Longhorn Engineer’s Atari 2600 Video Mod


The back of you Atari could look like this!

At the Midwest Gaming Classic Parker Dillmann – otherwise known as the “Longhorn Engineer” – gave me a sample of his new Atari video mod. This is a small circuit board he sells that you solder to the TIA chip inside and Atari 2600 to get a great composite/S-video picture.

Check out his site here, and continue reading to see me try the mod out for myself.

Also, if you need spare Atari 2600 parts, why not check out my awesome auction?

Continue reading Longhorn Engineer’s Atari 2600 Video Mod

Beyond Port Washington


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It’s official! Due to overwhelming demand the next Ben Heckendorn movie is going to be a sequel to one of our most popular titles called “Beyond Port Washington”.

SYNOPSIS:

It has been 5 years since the events of the first movie. Steve and Erica have been living together for a while now, things are going well, and marriage is on the horizon. However Mike has latched into a deep depression, much like Steve in the first movie, and has grown distant from his friends.

Living in New York, but back in the area on vacation, Ben decides to enlist the help of Steve and Erica to help Mike out. But after helping with some sneaky tricks, Erica realizes that Ben and Mike in fact influenced her love for Steve, and the cat’s out of the bag!

Now Erica questions the validity of her own relationship with Steve, but with a proposal looming can’t bring herself to tell him the truth. Meanwhile Ben embarks on a quest to find Mike’s dream girl – a mysterious World of Warcraft player known only as “hot_69_chik”.

Expect all of the madcap thrills, spills of laughs of the first movie with some new surprises along the way. The script, once again written by Ben Heckendorn and Dale Nauertz, has been underway since last fall and filming is slated to commence this summer. All major characters are returning.

Realistically we hope to finish it by Christmas 2010, I’m not going to kid myself with post production but I think if anything “Possumus Woman” shows we’ve sped the process up.

Stay tuned!

R.I.P. my Dremel

Well the day has finally come. After 2.75 years of faithful service, my first Dremel has bought the farm.

For a few months now the variable speed switch has been erratic, only going to the lowest speed, requiring a shove to get higher. Now the switch is totally dead, and the Dremel’s days are over.

Even though 99.99% of the time I only use it for the cutoff wheel, the Dremel has been an invaluable tool in my quest to do whatever it is I do. It has worked on every project of mine since the first 2006 Xbox 360 laptop, and finally conked out during the dual builds of the final THQ laptop and the long-suffering original hardware C64 portable.

All is not lost, however. Dremel is a Wisconsin company so I had no reservations about buying a new one. I also bought it at the local Ace Hardware store and not the Farm & Fleet… even though this support strategy didn’t work for Circuit City I’m hoping it’ll keep the local Ace open.

Xbox 360 Controller Monitor (Rev 2)

Controller Monitor Rev 2

I have completed a new style of my Xbox 360 Controller monitor, which now includes indicators for the analog sticks, providing even more data for playtesting.

Currently these controllers are being used for playtesting on Modern Warfare 2, the new Wolfenstien game’s multiplayer, and this particular prototype for Mass Effect 2.

For more information, videos and to order one for your own company’s playtesting please visit the product page. I plan to do a run of these if there is sufficient interest.

Midwest Gaming Classic – The week after


Myself, an Xbox 360 laptop, and a bunch of free donut holes.

It was a fun show! Stan Miller did a piece for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and our booth was mentioned, you can check it out using this link.

I’d like to thank all our forum members for coming along, manning the booth and helping visitors with their questions. We even fixed some stuff for people, which I should have advertised ahead of time.

In other news, I have a new model Xbox 360 Controller Monitor finished and will be showing that on the site soon, stay tuned!

Midwest Gaming Classic – Day Two

Well I got a TON of sleep last night, more than makes up for the lack of sleep on Saturday morning.

Booth should be less crowded today so I hope to spend more time talking with the show visitors, and work on the controller monitor some more.

Completely neglected to take any pictures, but plenty of other people did so I’m sure they’ll be passed along.