17 replies to this topic

[King Asmo]

I've found 2 Zellers carts that aren't on your list, and I'm sure there are many more.. I've got:

Laaser Voley (not Laser Volley)

and

Motor Race

Does anybody else have any Zellers carts not on the rarity guide?

[hurt]

think you could post some scans of these?

[King Asmo]

I'll try to post them in the next week (I don't have my scanner hooked up right now).

Laaser Voley has the exact same label as Laser Volley, except for the spelling on the end label. I have both versions.. I've seen quite a few Laser Volleys, but only a couple Laaser Voleys, so I'm guessing the spelling error is the rarer of the two.

Motor Race is your typical Zellers cart.. has a really cheesy drawing of a road and a couple of cars. I just checked DP5 and it isn't in there either (I don't have DP6 yet). I've had this cart for *years* so I didn't think it was particularly rare, tho I must admit I don't remember seeing another one.

So if the Admins want to add them to their lists, I'd be more than happy to scan them later in the week.

[Alex]

Okay, here's the thing about Zeller's carts. A lot of companies used the Zellers style label, not just Zellers. In fact, all these companies may have gotten them from the same source, and put them in their own boxes. But we're not adding any games to the Zellers list unless we see the box - it's the only way to tell if it's actually a Zellers game. I have personally seen boxes for all of our Zellers games, I have scans but they're too small and low quality to put on the site.

As for the DP, I think they just list everything with that label style as Zellers. But unless you have the box, there's no way to tell. I seriously doubt all those games were sold by Zellers. I've done quite a bit of searching for boxed Zellers stuff, and these are the only ones I've found.

If you have a box, we'll be happy to add it. Otherwise, they'll have to wait until we can figure out what they are. One day we'll just be able to add stuff as 'unknown' until we figure it out, but we don't have the server space right now.

[King Asmo]

I'm pretty sure they're both Zellers carts, but unfortunately I don't have boxes for either of them (I'm sure I've seen a Laaser Voley box, but I'll have to find one). There's a local guy who has a ton of boxed Zellers stuff, so I'll visit him next week, and see if he has either of them boxed. I do understand your reluctance to include them without more proof. I just found it odd that Digital Press didn't even have Motor Race.. If I get the 6th edition, and it's not in there, I'll have to contact Joe.

Alex: I just want to thank you again for this incredible resource you've created.. I think I've been on this site almost every day for the last couple months. Please don't take any of my suggested additions as "criticisms".. I'd just like to help out the site any way I can.

I've also got to send a few carts to that guy who wrote Cart Commander. That's one sweet program.

[King Asmo]

I still haven't found the box to Motor Race, but I see that I have a bunch of Zellers boxes that you guys don't have scans for, so I'll scan those later this week (I still don't have my scanner set up).

I also have an Activision catalog not on the site. It's an odd 5-language one.. and it's just a small folding sheet (as opposed to a book like all the other ones I've seen). I'll scan that as well.

Where I should post/e-mail them when I've got the scans?

Mike

[Alex]

Don't worry, we welcome any suggestions or criticisms, that's how the site will improve. If we're missing a Zellers game that can be proven, we definitely want to know about it. We're just trying to avoid guessing at things. I'd rather add something as "Unknown" than guess at its origin.

As for the scans, that would be great! You can send them to editor@atariage.com. Please try to scan at a high quality, we'll compress and crop them.

[King Asmo]

I'll get those scans to you as soon as possible.

I've found two more Taiwan Pirates in the Zellers style that I can't find listed anywhere: Scuba Diver (Seaquest) and Sparker Gardon (Flash Gordon). I only have these loose, so I'm not sure where they came from.

Does anybody have any idea where these pirates may have been sold if they're not from Zellers? I'm now up to four titles I can't identify now (Laaser Voley, Motor Race, Scuba Diver and Sparker Gardon) and I'm really curious about their origin.

[Alex]

Scuba Diver I've seen a number of times. I'm more inclined to think that one is a Zellers, but until I see a box...

As for where they came from, I'm really not sure. Did you find them in the US or Canada, or did you get them from overseas? PAL or NTSC? We'll start adding that kind of thing eventually as "Unknown", and hopefully someone browsing the site will have a box.

[King Asmo]

I've gotten all my Taiwan Pirates from Garage Sales and Flea Markets in Southern Ontario (between Windsor and Toronto), so that's why I'm inclined to belive they're all from Zellers, since there was a ton of Zellers stores in the mid-80's in that part of Canada.

All the ones I've found in this style have been NTSC.. have you found PAL ones in this style before?

[Alex]

To be honest, I'm not much of a PAL expert right now, so I can't tell you.

The reason I am skeptical of other games being sold by Zellers, is that I have seen numerous boxed examples of the titles in our list. I have seen numerous loose examples of some of the titles you have mentioned (Scuba Diver for example), but never boxed by Zellers. I find it unlikely that certain games would repeatedly be found boxed, while others wouldn't.

That said, I would wager that there are other games that were sold by Zellers, but I've not seen the proof yet. Scuba Diver would be the most likely candidate IMO.

So where did they come from? I don't know. They're black market items so it's pretty hard to trace. Hopefully we'll figure it out one day. Hmmm, maybe it's time to add that "Unknown" category for NTSC carts.

[orion]

I got a Texas Chainsaw Massacre cartridge. I know it's rare, but how rare is it? Also, are the xonox programmers still around anywhere on the net today?

[Alex]

It's pretty rare (we rate it a 7/10), but much rarer with the box. I think a stash of loose carts were found at one time, but if you have the box it usually doubles the price (or more).

I've never heard of any of the Xonox programmers being tracked down.

[Tempest]

If you were a Xonox programmer wouldn't you want to hide your identity? It's sort of like bragging you worked for Froggo or Mythicon. Then again they programmed the 2600 better than I can.

Tempest

[Ze_ro]

I always thought some of the Xonox games were quite good. They weren't as good as Atari or Activision... but compared to some of the junk out there, they were quite well done. Of course, their whole business plan revolved around marketing two games at once, so it's quite likely they only put in half the effort on each....

--Zero

[jahfish]

i should have at least 10 of those, alternatively some have even the v-shape case (circus, sold to me from usa as zellers).

i think they were actually done in the same factory, then maybe finished (label sticking, etc ..) somewhere else, what would explain the same carts but different labels. just like the starsoft/quelle/homevision/rainbowvision confusions ....

[videotwit]

quote:

---

Originally posted by jahfish:
...just like the starsoft/quelle/homevision/rainbowvision confusions ....

---

Fish-

It's funny, but I was just thinking about this topic. So, how do you distinguish between StarSoft, Quelle, Rainbowvision, and Homevision carts? They all seem so similar, and I don't have too much experience with them.

[Alex]

By finding them boxed. If you just find a loose cart, sometimes it's impossible to determine which company produced it, since they used the same carts with different packaging. I'm not necessarily speaking about those four companies (there may be subtle differences in their particular carts), but certain European and Taiwanese companies.