Retro VGS Game Console

[esteban]

This "Retro" mag is pretty bad. I skimmed a couple issues at a book store and it's like a collection of the worst kind of articles posted online. "Youtube Comments Compendium Monthly" would be a much more appropriate title.

During the VGS fiasco, there was a brief period where Mr. Mike gave out a code for free digital downloads of most (all?) issues of Retro Gamer.

Naturally, I downloaded all of them, because I was curious to see what it was like.

Naturally, I after reading an issue or two, I got distracted with other things and forgot I even had them on my phone.

NOW I WILL GO BACK AND READ THEM.

Thank you.

This is the thread that keeps on giving.

[mickcris]

I think he has yet to try "Go Fund Me".  That will probably be next.

[Otaking]

During the VGS fiasco, there was a brief period where Mr. Mike gave out a code for free digital downloads of most (all?) issues of Retro Gamer.

Mr Mike's mag is called "Retro".
Retro Gamer is the excellent British games mag that's been around along time.

I have a couple issues of Mr Mike's Retro mag which I bought before the whole Retro VGS thing kicked off, the magazine is shit. I've been meaning to dig them out and bin them for ages now.

What I want to know is what happened to the mysterious Mr Lee??? 

[Zero_Gamer]

This states that Kennedy didn't know how to manage his mag business either

[Punch]

Never read his magazine or I don't remember if I did, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's really as bad as people are saying here given his track record.

What I want to know is what happened to the mysterious Mr Lee??? 

He went back to his life of massacres, terrorism, blackmailing and smuggling of weapons.http://audioatrocities.com/games/lastalert/clip3.mp3

[esteban]

During the VGS fiasco, there was a brief period where Mr. Mike gave out a code for free digital downloads of most (all?) issues of Retro Gamer.

Mr Mike's mag is called "Retro".
Retro Gamer is the excellent British games mag that's been around along time.

I have a couple issues of Mr Mike's Retro mag which I bought before the whole Retro VGS thing kicked off, the magazine is shit. I've been meaning to dig them out and bin them for ages now.

What I want to know is what happened to the mysterious Mr Lee???

Oh, yeah.

I get those mixed up.

I have a bunch of old issues of RETRO GAMER from 2003-2006?

Or am I confusing it with yet another magazine?

Anyway, I loved the interviews with old British developers... but something happened with my subscription.... and that was that.

[ClodBuster]

I tried some English and German retro gaming magazines. What I discovered is that most of the knowledge found inside was nothing new to me, and there are sometimes errors (not only typos) creeping in here and there. It's only the interviews with developers that are interesting to me.

So I decided that I won't spent more money on them. Even though these mags are directed at nostalgic persons, I think they do a better job to new people still unaware of most of the videogame history. Than teaching me a thing or two.

[elmer]

More chuckles ....

[esteban]

Yes, the premise of that game is hilarious.

I have only managed to acquire 3-4 of the items in the game, but, for folks who take the time, there are a lot of humorous little statements in most of the text descriptions.

[KingDrool]

Oof...brutal.

Am I wrong for wishing the game dev hadn't used real names?

[elmer]

Am I wrong for wishing the game dev hadn't used real names?

Nope, it seems like an unnecessary thing to do, and I suspect that someone will file a complaint and get it removed from the App Store.

It's still funny, though, and now that it's out-there, it'll never disappear altogether.

The guy that wrote it has a personal history with Mike Kennedy.

The tale of the people that were thrown-under-the-bus, and the long term personal grudges that have been created, is just another piece of the RVGS disaster.

There's apparently a book being written about the whole affair.

[elmer]

Just for the amusement of hearing more of the behind-the-scenes history of the RVGS, Kevtris posted this today (in reference to the other-console Cartridge Adapters that he's doing for the Analogue Nt Mini) ...

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/242970-fpga-based-videogame-system/page-70#entry3711509

It's pretty funny to me because I was pitching basically this same idea to them (well with a different form factor on the connector for cart adapters) but his engineer basically poopooed everything I said.  And it was even funnier when I described the Zimba 3000 to them, and showed them the PCB and shared my specs and plans, only to see their system basically clone everything.  The only difference was having an ARM SOC on it vs. the PIC before the kitchen sinking started and it ended up using some hot new TI chip under NDA (wonder what chip that ended up being?) and a $300 BOM.
 
I am not sorry to be part of the disaster and to be honest I was only sticking around in a minimal capacity (basically joining in on skype calls and I didn't actually do any real work) just in case it ever came to pass, but I knew after the second call it'd never ever come to fruition because they couldn't nail down any system specs, and each call the costs kept going up and up and it'd run more and more things.   Then they started talking about the lunacy of no updates and carts that HAD to work 50 years later (lol).   I hated to pop their bubble and tell them that most of the chips they were using had flash inside them such as the power supply chips which use it to trim output voltages and stuff.
 
Interestingly, I never did see any PCB design that John did, and he claimed to have been working on it for 'months'.  The only design I saw was with everyone else when they printed the cardboard PCB and glued parts to it.   Still trying to figure out what the purpose of those giant heatsinks and heat pipes were.  The FPGAs don't get very hot, at least the ones they were using.
 
Wonder where they are now, and what happened to any/all of the RVGS/Coleco Chameleon specs and design documents if they existed?
 
In any event, the Core Store(tm) is going great guns and thanks to everyone for their support and kind words!

[SignOfZeta]

How can a guy that smart be so naive as to think that RVGS design docs of any kind existed? 

[elmer]

How can a guy that smart be so naive as to think that RVGS design docs of any kind existed? 

Which part of his "if they existed" are you having trouble with?   

kevtris just doesn't seem to like to use the same kind of dismissive sarcasm that a lot of folks here (including myself) sprinkle our posts with.

[NightWolve]

How can a guy that smart be so naive as to think that RVGS design docs of any kind existed? 

Which part of his "if they existed" are you having trouble with?   

kevtris just doesn't seem to like to use the same kind of dismissive sarcasm that a lot of folks here (including myself) sprinkle our posts with.

Well whaddya know, the #RetroVGS topic lives again!