ColecoVision: A Six-Year-Old Girl's Dream Come True!
Written: Jun 18 '02 (Updated Jun 18 '02)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Great graphics, powerful console, good games.
Cons: Sometimes difficult controller, pricey in 1982.
The Bottom Line: State of the art in 1982, the ColecoVision defined and set the benchmark for systems to come following the crash in 1984. Oh yeah...remember Donkey Kong?
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| lambchops's Full Review: Colecovision |
I was the coolest 6-year-old on the block. A few of my friends had Atari 2600 consoles. A few others had the now forgotten Mattel Intellivision. I however had the uber-cool ColecoVision to call my own.
I remember the day I got it very clearly. I had just returned from a very serious surgery yet I refused to sit down despite the umpteen million ugly stitches that crisscrossed my belly and doctors order. My parents decided the best way to calm me was to buy me a video game system. It didn’t hurt that my father also had an interest in the ColecoVision (manufactured by Coleco), and insisted that the system would improve my young eye hand coordination.
To make a long story short, the family made a trip to Toys ‘R’ Us during late summer 1982 (likely August) and after a little research settled on the system in question. The console came equipped with Donkey Kong. Over the next few months other games like Zaxxon, Turbo (including the revolutionary $55 expansion that included a steering wheel, shifter and gas pedal), Ladybug, Smurfs Rescue in Gargamel’s Castle, Cabbage Patch Kids Adventure in the Park, and a few others entered my small collection.
At the time my family bought the ColecoVision, it cost a small fortune at $175. The price, in actuality was $75 more than the popular albeit lower quality Atari console. The graphics were in fact very impressive in comparison to some of the competition consoles. Coleco touted claims of arcade quality play and many of the titles were in actuality based on overlooked coin operated games. The system fortunately lived up to the advertised claims. ColecoVision, introduced that same month it was purchased for me, ended up being extremely successful selling over six million units in the brief two years it was sold in stores.
The ColecoVision was great fun. As with most systems, some of the games were more difficult than others. Zaxxon and Smurfs were relatively simple while Cabbage Patch Kids and Ladybug both posed a challenge. My father had a great time with his Turbo cartridge. In all, over 170 games were released for play on the ColecoVision…and more promises went unmet. Considering the add-on system that worked with existing Atari games, the console played the most cartridges of any on the market at the time. Other popular titles available on system included: Q*Bert, Pitfall!, Mouse Trap, Jumpman Junior, Centipede, and Spy Hunter.
The most powerful system on the market in 1982 through 1984, the system specs on the ColecoVision are laughable by today’s standard. Here they are in all their modest glory:
Speed: 3.58 MHz
Bits: 8 bit
RAM: 8K
Video RAM: 16K
Colors: 16
Resolution: 256 x 192
Sound: 3 channel
Despite these now extremely modest specs, the system was in fact more powerful than the Atari 2600 that boasted 1.17 MHz of speed and 128 bytes of RAM. Atari later released the 5200 that was slow to catch on, but had more RAM (not a faster professor) before the great video game crash of 1984. The Intellivision ran at 894.886KHz and had just 224 bytes of RAM. Obviously, no competition hardware wise for the seemingly hulkish ColecoVision. The later Nintendo Entertainment System (released in the wake of the aforementioned crash) had a higher resolution, the same number of colors, only 1.79MHz of speed, and just 2K of RAM when compared to my older system.
I loved my ColecoVision when I was a child. My friends drooled over it and my parents were satisfied with their at the time pricey purchase. My modest game collection lasted my entire childhood and the console would probably still work if I were to hook it up these twenty years since it’s original purchase although if memory serves the Turbo add-on died somewhere toward the late 1980’s. As I’ve already mentioned, graphics were better than anything else and the specs and comparisons (regardless of how dated) still speak for themselves. The only complaint I have about the ColecoVision was the controller. It wasn’t particularly comfortable to use and my little girl fingers ended up with blisters. The inside of my thumb was also usually cramped and blistered. The keypad on both controllers was very different than other consoles and useful when choosing players and scenarios and helped to expedite the paddle controls common to the Atari.
If it were still the early 1980’s I would both rave and suggest the ColecoVision to gamers. Alas…it’s 2002 and video game systems have far surpassed those of twenty years ago. With that said, don’t run to Ebay to pick up the old console unless you are a collector or for whatever reason particularly interested in the system. If you yearn for your childhood it’s easy to download Emulators and ROMs of the ColecoVision and accompanying games. This is legal as a result of the company being all but defunct.
For some great resources check out:
http://www.classicgaming.com/museum/colecovision/ (for downloads – the vault, also history and stats)
http://www.colecovision.com (for history, links, message board, and more)
http://ecoleco.com/ (for sales, parts, and service)
1982 Rating: 5/5 stars
2002 Rating: 4/5 stars
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
lambchops
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Member: Shelly T.
Location: Metro Detroit, Michigan
Reviews written: 1172
Trusted by: 841 members
About Me:
Bye-bye CL hat. Hopefully I'll write some new reviews some time soon!
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