Collecting the Evercade

Around two years ago the Evercade became a thing among vintage and physical edition game collectors. I think I've written a bit about it before, but if you're not sure what the Evercade is you can check out their website here and take a look; it's a nice website. Most recently the third iteration of this console is about to release: the Evercade EXP, a more robust handheld console which has internet connectivity and some preloaded games. It's a step in the right direction, even for a system which is selling itself on the idea that you can buy and play vintage games in cartridge collections.

Anyway, as a person who got swept up in the collector's fever of this console, I thought I'd share a few observations about it, and offer some advice for those of you who are new to the Evercade but might be interested in picking it up. First and most importantly is that the original is a nice, sturdy handheld design, and its only failing is it can be mildly awkward to connect to your PC for any necessary updates (there's usually one you need to download when you get it), and it does not support all the cartridges in current release....I believe the original Evercade only works with the red box releases. That said, there are at least 26 of these collections out there so the original still has a lot of content, and if you find one on sale its probably worth it (but see below).

The Evercade VS is the "console" version of the system, slightly more robust, and designed to handle arcade ports of up to 23 bits (iirc). It's able to play all the games, but its collection of purple box cartridges contain arcade ports and other titles that the handheld can't handle. It's main feature is you can easily hook this up to a TV and play with friends using the retro controllers it comes with. It's main downside has been, from my experience, it can sometimes be hard to "wake up." It's fun, though....my son and I have had a good time plowing through old games I never had the quarters on hand to complete back in the day. I now know for example that it would have probably taken me 120 or more quarters to finish Dark Seal I or Dark Seal II. I bet some of these old arcade classics never had their full range of content fully explored by most people, simply because it cost too much to get there! 

Now there is a new Evercade EXP coming out next week, a slimmer handheld which is compatible with all cartridges, some wireless connectivity, and a range of games preloaded (including some actual notable titles like Mega Man). This one looks like a measured improvement over the origina handheld, and I will report on it when I get my copy in. 

So far, my main realization in collecting Evercade so far has been the following: any of the iterations are worth having if you like retro gaming or physical cartridges, but unless you love owning all games for their own sake, you may wish to look closely at each cartridge release and assess whether the games on it are worth the typical $20 price tag you can get the cartridges for. For example, I know I have gotten my money's worth out of cartridges like the Namco and Atari collections, and there's a great collection of mostly RPGs that I never played back in the day but find well worth the time now to have (Piko Interactive Collection), but some other collections have provided precious little....owning them is more so you can smugly say you have it all, or to admire the equivalent of an electronic museum of forgotten relics of the past than anything else. 

A few collections contain games new to the console or at least newer, such as the Xenocrisis/Tanglewood collection, well worth owning if you don't have these games elsewhere yet) and the Indie Heroes collection, which gathers a range of more contemporary titles for the Evercade and puts them in an ideal medium of play. But for many collections, I have been lucky to find one game that made me happy to have the cartridge, and often the main appeal of the other games was simply to discover that they even existed....and that anyone cared to bring them back! The Atari Lynx collections, as an example, were all new to me, and while a couple were fun, I suspect I would be a lot more enamored of the collections if I had ever owned a Lynx back in the day.

So basically: take the time to look at what's on the cartridges, and make sure at least a couple of the titles appeal to you or scratch the nostalgia itch. Unless you're planning to dive deep into the collector's zone, chances are you can probably pick up 5-6 cartridges with most of the actual games you might want to spend time with and be scrutinizing of the rest.

Okay, maybe next week I'll talk more about the Evercade EXP, unless my wife forces me to put them under the Xmas tree, we shall see.

More Random: Retro Collecting and the Playstation 3

 I've decided I need to try and keep up with the blog more, like in the good old days of 2011-2017 when I was able to somehow knock out at least three posts a week, sometimes even daily. Good habit and all! I've always treated the blog as a writing exercise....the idea is not so much that I am writing for an audience, but rather than I will write with the notion of an audience being present. Whether or not what fascinates me also interests you is just a happy coincidence.

So the thing on my mind today:

Retro Video Game Collecting and the Playstation 3

Back in 2019 I got the notion to grab a Playstation 3 from a local retro gaming store. I also grabbed a PS2, which chugged along nicely for a while but now won't read disks no matter how much weight I pile on it, so I think the PS2's laser arm is failing. The PS3 I bought was a slim later model, similar to the one I had in 2012-2013 before I traded it in for the PS4. I was a late buyer on the PS3 when it came out, because of course it was initially $600 (too pricey), then Sony got hacked (controversy!), then eventually it just seemed pointless because by that time I was so deeply invested in the Xbox 360 it was unnecessary. When I bought the PS3 it was late in the game, with the intent of catching up on the many Playstation exclusives I had missed over the years (Resistance, Killzone, Uncharted, etc.). By the time the PS4 came out I was more or less caught up....and the clear and decisive quality of the PS4 kept me once again with Sony for the last console generation. 

Cut to 2020, and while I was among the lucky few to snag a Playstation 5 out of the gate, it became clear to me that my PS3 I'd purchased still had value (as did the PS2). Tragically the soldering on the PS3's HDMI connection failed at some point and I could only get it to work through the old SD connection with an adapter. So last month I got very lucky and snagged an older original model PS3 on ebay with a ton of games for only $80. Not only was this model in great shape it became clear to me that the original design of the PS3 was superior to the PS3 slim model (the one with the sliding door to open the disk area). This is a solid machine, and the guy who sold it to me appears to have kept his clean and intact....and based on the many games that came with it he was really, really into modern combat shooters like Call of Duty, Battlefield and Medal of Honor.

Anyway, I've been hunting and pecking on Ebay to fill out my game collection, which already had about 40 titles in the mix. A surprising number of PS3 titles can still be found in new, wrapped condition, and a lot of titles for the PS3 were exclusive to the system. Some are much harder to find....for example, Folklore is widely regarded as a must-have for the PS3 era, but it was an exlusive title that is not available in digital format or on Playsyation Now, best as I can tell. In fact Playstation Now, which is the rough analog to Microsoft's Xbox Game Pass, never seems to have any title I want when I search to see if it's available, which is a shame, because if they had half of these I'd subscribe to it. Sony definitely has a retro-compatibility problem, with a strategy that has failed in comparison to Microsoft's superior efforts and retaining as much backwards compatibility as possible. Good enough, in fact, that I really only need a current Xbox to play my digital and disk collection, I have nothing currently that isn't compatible on the Series S/X or the Xbox One X. 

On the plus side, I guess, that means that the fun of retrogame collecting is strong on the Sony side, since so many titles remain available only on their original systems. The top five recent titles on PS3 which I have recently found and been playing, for example:

Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard - a great game! The self-aware video game character voiced by Will Arnett tries to survive as his video game franchise comes under literal attack. The game's controls and design are pretty good but just a bit janky (and the box cover art was highly "meh") but the game is still fun to play and has some funny moments. Found new in wrap on Ebay for $18.

Folklore - mentioned earlier, this dang game is expensive on Ebay, but I got lucky and found a disc only copy (no box) for $40 and took the plunge. It's actually even better than I expected, a sort of mystery/RPG/survival adventure hybrid that is compelling to play. I can see why it's sought after so much, and am shocked Sony hasn't tried to secure the rights to port it to current gen consoles in a remastered HD edition.

Medal of Honor - the franchise reboot on the PS3/Xbox 360 era of consoles slipped by, regarded perhaps at the time as not as good as Call of Duty, but I am actually having a lot of fun running through the campaign, which lacks the pomp and circumstances (read: crazy) of contemporary shooters. Cost: trivial, it was one of the many games that came in the box with the console. 

Sacred 2: This Diabloesque competition is actually a lot of fun with some very non-serious story and tale telling; if you recall a game back in the day with extremely amusing (or stupid, take your pick) gravestone commentary, then you may be recalling this series. It died with a poor Gauntlet-reskin style reboot after the second game, but this is well worth it and also provides for easy multiplayer. Indeed, the fact the PS3 multiplayer is so easy to do on the PS3 and earlier consoles remains a huge selling point for these games. So nice not to have to go log in to an account for my son so some online entity can track our data just so we can play a game on the big screen. I snagged Sacred 2 for about $15 on Ebay but you can get it on PC easily enough, probably for very cheap, too.

Star Trek: so I actually played this game on PC when it came out, but I found a cheap copy of the PS3 edition for $8 at a local shop. It's set after the 2009 Star Trek Kelvin Universe reboot film, but is a surprisingly fun game, designed for two players on a splitscreen to play (you can also play solo). My son and I have almost finished it (it's a bit short, about 6 hours), but its key worthy traits include a fun combat system, lots of Trekky puzzle bits, and a really neat take on the Gorn that makes them look like real aliens and not giant paper-mache Halloween costumes. 

I've had a lot of fun collecting on the PS2 as well, and I've owned a PS Vita for years....but more on those later! Especially the poor PS2, which I have one or two more things I can try to fix it before I give up and seek out a replacement.