The trip had been in the planning stages for months, and it finally happened
on June 14th 2007: My friend Tommy and I travelled south of the border (the
Canadian border, that is) to go meet Eduardo in person! But not before making
an important stop along the way...
RAIN ON A SUNNY DAY
The detour took us to FunSpot, in New
Hampshire, home of the biggest classic arcade in the world! We were planning
to spend several hours there, plucking an insane amount of quarters into
close to 200 classic arcade machines, but once we actually found the place,
all we found were closed doors! We had arrived at FunSpot right in the middle
of what the locals call "Biker Week", a yearly shindig that welcomes
motocyclists from all over the country. FunSpot's parking was reserved for
motorcycles (no cars allowed!), and there were a number of outdoor kiosks
demonstrating and selling all kinds of motorcycle-related stuff. The place
was packed with motorcycles of all shapes and colors, but the main FunSpot
building was locked up for the duration of the event. Needless to say, Tommy
and myself were pretty disappointed. We travelled to the motel at which we
had made reservations in advance (which was a good thing, because every motel
in the area was booked solid because of Biker Week), where Tommy slept for
the remainder of the afternoon while I read some of Tommy's japanese mangas.
We had diner at a local restaurant and we occupied ourselves in the evening
as best we could. Thank God Tommy had brought his PSP... So let that be a
lesson to you: If you're planning to visit FunSpot to play in the arcade,
make sure to avoid Biker Week in mid-June!
EDUARDO!
The next day, we drove further down south to Massachusetts, where we arrived
at Eduardo's place just before lunch. Both Eduardo and I were eager to share
ColecoVision-related stuff, which we did for most of the day. I showed Eduardo
my collection of rare ColecoVision promotional flyers and my Questar joystick,
while he showed me the prototype of the Opgrade Module, which was bigger than
I expected. This prototype only had 16K of RAM installed, which was enough to
allow us to try some of the upcoming Opcode Games releases, namely Goonies,
King's Valley, and Knightmare. We also got to play some rare ColecoVision
carts I had brought with me, namely Penguin Land, Lode Runner and Kevtris.
The Opgrade Module prototype
Eduardo also showed me his "one-chip" MSX computer, which we used to play
some nice games, including Gopher (which is part of the Gradius series),
Comic Bakery, Maze of Galious, Dragon Slayer 4, Metal Gear 2, Penguin
Adventure, Space Manbow, and a few others. To say we had a full day would
be the understatement of the century! And to think that a lot of those MSX
games could be ported relatively easely to the ColecoVision with the help of
the Opgrade Module and the MegaCart... Sadly, there's only one Eduardo, and
porting all of these games would take forever for a single programmer.
Later that same day, we were introduced to Eduardo's lovely wife Biatriz, who
came home from her english courses later in the after-noon. She whipped up
an excellent diner while the rest of us continued to have fun in the living
room. During diner (and throughout the rest of our visit), Bia got the chance
to practice her english, which is still a little rough, but I'm sure it will
improve over time. If I go see Eduardo again next year, I'll be looking
forward to seing how much Bia's english will have improved.
Eduardo and Bia
My time with Eduardo wasn't all fun and games though. We also pursued some
serious discussions about all our current Opcode Games projects, and there
are certain facts we came to agree upon (You can read all about it in the
"Latest News" section below). My friend Tommy isn't a big ColecoVision fan,
but he had fun with the MSX games, and he kept himself occupied with
Eduardo's Wii, playing Elebits and Brain Age Academy. Tommy understood that
Eduardo and I had a lot of ground to cover, so I'm grateful for his patience
during these busy days.
VISIT TO BOSTON
The next day (Saturday) was spent visiting Boston. We arrived there at around
11:30 AM, and the first place we visited was Quincy Market, which is packed
with all sorts of restaurants. The weather was beautiful that day, so there
were a lot of people walking around the market's central alley, and it was
so noisy we could hardly hear ourselves think!
Boston's Quincy Market
Later we visited the Old State House, a museum where we learned of such
historically significant events as the Boston Massacre and the Boston Tea
Party. The red line in the sidewalks helps tourists cover all of Boston's
historical landmarks easely, and serves to proove that Boston truly played
a pivotal role in American history.
One thing that I find interesting about Boston is how well the old coexists
with the new, especially in the downtown area. Old buildings stand seamlessly
next to the newer ones and it doesn't look as weird as one might imagine,
although the newer buildings are evidently legion compared to the few
preserved historical buildings.
One thing that DID feel very weird for me was Boston's subway system. Before
then, the only subway I had even known was the Montreal metro, and Boston's
subway is different in so many ways... I will always remember the smell in
the underground tunnels, like burned oil or something like that, which is
probably not exactly healthy for one's lungs. That didn't stop us for riding
the subway (they call it "the 'T'") and visiting several stations on the blue
and orange lines. Also, if you want to see some amphibian tour buses, Boston
is the place to go! Overall, we didn't get to see all that much, because we
wanted to get back to Eduardo's place in time for diner, but we enjoyed our
visit to Boston nonetheless.
SATURDAY NIGHT AND BEYOND
After eating some pizza for diner, we promptly got back into ColecoVision
stuff: Eduardo showed me how to solder EPROMs (and other components) to a
ColecoVision cartridge PCB. It's simple to do, but it requires some practice
to do it right. This was followed by a session of questions and answers
about ColecoVision game programming (sprite priority and flicker management,
among other things). We also tried the ColecoVision Super Sketch which I had
brought with me, which kept us interested for hardly more than 15 minutes,
mostly because the drawing interface was clunky and there was no way to save
any work done on the screen. We discussed the finer points of the Opgrade
Module design for the remainder of the evening, and then we all went to bed.
Tommy and I left the next morning, and the trip back home was uneventful.
Eduardo and Luc
So will I go back to visit Eduardo next year? or will Eduardo and Bia come to
visit us in Montreal? Time will tell, but this was certainly not the last
Eduardo and I will see of each other. For now, Tommy and I can only thank
Eduardo and his wife Bia for their excellent hospitality.
Below, you will find a text written by my friend Tommy. It's essentially the
story of the trip from his point of view.
TOMMY'S BLOG CONTRIBUTION
Hi guys!
You might not know me, but I'm Tommy AKA Mega Boy, one of Luc's close
friends for many years. You might have stumbled upon the maps I did for the
MegaMan Battle Network series or some other guides I did for other Mega Man
games (which you can find at GameFAQs, shameless plug). I also had a webpage
called "The Mega Man Data Base" a long time ago. Anyway, Luc is going to
become my roomate soon. (Yes, two guys over thirty living together, but
don't get any ideas). Anyway, we went to see Eduardo together, since Luc
doesn't have a car and it was an excuse to see Boston on the way. :)
First, let me just say I'm not a ColecoVision, Atari or MSX fan. I've played
the games when I was young, but I was not enough into it to understand the
beauty of it. I really started playing videogames with the NES and more
or less concentrated on one series (guess which one, some subtle hints are
spread throughout this text).
So we departed together for the big trip, listening to Mega Man remixes for
about six hours. Talk about dedication to video games! We planned a detour
at FunSpot in New Hampshire, so Luc could go wild on those old arcade
machines. However, when we got there, it was closed due to a motocyclist
convention on the site. That would explain the gazillion bikes we saw on the
way. Luc was not amused! He didn't get his share of amusement he planned to,
so I lent him my PSP at the hotel, so he could play Mega Man Powered-Up. Not
as old as ColecoVision, but a nice trip to the past.
At long last, we got to Eduardo's place. I was a little anxious: I didn't
know the guy at all and he didn't know me. Luc was the link between us. But
my fears melted away real fast, Eduardo is a really nice person and fine host
(his wife too!). Of course, as soon as we got there, Luc and Eduardo started
to talk about their projects and started comparing their stuff (Hey, what are
you thinking about!?)
At first, I didn't care much about what they were discussing: too much
techno-babble (although, I love Star Trek!). But the more they were talking
about it, the more I understood why it drove them. As a former programmer
myself and video games player, I could see the motivation: it's the
challenge and the fond memories of childhood play. "What if they could have
done this in our time?, What if we could cram that game into that tiny 32K
chip?" and the like...
I had the chance to play a little of the games they were planning to work
on. I suck at many video games, but I'm the kind of guy who thinks that the
more important thing is the fun and innovation factors and not elaborate
graphics and sounds they put so much now in the games today. That's why I
think the Wii shows much promise!
We had a break of the projects for half a day and had a chance to see
Boston. I must say it reminded Luc and me of Montreal (that's where we live
by the way), a blend of old and new close to each other. Too bad we didn't
have a chance to visit it more and didn't prepare better, but we were here
for other reasons. Nice city though!
Finally, Eduardo and Luc had the time to talk about everything they planned
to talk about and we got back, listening to six hours of one of our favorite
french humorist, François Pérusse. It was a good relief after three days of
exclusive english.
I hope I will be able to help Eduardo and Luc in some way in the near future,
whatever tiny contribution it could be, just to see that twinkle in Luc's
eyes again! ^_^
Thanks again for your hospitality, Eduardo and Bia!
Tommy, with Eduardo and Bia
LATEST NEWS
As stated in the above texts, Eduardo and I had some lengthy discussions
about our current Opcode Games projects. Outlined below are the main points
we discussed.
First of all, Eduardo was forced to admit that the completion of Pac-Man
Collection's software is getting behind schedule, as it is proving to be
quite a challenge for him to cram the different Pac-Man games into the
MegaCart. It's not so much a question of ROM space (which the MegaCart has
plenty of) but rather a question of code structure, because each game has
to fit within 32K, with bankswitching applied whenever necessary. It's all
very complicated (especially where Ms. Pac-Man is concerned), and while
Eduardo is always up for a good programming challenge, Pac-Man Collection is
really testing his resolve. By comparison, Konami Sports Collection, which
will also use the MegaCart, will be MUCH easier to do software-wise.
Suffice it to say Pac-Man Collection probably won't be ready for our
mid-August target release date (the revised release date is up in the air
right now), so we decided to put Pac-Man Collection aside for a while, and
concentrate on finishing Road Fighter, which only requires a couple of weeks
of work to complete. This means Road Fighter's software should normally be
ready by the end of June, but we'll see how that goes. Even if the software
gets done on schedule, the manual and box art are nowhere near ready, so it's
not like we'll be releasing Road Fighter in July or anything.
A couple of weeks before the trip, Eduardo had an idea about a better
hardware configuration for the Opgrade Module, and we discussed it some more
during my visit. Overall, the design will stay the same, except for one major
difference: We will be using an FPGA solution to implement a custom video
chip and custom sound output interface. You can read more about it by
visiting the updated Opgrade Module section,
but in a nutshell, this will allow us to address two main issues, namely
general microchip availability and video chip limitations.
The previous design of the Opgrade Module used an array of microchips that
are relatively easy to find today, but if the supply of any of these chips
ran out, we would be unable to build more Opgrade Modules to satisfy the
demand. The custom FPGA solution allows us to regroup a certain number
of these microchips into a single chip, which helps to reduce manufacturing
costs, and the beauty of it is that if the FGPA chip we decide to use
becomes unavailable in the future, we can simply use a more recent FPGA
model, which involves a simple revision of the Opgrade Module's PCB. This is
much preferable to just keeping our fingers crossed about future microchip
availability.
Eduardo was never happy about using the V9958 video chip for the Opgrade
Module. It's not really game-oriented, and the additional video modes offered
by the V9958 are only mildly interesting from a game developer's point of
view. The FPGA solution will allow us to design our own video
chip with the features we really want (again, I invite you to
review the updated Opgrade Module section
for all the juicy details) while still retaining backward compatibility with
all existing ColecoVision games.
This new Opgrade Module design is very promissing, but it comes at a price:
The previous design only required the purchase and assembly of existing
parts, while the new design will require a significant amount of research
and development, mostly for programming the FPGA chip and designing the
custom PCB. Eduardo did some preliminary research and determined what can
and cannot be done with the FPGA solution, but there are still several
unknowns to address, and all of this R&D will likely require months of
hard work. So assuming we eventually release Road Fighter, Pac-Man Collection
and Konami Sports Collection as planned, does this mean Opcode Games will not
release any new games afterwards while the Opgrade Module is being worked on?
And what about the games designed to work with the Opgrade Module, like
Castlevania Redux? When will those games be released?
Our answer to those questions can be found in the form of a new item in the
sidebar of this site, namely the Memory Pack.
The Memory Pack is an old project, but we decided to revive it because it
will give us the opportunity to release several ColecoVision games in 2008.
In effect, some of our upcoming games such as "The Goonies", "Yie Ar Kung-Fu
II", "Zanac", "King's Valley" and "Knightmare" only require extra RAM to
function properly, which is exactly what the Memory Pack is designed to
offer. The electronics of the Memory Pack are extremely basic, but our
current problem is the plastic casing. A custom casing of specific dimensions
is required, but making a durable mold for such a casing is quite expensive,
so at this point we're trying/hoping to find a solution, and we welcome any
useful suggestions.
If we can make the Memory Pack a reality, Eduardo could spend the first
couple of months of 2008 on finishing the software for "Goonies", "Zanac" and
a couple of other games, and while the manual and box art is being worked on
for those games, Eduardo will have all the time he needs during the rest of
2008 to work on the Opgrade Module and at least one launch game to go with it.
So with the Memory Pack, everyone wins! Well, everyone except me, that is,
because if we go ahead with this 2008 release plan, I will have to give up
on my own plans to release "Bank Panic" and "Pitfall II Arcade" under my own
publishing label. But given the circumstances, I don't really mind. :-)
One last footnote, just in case you're wondering: We want to release a new
batch of Space Invader Collection carts within the next year, but we're
not sure exactly when (or even if) we're going to do it. Sorry we can't offer
more precise news about that, but we're already busy enough as it is with
Road Fighter and Pac-Man Collection.
Phew! What a long blog entry that was! See you all next month!
