Acquisition Log: Tycoon Game Tycoon

Posted on June 28, 2011 by Multimedia Mike

The genre of “Tycoon” simulation games is ridiculously vast. Here are some of my acquisitions from the previous year in this field:

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So we have:

Fairy Godmother Tycoon (I actually remember seeing this when it was first released in 2007 and keeping my eye on it, knowing that I would collect it some day)
Prison Tycoon 4: Supermax (first 3 games in the series are already in MobyGames)
Deep Sea Tycoon: Diver’s Paradise (already in MobyGames)
Mall of America Tycoon (apparently a “special edition” of the overarching Mall Tycoon series, the first 3 of which are already in the database)
TV Tycoon (I just realized this is already in the database as TV Manager)
Tycoon Collection (shovelware collection not documented in database yet, though some of the constituent games are):

Moon Tycoon (in database)
Marine Life Tycoon
Ocean Explorer Tycoon
Coffee Tycoon (in database)

I actually look forward to these playing these games sometime since I had such a good time during my all-too-brief time allotted to Skateboard Park Tycoon.

Acquisition Log: 2011-06-18

Posted on June 18, 2011 by Multimedia Mike

A thrift store haul

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Frog Frenzy 2 (with Frog Frenzy 1 on the same disc), from Cosmi
Sammy’s Science House, from Edmark
Carmen Sandiego’s ThinkQuick Challenge, from The Learning Company
Intel Video Phone Software (multimedia software that will be useful on my other blog)

Recent Auction Acquisitions

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Grandia II (Dreamcast), from Ubisoft
Championship Snow Boarding 2004, from Activision
Cabbage Patch Kids: Where’s My Pony, from D3Publisher
NHL ’99 (PC), from EA Sports

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Rune, apparently published through Global Star Software as part of a CD-ROM shovelware set, perhaps titled Pack 5; this is presumably disc 3 of a multi-disc set and encompasses action games
KAR Racing, from Cosmi
Nascar 2000, from EA Sports

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I thought that this would be “Fantasy Pack 6”, as in, there were 5 other packs before this one. Some Googling reveals that the proper title for the set is “Fantasy 6 Pack”, which means that my set is incomplete since I only got 4 unique games. But deeper searching and squinting at the box image available on Amazon reveals that I do, in fact, have a complete set since one of the games actually counts as 3:

Disciples II (2 discs) — this is the one that counts as 3 games since this includes Dark Prophecy, Servants of the Dark, and Guardians of the Light
Prince of Qin (3 discs)
Robin Hood: The Legend of Sherwood
Dragon Throne: Battle of Red Cliffs

The MAME Fix

Posted on June 15, 2011 by Multimedia Mike

Every few years I find myself coming back to MAME. For the uninitiated (or just forgetful), MAME is the Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator, a remarkable piece of software that emulates considerably more arcade games than you even knew existed.

Unfortunately, my experience always goes like this:

Download and build MAME (I’m often on Linux and building from source works best for me); this step usually works pretty smoothly, if a bit slowly as the MAME code base consists of many thousands of files
Find some ROM images I downloaded years ago
Re-familiarize myself with the documentation; the trade-off you make with such a marvelously super-flexible program is that the setup can be painful
Finally figure out how to launch the emulator with a particular ROM
Find that the ROM package is corrupted and MAME can’t run it (no quality control with underground contraband, I tell ya)
If it does work, then read some more documentation until I can make a gamepad work and achieve the optimal graphics and audio settings

Then I can finally enjoy a classic arcade game or 2… until I remember the final insult:

Pure arcade games are not terribly engaging when played by yourself in free-play mode. When playing any arcade game in free-play mode, it becomes painfully obvious in short order that — for the vast majority of such games — the only challenge is to keep your character alive and the only motivation for doing so is to not have to feed more currency into the machine in order to keep playing. When you’re effectively on free-play, getting through an arcade game just feels like a rote chore. Conventional emulators don’t suffer from this same issue since, generally, one emulator only emulates one system while MAME emulates thousands. Further, other emulators tend to emulate systems that are built around gameplay principles other than pure token-eating.

Still, I have come back every so often and get that MAME fix.

Gaming Pathology

Piles Of Games, Copious Free Time, No Standards

Month: June 2011

Acquisition Log: Tycoon Game Tycoon

Acquisition Log: 2011-06-18

The MAME Fix