Yesterday afternoon, I made a trip to some local thrift stores that I hadn’t visited in eight years. I left with a 24-game N64 cartridge drawer, some books, an unopened copy of Bill Gates’ The Road Ahead on audio cassette, some neat board games, and the two devices you see above. It’s more junk, but it’s good junk.

The VTech Talking Whiz-Kid (1987, right) came with the box, manual, and cards. This educational toy reads paper “program cards” as you insert them into an optical reader slot. The cards don’t contain any software, but instead bear a simple bar code that tells the Whiz-Kid which built-in program to start. Highlights include Hangman, word scramble, and an extremely limited calculator.

I remember seeing the VTL Computron (1980, left) in J.C. Penney catalogs as a kid. It works too, although it’s missing the battery door. The LED-based Computron plays matching games based on which letter you select. Most of the games obviously went along with a printed guidebook that I don’t have.

Neither device does BASIC like the VTech Pre-Computer 1000, but they’re both highly collectible microprocessor-powered toys. Total cost for both? $10 (US).

Anybody else have one of these? Feel free to share your memories with us.

What is Nasty?

Nasty is the keyboard of my well-loved 29 year-old Apple II Plus.

It’s always a bad sign when a keyboard that’s been sitting untouched for ten years in climate-controlled storage is wet beneath the keys, coated with a glistening, gooey gunk of unknown origin. Mix in two decades of fuzzy dust and moldy cat hairs, and you have yourself a potent cocktail of pure, unadulterated Nasty.

[ Continue reading Shining a Rotten Apple » ]

Atari announced this ambitious computer add-on for their popular Atari 2600 game console just as it was bleeding to death from record losses. Sadly for us collectors, this unit never went into production — although the wisdom of releasing such a device is highly debatable.

Discussion topic of the week: What if Atari had included a built-in keyboard with the 2600 at its launch in 1977? How would it have changed the nature of the system?

If you use this image on your site, please support “Retro Scan of the Week” by giving us obvious credit for the original scan and entry. Thanks.

In this ad for the Tandy 1000 SX, Radio Shack shamelessly depicts the 1980s version of the “work in your underwear” marketing tagline: work in your shorts. Oh, the indecency. If this guy shows any more leg, it’s going to cause a scandal.

Discussion topic of the week: What if everyone wore shorts while using computers? Would global economic productivity grind to a halt?

If you use this image on your site, please support “Retro Scan of the Week” by giving us obvious credit for the original scan and entry. Thanks.

In Memoriam: Gary Gygax (1938-2008), co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons.

Stop a moment and think about the profound influence Dungeons & Dragons had on computer RPGs and MUDs. It’s immeasurable.

I’ve read a lot of bad press about China Warrior recently due to its re-release on Nintendo’s Virtual Console service. Many make fun of the simple beat-’em-up as being a completely horrible game, which is not far off the mark: playing China Warrior is about as fun as eating a brick. But they don’t know exactly how horrible it can be. In the early nineties, I had a personal run-in with this TurboGrafx-16 non-classic that still haunts me to this day.

[ Continue reading How China Warrior Ruined My Childhood » ]

If you’re a regular reader of VC&G, you know the important role that clearance isles have played in my adventures as a video game collector. Silly as it may seem, collecting vintage computers and classic game systems starts now, in the present. Wise choices can be made as to what will become rare and collectible in the future, and collectors should seize the opportunity to purchase such items while they’re still available through regular retail channels.

Case in point: Thanks to Blu-Ray’s conquest over HD-DVD in the hi-def format wars, Microsoft’s HD-DVD drive for the Xbox 360 is now $50 (US) new at Best Buy and Circuit City. Best Buy even has a free HD-DVD movie rebate program that makes the deal much sweeter [expired] If you’re feeling lucky, wait a few months and they may dump them for even less. Otherwise, go for it now. If you’ve got the cash, buy a second and keep it mint in the box.

It’s true: most controllers can’t stand up to the intense punishment delivered by the average Donkey Kong Country player. That’s why Asciiware created the Super Advantage joystick for the SNES. It’s built “gorilla tough” for “gorilla games.”

Woah there — don’t try using this sophisticated piece of technology on a non-gorilla game, or that tiny gorilla (pictured) will jump out of the controller and smack you. Just a warning: he goes straight for the eyes.

Discussion topic of the week: What if standard joysticks looked like this in the Atari 2600 era? How would games have been different?

If you use this image on your site, please support “Retro Scan of the Week” by giving us obvious credit for the original scan and entry. Thanks.

Sometimes people ask me if I’ve played any good games recently. At present, I must reply a resounding “YES!”

The title I’m engaged in at the moment is one of the most fun computer games I’ve played in years. It’s called Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, a graphical point-and-click released by LucasArts in 1992. I’m playing it on my favorite MS-DOS computer, a generic 386SX with 4 megs of RAM and a 21″ Mitsubishi Diamond Plus 100E monitor that I bought last year at the NCSU surplus sale for $1 (Yes, one whole dollar, and they have plenty more where that came from).

Spielburg should have turned this game into a movie — or at least one with Atlantis in it — although I’m looking forward to the new Indy flick coming out later this year. Anyway, I have to get back to the game.

And I mean epic. Last week, I crossed the country to attend Game Developers Conference 2008 in San Francisco, California. Below, you’ll find a detailed report on my travels, replete with in-depth photos, each accompanied by both honest and sometimes facetious commentary. But be warned: it’s going to be a long trip. If there be any lilly-livered scallywags amongst ye who fear the voyage, turn back now, or forever will ye be scarred by me words.

[ Continue reading Benj’s Epic GDC 2008 Adventure Slideshow » ]