I recently ordered a couple of new game cartridges from Team Pixelboy. Apparently these will be some of the last games that they will be publishing. The 2 games I picked up are “Utopia” and “Space Shuttle: A Journey Into Space”.

As you can see, the boxes themselves are beautiful and the games come complete with full colour manuals and high-quality overlays for the ColecoVision controllers.

Space Shuttle is a highly advanced space shuttle mission simulation that is so detailed that the game includes a separate “sub-manual” for each stage of the 4-part mission:

• Launch
• Stabilizing Orbit and Satellite Docking
• De-orbit Burn and Reentry
• Landing

I quickly read through all the manuals - there is a lot to digest but they are well written and very helpful. The game features a 3 different flight modes (levels) starting with automatic flight and working up to a fully unassisted simulation. After playing through the auto flight once I decided to give flight mode #2 a try. After a couple of scrubbed launches I was able to launch successfully but eventually veered off course leading to an aborted mission. It is going to take a while for me to master this one! Thankfully, that’s exactly what I was hoping for with this game - a space sim that I can really dig into.

Utopia is a ColecoVision version of the Intellivision classic world-building strategy game. I’m pretty sure back when the original Utopia game came out there was nothing else like it on any other platform. It’s been a while since I played Utopia on my Intellivision Flashback but it is a great game and I’m thrilled to have it for my ADAM – especially since this version allows playing against the computer.

If you are interested in seeing some gameplay video you can check out electricadventures YouTube video where he plays both games as well as a third one (Arabian) which I did not get.

Between these two very different games I’m sure I’ve got hours of fun ahead of me! 🌍🚀

Space Junk is a fun little low resolution (GR mode) game written in SmartBASIC by Brian Sawyer in 1984. It’s available on the SmartBASIC Games III disk.

I’ve always been a big fan of the original NES D-pad style controllers. After all, I spent many hours of my youth holding one! So… when I discovered a shop on eBay that was making & selling custom ColecoVision controllers in this style I had to have one. 🤤

It arrived this week and its even better than I expected. The care that went into making this controller is very evident when you see it and even more so when you hold it. The build quality is remarkable and it actually feels even better than I remember the old NES controller being. Not to mention - it just looks great! Retrogameboyz has truly done a wonderful job on this product.

Of course, by not featuring a numeric keypad like the standard Coleco controller there are some games (mainly ones that utilize overlays) that won’t be playable with this. However the vast majority will play just fine and (bonus) will be made even more enjoyable by virtue of it simply being more comfortable than the original ColecoVision controller. The “select” and “start” buttons on this controller have been wisely mapped to the keypad *️⃣ and 1️⃣ buttons, respectively. This combo will get you through the start screens and select screens of most games. For games where this is insufficient you can connect a standard Coleco controller with a Y-cable to port 1 or do what I do and leave a Coleco controller plugged into the second joystick port. If all else fails, you can simply swap the controller in port 1 after the menu screen.

This controller - combined with my recently acquired AtariMax Ultimate SD will provide me with hours of retro gaming fun on my ADAM! If you’re interested in getting one of these awesome gamepad controllers visit Retrogameboyz on eBay. He also offers custom-styled versions for other retro systems like the TI-99 4A, Sega Master System, Atari, MSX, Commodore 64, Amiga, Odyssey, and even Vectrex. Game on! 👾

Look what arrived at my door this week! This is the Atarimax Ultimate SD cartridge.

This beauty lets me easily play any ColecoVision game ever made in addition to the hundreds of quality homebrew indie games that are available. Believe it or not, awesome new games are still being designed and released for ColecoVision/ADAM after all these years!

While the old original games were all 32K or less, many of the new ROMs are much larger featuring enhanced graphics and sound. My ADE Lite drive already has the capability to load (most) of the 32K ROM files but any of the larger games were out of reach for me… until now!

If you’re interested in picking one up for yourself head over to www.atarimax.com.

🚨New hardware alert! Got a 🖲 ColecoVision Roller Controller in great condition from my new friend James at crt-international.com. I love it! Definitely adds some arcade authenticity to games. Took me right back to playing Centipede in the arcade. Good times! 🎮🕹 #ColecoADAM

I recently got a new book called “Programming Games For The ColecoVision and ADAM in Assembler” by Tony Cruise. Yes, it is still 2020 and yes, there is a new book about ADAM programming! Of course I preordered this book as soon as I heard about it and it was released at the end of August as a digital Kindle book. You can get it on Amazon now or if you prefer a printed physical version you can preorder it here.

I’m already nine chapters into it and I’ve been enjoying it so far. The only unfortunate thing (for me) is that the workflow described in the book is Windows-centric and these days I use a Mac (when I’m not using my ADAM 🙂). This didn’t slow me down too much though as I already had a working virtualized Windows 10 installation on my Mac using VirtualBox before I started the book.

If you’re interested in creating games for ColecoVision or ADAM or maybe just interested in learning some Z-80 Assembler then I highly recommend checking out Tony’s book! There is a thread on the AtariAge forum where the author is active so you can discuss the book and ask any questions you may have.