Stella cartography: Solaris / Tax Avoiders / Cubicolor | NES Works Gaiden 76
780Word of warning: This episode has a LOT of strobing / flashing effects. Please address all complaints to Doug Neubauer.
Anyway—the cool thing about this approach to covering only the NES era of Atari 2600 releases is that it means I got to skip over all the stuff like edutainment games and the third-party slop that killed the U.S. console biz for a few year and just jump directly to mmmmmaybe the finest original creation ever programmed for the console? I am, of course, referring to Solaris here. Not Tax Avoiders. I guess I didn't get to skip ALL the third-party slop.
Also of note is Cubicolor. What makes an Atari 2600 an "official" release when no central authority existed to authorize or license games? It's not like the NES with the seal of approval. Does Cubicolor count as an official release since it was sold in plastic baggies direct from the programmer and never made available in stores? These are the dumb, annoying technicalities that we gotta deal with in this world of old video games.
You can learn more about the Intellivision's history during the 2600 days by preordering The NES Era Vol. III: NES and the Peak of 8-Bit, a comprehensive photographic atlas of every console game released for NES and its competitors—including the Intellivision—at the height of their power, from January 1988 through the advent of 16-bit systems in August 1989. Take a deep dive into the prehistory of NES with this limited-edition oversized (12x12"!) photo book: https://limitedrungames.com/products/the-nes-era-vol-3-hardcover
Production notes:
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Atari 2600 footage captured in RGB from Analogue Nt Mini. Video upscaled to 4K with RetroTink 4X.