is that really a full sized cabinet? Size is at a premium in Japan, where would someone put that? Are you going to need your own tv to put in it? It's hard enough finding a place to put an X-Box... idunno, I'm confused about this.
It doesn't say how much it costs, either. Also, I wonder if the cabinet has the coloured overlay on it.
I've noticed Nintendo has been going retro here in the states and in Japan... check out the Japanese shirts: http://www.nesretro.com/shite/famicomshirts.html I've even seen Shigeru Miyamoto wearing the Donkey Kong shirt. In the states, you might find the retro shirts licensed by Nintendo in a Hot Topic. I really liked the one they did of just a plain screenshot of Donkey Kong... I shoulda got it while I had the chance (I own a DK machine, would've been a nice tribute =P). I'm sure alot of ppl have "issues" with the whole goth store, but it's the only local place to pick up Gameskins shirts.
I really didn't like the famicom or nes colour scheme... but that's just me. I'm about to paint mine black with that new fusion paint from krylon. I'm sure if you really wanted to you could easily make a Famicom colour scheme yourself for your own GBA. It doesn't look that hard to do. Maybe it'd help to get a sticker made, something like http://www.gbamod.com/
normally, I am the adbusters loving anti-advertisement kinda guy... but I think they did a great job. at least you can tell it's a big joke... I probably would be miffed if I had bought into some elaborate site and later found out it was a marketing scheme...
but, this is probably the funniest advertisement ever... I laughed so hard at this site =P
I like the authentic touches here and there (kinda surprised about the modchip)... even though the first entry on beta-7 shouldn't be about pre-beta-7 times =P I'm sure you could make a list of the mistakes
oh well, I'll probably be hating this site later after I've reached my senses. once this kind of marketing is widespread, I will loathe it, I know it.
I had planned long ahead of time to check these out on release date... so, yesterday I went out to as many mcdonalds as I could to get as many different ones as possible.
I'm a big game and watch fan, and I have a good collection of LED/LCD games old and new. But, if you miss your old handheld games (anyone remember Tron?), you guys should check out the simulators scene. Do a google search for Madrigal simulators and LEDHead. I don't want to slashdot them;)
As far as the quality/complexity of these mcdonalds toys go... they are mostly variations of the same idea. In most games, you either collect objects of 3 fields coming at you, or avoid them.. the other games that only have one button are just reflex games, avoiding objects by hitting the button at the right moment. all of the games get progressively faster as you go. (the only one I can't vouch for is the knuckles one, I played the monkeyball demo online, though) they're pretty simple, even by game and watch standards... what really takes away from gameplay potential is the fact that you're able to "beat" each game after the speed has reached the highest level. It'd have been nice if they would've let you go on forever... but it would be pointless since it doesn't keep track of score.
They're fun little distractions, and I personally think they're the best mcdonalds toys ever. They're well worth the $1.50 it costs to get the toy alone... if anything, the batteries are probably worth more than the toys themselves =)
They're starting to sell these on ebay already, strangely enough... one guy who's put up an auction doesn't even have them yet, says he'll have them in 30 days. =P
speaking of those "true skill" regulations and cheatings, mentioned on the webpage... there's this game at the local movie theatre, in the arcade, that has a spinning arrow you had to stop in a ladder climbing game... it highlights #'s 1-5 depending on whether the arrow stopped at a positive # or negative #... i.e. #5 is highlighted, you land on -1, #4 is now highlighted, but if you landed on +1, you win.
From personal experience on playing "fair" (or what seem to be fair) "true skill" machines, I am good about winning them (try playing the minigames on kirby super star for SNES, they're all good for honing these kinds of skills). I know that according to chance, there was no way I could've lost that game as many times as I did. Like this website mentions, some games only let you have "true skill" on the lower part of the ladder, and it cheats when you get too close to winning... this game I was playing had to be the most blatant about it... it played with you, enticing you by leaving it on #5... so you might think that you have a 50/50 chance of winning if you put two more quarters in. After playing at least $10 worth (I really wanted that portable tv!), I knew it had to be cheating... there was just no way that I could keep getting numbers that WEREN'T enabling me to go higher than 5. It would always go AT 5 or below. And immediately after being on 5... it would ALWAYS kick me down...
being that I got back to #5 alot, my conclusion was that it truly had to be cheating... it's really hard to trust prize winning or gambling machines if you don't have access to their sourcecode. I would love to rip apart this machine, emulate it, save and load state over and over to see if I have a fair chance on #5;)
moving on to the point:
In Nevada, I believe they might review the source code for gambling machines, but I don't believe prize winning machines go through the same scruitiny... it's really unfair, I think.
the problem is, 2.0 is no longer supported in any of the modern windows ce development kits... the latest only goes back to 2.11... unfortunately for me, I missed out on Phenom's free 2.11 upgrade program, and now they expect people to pay $99 US for it. ONLY if the people at NetBSD had an older development setup, would they be able to compile for older machines. This or Nethack for WinCE are probably the only reasons for me upgrading =P And I can't be for sure that either will work on my machine properly. Btw, the exact equivilancy to my Phenom Ultra machine in the Japanese market would be the Hitachi HPW-200EC (same hardware, case, etc... just the Hitachi name). It seems that every year I go out searching for info on putting some kind of BSD or Linux variant on my palmtop, but always end up with dead ends... most of the websites are defunct and have moved on to the iPAQ. Being a non-programmer, there's nothing I can really do about it.
Phenom Ultra
on
Palmtop NetBSD
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
NetBSD supposedly supports the Hitachi PERSONA HPW-230JC, which is the 32 meg version of what I have, a Phenom Ultra. But, the funny thing is... the bootloader program is only for Windows CE 2.11, not 2.0 that the machines come with (so, I can't even test it).
I've gone through hell trying to find an open source operating system to run on this thing, with no dice. Anyone have one of these things?
Slashdot Mirror
is that really a full sized cabinet? Size is at a premium in Japan, where would someone put that? Are you going to need your own tv to put in it? It's hard enough finding a place to put an X-Box... idunno, I'm confused about this.
It doesn't say how much it costs, either. Also, I wonder if the cabinet has the coloured overlay on it.
I've noticed Nintendo has been going retro here in the states and in Japan... check out the Japanese shirts: http://www.nesretro.com/shite/famicomshirts.html I've even seen Shigeru Miyamoto wearing the Donkey Kong shirt. In the states, you might find the retro shirts licensed by Nintendo in a Hot Topic. I really liked the one they did of just a plain screenshot of Donkey Kong... I shoulda got it while I had the chance (I own a DK machine, would've been a nice tribute =P). I'm sure alot of ppl have "issues" with the whole goth store, but it's the only local place to pick up Gameskins shirts.
I really didn't like the famicom or nes colour scheme... but that's just me. I'm about to paint mine black with that new fusion paint from krylon. I'm sure if you really wanted to you could easily make a Famicom colour scheme yourself for your own GBA. It doesn't look that hard to do. Maybe it'd help to get a sticker made, something like http://www.gbamod.com/
normally, I am the adbusters loving anti-advertisement kinda guy... but I think they did a great job. at least you can tell it's a big joke... I probably would be miffed if I had bought into some elaborate site and later found out it was a marketing scheme...
but, this is probably the funniest advertisement ever... I laughed so hard at this site =P
I like the authentic touches here and there (kinda surprised about the modchip)... even though the first entry on beta-7 shouldn't be about pre-beta-7 times =P I'm sure you could make a list of the mistakes
oh well, I'll probably be hating this site later after I've reached my senses. once this kind of marketing is widespread, I will loathe it, I know it.
I guess I needed to clarify that the toys can be bought for $1.50 without the happy meal... some places even gave it to me for free =P
I'm a big game and watch fan, and I have a good collection of LED/LCD games old and new. But, if you miss your old handheld games (anyone remember Tron?), you guys should check out the simulators scene. Do a google search for Madrigal simulators and LEDHead. I don't want to slashdot them ;)
As far as the quality/complexity of these mcdonalds toys go... they are mostly variations of the same idea. In most games, you either collect objects of 3 fields coming at you, or avoid them.. the other games that only have one button are just reflex games, avoiding objects by hitting the button at the right moment. all of the games get progressively faster as you go. (the only one I can't vouch for is the knuckles one, I played the monkeyball demo online, though) they're pretty simple, even by game and watch standards... what really takes away from gameplay potential is the fact that you're able to "beat" each game after the speed has reached the highest level. It'd have been nice if they would've let you go on forever... but it would be pointless since it doesn't keep track of score.
They're fun little distractions, and I personally think they're the best mcdonalds toys ever. They're well worth the $1.50 it costs to get the toy alone... if anything, the batteries are probably worth more than the toys themselves =)
They're starting to sell these on ebay already, strangely enough... one guy who's put up an auction doesn't even have them yet, says he'll have them in 30 days. =P
From personal experience on playing "fair" (or what seem to be fair) "true skill" machines, I am good about winning them (try playing the minigames on kirby super star for SNES, they're all good for honing these kinds of skills). I know that according to chance, there was no way I could've lost that game as many times as I did. Like this website mentions, some games only let you have "true skill" on the lower part of the ladder, and it cheats when you get too close to winning... this game I was playing had to be the most blatant about it... it played with you, enticing you by leaving it on #5... so you might think that you have a 50/50 chance of winning if you put two more quarters in. After playing at least $10 worth (I really wanted that portable tv!), I knew it had to be cheating... there was just no way that I could keep getting numbers that WEREN'T enabling me to go higher than 5. It would always go AT 5 or below. And immediately after being on 5... it would ALWAYS kick me down...
being that I got back to #5 alot, my conclusion was that it truly had to be cheating... it's really hard to trust prize winning or gambling machines if you don't have access to their sourcecode. I would love to rip apart this machine, emulate it, save and load state over and over to see if I have a fair chance on #5 ;)
moving on to the point:
In Nevada, I believe they might review the source code for gambling machines, but I don't believe prize winning machines go through the same scruitiny... it's really unfair, I think.
the problem is, 2.0 is no longer supported in any of the modern windows ce development kits... the latest only goes back to 2.11... unfortunately for me, I missed out on Phenom's free 2.11 upgrade program, and now they expect people to pay $99 US for it. ONLY if the people at NetBSD had an older development setup, would they be able to compile for older machines. This or Nethack for WinCE are probably the only reasons for me upgrading =P And I can't be for sure that either will work on my machine properly. Btw, the exact equivilancy to my Phenom Ultra machine in the Japanese market would be the Hitachi HPW-200EC (same hardware, case, etc... just the Hitachi name). It seems that every year I go out searching for info on putting some kind of BSD or Linux variant on my palmtop, but always end up with dead ends... most of the websites are defunct and have moved on to the iPAQ. Being a non-programmer, there's nothing I can really do about it.
NetBSD supposedly supports the Hitachi PERSONA HPW-230JC, which is the 32 meg version of what I have, a Phenom Ultra. But, the funny thing is... the bootloader program is only for Windows CE 2.11, not 2.0 that the machines come with (so, I can't even test it). I've gone through hell trying to find an open source operating system to run on this thing, with no dice. Anyone have one of these things?