2nd October 2014, 9:47 PM
I got a PS1 memory card for $5.
More importantly, I got a TI 99/4A Computer. I actually got the computer several years back for $3 from Goodwill, but now got from ebay a power cable and RFU ($22, with a game and some replacement parts for the system; decent price), so that I can test it -- and it all works great! Impressive stuff, for such an old system (from the early '80s!). Good build quality there from TI. I saw some games for it and knew I had the thing sitting around, and that it'd be cheap to get games for and get up and running, so I got it. It's not great, but it is kind of interesting, and yes, cheap. I don't have joysticks or an Atari/Sega joystick adapter yet, though, which is a big problem; games do NOT play nearly as well on keyboard! The computer has a nice clicky keyboard, but it's no match for a decent joystick or gamepad. I'll need to get an adapter (TI's joysticks are supposed to be awful). In addition to the computer, I also have the Speech Synthesizer module, which I got really cheap locally in a bundle with a bunch of games. $10 for 12 carts and the speech module... great deal! It works, and is great to have. I don't have the other accessories, such as floppy drives, tape drives, etc; for now at least it's just a cart game platform. Apart from text adventures, most games are on carts anyway. The system has a small library, and TI released their games on carts. Oh, all of the games work perfectly on the first try every time so far too, impressively. They have nice spring-loaded dust covers which seem to be doing their job well.
Games (all cart only)
--
The Attack - This came bundled with the power supply and RFU that I got from ebay, so it was some portion of that $22 purchase. It's a slow shooting game, not great but not awful. You have to kill small enemies who can't hurt you, but if four of them touch they form a large enemy which can hurt you if it touches you. Enemies also spawn from black timer blocks. You win a level once all timer blocks are gone and all large enemies are dead. In harder settings timer blocks spawn large enemies. I'm not sure if this game is good or not, but the controls on keyboard are clumsy, and the game very hard after the early levels. I imagine a joystick would help.
Early Learning Fun - Learning "game" for five year olds, and no one older than that. This is the first of the 12 carts from that $10 bundle with the Speech Synthesizer.
Music Maker - music composition application. This really is not a game; it's just here for completion (listing everything). You can save compositions to tape or floppy, if you have them. I'm hopeless at music and will never use this.
Adventure - Unfortunately this isn't a game, just a boot cart for a series of 12 disk or cassette-based text adventures by a guy who made lots of them back then. It does nothing much on its own. Too bad.
Blasto - Tank action/puzzle game in a minefield. Try to shoot all the mines before time runs out! They blow up the area around them when shot. Tough game above Easy. It's very basic but okay, for a few minutes. Has two player versus support. Oddly, if you clear the screen, that's it -- there's only one level! At least there are difficulty settings and multiplayer.
Alpiner - Supports the Speech Synthesizer. Crazy Climber knockoff with normal controls (so left, right, up, and down move you). Climb mountains. Your character is HUGE, which is a problem -- avoiding things falling at you is way too hard! Other obstacles are brain-dead easy to get around. I don't like this game much, I think.
Chisholm Trail - Fun and challenging top-down grid shooting game. It's more of a space shooter than the western-themed game it supposedly is. Hard to play without a joystick! This is the most action-packed of the three (or four, counting Blasto) top-down shooting games I have, and the only one with enemies who actually shoot back at you. This could be good, or average. Will play more.
Hopper - Solid Pengo knockoff, with no frills but good base gameplay. Push the blocks to kill the enemies, and repeat forever.
Tombstone City - This is the most complex of the shooting games. It's sort of like The Attack or Chisholm Trail, but different. This time, the center of the screen is a safe area, and the outsides dangrous. As in The Attack, there are harmless aliens to kill, and also ones which will kill you. Gameplay here is a bit unique, though -- the threatening aliens become a cactus (marking their tomb) when you shoot them. If three cacti are touching, they are destroyed and an alien enemy spawns. You move on to the next level when no cactus is touching another one, so you need to get enemies to move into a place where you can kill them next to anywhere with two touching, so as to clear them out. It's a slow-ish paced game at first, but gets harder. This isn't a great game, but does seem interesting and kind of original.
Blackjack + Poker - What it sounds like.
Hunt the Wumpus - Simple but interesting fantasy action-adventure game. You have to use some clues to find the monster the Wumpus on a single-screen grid of rooms and connecting paths. If you touch him or fire into the wrong space (you have only one arrow) or fall into a pit, you die. If you shoot into the right space, you win. For its time, this was pretty innovative stuff. It's badly dated now, but is interesting for a little while, at least.
Hangman - Solid Hangman game. Too bad it doesn't support the speech synthesizer. Sure, it's basic "guess the word" stuff, but it's decent fun.
A-Maze-Ing - You're a mouse in a maze, and have to try to reach the exit. This game has a bunch of options, including optional cat enemies, two player simultaneous, obstacles in the maze, invisible maze, several cat difficulty settings, and more. There are several maze sizes too. I like this a lot more than Maze Craze on the Atari 2600! Decent game.
Parsec - $5, cart only (got today). Supports the Speech Synthesizer, and nicely too; it's a nice addition. One of the more popular TI 99/4A games. It's a horizontal shooter. It's basic stuff, like all the 2nd gen scrolling shooters are, and doesn't even have terrain obstacles to work your way around as there are in Scramble -- there's just ground on the ground to stay above, and that's all -- but still, yeah, this is kind of fun. Move up and down, shoot your laser at enemies, and try to avoid fire. Both your and their shots move quickly, so try to predict what they'll do.
Munchman - $5, cart only (got today, with the above). TI's spin on Pac-Man, this is another of the system's better games I think. This is Pac-Man, but for copyright reasons you fill IN the lines, instead of eating dots, so it's like Crush Roller or Amadar I guess, but it plays like Pac-Man. The maze is original, but the gameplay is familiar. Power Pellets are TI logos... yeah, really. Enemies stay dead when eaten this way, unlike in Pac-Man -- they won't come back until after the invincibility time wears off. Interesting.
Overall, the system's kind of interesting. I want a joystick for it though, the keyboard controls work but definitely are less than ideal. I probably won't be getting lots of stuff for this system soon, since it'd almost all have to be ebayed (TI 99/4A things being quite rare in stores around here, apart from the things I got above) and I'm not getting much of that soon, but it's nice to have as it is; I do have a solid little starting library as it is.
More importantly, I got a TI 99/4A Computer. I actually got the computer several years back for $3 from Goodwill, but now got from ebay a power cable and RFU ($22, with a game and some replacement parts for the system; decent price), so that I can test it -- and it all works great! Impressive stuff, for such an old system (from the early '80s!). Good build quality there from TI. I saw some games for it and knew I had the thing sitting around, and that it'd be cheap to get games for and get up and running, so I got it. It's not great, but it is kind of interesting, and yes, cheap. I don't have joysticks or an Atari/Sega joystick adapter yet, though, which is a big problem; games do NOT play nearly as well on keyboard! The computer has a nice clicky keyboard, but it's no match for a decent joystick or gamepad. I'll need to get an adapter (TI's joysticks are supposed to be awful). In addition to the computer, I also have the Speech Synthesizer module, which I got really cheap locally in a bundle with a bunch of games. $10 for 12 carts and the speech module... great deal! It works, and is great to have. I don't have the other accessories, such as floppy drives, tape drives, etc; for now at least it's just a cart game platform. Apart from text adventures, most games are on carts anyway. The system has a small library, and TI released their games on carts. Oh, all of the games work perfectly on the first try every time so far too, impressively. They have nice spring-loaded dust covers which seem to be doing their job well.
Games (all cart only)
--
The Attack - This came bundled with the power supply and RFU that I got from ebay, so it was some portion of that $22 purchase. It's a slow shooting game, not great but not awful. You have to kill small enemies who can't hurt you, but if four of them touch they form a large enemy which can hurt you if it touches you. Enemies also spawn from black timer blocks. You win a level once all timer blocks are gone and all large enemies are dead. In harder settings timer blocks spawn large enemies. I'm not sure if this game is good or not, but the controls on keyboard are clumsy, and the game very hard after the early levels. I imagine a joystick would help.
Early Learning Fun - Learning "game" for five year olds, and no one older than that. This is the first of the 12 carts from that $10 bundle with the Speech Synthesizer.
Music Maker - music composition application. This really is not a game; it's just here for completion (listing everything). You can save compositions to tape or floppy, if you have them. I'm hopeless at music and will never use this.
Adventure - Unfortunately this isn't a game, just a boot cart for a series of 12 disk or cassette-based text adventures by a guy who made lots of them back then. It does nothing much on its own. Too bad.
Blasto - Tank action/puzzle game in a minefield. Try to shoot all the mines before time runs out! They blow up the area around them when shot. Tough game above Easy. It's very basic but okay, for a few minutes. Has two player versus support. Oddly, if you clear the screen, that's it -- there's only one level! At least there are difficulty settings and multiplayer.
Alpiner - Supports the Speech Synthesizer. Crazy Climber knockoff with normal controls (so left, right, up, and down move you). Climb mountains. Your character is HUGE, which is a problem -- avoiding things falling at you is way too hard! Other obstacles are brain-dead easy to get around. I don't like this game much, I think.
Chisholm Trail - Fun and challenging top-down grid shooting game. It's more of a space shooter than the western-themed game it supposedly is. Hard to play without a joystick! This is the most action-packed of the three (or four, counting Blasto) top-down shooting games I have, and the only one with enemies who actually shoot back at you. This could be good, or average. Will play more.
Hopper - Solid Pengo knockoff, with no frills but good base gameplay. Push the blocks to kill the enemies, and repeat forever.
Tombstone City - This is the most complex of the shooting games. It's sort of like The Attack or Chisholm Trail, but different. This time, the center of the screen is a safe area, and the outsides dangrous. As in The Attack, there are harmless aliens to kill, and also ones which will kill you. Gameplay here is a bit unique, though -- the threatening aliens become a cactus (marking their tomb) when you shoot them. If three cacti are touching, they are destroyed and an alien enemy spawns. You move on to the next level when no cactus is touching another one, so you need to get enemies to move into a place where you can kill them next to anywhere with two touching, so as to clear them out. It's a slow-ish paced game at first, but gets harder. This isn't a great game, but does seem interesting and kind of original.
Blackjack + Poker - What it sounds like.
Hunt the Wumpus - Simple but interesting fantasy action-adventure game. You have to use some clues to find the monster the Wumpus on a single-screen grid of rooms and connecting paths. If you touch him or fire into the wrong space (you have only one arrow) or fall into a pit, you die. If you shoot into the right space, you win. For its time, this was pretty innovative stuff. It's badly dated now, but is interesting for a little while, at least.
Hangman - Solid Hangman game. Too bad it doesn't support the speech synthesizer. Sure, it's basic "guess the word" stuff, but it's decent fun.
A-Maze-Ing - You're a mouse in a maze, and have to try to reach the exit. This game has a bunch of options, including optional cat enemies, two player simultaneous, obstacles in the maze, invisible maze, several cat difficulty settings, and more. There are several maze sizes too. I like this a lot more than Maze Craze on the Atari 2600! Decent game.
Parsec - $5, cart only (got today). Supports the Speech Synthesizer, and nicely too; it's a nice addition. One of the more popular TI 99/4A games. It's a horizontal shooter. It's basic stuff, like all the 2nd gen scrolling shooters are, and doesn't even have terrain obstacles to work your way around as there are in Scramble -- there's just ground on the ground to stay above, and that's all -- but still, yeah, this is kind of fun. Move up and down, shoot your laser at enemies, and try to avoid fire. Both your and their shots move quickly, so try to predict what they'll do.
Munchman - $5, cart only (got today, with the above). TI's spin on Pac-Man, this is another of the system's better games I think. This is Pac-Man, but for copyright reasons you fill IN the lines, instead of eating dots, so it's like Crush Roller or Amadar I guess, but it plays like Pac-Man. The maze is original, but the gameplay is familiar. Power Pellets are TI logos... yeah, really. Enemies stay dead when eaten this way, unlike in Pac-Man -- they won't come back until after the invincibility time wears off. Interesting.
Overall, the system's kind of interesting. I want a joystick for it though, the keyboard controls work but definitely are less than ideal. I probably won't be getting lots of stuff for this system soon, since it'd almost all have to be ebayed (TI 99/4A things being quite rare in stores around here, apart from the things I got above) and I'm not getting much of that soon, but it's nice to have as it is; I do have a solid little starting library as it is.
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