oooooooo... Barracuda!!

Here's more we all played with... Tommy... plllluuuuzeee   do a 70's Classics series!!!

636556960693968833-matchbox-hot-wheels-02.webp

My Hot Wheels car would be this.

https://www.amazon.com/Hot-Wheels-Batman-Batmobile-Movie/dp/B0149NIX7A/ref=sr_1_36?dchild=1&keywords=batmobile+hot+wheels&qid=1600706286&sr=8-36

Whoops!  Snuck mine in there... lol  🤭

4 minutes ago, IMBerzerk said:

Here's more we all played with... Tommy... plllluuuuzeee   do a 70's Classics series!!!

 

 

636556960693968833-matchbox-hot-wheels-02.webp 112.8 kB · 0 downloads

My brother had a Gremlin.. Tan with a light blue interior. I don't remember it having 6 wheels.. Although his was an X, have to say, don't remember the V-16 engine either. I'm old.. But you would think I'd remember those little details. According to some people I'm the perfect demo for the Amico.

Tommy,

Do you remember a movie series called "Critters"?  It started in the 80's.  I don't think there's ever been a video game made for it.  It would be cool to have a Critters game exclusively on Amico.  If you can't get Zombies ate my Neighbors, what about Critters ate my Neighbors?  Lol.  You play as a bounty hunter from the movie and go around blasting the killer fur balls.  Of course the game needs to be non violent.  Perhaps put a cartoon spin on it or something. 

1 hour ago, woobman said:

My brother had a Gremlin.. Tan with a light blue interior. I don't remember it having 6 wheels.. Although his was an X, have to say, don't remember the V-16 engine either. I'm old.. But you would think I'd remember those little details. According to some people I'm the perfect demo for the Amico.

 

It might be fake..but I'd like to see the metallic paints in all the radical colors and red pin stripped wheels with Cragars rims.

A promising new game studio has been created, born from many of the developers behind Indivisible and Skullgirls:

https://www.futureclub.dev/

And they appear to be looking for development or publishing partners!

Maybe something for INTV to look into? Clayfighter 4, anyone?

3 hours ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

Here's mine!

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Hot-Wheels-RLC-55-Chevy-Bel-Air-Gasser-The-Flying-Tiger/254703998795?hash=item3b4d8a974b:g:6JcAAOSwT4JfSwTj

 

Damn... these special editions are expensive!!
 

Oddly enough, I was just working with Mattel last week and going through all of the Hot Wheels designs this weekend picking the ones that we'll be putting in the game.

Post your favorites from this link:

https://play.hotwheels.com/en-us/collection/index.html

 

Under MAKE, please sort by HW Original.  Those are all of the Hot Wheels original designs (i.e. not licensed car manufacturers, etc.)

 

There are some cool TRON inspired ones that will be making the cut!!
 

 

 

 

They've got some funny ones this year! Especially Total Disposal and Duck N'  Roll

That Mattel Dream Machine, though...Dang!!!

1 hour ago, woobman said:

My brother had a Gremlin.. Tan with a light blue interior. I don't remember it having 6 wheels.. Although his was an X, have to say, don't remember the V-16 engine either. I'm old.. But you would think I'd remember those little details. According to some people I'm the perfect demo for the Amico.

 

Can't leave out this one either... Lol

3 hours ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

 

Okay everyone... lets all share our favorite giraffe shots. 

 

Here are a few from my trip to South Africa a few years ago...

My wife with a curious giraffe

A nice silhouette shot of a mother and her calf...

A rather opportunistic shot of a giraffe framed by trees.

8 hours ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

Imagine having friends to play with.

Reminds me of poor ol kip

Heres my pick.

i believe hot wheels owns matchbox, so theres another lineup right there. But i suspect the hot wheels range will have it covered

9 hours ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

Holding a gun and shooting would probably be a very controversial thing for Amico.  Maybe if it was a squirt gun type of game with a squirt gun type of controller!

You can't really do "light guns" on modern TV's because of the lack of scan lines of CRT's.  Would need a special set up and technology, which is why you don't see many in the marketplace anymore.  Also (unfortunately) I think it would quickly become a political issue as well.

 

Not a light gun game 

..but demons ate my neighbors  you use squirt guns. 

So tommy with Microsoft's  big purchase . How about get Jay to have some talks with his old friends. Imagine bringing fallout to amico a top down action rpg where the amico controller becomes your pipboy

Growing up me and my younger brother had a favorite car its was the Hairy Hustler.

Funny story, a couple years back my brother a very successful bio medical engineer retired at 50, he had had it with the corp world and made a bunch of money so he left, now he has his own car business where he makes custom resto mods.  For his retirement party it was one of those deals, what do I get a guy who has everything he wants, well I thought back to this car and our childhood, so I found one on ebay, bought it for him since it was one of the things that likely led him to his lifetime love of cars and gave it to him at the party. He loved the gift. The car now sits proudly front and center in his office. 

18 hours ago, bigdaddygamestudio said:

Growing up me and my younger brother had a favorite car its was the Hairy Hustler.

 

 

 

Funny story, a couple years back my brother a very successful bio medical engineer retired at 50, he had had it with the corp world and made a bunch of money so he left, now he has his own car business where he makes custom resto mods.  For his retirement party it was one of those deals, what do I get a guy who has everything he wants, well I thought back to this car and our childhood, so I found one on ebay, bought it for him since it was one of the things that likely led him to his lifetime love of cars and gave it to him at the party. He loved the gift. The car now sits proudly front and center in his office. 

I had that car. Kept the box.. I completely forgot about it until I saw the pic above. I can actually feel it in my hand as I type this. The grooves on the plastic intake. I think I may still have it in a case stashed away someplace. I may have to try and locate. 

Tommy's 09/21/2020 interview on Wave Radio, Boston MA - Interview start 1:13:00

https://www.hulkshare.com/appetitefordiscussion/bottoms-up-afd-09-21-2020-1

The gaming world seems more chaotic to me now, more than ever. Huge companies like Sony and Microsoft can't seem to get pre-orders for game consoles to go smoothly, even with the help of giant retailers like Walmart and Amazon (and sometimes, at the detriment of their help). I will say, I pre-ordered two Amicos with zero problems at all. I could in fact pre-order another one right now without issue... maybe I should... no, two is enough for now. Yes, I'm sure volume is the big differentiator here, but I will say that my experience with Intellivision has been a wonderful experience compared to what some are going through trying to get a new PS5.

I'm also a bit surprised that so many people are rushing to order Xbox Series X or PS5 when they still don't know very much about them. Nobody, outside of their respective companies, has seen them. Or played them. Aside from the highly polished videos of their games, what do those games actually look like? What does the UI look like? Contrast that to Amico where Tommy shows off the system, the controller, and the ideas behind the console every chance he gets. We've even had a demo of one of the games that we've been able to play on our phones for months now. I may have not played an Amico yet, but I'm so intimately familiar with so much of the console, that it feels like I have. I feel confident when I put my money down on one to purchase it.

But the problem is bigger than that. Maybe I'm just getting old, or maybe @RetroAdvisoryBoard's video had an impact on me, but these gigantic games coming out really do seem like they're bringing the entire industry down. Not just that, but this push to make games as a service with offerings such as Xbox Game Pass or PS Now are not only diminishing the value of games, but changing the fundamental way we view, purchase, and consume these products. Games are no longer the treasured gift they once were, but a disposable commodity that gets but a moment's notice before being discarded. Netflix was once a great value when it was the only streaming service in town, but then came Hulu, Amazon, Disney+, CBS, NBC, HBO... and so on. How long until there are a dozen gaming services all asking for a monthly payment of $9.99 to give you access to 500 games that you will never play??

Again, maybe it's my experience talking, but I really like the way Intellivision is going. You buy a game, you own the game. And the game you bought is the full game. No DLC, no extra content to buy, no microtransactions. It's focusing on quality over quantity. Yes, you can have 1000 games in your store, but if 80% of them are crap, what's the point?  I recently had to go through a number of games on my PS4 to delete some, and as I played a bunch I had downloaded but never touched, I was amazed at how much garbage there was out there. Even big AAA games were not worth playing. I really look forward to console that offers focused content that doesn't take me 40 hours of my life to experience, while constantly bombarding with the feeling that I need to download the next offering I got from a subscription. 

I'm worried about the way video games are headed, and I really hope Amico is everything it says it will be.

1 hour ago, vongruetz said:

I'm also a bit surprised that so many people are rushing to order Xbox Series X or PS5 when they still don't know very much about them.

I dont think its actual people anymore, I think its reseller bots.  Sort of like what ticket agencies and scalpers have done for decades, they get up front in line and buy up all the tickets, now they are doing it with electronics. They then try to flip them during the holiday season on places like ebay.  

1 hour ago, vongruetz said:

Games are no longer the treasured gift they once were, but a disposable commodity that gets but a moment's notice before being discarded.

the issue with games IMHO is the same issue Hollywood has, following the tried and true and ( boring as hell) formula still proves to make money, so thats ALL they do. Most games are so formulaic that I simply cant play them. I can see right through them and see right into the design. Knowing how the sausage is made, it takes something new to personally really grab me. I need a new twist or really awesome art design.  It just sad that its seems so much easier to greenlight Boredom part 5 than a new daring IP.  So anyway it does allow a small window for indies but the market is so saturated with games, its hard to find anything. Its a tough out there.

3 hours ago, vongruetz said:

I'm also a bit surprised that so many people are rushing to order Xbox Series X or PS5 when they still don't know very much about them.

1 hour ago, bigdaddygamestudio said:

I dont think its actual people anymore, I think its reseller bots.  Sort of like what ticket agencies and scalpers have done for decades, they get up front in line and buy up all the tickets, now they are doing it with electronics. They then try to flip them during the holiday season on places like ebay.  

It could also be that after all these years, people trust Sony and MS to put out a quality product, even if it takes a few mega software updates to get there.

For hard-core gamers, there’s probably a bit of peer-pressure, too. You don’t want your friends having all the fun while you wait a couple of months to make sure everything is “just so” with either console. Even worse if the console comes out to great reviews and you’re in the back of some waitlist to get yours.

(But I’m not ruling out the “bots” idea, either, which had really turned me off to going to concerts.)

1 hour ago, Jake67 said:

(But I’m not ruling out the “bots” idea, either,

The entire Nvidia RTX 3080 sellout last week in record time was all due to bots.  Funny thing is now ebayers are hitting back with buying bots..  what a world.. 

https://gizmodo.com/the-nvidia-rtx-3080-ebay-debacle-exposed-a-scalper-bot-1845133050

I don’t know, but I’m thinking I’m in the minority here when it comes to graphics.  I’ve stated before I’m a PC gamer.  I went from my original 2600 heavy sixer to a PC and never looked back to consoles.  I do own a PS3 mainly because I wanted a Blu-Ray player for the bedroom and the fact that I could play games on it was a plus (and I got it with American Express points!).  I only bought PS originals for it, if it was available on PC I would by it for the PC.  To me graphics AND game play make for a great game.  
 

The latest PC I built a year and half ago I’ve never spent as much on a graphics card as I did on this build.  I was actually shocked at the price of the RTX cards (I’m a NVIDIA guy).  I usually go with middle of the road cards because the difference in price for the higher end card just to get a few more FPS doesn’t make that much sense to me.  Even at the mid-level a RTX 2070 was still $600.  Anyway, to me that was worth it to be able to play games in high graphics fidelity.  I won’t be upgrading for at least five years.  I want total immersion when I play games and the better the graphics, the better the game to me.  Simulators, flight sims in particular are some of my favorite to play,  in that category of games the higher fidelity of the graphics the better the immersion.  The newest MS Flight Simulator is just mind blowing.  I’m waiting to make the jump into VR for the ultimate in immersion.  Once 4K and wireless headsets come down in price some I will more than likely make that jump.
 

Now that all being said I have two VIP Amicos on order.  We have a Wii which we would have fun playing together as a family which I’m hoping the Amico will bring that back.  Playing bowling with my wife (who would kick everyone’s ass!), playing Guitar Hero with the kids each playing an instrument and jamming to songs I grew up with, or watching the kids play Just Dance with their friends during sleep overs was a magical time.  The kids are now in their mid twenties (three girls, one still heavy into gaming on the Switch, one casual Switch player, and one pretty much mobile games on her phone) but I’m hoping when they come over they will join in when they see me (and hopefully my wife) playing some games on the Amico.  

On 9/21/2020 at 8:46 AM, Intellivision Master said:

 

I watched the entire video, it was great and really touches on what makes a game “fun” and why Amico is looking at this in the right direction.  Let’s be clear, the avg Joe Schmo would not accept graphics like Atari Football anymore; only someone with our love for retro games will REALLY appreciate what we see in this video.  But as I re-discovered when I played Pitfall on the Colecovision last year, if you can allow yourself to let the devs take you away and experience the intent they were going for, there is still a LOT of fun to be found in these low bits games, even with the “poor to mediocre” graphics.  It’s a little harder to do that with single player games, but last year when I was playing Pitfall in a high score competition (right here on AtariAge), I was motivated to continue and continue I did. I must have put in 6 hours at least just replaying it, trying to get 100K or finishing the game.  So the competitive aspect of the high score comp CARRIED me through the initial “meh” and right into the old “one more try” which many of these classics had, and still do if you let them.

Nowadays, like back in the day (and seen in this video), the secret Sauce is the alternate to the competitiveness of the single player high score chaser and that lies in the multiplayer mode.  Once you start playing, if the gameplay is fun, whatever graphics you are looking at ends up melting away, leaving just the core design of the game exposed ... and if done well, the players are having a ball.  The core design doesn’t have to be complex, you can’t get more basic than tennis and that is still a killer multiplayer game when done right.  It’s not only the competitive nature, it’s not just about beating the other guy, it’s the social aspect of gaming elevated to what it really means to spend time with someone, to laugh together, the ribbing of each other, etc.  You can’t tell me anyone looking at that video that they wouldn’t have liked to spend an evening with a friend long past or current, just playing that little football game for an hour or so and moving onto something else and continuing to play together.

Does it hurt to have excellent graphics?  Of course not, Virtual Tennis on the dreamcast looks splendid to this day and that’s definitely a game that can be done on Amico hardware (it’s certainly one game that would be perfect for Sega to bring over hint hint Tommy! ). It’s also a game that proves you don’t need PS5/XBSX level graphics to make a game appeal to the masses, it’s all in the art style (something I think the small vids seen of Night Stalker and Cloudy Mountain already prove that in the right hands, we have nothing to worry about)

This is what Amico gets right.  With the right game idea, and of course the right talent behind that idea, couch coop/vs is a great unique focus to have on ALL your games. You can definitely experience some of this fun playing online, but its just more likely to happen sitting on the same couch.  You can give a guy a verbal shot online but it won’t have same effect if when doing so, you also have your hand on his shoulder pushing him away at the same time. Every game, EVERY GAME will support this focus.  This is Intellivision Entertainment’s lane and there is no one else in it that can say that about every one of their titles.

I used to manage a hockey league on the old operationsports.com website and we had a ball playing online hockey on the xbox 360 (may have been EA’s NHL 12, can’t remember but been a while!), some classic overtime Playoff games in that league.  But there’s nothing like couch coop/vs for that integral Interaction that isn’t possible online. Although the online experience is fun, there is a missing socializing experience that just isn’t there like there is with couch coop.  

As an experiment, I invite you guys to look at that video one more time, but now, put those two in separate rooms with a headset and think about them playing the same game.  It would not have been the same experience, there’s a physicality from their interaction that wouldn’t be there online.  It’s the same thing with playing board games or any game standing beside someone else, there’s a... scale to the experience that is very unique to live gaming *

* side note: I find VR can trespass here but that’s the subject for another day ) 

Sadly when I get Amico, with most of my friends living far away, that’s likely not something I will be able to experience enough (and one reason why I do hope we eventually get an online mode, online better than nothing  ), so for me the draw is still the retro-inspired games as I gather is what most here on AA find attractive about the system.  As a target audience, Tommy and his team have rightly targeted couch coop/vs as the focal point of their mission statement and to me, this has the potential to result in one heck of a touchdown, dance not included.