Underball, on Tue Mar 22, 2011 7:33 AM, said:
I've bought every game Bob has made for the 7800 from either the AA store or him directly. This version is excellent, and I would love to own it, but I am at a crossroads here, in that - I already own the non-pokey version, and I don't know if I plan on buying an XM. I'm waiting on more/better software support, and a more positive out outook for the XM's actual release date before I decide to go for it.
It's really kind of a bummer if people who don't buy into the XM get excluded from owning this version of the game, especially since it doesn't feature anything that requires the XM to operate.
Hey man - I'm really sorry about this, but I figured it like this: So many people had it by now, that the only way I would update it is if something were added to make it 'new', and not just a few more mazes (which BTW have been added in this version - there are 32 now for the 'Random Mazes' option). It actually does use two of the three main features of the XM (High Score and Pokey sound). There just aren't many Pokey boards left (Commando is already rare, and Ballblazer - as I explained in another thread - will be becoming rare shortly because of one company's idiotic practices). Plus the Pokeys themselves aren't that easy to find. I think it's better to fit an add on to the system (one Pokey per user) than to try and fit Pokeys on every cartridge (one Pokey per user *per game*).
I don't mean to start anything here.

Perry did such a wonderful job with the sound we thought (or at least I did) it would help with the XM's sales, and we wouldn't have to worry about getting Pokeys any more for newly created games that we wanted to make carts for.
On another note, Marc did a *great* job with the box art. The cart labels look very similar
Bob