Retro Game Guy

The 7800 was released in 1986…over 25 years ago! Atari released about fifty games for the 7800 and there were also several 3^rd party releases.  One of the things that has amazed me is that it is still possible to buy brand new games for the 7800.  Atari sold about four million 7800 systems and they must have also made millions of games.  Many of these can be had, inexpensively, still shrink wrapped, as they just came from the factory.  In fact, I paid no more than $15 each for my first few games, but some were as inexpensive as $5.  I was also able to pick up some used games on ebay.  I have learned to buy games in lots of six or more; large lots often go for as little as $1-2 per cartridge.  Of course, at that price, you are just getting cart without the box or manual.

Games like Alien Brigade, Commando, Ikari Warriors, and Midnight Mutants were released toward the end of the 7800’s life cycle and were manufactured in smaller quantities.  These command higher prices all the way up to $100 for a shrink wrapped copy.  While collectors may want to have complete games with boxes and manuals, all you need to have fun is the cart itself.  There are several sites where you can find the manuals for the games, so it is easy to build up a good collection of 7800 games without spending a lot of $$$.

Also, don’t forget that the 7800 plays almost all of the 2600 games. Loose 2600 carts often sell for less than $1 and there were some great games made for the 2600!  Games like Demon Attack, Missile Command, Pitfall, and Warlords play great on the 7800 and are as much fun now as they were 30 years ago!

A few days after I ordered my 7800, I received a notice from my post office that a package had arrived for me.  I managed to get there just before they closed and picked up my 7800. I had ordered one with an AV mod.  Originally, these came with RF modulators that you could set to either channel 3 or 4.  A better solution for today’s TV’s is to have the system modified to do either S-video or composite output; mine was modified for composite output.  Even with an AV mod, these are not the greatest with modern HD TV’s as they have many less lines of resolution.  Fortunately, I still had a non HD LCD TV to use with my 7800.

With my 7800, was the four or five games that I had ordered with it.  After hooking up the 7800 to my TV, I put in Donkey Kong and was amazed.  Sound is a weak point on the 7800 (I will explain why in the future), but the graphics are amazing (for a machine designed in the mid eighties).  In fact, one of the strong points of the 7800 is that it was designed to bring the arcade experience home.  There are some amazing ports of arcade classics such as Centipede, Donkey Kong, Galaga, Joust, and Ms. Pac-man.  The experience was all that I hoped for…all you need to do is put a cartridge in and start playing.  Even for the games where you need the manual, they usually only take a few minutes to read.  The 7800 definitely looked like it was a good choice and more great games were still in the mail!