Old Computer Games

Remember the good old days of gaming, when there were only 5 pixels in the protagonist and your imagination could turn them into a heroic figure of Schwarzenegger proportions? When the enemies and the heroes were distinguished by colour and you only needed one button on the joystick? Well times have changed and technology has moved on. Pulling my old Commodore 64 or Atari out of the back of the cupboard and setting them up often takes more time than the nostalgic pang lasts. I’ve also noticed that some of my old disks are starting to age and become corrupted. Enter the Internet.

The wonderfully technologically gifted and giving Internet populace is out in force in their attempts to preserve the older side of gaming. Remakes and Emulators for almost any old machine can be found around the Internet. Emulators act as a layer between old software and new hardware allowing modern PCs to run programs that such hardware was never meant to see. Commodore 64, Amiga, NES, Master System, Arcade Machines and more have all been emulated and the necessary programs placed online for download, usually for free.

Emulation is not a new idea. I had a hardware emulator for the VIC20 that plugged into the back of my Commodore 64 and allowed the use of the older VIC20 cartridges with the new hardware (I never actually owned a VIC20 or any programs for it but that’s another issue). Emulator popularity has been fading in and out for many years, only coming into many people’s attention with the release of Bleem!, a Playstation emulator for PC that was released while the PSOne still held a dominant share of the video game market. Bleemcast (a Playstation emulator for the Sega Dreamcast) soon followed causing one of the more interesting video game legal battles as Sony fought to have the emulator shut down. However, the emulators have a strong following and very active user base.

Emulators are easy to find and download. Simply search for the system you want and add the word emulator to the end (e.g. “SNES Emulator”) and you’ll probably come up with a lot of hits. Be slightly wary as some emulator sites will either be false links or may contain pornographic ads. Setting the emulators up to run is usually fairly straightforward and there’s a fair chance that you’ll be able to find some documentation and help. Some of the newer systems require a BIOS image to be installed with the emulator. This is to get around the legal issues raised by Sony in the Bleem! legal battles by requiring you to be in possession of a Playstation BIOS (and hence, presumably, a Playstation) in order to play the games on your computer. Making a BIOS image to load into your computer will most likely be beyond your technical expertise, but a quick check of your console’s case will reveal the file you need to get and then it’s as simple as searching the internet for a BIOS image that matches the BIOS you already own.

Of interest are the PC emulators now available. Windows no longer has very good support for older DOS-based games so there are a few emulators out there now to emulate the DOS environment. DOSBox (http://dosbox.sourceforge.net/) is probably the best known of the crop. There are also game-specific emulators such as ScummVM (www.scummvm.org) or DOOM Legacy (http://legacy.newdoom.com/) that focus specifically on certain games and hence are able to improve the experience for those particular titles.

Once you have yourself an emulator you’ll need to get yourself some programs to run with it. These programs are called ‘ROMs’ and are images of the original storage device that the program came on (be it a cartridge, tape, floppy or other). The process of creating a ROM is probably far too technical for the vast majority of computer users so you’re probably going to have to find a ‘backup’ from somewhere to download. This is where the venture gets slightly foggy. Basically the deal is that you can only have a program ROM if you own the original program. So if you have boxes of old Amiga disks, NES cartridges, or other old gaming programs stored away somewhere, you’re in luck, otherwise you’re treading on legally shifty ground. While it can easily be argued that the downloading of a 1987 computer game is of no real consequence to the company that has in all likelihood closed down, copyright doesn’t actually expire for 50 years and computer games just haven’t been around that long.

Online ‘emulation’ is a new area now being explored. The idea is that you simply play the game in your browser through a Java applet or Flash application. These might not always strictly be emulated programs but many remakes are feature perfect with the originals. The graphics, sounds, and game play remain intact. One excellent place to look for online games is Every Video Game (http://www.everyvideogame.com). While the site does not in fact contain ‘every video game’ it does have a very large list of old games from the arcades, GameBoy, NES, and Master System all playable through your browser. Many remakes can also be found at Shockwave’s site (http://www.shockwave.com/sw/actiongames/arcade_classics/).

Some of the old games have even been remade and updated for this modern world we now live in. Try doing a search for remakes of a game title you particularly enjoyed and you may be surprised at what you find. There are games that have been updated to be 3D, such as some old favourites of mine: Pac man (http://www.caiman.us/scripts/fw/f1292.html) and Barbarian (http://www.dgdevteam.tk/), and while these might not always be brilliant games or remakes in their own right, the thought and effort put in often leads to an enjoyable diversion. There are also more traditional versions of games that have just updated the code as well as possibly the graphics so that they can still be run.

So if you’re feeling nostalgic or just can’t get the hang of these new-fangled games that require you to push fifty buttons in a precise configuration just to jump, you may like to check out the emulation and remake scene. It’s surprisingly entertaining to go back in time to when games were simple yet fun.

Daniel Punch M6.Net Web Helpers http://www.m6.net

Do you remember the old games that were used to play? If we have lived long enough, we can probably remember standing around in the video arcades dumping mass quarters into video games.

We may also be able to remember the old videogame systems, such as the Atari and the games that we would play on it. Video games are much more complex now and it seems that more complex games are coming out all the time. Many of us still enjoy playing those old games from time to time, however, so what is the difference between old games and new games?

The older games were really played at a time in which the videogame technology was very new. Even by the time a home video game systems came onto the market, we still were very used to playing the old games and thrilled at such titles as Breakout or Space Invaders.

I can remember sitting around at my friends house and spending an innumerable amount of hours playing these games. They were extremely enjoyable and were an excellent diversion to life in general which can get stressful from time to time.

The new games are all about graphics and action. Yes, there are still plenty of word games and puzzles that people play but the newer game systems were built with the thought that people enjoy playing games with a lot going on in them. This is true and you can certainly tell that it is because of the type of games that are coming out that are wildly popular. Even the game systems that are coming out are being updated almost on a yearly basis. As the videogame technology grows, the games need to grow along with it.

It doesn’t matter if you like new games or old games, it’s always good to play something fresh. Some gamers would never think of playing something retro, such as the Atari but the fact is that, for those of us that have played it when we were younger, it’s still a lot of fun. It’s hard to find those old games in the store anymore but you can still find them on eBay. In fact, many people look on eBay every day for the older games and find out that they can get newer games at quite a discount. It’s a great way to build up your video game library without depleting all of your money

Chris Young is an experienced gamer and loves playing on some of his old systems. The only difficulty being finding somewhere you can purchase old video games. If you follow the link you will find his favorite resource for old video games.

Q: My 3-year-old has been watching his 9 and 11-year-old brothers play video games, and he wants to start playing games too. I know that there are games out there for kids his age, but is 3 too young for him to start?

A: There are many video games available for three-year-olds, including one by Fisher Price that has tots pedal a miniature stationary bike to work the game. But I would advise delaying having your son play video games for at least another year. The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests that children under three shouldn’t spend any time in front of the “screen” (TV or video games), although that may be a bit unrealistic. A recent survey from the Kaiser Family Foundation found that half of all four to six-year-olds play video games, and about 25% play several times a week.

As with all children, the real question is: How much time playing video and computer games are we talking about? Beginning at four, children might find some video games entertaining and educational, but they should really be spending their time in more active and imaginative play. Time spent playing video games becomes much more of a problem beginning at five or six, when there is a significant push to get kids on Internet sites like WebKinz, and many more commercial games are available for the various video consoles. And things don’t get better. In the ‘tween years, many kids add instant messaging and social networking sites to their repertoire of time-consuming sedentary interests.

An article in the NY Times, “Moving Beyond Joysticks, and Off the Couch,” by Tara Parker-Pope, asks a new question: Are active video games like the WII system better for kids than traditional sit-on-the- couch games? The articles quotes several studies suggesting that active games that require kids to dance or use body movements to control the action on the screen may burn as many calories as walking on a treadmill.

But while games that require kids to get off their bottoms are probably better than sedentary games, this is only a slight improvement. Clearly, being outside on a bike or skiing or playing tennis in the fresh air, with real people, is preferable than doing these activities in a virtual world.

As with so many issues in child-rearing, the best answer involves appropriate use of the “L” word. No, I’m not talking about love; the “L” word I’m referring to is limits.

Parents need to determine a limit for their children to be in front of the screen (TV, video games, computers) for each child, and don’t exceed it. My recommendations would be: one-half hour or less a day for children ages 3-5, one hour a day or less for children ages 6-12, two hours a day for teens (which hopefully would include using the computer for educational purposes). Of course setting limits is one thing, and getting kids to do things like chores, reading, or sports is another. Responsible parents need to work at both limiting questionable habits and supporting habits which lead to physical and mental health. When it comes to video games other gadgets and gizmos, the sooner you teach good technology habits, the better.

Lawrence E. Shapiro, PH.D. is an internationally recognized child psychologist and parenting expert. He has written over two-dozen books, including most recently, “The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Baby Brain Games.”
http://counselingstore.com

Video game trading is a matter of taking your old games, be them for old gaming consoles such as the Nintendo classic or first version of the Playstation to the Xbox 360 or Playstation 3, and exchanging them for either cash or more games. This practice has been around for quite some time starting back when we were kids and would take the games in our collections that were older and played a lot and traded them to our friends for the games they no longer required the ownership of. This prevented us from having to spend a small fortune on new games when they came out and if you owned multiple systems it really bolstered our possible selections.Money is very important. It’s even more important to big companies.

Corporations thrive on the little guy needing exactly what it is they want. Companies who are in the business of retail operations are left with surplus merchandise, the stock that just doesn’t seem to go anywhere. It takes up space on the shelves where other product, product that could very well sell, could be sitting. This is stagnant money flow and keeps it tied up in product instead of being inside the cash register. The gaming stores are tough businesses to be in. There are many avenues that sell video games and video game systems as well as peripherals including Target, Wal-Mart and hundreds of stores in between. But if you walk into any of those stores with a game in your hand and make your way back to the electronics department and ask the guy behind the counter to kindly give you a game in the case in exchange for the game in your hand he’d laugh at you and you’d wind up thrown out of the store. Video game trading isn’t much of a science. You have a game or games that you do not want.

Someone you know has a game you do want and, lucky for you, they happen to want the game that you no longer have a use for. So you trade and everyone is happy. This is the same thing that stores like GameStop, EB Games and Game Crazy do. They have all these old games they procured from the inevitable sources such as game store closings, warehouse closings and buying useless back stock. The games are pretty much useless. A lot of them no longer work so they spend a little time cleaning up and deoxidizing the chips inside the plastic. Now they have a veritable license to print money. The games are originally purchased for pennies on the dollar. Old accessories and peripherals round out their used goods. They also carry the usual full line of new games and accessories as trading is only part of their game giving the buyer an opportunity to purchase larger ticket items.Your game isn’t worth much really. They usually will allow you to trade in two to five games at a time for store credit, $1.00 or $2.00 a title depending on the system and condition. They’ve just increased their inventory of trade and sell stock while losing about 1% of the profit off a new item.

You get more money for trade-in value than discounts on new. It’s the same principles that the car dealers use. With new cars they make maybe $400.00, but if you’ve traded in your Cherokee, blue booked at $4,900.00 for roughly $2,500 they’ll lose $800.00-$1,000.00 on the new car but will sell the traded-in car for around $6,800.00 making them nearly $5,000.00 and if you decided to finance they make more off of interest.So when you take your old games into a corporate branded store you best be prepared to be saddened by the lack of exchange you’ll get for the game. Instead look on-line in message boards or other sites for video game trading. I’m sure you’ll do much better not going toward the corporate gaming community. For further details and video games swapping, please visit Video Games Swapping Website

Abdul Hayi Mansoor is a veteran internet savvy freelance SEO (Search Engine Optimization) Specialist & Guru from Lahore, Pakistan with over seven years of experience in the field of IT as a SEO Specialist and an IT Specialist. He holds a Masters Degree in Computer Science (MCS). The leading SEO Specialist has excellent hands on Keyword Analysis and Market Research, Content & Tags Writing, Search Engine Submission, Link-building, E-zines, Blogging

Like every Christmas, this year a new video game console is on the top of many kids wish lists. The question for parents is which console is right for my kids, do you know the answer? I’ll break down some of the major features of each console, the advantages and disadvantages and in the end hopefully give you some of the information you need to make an informed decision.

The Wii has been this years media darling console and with good reason. The Wii has introduced gaming to a whole group of people who wouldn’t look twice a at a video game console before.

I have yet to meet a person who didn’t enjoy playing games on the Nintendo Wii. Sure I’ve met some who say things like “I was expecting better graphics”, but each and every person who has tried our Nintendo Wii has enjoyed the experience. Everyone from my Mother, to my daughter have enjoyed games like bowling, baseball and boxing on the Wii. Even just watching the amusing little Mii’s walk around on screen can be fun.

Pick up the Wii controller and try games like bowling, baseball and see what a difference a motion sensitive controller can make to a game. When bowling, use the motion you would when you bowl, same for golf, baseball and a number of other games. When driving, turn the controller sideways and use it like a steering wheel. It really is quite revolutionary and gives the Wii it’s own flavor.

If you have a teenage boy who likes online gaming, then chances are pretty good he’ll be wanting an Xbox 360. The Halo series is one of the most successful of all time and it’s only available on the Xbox360.

I’ve been very happy with the system, the graphics on our 42″ plasma HDTV are outstanding and it came with a free month of Xbox Live Gold, which I just extended another 13 months for $59. Xbox Live and Halo 3 may be the Xbox 360’s distinguishing features, Xbox Live allows you to download demo’s of games, video clips and of course play multi player games online. There are many other great games for the Xbox like Gears of War and BioShock, in fact as of this Christmas the Xbox 360 probably has the best library of great games of all three systems, with the Wii in second and the Playstation 3 third.

The Sony Playstation 3 is the most expensive of the three systems, it was also the last one to hit store shelves. The Playstation 3 features include the best graphics subsystem of any of the consoles and of course the Blu-Ray DVD player which is built in. If you have a high def TV and want a Blu-Ray player, then the Sony Playstation 3 is the right choice for you.

The Playstation 3 was delayed many times and because of that it has the least number of games for it of all three systems, but if the new price reductions of the system are any indication (you can get a 40GB version for $399) then the Playstation 3 will make up lost ground quickly in 2008. I don’t personally have a Playstation 3, so can’t really comment on first hand knowledge of the system, but I know that Sony will not give up it’s position as market leading in the video game console wars without a fight.

So, will it be the funky remote, the most games, or the Blu-Ray player and the promise of future dominance? Your decision is not an easy one, but I believe that there are no loosers in this race. All three systems will have an excellent library of games, amazing graphics and sound and none of them are going anywhere for a few years. Choose the fun and cute Wii with it’s revolutionary controller, the sure footed and proven Xbox 360 with it’s library of exciting games (mostly aimed at teens and young men) or the ultra powerful Playstation 3 with it’s Blu-Ray player.

All three systems have some level of backward compatibility with games from their previous versions (Gamecube for Wii, Xbox for Xbox 360 and Playstation 2 for Playstation 3), but don’t buy a new system because it plays your old games, there is no better platform for the games you own now than the system which was meant to play them. Buy your new system to play the new games, the ones which aren’t available on the old systems.

North Pole Christmas has excellent Christmas gift ideas and Christmas wallpaper, come to http://www.north-pole-christmas.com to see.

There are six major video game consoles available at retailers right now; Xbox 360, PS3, PS2, PSP, Wii, and Nintendo DS. It can be hard to choose which one is right for you. And after you add in the old consoles too, it makes the choice even more overwhelming. Don’t worry too much though. Just ask yourself a few simple questions outlined below and you can easily decide which system is right for you. The points to consider are price, graphics, game selection, and other capabilities.

Price -

Probably the single biggest factor for someone choosing a video game console is the price they have to pay to purchase the system itself. Prices range from $599 for the Playstation 3 down to $129 for the Nintendo DS. And if you really want to save money you can buy past generation consoles like Playstation, Nintendo 64, and Super Nintendo and spend no more than $20 for a used system. The prices for games should also be factored in when making your choice. PS3 and Xbox 360 games are usually $59.99 new, while Nintendo DS games sell for $29.99 new. Games for old systems are hard to find at regular retailers, but they are usually quite a bit cheaper if you buy them online.

Graphics -

The graphics are always improving with the newer video game consoles, so the newer systems will always have the best graphics. The Xbox 360 and PS3 have the best graphics and can display in High Definition if you have a TV that can display it too. The Wii does not have the same graphical capabilities as the other two, though many casual gamers will not be disappointed. The Nintendo DS and PSP lack the graphical power that the home consoles have because they are portable. And the PSP can display graphics quite a bit better than the DS.

If you are considering older systems, each generation is roughly at the same level graphically no matter which system you choose. Playstation and Nintendo 64 are about the same, as are Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis. But the Nintendo 64 will have better graphics than Super Nintendo, which in turn is better than the original Nintendo.

Game Selection -

The main reason you buy a system is for the games, so you have to be sure the games you want to play are on the system you choose. Some systems have very wide selections of games because they were so popular, like Playstation 2, Playstation, and Super Nintendo. With these systems you can almost always find a game in the genres you like. If you really like a particular series of games (Mario, Halo, Final Fantasy, etc) you need to be sure to pick the system that those games come out on. Mario games are only available on Nintendo consoles, including Gamecube, Nintendo 64, Nintendo DS, and Super Nintendo. Halo is only on Microsoft’s systems, Xbox and Xbox 360. Meanwhile, Final Fantasy has changed systems. You can only find the newest Final Fantasy games on Playstation 2 and you can find older ones on SNES, Gameboy Advance, and Playstation.

Other Capabilities -

Many systems have features unique to them that might be important to you or change game play dramatically. For example, the Wii uses motion-sensing controllers so all of their games use a different style of game play compared to the other systems with a regular joystick. Likewise, the Nintendo DS has one touch screen, another screen above that, and is portable too. If portability is important to you be sure to choose one of the portable systems PSP, Nintendo DS, Gameboy Advance, or Gameboy. If online games are and important feature, you should choose the Xbox or Xbox 360. They have the most capable online features.

After considering all these questions you can decide which features are the most critical for you and choose the system that best meets that criteria. If you are on a tight budget but want a wide selection of games to play, you should choose Playstation or Super Nintendo. The systems and games are very cheap now and thousands of games were made for them. If you want the best graphics and online games, you should probably choose the Xbox 360. It has some of the best graphics and the best online setup.

Once you have weighted all these options you should be well on your way to choosing the best system for you. Now go buy it and start enjoying your gaming purchase.

JJ Hendricks owns an online retailer of used video games and consoles for most major video game systems. Click here to find more information about the system you decide is right for you => http://www.jjgames.com

If you grew up in the early to late 60s you remember watching Vic Morrow in the great series Combat. You were so taken by the his performance that if you were a normal kid, you wanted to be Sergeant Saunders. And you got the chance to do it too. The toy stores were stocked to the rafters with Saunders trademarked camouflaged helmet, Thompson Sub Machine Gun and hand grenades. The gun had a pull back knob that was quite realistic and the gun made quite a racket when it was shot. The grenades were equipped with the old style cap explosives that also made quite a bang when the grenade hit the ground correctly.

Taking your equipment, you and your friends made off for the nearest woods or mazed area. You took turns hunting each other down. Because nobody really got shot, you were pretty much on the honor system when someone snuck up behind you, started shooting and said, “you’re dead”. You were always tempted to say, “I’m just wounded” and walk off to the aid station for a brief timeout until you were “healed” and ready to get back in the game. Nobody really died and the games went on forever until you simply got tired of playing or your mother called you in for dinner. It was all pretty harmless fun.

But, it’s 40 years later and parents are wondering if they should let their kids play war games. They’re afraid that if their kids play with guns they will grow up to play with real guns. We have become so politically correct that it has gotten to the point where you can’t even find guns in a toy store anymore. Those days are long gone. So if a kid wants to play army, he better have a very good imagination.

The question is, is this right? Certainly not every kid who played with guns grew up to become a killer. An associate of mine had not only a Saunders Tommy Gun, but also a German Luger, an M1 rifle, a Colt 45 and quite a few hand grenades. He says he had to have several when attacking those German bunkers. Today, this kid who lived to play army, is a successful Internet marketer and has never held a real gun a day in his life.

The truth is, it doesn’t take a toy gun to turn a kid bad. If somebody is destined to turn to a life of crime, he’s going to do it with or without having played with toy guns. So the question of whether or not kids should be allowed to play war games is one that has to be answered by each individual parent. Parents should make informed decisions about everything they allow or don’t allow their children to do. There is an old saying that says guns don’t kill, people kill. That was true in the 1960s and it is true today as well.

Certainly toy guns don’t kill anybody.

Michael Russell Your Independent guide to Games