RIP-Felix

Wow, is this the legendary tease? Have they FINALLY made Half-Life 3? I hope they realize that not doing this franchise justice after the long...LONG...wait is a very bad idea. This is not a game you try a cash grab with. EDIT: No, after further reading on my part Alyx takes place between the events of 1 & 2, so it's really not a sequel. A 1.5 if you will. Also it's a VR game. Kinda makes sense actually. Still it's been 13 years since there was a Half-Life release! The last one was in 2007!

I thought I share this here since some of you have expressed interest in getting your OG consoles hooked up to modern flat screens without lag or hassle. I ordered the Nintendo version which should be here soon. I want the Saturn version too, but it's not in stock yet. Yes I have an OSSC, which scales up more than 480p, but these are easier to pack up and use on other TV's. So when traveling or setting up at a friends house, this is easier and perfectly acceptable. Plus, they're only $50.

Glad I could help contribute to the available information online, sadly there isn't enough of it out there for would be SNES repairman. Nintendo sure doesn't help in that department. I wish you the best of luck on you adventure!. May the landfill never claim another console! The CIC was one of my first suspects and I reflowed the chip just with a hot iron. That was ineffective. Took me a long time to circle back to the CIC after I thought it was clear. Don't be like me and clear a component until it's been properly checked and reflowed.

Would it have to do with careful timing to produce harmonic and non-harmonic overtone structures? That could sound like a 4th voice when there are actually 3.

Here a close up. Excuse the loacal news idiots, they try.

Next time I'm going with $300-400 in cash, a list of game I have and want, and a will elbow you attitude. One thing I wish I had taken advantage of was the Genesis cases. I have maybe 10 loose genesis games in need of cases and I know they had a bunch of them. I didn't see manuals, but I'm sure someone had a bunch. One booth had a bunch of loose cases that were buy 2 get one free. I don't think the prices were all that bad either. I was seeing N64 games from $3 - $25. Atari 2600 carts for a couple dollars each. A lot of PS2, Gamecube, X-Box and XB360, PS3 games in the $10 range. Some booths had high prices, about what I'd expect in a retro gaming store front (e-bay is usually much better). I forgot to mention that the Immortal John Hancock was there with his entire Genesis collection! Sadly, I missed it. However, he did a video on it: ...lol. I have that stupid Wacky worlds creativity studio game and mouse. I thought it was boring as hell. It was one of those games my mom thought would be neat. That's what happens when parents are allowed to choose the games without asking. There were plenty of couples and families, a pretty even spread of people. The atmosphere was fun and engaging, if a bit crowded. Like I said, this kind of thing is better attended in a group. I felt kinda lonely by myself, especially seeing how happy couples and families looked engaging in their shared interest of video games. The demographic was mostly 30s male, but I did feel a bit creepy when my eyes lingered a bit too long on the bombshell rocking a skin tight Samus Aran unitard, or the slightly nerdy but attractive girl pulling off Lara Croft. I was a bit surprised to find a fair turnout of women, but the statistics show women game too. Also there was a cosplay contest, so that explains the get ups. Actually I was thinking if I were to do a costume I'd go as AMS agent James Taylor from the Typing of the Dead: Not to difficult to make actually, just a broken Dreamcast shell for the backpack, a spray painted water bottle for the battery, and a keyboard strapped to the front. I have a suit, so that's covered. The problem is that I need 3 friends willing to come in zombie makeup/attire carrying banners with words to type. Then they can bum rush me on stage while I pretend to type their word in dramatic style, and then they recoil and fall down like the keystrokes were bullets striking them...Lol! Man that's a weird game. It's better than any of the costume ideas I saw there. Well, the star wars guys were better. But that's been done.

Well played sir!

Hey, I took a trip to the Portland Retro Gaming Expo this weekend. I left Friday and braved the rain arriving late that evening. I attended Saturday and enjoyed a day of nostalgia before leaving this morning for home. I don't usually go to these things, but decided to check it out this year. Here's some pics. Freeplay arcade. There was a DJ booth pumping out 80/90s hits. I haven't seen an arcade with someone standing at every machine, ever before. I had to put a quarter on the marquee to reserve the next game, except the machines were free. So the the gesture was just for fun! There were a pretty good mix of games, mostly retro arcade, but a whole row of pinball too. Here's the console arcade. They had rows of tables setup with consoles hooked up to monitors ready to play. I got in on a 10 player match of Saturn bomberman! I sucked and blew myself up more often than not, but it was still fun shouting and laughing with complete strangers. Off in the corner there was a professional gaming tournament with projector screens and seating for spetators. I'm a bit too young to have ever played any of the Atari computer systems (just the home consoles). So I couldn't pass up the oppritunity to play an Atari 400. This was some space game where you fly around in space and try to find something to shoot. I'm sure there's more to it than that, but it got boring pretty quick and I eventually moved on after blowing up a couple of...asteroids? Maybe you recognize the game, if so let me know. Anyway, now I can say I have played it. I also have never played an Atari Jaguar. So I got to remedy that as well. Alien Vs predator was like, um...running around a maze looking for someone to kill, just to make it end. Tempest I got into, I made it a few levels before they caught me! I can see the potential of jaguar now. I'm not sure if I want to add it to my collection, but I might look into it closer now having seen it in person. This is just nostalgia in a nutshell! There was a food vendor right next to this setup. So you can get something to eat and enjoy it in a retro living room, Atari 2600 and all. Here's the showroom floor with just about anything you could possibly want. I saw japanese imports, boxed NES/SNES/N64/Atari2600/5200/7800, games and more games. Honestly it was overwhelming. That croud was in the morning and it only got worse! I followed the current of people (that's the best word to describe how it flowed). Getting close and actually looking throught the games to find something you might want seemed like it would take a force of will. Seriously, you need to have a clear list of what you want and how much your are willing to spend, because otherwise it's just too much. I didn't buy anything, because I was just paralyzed by the frenzy. It's crazy to see that much retro gaming stuff for sale all in one place. And of cource if you were wondering where to go and asked these guys, the answer is always the same, "nothing to see here, move along!" Besides the showroom and arcade I attended a number of panels (talks) given by youtube personalities. John Rigs gaming with children, Kinsley burke from Metal Jesus Rocks taking about Japanese imports, and probably the most interesting was Modern Vintage Gamer's panel on secrets of copy protection. I couldn't even get in on the Angry Video Game Nerd's auditorium because the line was so long. Sadly I pooped out too early to catch Bob Neal's "getting the best from retro consoles at any price point" (that's the Bob from RetroRGB). Too bad, I was most interested in that, but probably already know everything anyway. It was all a bit too much to handle. The constant influx of people and lack of seating was off putting. I think I would prefer to go with friends if I go again. Still it was fun, and I don't think it was a waste of the $35 I paid for admittance.

I've used plutoTV. It's kida like Sony crackle in that they have programming to watch and are interrupted with ads like live TV. Honestly, it's a better than I get OTA in my smallish city. The bigger cities have more TV stations and attenas blasting out microwaves, so my Dad who lives in a big city gets way more channels (not that there's much to watch). Even with just free services, there is much more than I had as a kid before cable. We had like 4 channels that came in clear enough to watch. Alluminum foil helped to get another one or 2, or to clear up the signal from an important channel. So we are really better off than 30 years ago. Add a couple of paid steaming services and the only thing I find myself lacking is my local sports teams. They have the big cable TV contracts and play the blackout game. So it's either pay serious cash monthly, go to a sports bar, or find something else to do...Or circumvent the blackouts.

Felix purrs when you stroke his ego! I appreciate your kind words and am glad I was able to help you make an informed decision. Sounds like you got the modding bug too. Yeah you can send a lot chasing cases, mod boards, and soldering it all together, but for me that's the fun. Sharing it here is too I guess. And of course, playing the games! At last check RetroBit's wireless DC controller hasn't officially been canceled, but they wont confirm the existence of a working prototype (yet). I would think they'd say if they did. So, IMO they are nowhere close to having a product. That means the DreamConn+ is currently the only wireless DC controller, at least on the immediate horizon. All we've seen from Retrobit is an empty box and a "we want to make one someday" kind of promise. At least Chris has an actual product you can buy. And he's a solid dude. My Dreamport did need a bodge wire to work properly with my clone GDemu, but it was designed to work with the official, so I can't hold that against it too much. Chris replicated the issue and had a fix for me the next day. I expect Chris will implement the design change as soon as possible and then it'll be a finished product. Of course, if you have an official GDemu you don't have to worry. Plus you can benefit from official GDemu updates, unlike the clones. Mcalssic - Well I don't like to hate on devices that could appeal to someone. I have tried to think about who that would be and have decided it's someone who HATES aliasing (jaggies). Feed it 480p and it does indeed soften the edges. It's HDMI compliant, so it doesn't much care for the OSSC's off spec brand of 720p, 960p, or 1080p. You get garbley gook. It will work with the OSSC's 480p, but why use that when you can cut out the mClassic and go higher? This is for the person with a RetroTink2x, or another device that takes 240p/480i and outputs 480p, but does not go further or add antialiasing that they want. If you like sharp pixels, it's definitely not for you! It makes the screen look like slightly better than composite and does it lag free. That sounds terrible unless you hate jaggies. Also, most untrained eyes will probably prefer the trade off of crushing dark detail to black to increase color saturation (appears more vibrant). Trained eyes will hate it. And the ringing artifacts due to artificial artifacts is present as well. Again something untrained eyes prefer and trained hate. My guess is that it's for the majority of users wanting to get into retro gaming on modern TV's, but don't like jaggies, and don't want to spend too much. Honestly, I don't really think it's worth it. I got mine and put it through it's paces. I don't think I'll use it.

Though to answer. It's not as reliable as a wired connection. So I plug in when I care. I had a friend over a week or so back and we were playing a bunch of multiplayer titles. He was wired and I had the Dreamconn+. He was beating me in power stone and chuchu rocket. I was holding my own in propeller arena. I didn't notice the lag too much in the heat of battle, but I did lose connection once or twice when someone was standing in the line of sight. I enjoy it in a casual gaming setting. If thing get serious or I got tired of losing, I can just plug in. I'm not really sure what causes the 2 second drop outs on my unit. They are pretty annoying in certain circumstances. Other times it's not a big deal. Hard to say if the downsides are not worth the price premium. At the price Chris asks I feel the device has to be perfect. But that's not reasonable, nothing is... Ok, let me put it this way. I don't feel like I wasted my money. I do feel like I over spent it. I wish it was perfect, but can't expect it to be. I use it a lot, but if it bothers me, I change back to a wired controller. Would I buy another Dreamconn+? Not at that price. 1 yes, another no. As for the dreamport, it's a nice upgrade simply for the ease of turning on/off the console. Cool, but not perfect either. I feel best about the dreamcon and port. The gun on is probably not worth the price, but works with some consideration of the limitations. I can advise you to choose carefully how much you want the wireless. Manage your expectations, but don't hold the limitations against the devices. The price is the only reason I'm apprehensive to give a clear recommendation. They're right at the limit I feel anyone not rolling in money would be willing to pay. So you might be disappointed unless you made the decision to buy knowing the limitations. That's why I put so much effort into being honest in my review. Hope that helps.

I cut triple play down to doubleplay a few years ago. I decided to do try Playstation vue and now Hulu with live TV. PSvue got too expensive and now Hulu is doing the same. The ad experiance is horrible. They trick you, carefully placing ads you cant skip in places that force you to watch. I'm tired of it. Crapcasts DVR let me skip through ads after I recorded something (at least they used to). Hulu doesn't. And they make it sound like you can upgrade to adless and it'll be better. But it doesnt remove ads on any of the content added as part of the live tv subscription. Not just live channels, but the on demand content that comes with it (whole seasons of tv shows curiously missing seasons and episodes is another issue). Without live TV Hulu is fairly limited in content. Netflix is a far better streaming experiance. PSvue was a better live tv experiance than Hulu (though they might have changed). I'm thinking of trying YouTube with live tv. My options are fairly limited by my local basketball teams network tv contracts. Otherwise I might give slingTV a try. What I'm going to do soon, as I'm coming up on the end of the 2 year double play contract, is drop crimecast for CenturyLink. The home phone I keep as a dummy line for applications that require a phone number. It get all the scammers, never my cell. Anyway, I was thinking of Ooma VOIP, as you can keep your existing phone number. I can buy my own router/modem to avoid the rental fee. And CenturyLink is fast enough for streaming to 3 TVs in HD (25mbps). It's not a fat pipe connection with the mondeo upgrade package. One suitable for uploading 10 exabytes of hacked IOI intranet data to the OASIS servers, but it suits my needs. I pay $100/mo. At the moment just for phone/internet. I figure I can get that to $50. Then whatever streaming services add to that is about as affordable as I can make it. Honestly, I just want my basketball. I could get NBA league pass and use a VPN to circumvent the blackout, but that's cheating the captive marketing scheme the billionairs (and their lobbyist bought policies) want me willingly obey...like a good little American citizen.

After careful over thinking I have decided backward time travel is impossible. If multiverses doesn't exist: It's not possible to travel into (or communicate with) the past without being seen or heard by someone, which would alter the past. That's not allowed because paradoxes requiring alternate realities would ensue. The butterfly effect and grandfather paradoxes would mean that no matter how careful you are, you would inadvertently change something requiring multiverse to explain. It's disallowed in this thought experiment, so that's the end of non-multiverse. You cannot travel into, or communicate with the past without multiverse. If multiverse exists: Any change you make would create a pardox that can't be explained in your reality. You must split timelines into an alternate reality - just another in an infinite sea of multiverse realities where every permutation has been done at nauseum and beyond. Sending messages into the past just splits the timeline and it can't change your reality. If you could travel into your past, you couldn't return to your own reality because the trip itself puts you into an alternate - the butterfly effect and gradfather paradoxes prohibit your timeiline from being achievable anymore. Your mere presence in your own past timeline obliterates it. Everything you do changes an outcome. Therefore, in a multiverse there is no reason to communicate with the past and no point traveling into it unless you're bored and never want to return to your own reality. You could have a life in an past era, but never return to your own timeline. But that creates the possibility of "time settlers" and "time criminals". Going deeper, if backward time travel/communication were possible, we'd meet/correspond with "time settlers/criminals" all the time. We'd be inundated with them from an infinite number of multiverses in which someone figured out how to do it. In fact, their "mass" (bodies/information) would reach critical concentrations causing Big bangs that sterilize that universe. And thanks to infinity being infinite, universes would be "massed to death" over and over again. In fact all of them but the ones not visited be sterilized. Inevitably, any living observer must be in one of the surviving universe's. And all multiverses must never achieve backward time travel, or they'd be "massed to death" by infinite "time suicides" (those wishing to visit the big bang of their own universe) causing big bangs in in others, reseting one after another until they sterilize the multiverse again. Isn't infinity great? And if multiverse is not true, then backward time travel is impossible anyway. Either way, no backward time travel is one metaphysical traffic law.

Interesting, pretty much confirms what others were speculating. Sounds like the motherboard is not a dummy, that's the good. The lead architect who designed it quits after 6 months without pay, that's the bad. And that's very bad. Debugging and hardware changes will have to come from another architect, which means more delays. If they couldn't pay their lead architect and had to raise more funds by duping Walmart and GameStop customers into pre-ordering, they are really only digging the grave deeper. Gamestop won't get into a costly lawsuit to protect their customers (they're near bankruptcy as it is), but Walmart will bury ATARI alive if they don't deliver. Dangerous game ATARI is playing. The executives who have ATARI locked up and gagged, need to sell it off to someone who can actually do the brand justice. Sounds like it will only be a linux PC inside a nice box. @hansolo77 you may get just what you asked for and nothing else. Well, assuming they actually do release something.

May this thread be dedicated to the outlandish truths no one can believe. May I start this off with a tale. A tale of yesteryear, when HDTV's were ridiculously expensive and DVD was just replacing VHS as THE video media storage vehicle. But what If I told you, that you could skip all the intermediate years between DVD and BluRay by simply recording 1080i onto a VHS tape. 50GB movies on a single VHS tape... And now the ball's in your court. Anything that you couldn't believe that challenged what you thought was true about the world? Feel free to blow our minds.

This one is over the top, but I think he makes some good points. He say's you can't cancel your order until the VCS ships and the lowdown from the game industry insiders is it's a complete scam. That day will not come anytime soon, if at all! Also that ATARI's been searching hard for real investors and they'll only touch Atari with a 10" poll to beat them out of their office! I feel lucky that I didn't get in on this. I was indifferent from the beginning, but kinda interested for the nostalgia factor. Moreover, I like supporting retro inspired projects. In this case, I'm glad I didn't pull the trigger.

I REALLY don't think you can trust what ARARI has to say at this point! They have proven themselves to be habitual liars. Don't make the mistake of believing them just because you want to believe the lie.

Okay, I tested the lens today and have updated PART 2 with my conclusions having played with the lightgun for awhile. I also updated the part about the Dreamconn+ blutooth controller.

Lol...thanks man! I'm glad my struggles to piece this together helped you out. To answer your first question, I haven't tested the Gunconn out that much yet. It does work if you're standing far enough back. I just got a wide angle lens in and have yet to custom print a 3D mount for it. However, the lens should increase the field of view on the IR sensor allowing it to work in my game room. I'm guessing it will distort the aiming calculation causing accuracy to suffer, but that's something I'll test when I get to it. As for the tracking/lag. Chris confirmed he harvests the IR sensor out of Nintendo Wiimotes. So it's basically the same level of responsiveness you can expect from lightgun games on the Wii. I imagine that it's very similar in performance to an Ultimark Aimtrack which uses basically the same tech. As for the marseille mCalssic, I agree with most of the sentiments others have expressed on the SHMUPS forums, but I don't see it as being completely useless. My main complaint with my mCable Gaming Edition is that it stretches everything to 16:9, even 4:3 content, and I can't stretch it back with my TV's aspect/zoom button because it rudely things It's already in the best mode (stay away from VIZIO). mClassic's retro mode fixes that! So that does entice me to give it another try. I have some real issues with it however: EDIT: I just learned about the RAD2x (Retro Analog to Digital 2x) upscaler by the same creator as the RetroTink. I'm planning to get the Nintendo Multi Out version, which is compatible with all Nintendo consoles that support the multi out video port (AV Famicom, SNES, N64, and GameCube). It uses RGB if available and composite if not, then converts to 480p over HDMI. It also has it's own anitalasing filter switch. It does not apply any video enhancements. This could work well with the mClassic, which I just backed. I'll try it out and see if my opinion changes on Dreamcast. 1440p is intriguing.

An interesting video. I have not heard of the DreamPi! Apparently it can be used to play Phantasy Star Online and download some DLC. I'll have to look into it as that sounds interesting.

Pretty much what I suspected. I was thinking of trying an Intel NUC, but the better ones cost a fair penny (or perhaps an unfair penny, knowing Intel). Still, they are too big for what I have in mind. Maybe a full size console gut, but I don't have any bunked consoles. AND I'VE TRIED BUYING BROKEN...lol. I have to attempt to fix them, and apparently I'm too tenacious to give up and call it dead. Why can't you actually find a really broken console on e-bay? I should start a repair shop.

Interesting. There's a Dreamcast and a Saturn case for the XU4 on thingiverse. Is the N2 the same footprint? Might make for a fun mini console project. I'll admit, my excitement for small form factor computers has waned. They don't have enough horsepower to use run-ahead latency reduction in retroarch, thus the suffer from lag (more than I care for). Does the N2 handle Run-Ahead latency reduction for NES, SNES, Genesis? I don't know if it's enabled in the RA cores for Odroid. N64, DC, and PS1 probably won't work well at all, but are of less consequence than older systems where tight controls matter.

Ah, how does that compare to an XU4. Last I heard, the XU4 was quite a bit better than RPi, but not quite there for DC emulation. From the benchmarks the N2 looks only slightly better. Does that 1320MHz RAM make all the difference? Pretty interesting if it can. Also I haven't been following the software side of things for Odroid. Has that matured, or is it still a PITA?

Yeah Shenmue is a really influential game. I'm like you, I never did get very far in the game. Again I've only played a few minutes of the intro during testing. So I have that title to look forward to as well. Shenmue and Shenmue II are available cross platform now in a set. So that's the definitive way to play, spotty emulation unnecessary. I have it on my modded DC and like the retro look, so that's is where it's at for me. As for Skies of Arcadia, I think the definitive version was the re-release on GameCube. I think there are some extras too, but I don't recall off the top of my head. Dolphin runs more accurately than any of the DC emulators. So that's your best bet for SOA. In general, I have been most disappointed with DC emulation. It has made big strides since RetroArch devs ported Redream and Reicast cores. It's gained user attention and thus development momentum again. I hope they can work out the kinks. The biggest problem I notice is texture rendering doesn't get layers correct, in Sonic Adventure's opening scene for example, after you beet Chaos he turns to a puddle and goes down a drain. I don't remember if it was redream or reicast, but half of the drain was clipped by the concrete texture, or Sonic's eyes were missing! One would have better options for graphics, and the other wouldn't. You might have to switch to the other to progress in the game, copying a save over to that cores directory. In Blue Stinger, I've seen super annoying flickering in Nephy's glow (the ethereal blue follower). There are sometimes random crash-points in the game, invisible walls, and otherwise glitchy behavior. I just prefer to play on OG hardware and get the experience that was intended, instead of worrying about fighting the emulator. PS1, GC/Wii, GameBoy, SNES, NES, Genesis and etc. have very good emulators that I trust not to bunk up the experience for me. So in those cases, I prefer emulation because of save states, graphic improvements, and versatility of platforms they're playable on (like my phone). I would like to see N64, DC, PS2, X-Box, and Saturn reach the same level of fidelity. I'd say that N64 and PS2 are the closest of that group to be acceptable, but the beefy specs needed limit the devices that can play them properly. @hansolo77 you mentioned smooth playback on your "N2". What is that?