64 replies to this topic

[tenoch]

This question came to me by my wife that tries to get me to go with her to craft type of flee markets. She says "oh there might be some more prototype for you to find", which is always somewhat true, but I tried to explain how rare finding 12 prototype, 3 unreleased laying on the ground is and all I could say was it is like winning the Lottery?

So my question is what are the odds of finding prototypes like this, or any prototype in the wild again?

thx
-h

[Uzumaki]

Far better than an odd of finding a blue T-handled MenaVision cart. But very rare to find a proto in the wild. The odd can vary depending on where you live or hunt as quite often protos are found not far from where they were originally created.

I would love to have a real proto of an unreleased game or one that is significantly different from released version but I don't have a couple hundred dollars just for it.

[Tempest]

It depends on where you are. If you're in California where many game companies were located, then the odds are actually not too bad. However if you're in a place that was far away from any game companies (like myself here in Michigan) then the odds are very low. I've never found one in the wild.

Tempest

[Uzumaki]

Oh oh the master of prototype never found any in wild??? I want his bank account!

[Wonder007]

Pretty low...I have only found one in the wild, an Up N' Down proto.

[DreamTR]

I've found about 10 in the wild, and I own about 1,000 cart prototypes at the moment.

[Tempest]

Uzumaki, on Tue Oct 30, 2007 7:24 PM, said:

Oh oh the master of prototype never found any in wild???

Yes, it's my secret shame...

Tempest

[MikeMika]

It's true about California. I moved out here about 11 years ago from Michigan. In the last few years, I've gone with my wife to a monthly Antique Faire, which will have the occasional Atari system or Odyssey. I never expect much going in - I mostly find cool classic toys. But a couple months ago I was browsing a table and a small box caught my eye. It was full of Atari games. Unlike the typical run of games, it looked like a few of them had all of their labels removed and replcaed by hand written or typed stickers. Turns out, they were protos! I got a handful of Activision (Plaque Attack, Crackpot, Private Eye) and Atari protos (Donald Duck, Pigs in Space, Dukes of Hazzard). All for 8 bucks! I left some games there for the guy who obviously noticed them after me and was desperate for me to leave him something. I left him Ram It Gray label, River Patrol, Stargunner, Crazy Climber, and a handful of randoms. I knew he wanted the protos pretty bad but he seemed to really appreciate me leaving him a gold mine of production games (Trust me, I already had those otherwise I would not have been so nice!). I have some regret, because I think he got all those games for the same price I paid by haggling. Come on! Give the lady her asking price!

I've also stumbled on a lot of Atari proto hardware and software at local bay area electronic flea markets and salvage shops. Before it closed a couple years ago, I found a car load of Atari Home Computer stuff at Mike Quinn's. For $100 bucks I got about a dozen Atari 800s, six 400s, 2 600s, 8 floppy drives, 12 ram expanders, about a hundred floppies of games, monitors, etc. My wife wasn;t very happy to see me drive up with my find. However, after digging in, it became obvious this equipment belonged to an ex-atari employee. I had xerox manuals of programming guides, floppies full of source code, etc. (Nothing of great revelation). Even better, the computers themselves were hacked up with all kinds of extras and goodies. All of this stuff was in Mike Quin's back room, and the only way I found out about it was that I walked in wearing an Atari T-Shirt and the guy at the counter asked,"Are you looking for Atari stuff?" Someone had dropped it all off earlier that day.

So if for nothing else, the move to California has been amazing for proto finds.

[Bill Brasky]

What's odd is that CV protos never seem to surface in CT, near where Coleco was. What about INTV protos? It just seems like lots of Atari protos get found.

[doctorclu]

I like to think Dallas is a good place for Atari stuff/protos too in a sense. Just a lot of Atari users used to be here, and a lot of products were made here.

One thing I found in the wild was two Atari Jaguar development systems the Felix and Rapier. Those were with Telegames, had been bought in a auction from Telegames by a video game store after the tornado that took out their warehouse.

Bought them for $50 a piece from the video game store. Traded them for catboxes. But the development systems were interesting to look at for a while. Naturally I wish I kept one, but at the time I lived in an apartment and the goal was to get rid of large items. A PC case item for a Catbox... a nice enough trade.

I've uploaded the pictures in case the links are later lost, but here are the links to where they came from. These pictures were taken by me.

http://www.geocities...y-aramis/Felix/

http://www.geocities...-aramis/Rapier/

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[Uzumaki]

Wow lotta photos!!

[jsoper]

Lab loaners for Defender and Realsports Volleyball are the best I've ever found in sunny Ca. The RV was simply labeled volleyball, so I thought it was an unknown proto the whole drive home, you wouldn't beleive how disappointing it was to see that sand and water pop up on my screen.

[BuddyBuddies]

doctorclu, on Wed Nov 7, 2007 11:48 AM, said:

I like to think Dallas is a good place for Atari stuff/protos too in a sense. Just a lot of Atari users used to be here, and a lot of products were made here.

One thing I found in the wild was two Atari Jaguar development systems the Felix and Rapier. Those were with Telegames, had been bought in a auction from Telegames by a video game store after the tornado that took out their warehouse.

Bought them for $50 a piece from the video game store. Traded them for catboxes. But the development systems were interesting to look at for a while. Naturally I wish I kept one, but at the time I lived in an apartment and the goal was to get rid of large items. A PC case item for a Catbox... a nice enough trade.

I've uploaded the pictures in case the links are later lost, but here are the links to where they came from. These pictures were taken by me.

http://www.geocities...y-aramis/Felix/

http://www.geocities...-aramis/Rapier/

OMG!!! Ive paid WAY WAY WAY over that amount for mine!!,that truly is some find in the wild! the pictures are a tremendous help,ive been trying to find out where the resistor goes,thanks so much!! did somebody in the community get them???

[BuddyBuddies]

doctorclu, on Wed Nov 7, 2007 11:48 AM, said:

I like to think Dallas is a good place for Atari stuff/protos too in a sense. Just a lot of Atari users used to be here, and a lot of products were made here.

One thing I found in the wild was two Atari Jaguar development systems the Felix and Rapier. Those were with Telegames, had been bought in a auction from Telegames by a video game store after the tornado that took out their warehouse.

Bought them for $50 a piece from the video game store. Traded them for catboxes. But the development systems were interesting to look at for a while. Naturally I wish I kept one, but at the time I lived in an apartment and the goal was to get rid of large items. A PC case item for a Catbox... a nice enough trade.

I've uploaded the pictures in case the links are later lost, but here are the links to where they came from. These pictures were taken by me.

http://www.geocities...y-aramis/Felix/

http://www.geocities...-aramis/Rapier/

humm, the Rapier will fetch up to $1000,and the Felix being uber-rare would have got you more than $1000,crazy......

[ANDYRYALS]

You should try living in the UK, the odds of finding any prototype are pretty much ZERO!!

[PingvinBlueJeans]

Bill Brasky, on Wed Oct 31, 2007 7:07 PM, said:

What's odd is that CV protos never seem to surface in CT, near where Coleco was. What about INTV protos? It just seems like lots of Atari protos get found.

Coleco prototypes never surface period. The Coleco/Mattel stuff is all in the hands of the original programmers (whatever still exists at all and didn't end up in the landfill years ago). That's because Coleco and Mattel only had in-house development prototypes, whereas Atari had lab loaners floating around all over the place.

Edited by PingvinBlueJeans, Sat Nov 10, 2007 9:00 PM.

[Pipster]

ANDYRYALS, on Thu Nov 8, 2007 4:52 PM, said:

You should try living in the UK, the odds of finding any prototype are pretty much ZERO!!

I've seen 4 lab loaners in the wild in the UK, 2 of which i bought.

[doctorclu]

BuddyBuddies, on Thu Nov 8, 2007 10:36 AM, said:

doctorclu, on Wed Nov 7, 2007 11:48 AM, said:

Bought them for $50 a piece from the video game store. Traded them for catboxes. But the development systems were interesting to look at for a while. Naturally I wish I kept one, but at the time I lived in an apartment and the goal was to get rid of large items. A PC case item for a Catbox... a nice enough trade.

I've uploaded the pictures in case the links are later lost, but here are the links to where they came from. These pictures were taken by me.

http://www.geocities...y-aramis/Felix/

http://www.geocities...-aramis/Rapier/

OMG!!! Ive paid WAY WAY WAY over that amount for mine!!,that truly is some find in the wild! the pictures are a tremendous help,ive been trying to find out where the resistor goes,thanks so much!! did somebody in the community get them???

humm, the Rapier will fetch up to $1000,and the Felix being uber-rare would have got you more than $1000,crazy...... icon_smile.gif

Yerp. They are cool and rare, but I think the store and I had about the right idea to get them into the hands of collectors. He was liquidating, and I was looking to make my Jaguar more useful. These two systems are in good collections now with good users.

[Shawn Sr.]

PingvinBlueJeans, on Sat Nov 10, 2007 11:51 PM, said:

Coleco prototypes never surface period. The Coleco/Mattel stuff is all in the hands of the original programmers (whatever still exists at all and didn't end up in the landfill years ago). That's because Coleco and Mattel only had in-house development prototypes, whereas Atari had lab loaners floating around all over the place.

I know a guy that has a shitload of Coleco proto's. Just cause Coleco didn't have "loaner" slaped on the cart face to be read 30 year latter doesn't mean games didn't get out of the building on a regular basis. So I believe you are basing your facts on opinion, not facts.

[Wonder007]

Shawn Sr., on Mon Nov 12, 2007 12:48 PM, said:

PingvinBlueJeans, on Sat Nov 10, 2007 11:51 PM, said:

Coleco prototypes never surface period. The Coleco/Mattel stuff is all in the hands of the original programmers (whatever still exists at all and didn't end up in the landfill years ago). That's because Coleco and Mattel only had in-house development prototypes, whereas Atari had lab loaners floating around all over the place.

I know a guy that has a shitload of Coleco proto's. Just cause Coleco didn't have "loaner" slaped on the cart face to be read 30 year latter doesn't mean games didn't get out of the building on a regular basis. So I believe you are basing your facts on opinion, not facts.

When you mean Coleco protos, do you mean Atari 2600 Coleco games or Colecovision games??? I own an Atari 2600 Colecovision proto (Time Pilot). I need more of those..... I also own a Colecovision proto (Zaxxon).

Edited by Wonder007, Mon Nov 12, 2007 8:36 PM.

[Dino]

Pipster, on Sun Nov 11, 2007 7:00 PM, said:

ANDYRYALS, on Thu Nov 8, 2007 4:52 PM, said:

You should try living in the UK, the odds of finding any prototype are pretty much ZERO!!

I've seen 4 lab loaners in the wild in the UK, 2 of which i bought.

wow, I just read your car boot sale story - interesting indeed. I bought some Atari lab loaners off ebay UK a long time ago, so there are some to be found there. Too bad you told the guy what they were. I guess by calling you over he was trying to get back at you for getting them from him for a song.

[orangest]

i've found one in over 10 years of game hunting in the los angeles area; a fast food proto that turned out to be a final version. didn't even know it was a proto until CPUWIZ gave me the good news.

[Wonder007]

orangest, on Mon Nov 12, 2007 8:43 PM, said:

i've found one in over 10 years of game hunting in the los angeles area; a fast food proto that turned out to be a final version. didn't even know it was a proto until CPUWIZ gave me the good news.

Curious, where did you find yours in Los Angeles. I found my Up N Down proto in a swap meet (flea market) by USC.

[orangest]

oh man...if i remember correctly it was at a thrift store in north hollywood that's long gone by now.

[Shawn Sr.]

Wonder007, on Mon Nov 12, 2007 11:34 PM, said:

Shawn Sr., on Mon Nov 12, 2007 12:48 PM, said:

PingvinBlueJeans, on Sat Nov 10, 2007 11:51 PM, said:

Coleco prototypes never surface period. The Coleco/Mattel stuff is all in the hands of the original programmers (whatever still exists at all and didn't end up in the landfill years ago). That's because Coleco and Mattel only had in-house development prototypes, whereas Atari had lab loaners floating around all over the place.

I know a guy that has a shitload of Coleco proto's. Just cause Coleco didn't have "loaner" slaped on the cart face to be read 30 year latter doesn't mean games didn't get out of the building on a regular basis. So I believe you are basing your facts on opinion, not facts.

When you mean Coleco protos, do you mean Atari 2600 Coleco games or Colecovision games??? I own an Atari 2600 Colecovision proto (Time Pilot). I need more of those..... I also own a Colecovision proto (Zaxxon).

Actual ColecoVision ones not 2600 games by Coleco. Sorry to get your hopes up on that one. Dude had a smurfs proto for the coleco at a show I was at in Montreal a while back and that is what attracted me to his little display. When I told him I thought it was cool but I was looking for the 2600 version he proceded to show me a breifcase full of colecovision proto's and said "so you don't want any of these then eh?"