Retro Gaming Museum
  • Home
  • The Collection
  • Hardware
    • Commodore
    • Sinclair Research
    • SpectraVideo
    • Nintendo
    • Amstrad
    • IBM
  • Software
    • Sierra Online
    • Infocom
    • Strategic Simulations, Inc. (SSI)
  • Gallery
  • Video
    • Complete Video Walkthrough
  • Donations
  • Contact
  • About

The Collection

Fairchild Channel F ( Luxor ) Games

10/16/2016

Comments

 
Picture

Twenty-seven cartridges, termed 'Videocarts', were officially released to consumers in the United States during the ownership of Fairchild and Zircon, the first twenty-one of which were released by Fairchild. Several of these cartridges were capable of playing more than one game and were typically priced at $19.95. The Videocarts were yellow and approximately the size and overall texture of an 8 track cartridge. They usually featured colorful label artwork. The earlier artwork was created by nationally known artist Tom Kamifuji and art directed by Nick Talesfore. The console contained two built-in games, Tennis and Hockey, which were both advanced Pong clones. In Hockey the reflecting bar could be changed to diagonals by twisting the controller, and could move all over the playing field. Tennis was much like the original Pong.

A sales brochure from 1978 listed 'Keyboard Videocarts' for sale. The three shown were K-1 Casino Poker, K-2 Space Odyssey, and K-3 Pro-Football. These were intended to use the Keyboard accessory. All further brochures, released after Zircon took over Fairchild, never listed this accessory nor anything called a Keyboard Videocart.

There was one additional cartridge released numbered Videocart-51 and simply titled 'Demo 1'. This Videocart was shown in a single sales brochure released shortly after Zircon acquired the company. It was never listed for sale after this single brochure which was used for winter of 1979.

It is amazing that we got all these games in their original packaging and they feel almost like new :)
Comments

Fairchild Video Entertainment System ( Luxor )  

10/13/2016

Comments

 
Picture

The Fairchild Channel F is a home video game console released by Fairchild Semiconductor in November 1976 across North America at the retail price of $169.95. It was also released in Japan in October the following year. It has the distinction of being the first programmable ROM cartridge–based video game console, and the first console to use a microprocessor. It was launched as the Video Entertainment System, or VES, but when Atari released its VCS the next year, Fairchild renamed its machine. By 1977, the Fairchild Channel F had sold 250,000 units, trailing behind sales of the VCS.

​The Channel F electronics were designed by Jerry Lawson using the Fairchild F8 CPU, the first public outing of this processor. The F8 was very complex compared to the typical integrated circuits of the day, and had more inputs and outputs than other contemporary chips. Because chip packaging was not available with enough pins, the F8 was instead fabricated as a pair of chips that had to be used together to form a complete CPU.

Lawson worked with Nick Talesfore and Ron Smith. As manager of Industrial Design, Talesfore was responsible for the design of the hand controllers, console, and video game cartridges. Smith was responsible for the mechanical engineering of the video cartridges and hand controllers. All worked for Wilf Corigan, head of Fairchild Semiconductor, a division of Fairchild Camera & Instrument.

The graphics are quite basic by modern standards. The Channel F is only able to use one plane of graphics and one of four background colors per line, only three plot colors to choose from (red, green, and blue) that turned into white if the background is set to black. A resolution of 128 × 64 with approximately 102 × 58 pixels visible and help from only 64 bytes of system RAM, half the amount of the Atari 2600. The F8 processor at the heart of the console is able to produce enough AI to allow for player versus computer matches, a first in console history. All previous machines required a human opponent.

One feature unique to this console is the 'hold' button, which allowed the player to freeze the game, change the time or change the speed of the game during the course of the game. In the original unit, sound is played through an internal speaker, rather than the TV set. However, the System II passed sound to the television through the RF modulator.
Picture

The controllers are a joystick without a base; the main body is a large hand grip with a triangular "cap" on top, the top being the portion that actually moved for eight-way directional control. It could be used as both a joystick and paddle (twist), and not only pushed down to operate as a fire button but also pulled up. The model 1 unit contained a small compartment for storing the controllers when moving it. The System II featured detachable controllers and had two holders at the back to wind the cable around and to store the controller in. Zircon later offered a special control which featured an action button on the front of the joystick. It was marketed by Zircon as "Channel F Jet-Stick" in a letter sent out to registered owners before Christmas 1982. They also released it as an Atari-compatible controller called "Video Command", first released without the extra fire button. Before that, only the downwards plunge motion was connected and acted as the fire button; the pull-up and twist actions weren't connected to anything.
Comments
    Picture

    Yngvi Th. Johannsson

    Retro gaming enthusiast and all around computer collector. 

    Check out youtube site for more videos !

    Archives

    November 2020
    October 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    June 2019
    April 2019
    May 2018
    January 2018
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015

    Categories

    All
    Amstrad
    Artwork
    Atari
    Commodore
    DOS/WINDOWS
    Fairchild
    GameCube
    Joystick
    Nintendo
    PC Hardware
    Playstation
    Playstation 4
    Pong Machines
    Retro Hunt
    Sega Mega Drive
    Sega Saturn
    Sharp Computers
    Sinclair
    Spectravideo
    Xbox

    RSS Feed

  • Home
  • The Collection
  • Hardware
    • Commodore
    • Sinclair Research
    • SpectraVideo
    • Nintendo
    • Amstrad
    • IBM
  • Software
    • Sierra Online
    • Infocom
    • Strategic Simulations, Inc. (SSI)
  • Gallery
  • Video
    • Complete Video Walkthrough
  • Donations
  • Contact
  • About