On Wednesday 11 December 2002 19:52, Glenn Saunders wrote:
> By making sure the original ROMs are the only ones downloadable that are
> already playable, it's up to the user on the client side to apply the
> patch, therefore not cluttering up the net with derivative ROM images (no
> matter how good they may be, mind you).
How would you enforce this? Sure the standard sites everyone goes to first
("Hey, do you remember that game where you're a square and you kill ducks
with an arrow? I think this site might have a copy!"...) would go in on it,
but the last time I got a 'complete' set of 2600 roms, a couple of years ago,
it was from Usenet. It was a flood from someone who had used Good2600 so
every file was marked as to whether it was a commercial release, a hack, or
whatever.
> There is the original "canon" of commercial releases for the 2600 and there
> is everything that has happened since then. It's important that we
> separate the two, plus protos which I guess are a 3rd category.
In which category would you put, say, Coke Wins? It's a legitimate game from
the 2600's prime that is a hack of Space Invaders but has somewhat different
gameplay. You could argue it belongs in any of the above 3 categories - the
first because it was legally licensed and appeared at the right time, the
second because it's a hack after all, and the third because it was never
commercially released.
What about all the South American and Asian releases of various US-originated
games? Often they have minor hacks in them and/or are PAL conversions. Yet
they were released in the 80's legitimately in cartridge form. Category one
or two?
What about games like Oystron and Thrust; should they really be lumped into
the "everything that has happened since then" categories with all the random
Space Invaders sprite hacks?
These are really rhetorical questions meant to illuminate some of the flaws in
adding another layer of classifications. Maybe it should be a 'best
practice' (whatever that term actually means) for sites offering 2600 games
to simply run 'em through Good2600 so they can categorize them easily and
appropriately?
Rob
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