I’ve reached 100 various Tetris games! :D I think I will celebrate with playing some more Tetris tonight!! ^__^
My two latest additions are not that common. One is Tetris on MSX from Korea, or Zemmix as they called the MSX there. Apparently Korean government banned Japanese companies from selling products in Korea, so they made their own knock-offs. The Zemmix / MSX Tetris game is not the greatest Tetris I’ve played. It’s odd. It only gives you 1 point per row cleared, no bonus for making a Tetris (4 rows at once), and the sound effects and music is scarce and dull. Also the controls are quite jumpy, I don’t know if it’s my joypads that are glitchy, but I tried 3 different ones and it was equally difficult to steer the tetraminos..
Tetris for Korean Zemmix
MSX Zemmix – Tetris
MSX Zemmix – Tetris back
Anyway, here’s some gameplay of it, I sat for hours last night trying to record gameplay through my Elgato but I just couldn’t get the signal unscrambled, it has some serious anti-pirating code built in or something XD So I ended up just shooting it with my phone.. sorry for shitty quality, but at least you can see what it’s like ^_^ I couldn’t find a video of it anywhere else..
The latest addition is another Korean game, but for the Gam-Boy, which is Korea’s equivalent to the Sega Master System or the Sega Mark III. The Gam-Boy was produced by Samsung in Korea. It reads 테트리스 which means Tetris ^_^
Tetris on Korean Gam-Bit
Gam-Boy / Sega Master System – Tetris
Gam-Boy / Sega Master System – Tetris back
This was better than the MSX/Zemmix version of Tetris, it had a lot of different settings. One cool feature that I’ve only seen a few times before in Chinese Tetris games is the scrolling. If you set it to scroll the blocks at the bottom will shift one block to the left or right (it changes each level you increase) and makes it more difficult to plan how you want to build! It’s interesting :) But you can of course play without the scrolling feature as well. In the beginning there’s also the choice of Easy or Hard mode, hard makes the floor rise with random blocks once in a while, and you can also set speed to Low or High, once you get to the next screen though you have even more selections where you can set level and height, the height starts you off with blocks already on the board. You can basically make it really difficult for yourself by setting highest speed, highest level, tallest height and add some scroll to it XD Basically impossible! I enjoyed it, except for the music that was kind of shitty and the controls being a bit jumpy. There was like a delay every time a new tetramino appeared in the top.
I recorded some gameplay of this one too so you can see what it’s like ^_^ Here’s Korean Tetris for the Gam-Boy / Sega Master System / Sega Mark III:
Some other recent Tetris purchases that has helped adding my collection up to 100 Tetris games are these ones below ^_^ Two quite rare ones for the Japanese MSX and the Sharp X68000. I still need to find myself an X68000, so I can play it! That one and the PC ones are the only ones I can’t play right now. I also need to find an old PC with Windows 98 XD… Tetris Elements and Tetris Gold are both PC games. Then there’s a ZX Spectrum Tetris game, Tetris Attack for Game Boy (which isn’t quite Tetris in my opinion, but since it’s called Tetris I’ll count it..) and a Japanese PS2 Tetris Kiwamemichi game ^_^
Since I went to Stockholm by train this time for the Retro Games convention I wasn’t able to buy more than I could carry, but once I got home I realised I had at least 35 games and also a new system with me home XD It was mainly games on cassette tapes though, and they don’t take up as much space ;D
Let’s start with the system. A few weeks ago I acquired a game from Zeela that I had previously seen at Retro Gathering, I mainly wanted to have it because of the cover. It’s called Softporn Adventure, and it’s made by On-Line Systems, which later turned into Sierra Online. The game is the predecessor to Leisure Suit Larry, but without graphics, it’s a text-based adventure. On the cover from left to right in the hot tub are Diane Siegel, On-Line’s production manager; Susan Davis, On-Line’s bookkeeper, Rick Chipman, an actual waiter from a local restaurant and Roberta Williams, famous for games like the King’s Quest series etc :)
Softporn Adventures by On-Line Systems on Atari 400
Softporn Adventures by On-Line Systems on Atari 400
Once I got the game though I just really wanted to be able to play it, and especially I want my friend Gabbi to be able to play it, because she’s totally into text-based adventures and she reaaaallly wanted to try this game when she saw it at Retro Gathering XD So I’m working on getting a setup for it to work :) At Retro Games I bought an Atari 400 from Michael Berglund, unfortunately he didn’t have the floppy disk drive, so I’m still looking for one of those.. but the Atari 400 computer he had for sale was apparently quite rare, since it was a Swedish version with a Swedish keyboard :) Either way, I can at least play some cartridge games that I got with the systems meanwhile, until I find a floppy drive ^_^
Atari 400 Computer
Atari 400 Computer
Atari 400 game cartridges
Atari 400 Pole Position
Atari 400 Swedish keyboard
Atari 400
Atari 400
Atari 400 game Bug Hunt
Atari 400 Pole Position
Atari 400 system
Most of the cassettes I bought this time were for ZX Spectrum, and a few Commodore 64 ones. One VIC 20 game slipped in and also one that I discovered was for MSX! O_o I actually have an MSX that I just haven’t blogged about yet, got it not too long ago, but unfortunately I don’t have a cassette tape deck for it yet :/ I guess that’s next on my list together with the floppy drive for Atari 400 ^_^
Mission Mercury for VIC 20
Jackle & Wide for MSX
I’m really happy to have found the other two Horace games that were officially released for the ZX Spectrum, because I really really love Horace Goes Skiing! I’m hoping these ones will be just as good ;D I also got a bunch of other ZX Spectrum games, some that are text-based adventures for Gabbi to try when she visits, and some I just bought for the name or the artwork :) Transylvanian Tower looks rad! :D
Hungry Horace & Horace the the Spiders for ZX Spectrum
Doomsday Castle and Beaky and the Egg Snatchers for ZX Spectrum
Fire on the Water, Never Ending Story and Espionage Island for ZX Spectrum
Spy Hunter and Gauntlet II for ZX Spectrum
Molar Maul, Penetrator and Invincible Island for ZX Spectrum
Ah Diddums, Transylvania Tower and Braxx Bluff for ZX Spectrum
Planet of Death, Cavernfighter and Pimania for ZX Spectrum
When it comes to these old cassettes I mainly just buy them based on the name of the games or just looking at the artwork. I got six Commodore 64 cassettes :) The Official Father Christmas will be my go-to game this holiday XD
Xenon Ranger, The Official Father Christmas and Raid for C64
Thrust, Starlifter and Alcazar for C64
I got a few games for other systems. I bought Neo Drift Out from Sol, I now also owe him a game night at my place with freshly bakes scones because I got such a good price on it XD I bought Yie Ar Kung-Fu together with a 3DS game called Dream Trigger from Peter at Arkadbutiken. I found one Japanese Sega Mega Drive game I didn’t previously have together with some C64 games from Söders Spel & Skivhandel and I bought Martin Lindell & Thomas Sunhede’s newly released book “Svensk Videospelsutveckling“. Martin also had some promo games, so I grabbed Castlevania for my Castlevania Collection, and I got Pac-Man World 2 and Space Race with it ^_^ Thanks Martin!
Neo Drift Out for Neo Geo MVS
Yie Ar KUNG-FU for MSX
The Kick Boxing for Sega Mega Drive
Svensk Videospelsutveckling (Swedish Video Game Development) by Martin Lindell and Thomas Sunhede
Castlevania Curse of Darkness Promo for PS2
Dream Trigger 3D for 3DS
I recently purchased an arcade cabinet from a friend (I’m up to 4 arcades now!) and it was a bit of a rare one, I’ll make a blog post about it soon :) I’ve gotten to know another collector in Sweden who knows a lot about this particular cabinet and when I showed him pics of mine he told me that one of the buttons wasn’t original. He apparently had a spare original part and was kind enough to give it to me ^_^ Thank you so much Pinge! <3 Also when I was talking to Peter from Arkadbutiken and he found out that I had a Blast City cabinet, he gave me the manual for it ^_^ Thanks a bunch Peter! <3
Red arcade button
Sega Blast City manual
I’m really happy with my l00t, and that I managed to bring it all home on the train XD The Retro Games convention was a blast, and I can’t wait for the next convention to get to hang out with all these awesome people again! :D Now I’m off to play some Atari 400 ^_^
It takes time going through, cleaning, testing and taking pictures of 105 games, a few consoles and other things.. that’s how much I came home with after this years Retro Gathering XD Anyway, let’s get to it! I mainly focused on cartridge based games this year, I found a whole bin full of cheap Atari 2600 games to start with ^_^ In the bottom were even some boxed ones :D I tried all these ones out tonight and some that stood out was Planeten Patrouilie and Sub Scan, these were fun and intuitive :) Fatal Run was also interesting, it had the most advanced tunes I’ve heard in an Atari 2600 game so far! Unfortunately it only played the music when you got Game Over XD Superman was probably one of the worst Atari 2600 games I’ve played.. I didn’t even understand what the hell I was supposed to do…
Atari 2600
Human Cannonball, Wüstenschlacht and Sorcerer – Atari 2600
Racquetball and Arilock – Atari 2600
Fatal Run – Atari 2600
Gangster Ruine – Atari 2600
Planeten Patrouilie – Atari 2600
Midnight Magic – Atari 2600
Sub Scan – Atari 2600
Superman – Atari 2600
I found these two little handhelds that were super cute! I love how “Hero and Princess” is such a total rip-off from Donkey Kong Game & Watch, it’s even dual screen! XD And the gorilla looks totally derpy XD
Grandstand handheld
Hero and Princess handheld
Hero and Princess handheld
I finally got myself the Zapper for Famicom! It’s so funny how this one actually looks just like a regular gun, while we had to have the “kids-version” XD
Famicom Zapper Revolver
Famicom Zapper Revolver
Famicom Zapper Revolver
Famicom Zapper Revolver
I managed to extend my Tetris collection a bit, but not with a game.. a music LP and an old ad! My friend Marcus sold it to me and he also had a few other cool EP’s with video game reference :) I also bought a cute Dreamcast game from him called PenPen ^_^
Doctor Spin Tetris LP
Tetris ad
Space Invaders EP
Ms. Pac-Man EP
PenPen – Dreamcast
After getting to know a lot of other retro gamers online I tend to usually have some deals waiting for me once I meet up with these friends at a convention :) Anders was kind enough to sell me a Video Computer VC4000 game which I didn’t previously have. I just got into this system thanks to an old high school teacher that found this system in his attic XD I also met the guy behind arkadbutiken.se on instagram who had a PCB with Hatris for me :D Can’t wait to try this one out, the arcade version must be so much better than the Famicom one ^_^
32 Invaders – Video Computer VC4000
Hatris PCB
One of the things I bought from Zeela was this really cute little Pong clone called Las Vegas Super Color Teve-Spiel :D I tried it out tonight and it was fun, I didn’t see the colors though because apparently the TV was black and white XD I’ll try it with another TV next time… what I really liked about this Pong version is that the joysticks also go horizontally, so it actually resembles Tennis even more :) You can run back and forth and not only up and down XD It has SO MANY BUTTONS on it though! I had to read the instructions just to figure out what they were all for..
Boxed Las Vegas Super Color Tele-Spiel by Philips
Complete Las Vegas Super Color Tele-Spiel by Philips
Las Vegas Super Color Tele-Spiel by Philips
Las Vegas Super Color Tele-Spiel by Philips
Las Vegas Super Color Tele-Spiel by Philips
Las Vegas Super Color Tele-Spiel Joystick
Las Vegas Super Color Tele-Spiel by Philips
I also bought a bunch of games from Zeela, he has such good prices on old cassettes that it’s hard to resist XD So many pretty covers! I also got some extra memory for my VIC-20, which is probably the reason why I haven’t gotten more than half of the games to work on it so far XD He was also kind enough to dig out a few Jeff Minter games! Hell Gate and Gridrunner ^_^ I also picked up some Amiga games.
Rockman, Cosmic Fire Birds and Critters – VIC-20
Alien Blitz, Outworld and The Alien – VIC-20
Hell Gate and Gridrunner by Jeff Minter – C64
Vic Rescue, Anirog Krazy Kong and Galaxions – VIC-20
Vic Scramble, Chopper and Skips Action Biker Clumpsy Colin – VIC-20 and C64
Vixen 16k RAM for VIC-20
Overkill – Amiga 1200
The Killing Game Show – Amiga 500
I also found a bunch of Videopac G7000 games that I was lacking ^_^ Some I bought from my new found retro gaming friend Jack :) Thanks for bringing them for me!
8 Baseball – Videopac
9 Computer Programmer – Videopac
30 Battlefield – Videopac
10 Golf – Videopac
19 Catch the ball – Videopac
14 Gunfighter – Videopac
Some other things I found were a Case Boy that Söders Spel & Skivhandel thought would look great in my Castlevania collection because of the Castlevania screenshot on the box :D I also bought a reproduction of Trip World, mainly so I can play the game.. I’m probably never gonna spend that much money on the original.. I also got some cheap Famicom pirates, I thought they were quite funny since they read “4 in 1”, then “39 in 1” and finally “1000000000 in 1”!!! I’m skeptical to whether it actually contains that many XD Apart from this I picked up a bunch of other games, like Hao-Kun no Fushigi na Tabi for Famicom Disk System, Slider and Mighty Morphin Power Rangers on Game Gear, Puzzle Figher II on Game Boy Advance, Cobra Command on NES, Puyo Puyo on N-Gage, a hombrew game called Photon for MSX a few other games and I also got two ZX Spectrum games for free ^_^
Game Boy Case Boy
Game Boy Case Boy
Trip World – Game Boy
Photon – MSX
Famicom Pirates
Slider & Mighty Morphin Power Rangers – Game Gear
Hao-Kun no Fushigi na Tabi – Famicom Disk System
Horace goes skiing and Space Resque – ZX Spectrum
Puyo Puyo – Nokia N-Gage
Cobra Command – NES
Puzzle Fighter II – Game Boy Advance
Paper Boy 2 – SNES
Joe Montana II Sports Talk Football – Sega Mega Drive
General Knowledge for Dummies – DS
There’s not a lot of Japanese games at this Swedish convention, but I did manage to find a few. I found some cheap PC Engine games I didn’t already have, and also Super Darius which cost a bit more. I also bought some Japanese Sega Mega Drive games from my friend Karl ^_^ And I found some really nice Super Famicom games! :D Yoshi’s Cookie, Yoshi’s Island and Super Bomberman 3 which completed my Super Bomberman set ^_^
Yoshi’s Island – Super Famicom
Momotarou Densetsu – PC Engine
Quackshot – Sega Mega Drive
Yoshi’s Cookie – Super Famicom
World of Illusion – Sega Mega Drive
Super Darius – PC Engine CD-ROM
Super Bomberman 3 – Super Famicom
Street Smart – Sega Mega Drive
Maniac Pro Wrestling – PC Engine
Pro Tennis World Court – PC Engine
Now this wasn’t the entire loot.. I’m saving some of the best parts ;D I’ll be back soon with part II of the l00t!
Last Friday I drove up to Västerås to attend Retro Gathering on Saturday, my favorite Retro Game convention in Sweden ^_^ Retrospelsmässan is also really nice, but as a retro game buyer there’s just more variation at Retro Gathering :) You can find everything from vintage computers, Atari and Commodore to newer PS2 and 3DS games. There have been more newer games lately compared to the first couple of years that I started attending, I hope they don’t take over though, because I love that there’s a place I can go to find these old obscure computers and consoles! I mainly focus on old cartridges and cassettes when I’m at Retro Gathering. Nintendo and Sega I can find at all the other retro game conventions in Sweden anyway.
So this year I was also asked to host an exhibit of my Castlevania collection, so I was there an hour earlier to set it up. People seemed to like it, but there were also a lot of visitors that asked me where it was. My cabinet had been hidden behind a roll-up behind the scene where they hosted the competitions, which was a shame… but people who looked found it anyway :) For those that missed it, this is what it looked like:
Castlevania Collection
Castlevania Collection
Castlevania Collection
Castlevania Collection
Castlevania Collection
The first thing I spotted was a boxed Colecovision that Japon was selling. I snagged it right away, with a bunch of games and a steering wheel controller ^_^ Pontus and Jan at Japon are really nice and gave me a good deal on it :)
Pontus at Japon
I love visiting Zeela’s table, it’s always filled with obscure and colorful things :) He also had a really fun rarity, Softporn Adventure by On-Line systems! On-Line systems later became Sierra, and on the picture of the “sexy” cover are executives and writers from the company, to the right is Roberta Williams, famous video game designer, writer and co-founder of Sierra On-Line who created for example the King’s Quest series :) This is the game that later became Leisure Suit Larry. Such a cool piece of history! I would have bought it if it wasn’t so expensive XD Also I’m not that into text-based adventures… ;D
Softporn Adventures – On-Line Systems
Softporn Adventures – On-Line Systems
Apart from this he showed me the TRS-80, a computer that I had bought from him a while back that I got delivered here ^_^ I needed one to play my Tandy Tetris game! It’s apparently some kind of Tandy computer.. It was in really nice condition though ^_^ Original box, and I got both a boxed joystick and a big box full of games with it! :D
Ready to hook up!
Tandy TRS-80
Tandy games
Boxed Tandy games
He also had a bunch of other cool stuff ^_^ Like Strip Poker and Centrefold Squares for Atari ST, I bought these for a friend who had been looking all over the place for Atari ST games XD He AND his girlfriend were thrilled and couldn’t wait to play it!! Haha!
Gakken TV-Boy
Zeela’s table
First laptop from Ericsson ///
Bentley Compuvision
Deluxe Strip Poker back
Deluxe Strip Poker
GX4000 – Amstrad home console
Centrefold Squares
Centrefold Squares back
M5 CGL Home computer
There were so many games for sale, and retro game related stuff ^_^ Spel & Sånt had brought some Virtual Boy rarities, they had the three games that I am missing! But they were darn expensive >_< Another seller had setup Zelda on CDi for whoever wanted to try it out XD The creators of Alwa’s Awakening were also there displaying their game which is almost done now, it will be released on Steam :)
Coleco Vision and Vectrex
Retro Game arts
Famicom
Games for sale
Atari 2600
Game Boy
NES
Virtual Boy gems
Sega Master System
Cheap retro games
Games for sale
So much Batman!
Zelda on CDI on display for whoever wants to try it
Cartridges for sale
Games for sale
Games for sale
Alwa’s Awakening
Jumpman Junior
My friends Nathalie and Andreas from up north were also there, and they were selling some of their games. Nathalie tried to sell me a weird DS game, and Andreas wanted me to upgrade my version of Tetris 2 to a mint copy XD I did end up buying Paperboy 2 from them though ^_^ Andreas is a pixel-perfectionist and he had some upscaler connected on display with Super Mario Bro 3, I don’t like when the picture is perfect and the scanlines are too obvious ;P I prefer it the original way with an old CRT and a bit of a glitchy pic XD
Nathalie & Andreas
Good sales pitch by Nathalie ^_^
but no thanks XD
I already have this Tetris game XD
Super Mario Bros 3
Too much scanlines XD
I finally got around to buying the game Photon that has been under development and on display for years at these conventions ^_^ It’s still not finished, but I bought an early version of it :) I also got to talk a bit to the man behind it who told me a bit about the Sord and the community around it :) Apparently there was a club back in the day that released a magazine here in Sweden called “Sordisen”, he had a few issues for sale. He also showed me a few different versions of the system. I almost went and bought one from Zeela, but then again, I don’t have any games for it yet.. so I think it’ll have to wait.
Photon
Photon
Sord computer
Sordisen Magazine
Sord M5 Pro
Sord M5 Pro
Sord M5 Pro
I competed in the yearly Swedish Championships of Pong this year as well :) I won the first take out but lost to my second opponent.. I haven’t been practicing enough, or rather, I haven’t been practicing at all XD I need to get my husband to start playing it with me!! The champion can be seen in the video below, damn that’s an intense Pong game!
Swedish Championships of Pong
Pong championships
As usual they also had a bunch of games and systems set up so people could try them out :) I saw an Intellivision there which reminded me that a seller had promised me from the previous Retro Gathering to bring me one, when I found him though he had already sold it to someone else :((( Hopefully he can set me up with another one.. I have so many Intellivison games and no Intellivisions to play them on XD
Games set up to play
Commodore VIC-20
Commodore C64
Amiga
Coleco Vision
MSX
Texas Instruments
Atari 800
Sinclair ZX Spectrum
Videopac Computer G7000
Fairlight on ZX Spectrum
Crew setting up the games before opening
Intellivision
Colour Genie
Atari 1040 ST
Atari 2600 & NES
Vectrex
Amiga CD32
Sega Master System
Sega Mega Drive, SNES & N64
They also had some other exhibitors, one collection of Sonic games and one of Handic for the VIC 20 :)
Sonic Collection
Sonic Collection
Sonic Collection
Sonic Collection
Handic Collection
One of the best things about going to retro game conventions though is all the people! I met so many old and new friends, and people are so friendly :D
Söders Spel & Skivhandel
Matt8bit
Andreas
Spel & Sånt
Vira & friend
Retrospelsfestivalen
Retroplay
Anders and people :)
After the convention we went out and met up with a bunch of retro gamers, and we found Kralleman and PingeAhlin there who had missed the convention, but had been off on more exciting business! They had scored a bunch of old arcades and other rarities from a connection they had. I was lucky enough to get to go check out their loot :D They had gotten rare prototypes for the Videopac, old minty posters with ads for the Luxor computer, boxed Vectrexes, a Taito Space Invaders arcade cab and a Super Bug arcade with super mint manuals, a really old wooden arcade and an original Break Out arcade. The Break Out arcade had only been played on 64 times, which means it’s hardly been used more than factory testing. That’s pretty rad XD
Box of Videopac prototypes
Videopac prototypes 2-sided
Old luxor ad
Old luxor ad
Old luxor ad
Old luxor ad
Old luxor ad
Boxed Vectrexes
Taito Space Invaders arcade
Super Bug Arcade manual
Super old arcade
Old orange Break Out arcade from Atari
As you can probably figure, Retro Gathering has outdone themselves again and it was an awesome convention! I’ll go through my loot in a later post when I’ve gone through it all ;D
I just bought some Castlevania games I didn’t previously have. Another Castlevania collector were selling off a lot of his collection on Facebook and I managed to snag a few of them :) Since I have recently acquired an MSX I thought it was time to get Castlevania for it, even though it was a bit overpriced.. It was still sealed though, but I’m gonna have to open it up, because I want to play it!! XD I’m not sure if my MSX is an MSX 2 or not though.. I hope it is so I can play it >_<
MSX 2 – Akumajou Dracula
MSX 2 – Akumajou Dracula back
There were two other games he was selling that I had never seen before, probably because one was a pirated game and the other one was a hack. They still looked pretty cool and weren’t too expensive so I picked them up as well :) One is a russian pirate of the Sega Mega Drive game Castlevania the New Generation, and the other one is a hack of Castlevania Dracula X called Castlevania Dracula X Evil Trevor, starring Trevor Belmont. This last one is also sealed, but I’m just gonna have to open it up to see what it’s like XD
SMD – Castlevania The New Generation Pirate
SMD – Castlevania The New Generation Pirate back
SNES – Castlevania Dracula X Evil Trevor
SNES – Castlevania Dracula X Evil Trevor back
I also picked up two copies of Lament of Innocence on PS2, because the one I had is a PAL version and these were NTSC and NTSC-J, with completely different cover art than the PAL game :) I don’t usually buy the same game just for various regions, but since it was Castlevania and these two were really cheap I couldn’t pass them up XD
PS2 – Castlevania Lament of Innocence US
PS2 – Castlevania Lament of Innocence US back
PS2 – Castlevania Lament of Innocence JP
PS2 – Castlevania Lament of Innocence JP back
I also bought a Japanese Symphony of the Night, or Akumajou Dracula X Gekka no Yasoukyoku as it’s called in Japan ^_^
PS1 – Akumajou Dracula X Gekka no Yasoukyoku
PS1 – Akumajou Dracula X Gekka no Yasoukyoku back
And the final new addition to my Castlevania Collection was a Soundtrack CD with music from the first three NES games, it’s called “Akumajou Dracula Famicom Best” :)
Akumajou Dracula Famicom Best Soundtrack
Akumajou Dracula Famicom Best Soundtrack back
The guy selling these games also had Castlevania for Sharp X68000 for sale, it was extremely expensive though, and I don’t have the system to play it on.. so it didn’t feel worth it..
I’m happy with these new additions to my collection :) I haven’t bought any new Castlevania games in a while. I’ve updated my collection page with these new ones already though ^_^ Check out my entire Castlevania Collection here >>
Retro Video Gaming 