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Coleco Gemini
The Coleco Gemini is an Atari 2600 clone manufactured by Coleco Industries, Inc. in 1983. Technical specifications * Processor: 8-bit 6507 * CPU speed: 1.19 MHz * RAM: 128 bytes * Resolution: 160x200, 128 Colors History In 1982, Coleco released Expansion Module #1 for its ColecoVision video game system. Using off-the-shelf components, the module enabled the ColecoVision to be compatible with Atari 2600 software. Later that year, Atari, Inc. sued Coleco for patent infringement, and the companies wound up settling out of court, with Coleco becoming a licensee of Atari's patents. Gemini vs. 2600 The main difference between the Coleco Gemini and the Atari 2600 is the controller design. The Coleco Gemini controllers (dubbed the 'Dual Command') featured an 8-way joystick and a 270-degree paddle on the same controller (the joystick was at the top of the controller, and the paddle was at the bottom of the controller). To play paddle games on the 2600, a Y-connector could be u ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joystick
A joystick, sometimes called a flight stick, is an input device consisting of a stick that pivots on a base and reports its angle or direction to the device it is controlling. A joystick, also known as the control column, is the principal control device in the cockpit of many civilian and military aircraft, either as a centre stick or side-stick. It often has supplementary switches to control various aspects of the aircraft's flight. Joysticks are often used to control video games, and usually have one or more push-buttons whose state can also be read by the computer. A popular variation of the joystick used on modern video game consoles is the analog stick. Joysticks are also used for controlling machines such as cranes, trucks, underwater unmanned vehicles, wheelchairs, surveillance cameras, and zero turning radius lawn mowers. Miniature finger-operated joysticks have been adopted as input devices for smaller electronic equipment such as mobile phones. Aviation Joystic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1980s Toys
__NOTOC__ Year 198 (CXCVIII) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Sergius and Gallus (or, less frequently, year 951 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 198 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years. Events By place Roman Empire *January 28 **Publius Septimius Geta, son of Septimius Severus, receives the title of Caesar. **Caracalla, son of Septimius Severus, is given the title of Augustus. China *Winter – Battle of Xiapi: The allied armies led by Cao Cao and Liu Bei defeat Lü Bu; afterward Cao Cao has him executed. By topic Religion * Marcus I succeeds Olympianus as Patriarch of Constantinople (until 211). Births * Lu Kai (or Jingfeng), Chinese official and general (d. 269) * Quan Cong, Chinese general and advisor (d. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sears
Sears, Roebuck and Co. ( ), commonly known as Sears, is an American chain of department stores founded in 1892 by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck and reincorporated in 1906 by Richard Sears and Julius Rosenwald, with what began as a mail ordering catalog company migrating to opening retail locations in 1925, the first in Chicago. In 2005, the company was bought by the management of the American big box discount chain Kmart, which upon completion of the merger, formed Sears Holdings. Through the 1980s, Sears was the largest retailer in the United States. In 2018, it was the 31st-largest. After several years of declining sales, Sears's parent company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on October 15, 2018. It announced on January 16, 2019, that it had won its bankruptcy auction, and that a reduced number of 425 stores would remain open, including 223 Sears stores. Sears was based in the Sears Tower in Chicago from 1973 until 1995, and is currently headquartered in Hof ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Front Line (video Game)
is a military-themed run-and-gun shooter game released by Taito for arcades in Nov. 1982. It was one of the first overhead run-and-gun shooters, a precursor to many similarly-themed games of the mid-to-late 1980s. The original arcade version of ''Front Line'' is controlled with a joystick, a single button, and a rotary dial that can be pushed in like a button. The single button is used to throw grenades and to enter and exit tanks, while the rotary dial aims and fires the player's gun. The game was created by Tetsuya Sasaki. It was a commercial success in Japan, where it was the seventh highest-grossing arcade game of 1982. However, it received a mixed critical and commercial reception in Western markets, with praise for its originality but criticism for its difficulty. The game's overhead run-and-gun formula preceded Capcom's arcade hit ''Commando'' (1985) by several years. ''Front Line'' went on to inspire the SNK shooters ''TNK III'' (1985) and ''Ikari Warriors'' (1986), ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mouse Trap (video Game)
''Mouse Trap'' is a maze video game developed by Exidy and released in arcades in 1981. It is similar to '' Pac-Man'', with the main character replaced by a mouse, the dots with cheese, the ghosts with cats, and the energizers with bones. After collecting a bone, pressing a button turns the mouse into a dog for a brief period of time. Color-coded doors in the maze can be toggled by pressing a button of the same color. A hawk periodically flies across the maze, unrestricted by its walls. Coleco ported ''Mouse Trap'' to ColecoVision as a 1982 launch title, then later to the Intellivision and Atari 2600. Gameplay The player uses a four-position joystick to maneuver a mouse throughout a maze and eat pieces of cheese scattered along the paths. Six cats patrol the maze and chase the player, with two present at the outset and four more being released one at a time. The maze has three sets of color-coded doors, which the player can open or close by pressing the corresponding button ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carnival (video Game)
''Carnival'' is a fixed shooter developed by Gremlin and released by Sega in arcades in 1980. It was one of the first video games with a bonus round. ''Carnival'' was ported to the Atari 2600, ColecoVision, and Intellivision by Coleco. A licensed Atari 8-bit family version was published in 1982 by ANALOG Software, the commercial software label of '' ANALOG Computing'' magazine. In 1983, Acornsoft published ''Carnival'' for the BBC Micro. Gameplay The goal of the game is to shoot at targets while conserving a limited ammunition supply for as long as possible. There are buttons for firing and left/right movement. The cocktail version replaces the directional buttons with a two-way joystick. Three rows of targets scroll across the screen in alternating directions; these include rabbits, ducks, owls, and extra-bullet targets, with higher rows awarding more points. If a duck reaches the bottom row without being shot, it will come to life and begin flying down toward the pla ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Donkey Kong (video Game)
is a 1981 arcade video game developed and published by Nintendo. As Mario, the player runs and jumps on platforms and climbs ladders to ascend a construction site and rescue Pauline from the giant gorilla Donkey Kong. It is the first game in the '' Donkey Kong'' series as well as Mario's first appearance in a video game. ''Donkey Kong'' is the product of Nintendo's efforts to develop a hit to rival ''Pac-Man'' (1980) and break into the North American market. Hiroshi Yamauchi, Nintendo's president at the time, assigned the project to first-time video game designer Shigeru Miyamoto. Drawing from a wide range of inspirations including ''Popeye'', ''Beauty and the Beast'', and King Kong, Miyamoto developed the scenario and designed the game alongside chief engineer Gunpei Yokoi. They broke new ground by using graphics as a means of characterization, including cutscenes to advance the game's plot and integrating multiple stages into the gameplay. Although Nintendo's America ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Combat (video Game)
''Combat'' is a video game by Atari, Inc. for the Atari Video Computer System (later renamed the Atari 2600). It was one of the nine launch titles for the VCS in September 1977 and was included in the box with the system from its introduction until 1982. ''Combat'' is based on two earlier black-and-white coin-operated arcade video games produced by Atari: ''Tank'' (published under the Kee Games name) in 1974 and ''Jet Fighter'' in 1975. Combat was programmed by Joe Decuir and Larry Wagner. Earlier in 1977, Coleco had released the similarly titled '' Telstar Combat!'', an entry in its Telstar series of dedicated consoles. Unlike the Coleco game, ''Combat'' had color graphics and numerous gameplay variations. The 27 game modes featured a variety of different combat scenarios, including tanks, biplanes, and jet fighters. The tank games had options such as bouncing munitions ("Tank-Pong") and invisibility. The biplane and jet games also allowed for variation, such as multiple pl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pac-Man (Atari 2600)
''Pac-Man'' is a 1982 maze video game developed and published by Atari, Inc. under official license by Namco, and an adaptation of the 1980 hit arcade game of the same name. The player controls the title character, who attempts to consume all of the wafers while avoiding four ghosts that pursue him. Eating flashing wafers at the corners of the screen will cause the ghosts to turn temporarily blue and flee, allowing Pac-Man to eat them for bonus points. (Once eaten, a ghost was reduced to a mobile pair of eyes, which had to return to the center of the maze to be restored.) The game was programmed by Tod Frye, taking six months to complete. Anticipating high sales, Atari produced over 1 million copies for its launch and held a "National Pac-Man Day" on April 3, 1982, to help promote its release. It stands as the best-selling Atari 2600 game of all time, selling over copies, and was the all-time best-selling video game up until then. Despite its commercial success, ''Pac-Man'' w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Woodgrain
Wood grain is the longitudinal arrangement of wood fibers or the pattern resulting from such an arrangement. Definition and meanings R. Bruce Hoadley wrote that ''grain'' is a "confusingly versatile term" with numerous different uses, including the direction of the wood cells (e.g., ''straight grain'', ''spiral grain''), surface appearance or figure, growth-ring placement (e.g., ''vertical grain''), plane of the cut (e.g., ''end grain''), rate of growth (e.g., ''narrow grain''), and relative cell size (e.g., ''open grain'').Hoadley, R. Bruce. "Glossary." ''Understanding Wood: A Craftsman's Guide to Wood Technology''. Newtown, Conn.: Taunton, 1980. 265. Print. Physical aspects Perhaps the most important physical aspect of wood grain in woodworking is the grain direction or slope (e.g. against the grain). The two basic categories of grain are straight and cross grain. Straight grain runs parallel to the longitudinal axis of the piece. Cross grain deviates from the longitudinal ax ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Paddle (game Controller)
A paddle is a game controller with a round ''wheel'' and one or more ''fire buttons'', where the wheel is typically used to control movement of the player object along one axis of the video screen. A paddle controller rotates through a fixed arc (usually about 330 degrees); it has a stop at each end. Design The paddle wheel is usually mechanically coupled to a potentiometer, so as to generate an output voltage level varying with the wheel's angle relative to a fixed reference position. A paddle is thus an absolute position controller. That is, without any previous knowledge, the sensor can be read and the result directly indicates the position of the paddle knob. This is in contrast to a rotary encoder-based device or "spinner". Where employed Paddles first appeared in video arcade games with Atari Inc.'s ''Pong'' in 1972, while the first console to use paddles was Magnavox's Odyssey that same year. The Apple II shipped with paddles until 1980. The Atari 2600 used paddles for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
