SpookyMulder

Crap! Missed that one, thanks for the heads up, just bought it! Hopefully Salamander won’t be too far behind.

Outstanding!!!

Great lists! I’d go: Phoenix Raiders of the Lost Ark Haunted House Adventure Superman Vanguard Ms Pac-Man Real Sports Volleyball Frogger Super Cobra With very honourable mentions for Communist Mutants from Space and the other version of Frogger, both rather wonderful but only available on the Starpath Supercharger for the 2600 (so a bit of a cheat!)

The Atari 5200 was my holy grail from my early teens (at the start of the 1980s) up to my 40s.... or more precise, one that would work on UK scart or svhs TV connections. Anyway, I have two converted machines these days and they’re big and beautiful with some wonderful arcade conversions and I even like the dodgy joysticks! Just to chip in on the Colecovision comments above, it’s a wonderful system with some great arcade conversions and lovely add on modules (steering wheel, trackball etc). I highly recommend it.... but the pads are very ‘creaky’.

Like others, I’m pretty much 90% Switch, with the other 10% being Xbox One X. Switch is my go to system for everyday gaming on my commute to and from work, on business trips & also for playing against the wife and kids on split screen Mario Kart at weekends, Xbox is mainly for online stuff eg: Conan Exiles, Battlefield 1 & V, if I’m home alone. My Pro is currently boxed up in storage and my retro stuff is more for collection purposes, than playing.

Just preordered for Switch. It looks utterly charming!

I started playing Defender at my local seaside town waaaaay back in the early ‘80s. It took me weeks to master the complicated (compared to other coin ops) control system, but once I did.... everything just clicked!

Oh, sorry, I do have versions of each one on various formats (Atari 2600, 5200, 7800, Colecovision, mame etc), but what I should’ve written is that I miss this type of game being made. I tried Resogun, but it just didn’t click with me.

Williams had a real purple patch in the early to mid ‘80s and produced some all time classic shooters. Games such as Defender, Robotron 2084, Stargate (Defender 2) and Sinistar all had wonderful booming sounds effects (that Sinistar voice!!) and retina burning graphics. I miss games like these...

At no point have I said they wouldn’t have them, but the sales figures don’t lie, it’s a dying format as an entertainment platform.... in fact all physical media is.The world is moving towards an all digital future, whether we like it or not. I treasure my physical library of retro carts from the Atari VCS onwards, but I haven’t bought a single physical game this gen for either PS4, X1 or Switch.

I agree, but the fact is that Blu-ray is a dying format, as are all physical forms of disc based entertainment (sadly). The sales figures don’t lie. This isn’t the 360 vs PS3 era, Blu-ray doesn’t matter any more.

I wouldn’t put too much faith into Blu-ray being a deciding factor, there are numerous companies who manufacture Blu-ray (don’t forget Microsoft use the format for the X1!) but as I’m sure you’re aware, it’s a dying format for movies/tv box sets, with sales of physical disc entertainment falling 50% from 2014-2019, whilst sales of subscription based entertainment services (Netflix, Amazon, Apple, Disney) leaping ahead (with a 27% increase in 2018 alone, before the latter 2 big hitters entered the game). Which ever way you look at it, physical entertainment discs will go the way of the dinosaur sooner rather than later. Samsung have already stopped production of Blu-ray players in North America.

This is a superb (and rather sad) true story based series. Excellent acting from the 3 main female leads.

Canada, South Korea, Taiwan, and numerous Central American countries also say ‘Hi’ But, seriously, MLB The Show is a cracking sports sim, up there with NBA 2K (as already mentioned).

You’re totally correct, the VCS/2600 was HUGE in the U.K. and USA! Consoles were very popular WAY before the NES/SMS. The Intellivision and Colecovision (the latter had some amazing arcade conversions for the early 80s) were also popular and the Vectrex was an amazing bit of kit. The Atari 5200, which never saw light of day in the U.K. due to the crash, also has some excellent arcade conversions, it’s not that hard to pick up converted US machines these days. All are excellent systems in their own right.