded console controllers, I think I'd try that before buying any ATGames product.

[YoshiM]

I suppose. Never did really emulate, and wasn't much of a PC gamer to begin with, so I can't claim to have used a broad range of PC controllers. With stuff like RetroUSB selling PC modded console controllers, I think I'd try that before buying any ATGames product.

Thing is, the people buying the AT Games stuff is probably not going to look on the web to find RetroUSB's or anyone else's modded product. It's a "see it on the shelf and buy outta nostalgia" or "I'm curious on the retro thing" situation.

[sloan]

Gotten so bad around my area that all the SA and GW outlets have zero as far as cartridge-based games/systems. Used to be able to walk in any day of the week and at least find an old SMB or Sonic cart. No more. I am thinking they put all this stuff out on ebay or GW's own auction site. Sad.

[Tanooki]

I know I'm not a fan of plugging my computer into the TV, but I could, have spare HDMI cables around. I might at some point, but with this new laptop having a nice 17" screen I don't see the need since at the distance I sit to it conpared to my 29" and the distance it is as, they look the same size if not the laptop being slightly larger. :)

[Steve W]

I use my HDTV as my computer monitor, it's a space saver. And there's all sorts of good classic game console controllers that have USB versions for them. I recently bought an Atari 2600 style USB joystick that's transparent and filled with blue LEDs to make it look like something out of Tron; http://www.amazon.com/Pc--Controller-Wired-Atari-retro-link/dp/B00IIO4G1Y/

There are some adapters out there, but I have to warn you away from the USB-to-Genesis controller adapter. I bought one and it stopped working 45 minutes later. Not only that, but I couldn't even restart my laptop with it plugged in, there's something really wrong with it. Maybe not everybody will have that problem, just thought I'd let you know before buying one. The idea was good - not only can it use Genesis and Atari controllers, I'd imagine you can use any 9-pin controllers with it once you mapped everything out, which would mean Colecovision and Intellivision II controllers might work (but who knows how the Intellivision's 16-position pad would map properly).

[Tanooki]

I suppose. Never did really emulate, and wasn't much of a PC gamer to begin with, so I can't claim to have used a broad range of PC controllers. With stuff like RetroUSB selling PC modded console controllers, I think I'd try that before buying any ATGames product.

There would be a fine exception due to the low entry barrier. IF AT Games would get their head straight and fix their Genesis emulator to at the least allow SRAM to work, the portable version of their device is actually a quality built thing and only costs $40. I had the v2 of it before it went blue with SSF2 and Mega Man on it and it was small, handy, clean screen, good speaker too. The barrier of entry there is cheap and easy to manage versus throwing crap on a touch panel phone and the struggles of no buttons or trying to find the best place to import a gp2x like device and configuring that.

The tv versions more or less are trash, the exception to me was the 2nd version of the atari flashback since it was an accurate system on a chip which had board marks/points on it to install a cart slot to play any 2600 game you want.