what the hell is this thing? i found a tape in my parents basement called "escape from mindmaster" and it had atari supercharger on it. was this a computer version of the atari 2600? is the game rare?
atari supercharger
what the hell is this thing? i found a tape in my parents basement called "escape from mindmaster" and it had atari supercharger on it. was this a computer version of the atari 2600? is the game rare?
"Description: An add-on device that improves the Atari VCS memory, graphics, and sound capability. By plugging the Supercharger into the VCS and connecting its wire to a standard cassette tape player, games could be "loaded in" to memory. The Supercharger unit contains 2K of ROM, but more importantly it adds an additional 6K of screen RAM to the VCS (a huge improvement over the hardware's 128 bytes). Initially retailed for $44.95."
From the Digital Press "Classic" Guide.
this is from the online rarity guide, if your wondering where i got it.
wow, that is pretty retarded, but way cool.
Actually, the Supercharger was an underused, but impressive tool for the VCS at the time...it could take the VCS way beyond it's limits and gave programmers a way to make much more impressive games. The media, cassettes, weren't the most weildy thing, but they were cheap as hell, albeit slow.
In a way, it was sort of what ther Super FX chip was to the Super NES (not that the Supercharger was another processor, but you getthe picture), or what some complex mappers were for the NES. Maybe the Alladin for NES is more fitting?
Many hackers and developers in the 90s (before?) found ways to put roms onto a Supercharger like a flash cart by turning the bin files into wav files and feeding them into the Supercharger via the audio out on their computers, or burning them onto CDs and loading them via their stereos or portable CD players. Pretty weird and cool at the same time. I believe years ago DP had some special CD they put out to take advantage of this...or was that someone else?
There is alsoa simple hack you can do to pump much larger files into it that what was originally allowed.
Very versatile tool, that Supercharger.
-Rob
The moral is, don't **** with Uncle Tim when he's been drinking!
Wow.Originally Posted by coinheaven
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New England Classic Gaming - Violent fighting to come again!
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"Stella gets a new Brain"
Yeah, not DP but a group of individuals -- including myself -- called CyberPuNKS. There were actually two runs -- the first was non-profit and limited. The second saw some profit (not much though), and was "unlimited", but I believe there were enough discs leftover that there probably won't be any more produced. The second run has more stuff on it, but we had to leave off a few things too, so the two runs are different.
I believe Randy Crihfield still has copies of the second run available for the insanely low price of $5; if anyone wants ordering details I can double-check and get contact info. Just email (or PM, but I prefer email) me.
Russ Perry Jr, 2175 S Tonne Dr #114, Arlington Hts IL 60005
Got any obscure game stuff?
I have Supercharger, but I never once used it.
Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Number 1 in the 'hood g!
Res ipsa loquitor, my friend.
So is he retarded, cool, or both, Pantechnicon?
Oh, and it's loquitur, not loquitor, heh heh
-Rob
The moral is, don't **** with Uncle Tim when he's been drinking!
Well, he's presumably a teenager who, upon stumbling across a piece of retrogaming history, is both completely baffled and condescendingly dismissive of the technology, yet retains enough curiosity to see if it might be worth some money.So is he retarded, cool, or both, Pantechnicon?
Oh, and it's loquitur, not loquitor, heh heh
-Rob
I would say that he's perfectly normal.
p.s. - Thanks for the spell check. Latin has never been my strong point.
Yup, I just ordered this from Randy a month or two ago. I sent an email to the address on this page, and he replied quickly. I had the CD in a matter of days. It's very impressive - I really like the effort put in to squeezing all that 'power' out of the 2600.
Oh, and I found the Supercharger at the local Goodwill store. Of course, the guy at the register had no idea what it was or what it was worth. I just chucked in on the counter and he looks at it - front and back, with a bewildered smirk, and asks "How about a buck?" He then rings it up and asks for 1.06 with tax. I had no change on me, so he only took my buck. So, I got it for .94!!
Anyway - it's worth picking up the CD if you have the supercharger.
Need. More. Games.
I've always loved this thing..
Those of you who have it and haven't used it are in the dark. That thing had some of the best games available for the 2600, I love Fireball, blows Breakout away, Rabbit Transit, Suicide Mission and Dragonstomper are great too.
If they made a movie out of your top five worst sins, what would it be rated?
Check out my list of trades on GameTZ Link
Mayhem, wtf!? Very cool score.
Any differences over the released version (besides the really weird shape..probably better shape, actually)?
-Rob
The moral is, don't **** with Uncle Tim when he's been drinking!
Yep that's the demo unit. The Supercharger itself was still inside the Phaser Patrol box when I took that pic.
On the other hand, here's the PAL version for you:
I've only got 3 PAL Supercharger games (Phaser Patrol, Dragonstomper and Frogger) so I defo make them harder to get! Indeed two of them came from Australia, so I'm wondering if they got a reasonable release down there...
Ok...did it also need a tape player attached to it? I hope the info on it is backed up somewhere...I believe you're referring to the demo unit shown in the upper-left (?). From DP:
A demo unit that connects to a Starpath Supercharger, this box contains a demo “movie” of various Starpath games. Much different than the game previews normally seen at the end of their game tapes.
Could it still function as a Supercharger if erased and rewritten?
-Rob
The moral is, don't **** with Uncle Tim when he's been drinking!
Nope, it's a self-contained unit, in that it supplied the data to the Supercharger itself.
Sadly not, the label on it is exactly the same as the US one, just with a small white sticker saying "PAL version" somewhere.
You've got a PAL copy of Phaser Patrol? You should record it to a wav file and convert to a BIN, the one of the Stella CD is buggy.
Mitch
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