Archive for September, 2012

[ Retro Scan of the Week ] Gun.Smoke

Monday, September 24th, 2012

Gun.Smoke Gunsmoke Ad Nintendo Fun Club News - 1988Guns don’t kill people. My grimy hands do.

[ From Nintendo Fun Club News, April-May 1988, p.13 ]

Discussion Topic of the Week: Have you ever fired a gun in real life? Do any video games successfully replicate that experience?

[ Retro Scan of the Week ] RCA Studio II Tennis/Squash

Monday, September 17th, 2012

RCA Studio II TV Arcade III Tennis-Squash Box Cover - 1988A stunningly realistic RCA Studio II gameplay session.

Here’s the box cover of TV Arcade III: Tennis/Squash for the for the RCA Studio II (1977), the world’s second ROM cartridge-based video game console.

The early console, which featured only two numeric keypads for control, was such a dog that I named it the “worst video game console of all time” in a 2009 PC World slideshow. Three years later, I stand by that assessment.

You may be asking yourself why RCA prefaced the game title with “TV Arcade III.” Well, silly, that’s because it was part of a sequence of “TV Arcade” games for the RCA Studio II that started with “I” and ended with “IV.” That’s exactly, I might add, how the ancient Romans would have labeled their video games.

[ From RCA Tennis/Squash Box, circa 1977, cover ]

Discussion Topic of the Week: Have you ever played an RCA Studio II? What did you think?

[ Retro Scan of the Week ] AtariWriter

Monday, September 10th, 2012

AtariWriter Atari 800 Word Processor Advertisement - 1980“You won’t find a bluer word processor package anywhere…”

[ From Personal Computing, November 1983, p.43 ]

Discussion Topic of the Week: What was the first word processor software you ever used?

[ Retro Scan of the Week ] Mario Paint Player’s Guide

Monday, September 3rd, 2012

Mario Paint Player's Guide Ad Nintendo Power - 1993Quite frankly, Mario is stunned — just stunned — by that potted plant.

[ From Nintendo Power, July 1993, inside back cover ]

Discussion Topic of the Week: Tell us about your most novel experience with Mario Paint. Did you make any music or animations?