* Disclaimer notice. Guys! This is my own personal list of games that I’ve played and enjoyed and come back to the most. If you don’t agree. I’d love to hear your thoughts or watch your video.
I would further suggest Tapper, Antarctic Adventure, Space Panic, Carnival, Beamrider Oil's Well, Popeye, Q*Bert (you featured Q*Bert's Qubes), Rock'n'Rope, Venture, Beamrider, Gateway to Apshai, Keystone Kapers, Montezuma's Revenge, and Space Fury. Don't forget to try some homebrews such as the absoutelly incredible Mario Bros. Last you may want to consider going the extra length to uy an ADAM, so that you can play super cassette titles.
@@MagesGuild Thanks for this, so many great games in your list, shocking how great this console is. I did buy one, but had nothing but trouble with it, so I’ve just bought the ColecoVision Phoenix which pretty much will play everything I throw at it, so really looking forward to it.
@@ClassicReplay What sorts of issues did it have? I am pretty sure that the Phoenix does not support the SGM but I may be wrong. The ColecoVision is not a terribly complex system, so I may e able to aid you in repairing your original. atariage.com/forums/forum/117-opcode-games/ colecovision.dk/sem.htm?refreshed for more information on that.
I got one as a kid when they first came out and I lived in Amsterdam NY where the Coleco factory was based, my sister worked there at the time and was able to get me tons of games. I remember her getting cartridges that didn’t have it’s casing yet and was just the circuit board still but they still worked. It was awesome. It was so much better than Atari. Tons of childhood memories with the ColecoVision.
There was something magical about this console for those of us old enough to have experienced it back in the day. The combination of the era, the aesthetics and its obvious superiority over the available competition made it special.
Always wanted a ColecoVision when I was growing up. Had one friend that had it. Made him show my the Smurfs game. Hey I was into Saturday Morning Cartoons in the late 70s and early 80. Great video. Cheers!
We had this console and it was a blast! I loved Dig Dug, Mousetrap, and Smurf Rescue. Was telling my 8 yr old how far gaming has come and wanted to show him the games I played. Brought back some great memories. Thanks!!
My friends and I all had Coleco's back in the day. Our parents coordinated game purchases so we could lend games to each other. It was an amazing system for the time.
I had a Colecovision back then. Everyone I knew had an Atari 2600. I remember getting a Colecovision for Christmas with my brother back in 1982. It looked like magic on that fuzzy CRT screen.
You and I are the same age, and I do remember when my brother and I got the ColecoVision. It was so amazing. Our only issue was that borrowing games was more challenging, because I only knew one other kid who had it. Quite a few years ago I snatched up a console, bunch of games, joystick controllers, etc to give to my brother for Christmas. Brought back a bit of the old days!
This was my first ever games console. I loved it so much. It's still in my loft somewhere. Seems your list is missing Venture though, that was a great game.
All the games were good in their own special way, and bring back a TON of favorable childhood memories. I was just happy to get something new when I was a kid... Loved Activision's HERO. Thank you for this!
Hero just works, I don’t know how, but the formula never tires on me. You can just pick up and play in an instant. The Atari version with its limited graphics plays a blinder as well. But yes, all the games had there own charm, but the quality of arcade conversions is off the chart on the ColecoVision. The games might not always look the same, but they play the same and sometimes because of the absence on not needing coin after coin, flow better and play in a more balanced way.
I had a Colecovision console back in the day. It was far superior to units like Atari and Intellivision. Graphics and sound were excellent. At the time, it was hard to imagine how anything could get any better. My son and I would spend countless hours playing all the machines. Apart from playing games, we enjoyed going to various stores that carried game cartridges to pick up the next new game. We had a mountain of games. Lots of fun.
So, I grew up with the 2600 and then the C64. I was always jealous of the Colecovision owners collections, and now I finally have one on the way from eBay. Hearing you say you wish you had one back in the day sums up my past 40 years lol. Cannot wait until Monday arrives. Great game choices and observations.
I wish you all the best, especially with all the available homebrew. Since you grew up on Atari, let me recommend your next watch ☺️ Atari 2600 ua-cam.com/video/Pm0j78U3Bag/v-deo.html
Love it! My parents got my brother, sister and me a Colecovision for Christmas in 1982. A year later we got Turbo. It was the best home system by a mile back then. I play some of the games with my kids today on our Raspberry Pi. I remember my sister got straight As and it was her birthday so she convinced our mother to buy her Zaxxon in the spring of 1983. We bought it of all places at a local video rental store for $40. I remember as my mother paid she turned to my sister and me and said, "This is a lot of money. You better play this game a lot." Ha!
@@ClassicReplay I still remember setting up the Turbo steering wheel with the gas pedal and how you used your joystick to shift - it was a driver's prep class for me. Zaxxon was billed as the first 3D, or 3D-like game. The big mistake I made was for my 8th birthday I asked for the Atari adapter. That way I could borrow titles from my friends who only had Atari systems at home, or they could bring games over on play dates. Once I did that my mother realized Atari games were half the price of Colecovision and soon for Christmas and birthdays we pretty much only got Atari 2600 games. I wound up with the Atari versions of Q-Bert and Frogger. Sigh... Rather than 20 Atari games I'd have preferred 10 more from Coleco.
@@ClassicReplay True, having Turbo was amazing. Another favorite of mine that isn't on your list was Mr. Do! I even liked the music on that one during gameplay. Miner 2049er was another fun one, and was the last game we ever got for Coleco or the Atari adapter before the market crapped out for a few years and before Nintendo swooped in and revitalized it.
I’ve done two other ColecoVision vids, this is the follow in to the one you’ve already watched 😉 ColecoVision | The PlayStation of the 80s ua-cam.com/video/-jjcI0_536Y/v-deo.html
I had a ColecoVision as well. It was my first console. I don't recall the logo on the front of the machine saying "CBS" though. I had the super action controllers as well...I believe there was a game pack where it came with 2 super action controllers, as well as Baseball and Football. There were plastic overlays that went on the key-pad of those as well, which had the layout of the baseball diamond, etc. And, the faster you could spin the wheel on the super action controller, the faster your player would run. I'm pretty sure Jumpman Jr. was where "rage quitting" was born. Either that or Pepper II. Once you got up to a high enough level, it became darn near impossible. I had those games I mentioned already, along with Space Panic, Zaxxon, Donkey Kong, Smurfs, Burger Time, Q-Bert, Pitstop, Venture, and Time Pilot. Thanks for the fun video!
Thanks for sharing. I owned one back in the day and now have some of these games loaded on my custom arcade. Some of the games are indeed better than their original arcade version
Zaxxon was my personal favorite. I was one of the spoiled kids. I had the atari and coleco at my house...the intellivision at my grandma's. The Coleco was head and shoulders my favorite. Time Pilot was another great game. 👍 Love your video!
Loved my coleco very much. Mr do, mr do’s castle, Congo Bongo, had the baseball with the special controllers, time pilot is also so classic. Was great because I had the adapter and could play all my 2600 games on it as well.
I had a home-made wheeled rack with an Atari 2600, an Intellivision and a ColecoVision stacked on it back in 1983, but the ColecoVision got the most use. I would play Zaxxon for hours and never did get very good at it. Sold my ColecoVision and games for $200 on eBay and moved on to PC Gaming, but I still miss my ColecoVision.
I bought the Colecovision back in 1985 with a few games from this list. Donkey Kong, Zaxxon, Burger Time, Q-Bert and Pepper II were my favorites. I had completely forgotten about Pepper II, lots of joy seeing it here.
It's a great system, must have been an amazing system to own back in 1985, good quality arcade conversions. Pepper 2 just does everything right, keeps it simple and plays really well even today. Thanks for watching ;-)
Had a Colecovision as a kid. It was our first console and was so excited to have after years of being jealous of my friends and their Atari or Intellivision. Top two games were Zaxxon and Ladybug. On Ladybug, the later levels got LIGHTNING fast. You had the ability to flip the doors and sort of trap yourself safely just to catch your breath and get the cramps out of your hands. Still to this day my absolute favorite home console game of all time.
I saved up my allowance for months to get my hands on Q*Bert. Fought with my little brother over top scores all the time with LadyBug, Zaxxon and we used to have to cry to Mom when sister was hogging the console with Carnival. Reading through the comments and seeing Smurf: Rescue in Gargamel's Castle reminded me that at the end of the level and if you timed your jump just right to get to Smurfette, your Smurf guy would pause looking like he had a little weenie. Thank you for this video and bringing back all these memories, I should go dig it out as I still have it somewhere.
Mi primera maquina tambien fue el amstrad cpc en 1988, pero mi vecino tubo un par de años antes un clon de la atari 2600 y no se parecia a esto en nada. Es increible que en esos primeros 80s hubiera una maquina con esas excelentes conversiones de arcades. La de monedas que hubiera ahorrado si hubiera crecido yo con esto,jajaja. Great video. Thanks so much, my friend.
Where is Venture??!! Loved that game!!! The green "wow-wow" man (as my sister and I called him) scared the crap out of us though when he appeared on the screen! LOL!
My friend Jimmy had a Colecovision, we only had the commodore 64 back in the old days. My favorite at that time was the one medieval era type games that you could choose the sort of weapon you'd use to try to outcombat your opponent with; was like a prototype of the mortalkombat types of games. I can't recall what the title was. People have reminded me numerous times and I keep forgetting the title.
@@ClassicReplay Aw yea! There's lots of games that are on multiple different systems and platforms. Thanks for having this neat channel, I will get to watching more
I'm delighted to hear that the Colecovision can impress a new player so many years on. As you know, many of the games let you play at level 1,2,3,4 (4 being the hardest). You might not think it from the title, but a game you should try is Smurf Adventures, especially on level 4. That plus a sequel to Frogger called "Frogger 2 Threedeep"
Yes, I’m not sure technically if this is a great console or not, when compared with others, but the programming of games feels masterful, you can tell the majority of games were carefully crafted and as I’ve mentioned before, it feels like an arcade machine in the home. I’m just sad I didn’t own one back in the day 😢
I owned a Coleco Vision console back in the day. I got it after it was popular. I can't remember the exact year, but it must have been around 1985/86. I got it from Woolworths for £29.99 and it came bundled with Donkey Kong. Once I bought it, I was bragging about it at school and one of my mates said ' I've got 'Zaxxon' cartridge for that, so I managed to buy it off him for £5. Both 'Donkey Kong' and 'Zaxxon' were near-perfect ports of the arcade originals. I also had a game called 'Pepper 2' which was a weird game where you had to do zips up around squares on the screen. It was weird, but very addictive!. Great console, it could well be still up the loft at my mums! gonna go round tomorrow and have a search for it.
You are right, as a young teen when this was released, I can tell you, ColecoVision would be the Equivalent to XBOX ONE / SERIES X/S! It was incredible system.
I owed this system back in the day. it was amazing! I had several of the games you reviewed, too. Watching this makes me want to re-buy it on eBay :) Thanks for sharing, this was a fun trip down memory lane!
I had an uncle who got a Colecovision when it came out. When my family was visiting his house I got to play it for a week. He nearly bought all the games and peripherals for it. I was blessed to be able to play Front Line with the Super Action controller. It was an amazing experience. Front Line was like a primitive version of Icari Warriors. I think the game required the Super Action controller which made playing this game a rare experience. The four action buttons on the grip of the controller changed the direction of where you fire.
Definitely agree with your number 1: _Turbo_ Great memories. A couple years ago, I checked to see what it take to play Turbo, like when I was a young kid. Like $450, for a working Coleco system with controllers, working steering wheel with pedal and the Turbo game itself, all used on Ebay. LOL Unfortunately, had to settle for the nostalgia in my head and $450 still in my bank account.
Unfortunately you can only play it with a wheel. Even emulation struggles to correctly emulate the steering wheel. I was lucky enough to play Turbo at a retro event back in 2018, played it for at least an hour. They really should have built in controller support. These days I play the arcade original, with spinner or trackball and it works a treat. Happy days though and thanks for watching.
There was another console called “Odyssey” you should look in to. Their big game was “Q-Bert”. I can’t put a year on the when the consule came out, believe there was also an Odyssey 2.
I'm almost 49 years old now and a stroke and cardiac arrest survivor and had a 2600 system when my brother Chris and I were kids, remember that my cousin Paul had this system it was great
@@ClassicReplay thank you I guess only 49 years LoL I was called a blue baby, was born with a whole in my heart. But really appreciate the good Cheer. Be safe wherever you are in this crazy world
Awesome video I had most of the games this was my first video game console and this brings back memories and makes me want to get one now ! 😂thanks for the video
Galaxian was my favourite space shooter arcade at the time, with Galaga a close second. If only I’d known I could have had an arcade perfect conversion to play at home. I had an Atari VCS, which I loved, but damn the Coleco looks amazing!
The Qbert version i had on my Colecovision look nothing like the one in your video... Its was way better. Mr Do was another great game on the Colecovision , which was hand down the best console of its time. Great memories !
@@mikaelvilhelmsson1484 I think you meant to write that the game in this video presented as Q*Bert is actually Q*Bert Qubes so (s)he actually had the original Q*Bert.
@Classic Replay I'm afraid my answer will probably be a bit lame for you, but I was a bit too young to experience the Colecovision in person. How I did experience these games however was that in the late 90's there were a lot of "X in one" cartridges for the Gameboy Color of questionable origin that would contain usually 100+ older games from other systems, and then maybe 1 or 2 current games or ROM hacks. I experienced many of these through that and still recognise them. Gyruss definitely left an impression on me with how different the approach was with the cylindrical movement axis, and also the sense of inertia in Defender. And now coming full circle I've been looking at hardware that mimics the Gameboy and can emulate Colecovision, so was looking at what my options were! Love the enthusiasm in your videos, though. It's clear they left a strong impression on you and blew you away at the time. I can certainly at least relate to that, going from Gameboy graphics, to 3d to the ray-tracing we now have on the latest games. Things have plateaued a little lately, but the fundamental advancements we were seeing back then quite frequently were mind-blowing!
ive hoovered around the edge of retro gaming for years. im that kid at school that was into PCs before anyone. im that guy. The coleco graphics at the start of this video - that was my childhood. Ive rarely seen the versions of games i played, in vids - ive just realised i must have had a coleco vision, or the arcade galleries around me were coleco - coz coleco is what i need to setup as a retro gaming setup. ive started to build a retro game machine a few times but given up as the software seems to be clunky but the realisation im team coleco means i need to honour it and build a coleco setup.
@@josephfrank1472 don't you have to have the plastic controler overlay to play the game to tell what buttons to press to open doors?.....i remember this....
I got ColecoVision for Christmas when I was 13. It blew away the other systems at that time. Seeing Zaxxon brought back a few memories. The memory is a bit hazy, but I seem to remember flipping that game over a few times, but then I seem to recall it would get to a point where you'd go so far the screen would freeze.
I’m so jelly, I’d have loved one of these as a kid. Arcade in the home. I get home from work and the second I’ve got an ounce of free time (very rare) I play on my Collectorvision Phoenix
@@ClassicReplay Not to make you even more jealous, but I remember getting Turbo with the steering wheel and pedal, and a different controller that's a bit difficult to explain. You held with one hand and there were buttons for each finger, and you'd use your other hand to control the joystick on top. Yeah, good times.
@@ClassicReplay I stupidly throw it and the games away years ago. The boxes in which they were stored were mistakenly kept in a shed in the backyard. Years later, I found them and realized the heat had done quite some damage. It wasn't easy to toss, and I should have kept it despite its condition.
My next door neighbors had a Colecovision. The game crash hit not long after unfortunately. It was the best thing out there for gaming next to home computers. A few of my friends and myself had C64, Atari 800/xl, and TI994a and I can easily say Colecovision held up really well. Where Atari 5200 failed miserably Colecovision succeeded. Everything was about comparing Donkey Kong ports back then. And Colecovision had a really good Donkey Kong port. My TI994a had all 4 levels but the Colecovision had animation on the part of the gorilla and really good arcade quality like everything else they did. Zaxxon was a really big deal back then also. It looked and played well on this system. Did not know it had Q*Bert's Quebes on it.
Massively underrated system that should have been a world beater in sales. Fantastic arcade conversions. It must have been like having your very own arcade in the home 🏡
I had a ColecoVision in the early 80s and still have one in my collection. It was ridiculously better than any other console available at the time and is still my favorite retro console to play today. The only drawback was not nearly as many games were released as other consoles like the 2600. Unfortunately the NES came out after a couple years and obsoleted ColecoVision.
@@ClassicReplay Great version, one of the best Atari 2600 games! It is true that there are versions that don't play the same, for example the Atari 5200 version plays much worse. However, the Coleco version plays practically the same, play it for a while and you will see that it is also very pleasant to play.
No doubt, but I’m flawed with nostalgia 😉 The C64 version looks a mess, but plays great and the Atari 800xl from memory plays good as well. Same for Amstrad
By the way, two tips for Donkey Kong on Coleco. One, tap twice up or down to climb the ladders at twice the speed. Two, on the first screen, go to the half ladder, go up, go down, take two steps left (I think), and jump right- you will fall through the floor and after a few second land next to Pauline and Donkey Kong. I got these from a gaming magazine I read at the time. The scene skip is kind of pointless except for the novelty of it, but the double speed ladder climb is really useful.
Colecovision is what I had at the arcades back in the time (they were rented by time). I remember playing a LOT of Jumpman Junior (called Jumpin' Jack Flash in america?) and River Raid
Both Q*Bert games were released for this console, and would probably make a top-6 list of my personal favourites, otherwise my list would include Jumpman Jr; Ladybug;; Gyruss & Mr. Do! There is a prototype Atari Pac-Man game for this system, it plays great too
Tengen released Ms. Pac-Man for several systems including: Megadrive, SNES, and possibly NES but nothing for Coleco. I haven't seen Mr. Do! for NES before but I have played it for SNES, which is a near arcade perfect port.
thx 4 your compilation, Zaxxon does look incredible, I got my C64 in december 1984, so I missed out on Colecovision, but I remember one friend who showed me some games on his colecovision (?) durin' the summer holidays of 83(?), and i kinda felt jealous.
To this day I still can't believe this was a pre-nes console. You would never think it came out in 1982. I think many of the arcade ports like Q-Bert, Frogger, Centipede and Galaxian almost look better than the arcade machines...
I have to agree, it’s as though they built the perfect console, but nobody realised until it was too late. I played a few games this evening and came away once again shaking my head in disbelief as to how good this console and the games are. I’ve said it already, owning this console on release with a handful of games would have been like unleashing the arcade in the home.
My cousin and I had the Coleco Vision as kids and my other cousin had the Intellivision. I had the Atari adapter and Super-Action Controllers. My cousin had the Steering Wheel and Roller Controller. I recall the advertisements said “experience the arcade at home”. I’ve read articles since about how they acquired the rights to Donkey Kong (the president said he wouldn’t come back without the rights but Nintendo said here’s the deal, take it or leave it- he took it). The Coleco Vision probably would have survived the video game crash of 1983 and dominated if not for how buggy their Adam computer was. Technically Intellivision survived, but Mattel dumped it and an employee took it, but they seemed to focus on NES games and compilations of their old games. Meanwhile Nintendo forayed with their own console and asked Atari if they would be the international distributor outside of Japan- Atari declined- and Nintendo took a chance and dove fully in. And thus the old era ended. I do miss it a little. Atari, Coleco, and Intellivision were a blast for the time.
I had a colecovision back in the day. Still have it actually. One thing you are missing is how annoying the controllers were. The games play a lot better under emulation as you can use a decent d-pad controller, a keyboard, etc.
100% agree! This is the one thing that concerns me about the ColecoVision. I’ve been looking into it, but thank goodness you can use other standard joysticks or even a Sega Megadrive game pad. I’ve read that you still might need the original controller plugged in for certain key config or key presses, but that for me is a fabulous design decision to allow for the use of standard d-pin joysticks. I very rarely use the joystick that comes with a console anyway, for instance my GX4000 bundled pads never see the light of day over my Master System pad or Cheetah Joystick 🕹
I had a Colecovision in the '80s and it was far superior to Atari and any other systems out at the time. I loved Q-Bert and glad to see it on your list! I still remember when we got the steering wheel module and Turbo, that was almost an unbelievable experience back then. A couple other games that I really enjoyed were Mousetrap and Venture, and I still remember how my sister would scream when the Hallmonster (which we called Vroom-Vroom) entered one of the rooms when you took too long to pick up the treasure.
I have always wanted to try that steering wheel module! It looks so amazing. I've honestly wondered, with emulation, if it could be used for driving games on other systems. Shit, it looks so awesome, I would use it on an X Box / Playstation with modern titles if I was able.
Hey welcome to the Colecovision fanbase, or whatever it is. It has always been my personal favorite Pre-NES console! Likely because of my nostalgia receiving it and several games the Christmas it was released and truly feeling like I had the arcade experience at home. Also, I like that they got a lot of the odd or quirky titles that were not grabbed up by competitors so their are some good classic arcade titles that never really appeared elsewhere. To this day my favorite game on it is Mr.Do!
I’m well jelly! I’d have loved to have owned this console back in the 80s - Can’t believe how much I missed out with this one. If only their marketing would have been SEGA or Nintendo quality I might have picked one up. I always thought it a poor man’s Atari until now. Mr Do! Is great, but as mentioned there’s so much quality, I couldn’t fit everything in. Thanks for your kind words 👍🏻
@@ClassicReplay Hey no problem. Of course it really is amazing to think it was also expandable with those add-on modules, crazy today to think of any gaming console allowing you to play a competitors games with an add-on! I started my channel early on in 2008 ONLY because I was so excited kicking off my new retro collecting hobby and I wanted to share my first pick up of BOXED Super Action Controllers ! Literally the first thing I got because I was looking forward to getting another ColecoVision, it was a low quality shot video shot with a potato but I didn't care because I was sharing my ColecoVision excitement. Later as my channel grew I would be BLOWN AWAY by a kind and generous donation a subscriber sent (I do not monetize and have never asked for anything) honestly when the person offered I really didn't expect anything to turn up, that kind of thing only happened to the big channels I thought but turn up it did and even looking back with my wife filming you can see how excited and utterly amazed I was to see the contents including a BOXED VCS 2600 expansion module, a Sensor Touch ColecoVision compatible controller and more. 😮I rarely do videos these days as I don't collect anymore due to circumstances, I cannot justify it with little money and no room these days as my entire collection resides in boxes in storage, behind the couch etc but eh, I certainly had my fun over the years, amassed and nice collection met many incredible, fun and generous people from around the globe. So just keep doing what you do and have fun! I shared your video in my videogame Facebook group FYI. I am amazed the quality of your videos especially compared to mine is excellent, you deserve far more subs imho.
mine too was Mr Do ...looked just like the nes game did but the monsters did not eat the apples or turn into apples oh i wanted mr do's castle but never got it this was the only console that had that game besides computer i think.
the colecovision version graphicswise was almost as good.....mr doo's castle was only on colecovison and atari systems and some computers & never was made again
I had the Adam which was the computer version of the Coleco vision. Buck Rogers and Rocky Boxing were my favorites. Wish I still had that and my Intellivision.
@@ClassicReplay I was pretty young at the time, so I don't remember much about the computer part, but I mostly used it for games. I played Buck Rogers non stop. I remember my Dad bought it at a store called Zayre's. It was on clearance for I think $599. Which was a lot back then! I remember getting the steering wheel and gas pedal and playing Turbo. Also those goofy controllers you stuck your hand in with the 4 different color buttons. I played Baseball and Rocky a lot also! Good times!
@@ClassicReplay Yeah well I must admit, Zaxxon I was in love with! Turbo was like a racing game that only the Gods could produce and Donkey Kong I played till my hands literally had calluses. I saved for 25 school days to buy Zaxxon, my Mother gave me $2 a day here in Australia for lunch so I went those 25 days without lunch to buy Zaxxon, the game cost $50 AU over here. And actually no, Donkey Kong was a separate Cartridge, not a single game at all was built into the Coleco it was standalone Cartridges. My brother who was 4 and half years older than me bought the Coleco (He's 51 now) and I'm 46 as I think you also mentioned you're the same age in this video, so cool 😎😎 Oddly enough my next system was the Atari 2600 (a downgrade) then the C64, Amiga 500, Amiga 1200 and then PC. Anyway, enough of my waffle brother, you've gained a sub from me. Great video ✊✊✊
@@ClassicReplay Forgot to mention as well, when we first got our Coleco, both Donkey Kong and Turbo were bundled with it, but we had to buy the Steering Wheel setup for Turbo separately.
@@perihelion7445 honestly, it’s great to hear these stories. Shocking how you went back to a 2600, but from then on you smashed it with pretty much the best system from each generation. I think we all have that one system or game we love the most, I have so many fantastic memories of my first computer. Zaxxon is a work of art on the ColecoVision as is Turbo. How did the steering wheel perform, I’m thinking of getting one for Turbo and Pole Position 👍🏻
I remember when my parents asked my sister and I which console we wanted for Christmas, the Atari or the Colecovision. We both said Colecovision because it looked better. We played our Colecovision so much we burned the thing out and our dad had to get us a replacement. 😆 Fun fact: Coleco made an expansion module that allowed you to play Atari 2600 games, which obviously didn't sit well with Atari. They took Coleco to court and eventually entered an agreement where Atari would licence out some of their games to Coleco. So that's why there's Atari games on the Colecovision.
The "big black brick" that regulated the power supply to the console was probably good for its day, but was quite terrible. As you say, it got INCREDIBLY hot. So much so that, as you pointed out, where the power connection sat on the main circuit board actually melted the soldered connection! Thankfully, my dad was an electrical engineer, so when my Coleco stopped working, he took it apart. He noticed the weak solder joint at the power supply, redid that solder joint much stronger ... and my coleco was back in business!! It would still fail about once a year and we'd have to re-solder it, but we kept it up and running for a long time. ;)
I remember driving to sears just to see the Colecovision & 2600 new game demos at that time there wasn't any mall or video games stores in my area at that time. I was a young adult.
Solid list. Get a super action controller and Rocky. I hated Zaxxon in the arcade. Fell in love with it on the Coleco! Should also try Montezuma's Revenge, came out in I believe 84. Very fun game, feels like the spiritual sequel to Pitfall! I also hated the Smurfs but loved "Smurf: Rescue in Gargamel's Castle". This was a system that was light years ahead of its time.
Here’s the problem, I’ve not played a bad game on the ColecoVision from memory. Compiling a list of best games is ridiculous, can’t be done without upsetting someone 😉
You completely forgot Miner 249’er, which was THE best, most fun, most original, most frustrating game around. Plus I think it had around 14 completely different levels that were all very creatively done. I had a ColecoVision. My fav’s were Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr, Zaxxon, Ladybug, Popeye, Artillery Duel, but Miner 249er was tops. I also loved Slither, the game that came with the Roller Ball controller, and Centipede and Milapead
Steady on mate, I’m massively new to the ColecoVision. I didn’t forget, I only know what I know 🤣 So far it has been a wonderful discovery for me. Check out my other ColecoVision video on the best new homebrew games 👍
With Bump and Jump if you get up lot of speed you could jump over to the far right and go off the screen. At end of run it would appear and drive over the landscape to the end.
Hey ya I had the Colecovision and it was amazing and when all my friends got to play it they knew there consoles were junk..This was a good list but I would have like to have seen Choplifter on it ….Slither want bad also Mr do was huge and Mouse 🐁 Trap ….Maybe we need a top 40 list..😅
I was the only one in the neighborhood to have one,lots of good games and memories,also I had the expansion module that played Atari games,as well as the super action joysticks
Never seen the CV Tutankhamen before.... wow. It actually looks like an egypitan tomb of sorts. the 2600 version, i had no idea what i was doing or looking at.
We never had a Atari 2600 and my best friend down the street got this system the first day it was released back in 1982 and his dad bought the steering wheel and sports controllers that were great for baseball and Rocky. We unfortunately got the Atari 5200 and had a ton of games but the damn controllers just broke after about three months of use. About a year later in 1984 we got a coleco vision with 25 games and two sports controllers. I still have it and should break it out. Then 1985 happened and Nintendo was the new great thing. I never got one of those but I gravitated towards the Sega Master system I still have and I do have a Nintendo that I got about 15 years ago still works and such great times growing up in the 80s playing coleco vision. I never forget when my dad went to buy the new Atari 5200 I was telling him to get the coleco vision and he would listen to me I was only 9 but I knew the coleco vision was better but he thought the 5200 because it was newer and more expensive was the machine to get. After about three months of that damn machine and horrible controllers breaking it went into the closet. That thing was huge 😆 the power supply was like a brick and it got hot. The rf switch was godawful too. Just horrible setup.
OMG! The 5200 looks horrendous, I've purposly steered clear of it for as long as I can remember, that was a right cock up from Atari. The Atari 7800 was a fabulous little console though. I'm so jelly you managed to secure a Colecovison in 1984, especially with 25 games, that's amazing. I can't imagine switching to any other console if I'd have owned a Colecovision back then, probably would have waited until the Sega Megadrive or SNES came along, as personally, unless the games dried up, I'd have been more than happy with a colecovision. I think the NES and the MasterSystem were great consoles, I own both today and play a lot of their games on real hardware and emulation, but I can't quite put my finger on it, I still enjoy the colecovision just as much.
@@Peatmoss0979 I’ve just purchased the CollectorVision Phoenix Video Game System, well chuffed 👍🏻 collectorvision.com/shop/colecovision/collectorvision-phoenix/
* Disclaimer notice. Guys! This is my own personal list of games that I’ve played and enjoyed and come back to the most. If you don’t agree. I’d love to hear your thoughts or watch your video.
I would further suggest Tapper, Antarctic Adventure, Space Panic, Carnival, Beamrider Oil's Well, Popeye, Q*Bert (you featured Q*Bert's Qubes), Rock'n'Rope, Venture, Beamrider, Gateway to Apshai, Keystone Kapers, Montezuma's Revenge, and Space Fury. Don't forget to try some homebrews such as the absoutelly incredible Mario Bros.
Last you may want to consider going the extra length to uy an ADAM, so that you can play super cassette titles.
@@MagesGuild Thanks for this, so many great games in your list, shocking how great this console is. I did buy one, but had nothing but trouble with it, so I’ve just bought the ColecoVision Phoenix which pretty much will play everything I throw at it, so really looking forward to it.
@@ClassicReplay What sorts of issues did it have? I am pretty sure that the Phoenix does not support the SGM but I may be wrong. The ColecoVision is not a terribly complex system, so I may e able to aid you in repairing your original.
atariage.com/forums/forum/117-opcode-games/
colecovision.dk/sem.htm?refreshed for more information on that.
Time Pilot & Cosmic Avenger!
@@MagesGuild no video signal and wavy lines
I got one as a kid when they first came out and I lived in Amsterdam NY where the Coleco factory was based, my sister worked there at the time and was able to get me tons of games. I remember her getting cartridges that didn’t have it’s casing yet and was just the circuit board still but they still worked. It was awesome. It was so much better than Atari. Tons of childhood memories with the ColecoVision.
Lucky so and so 🤣
Wow lucky you were! We in Germany Had to buy cartridge for about 130 bucks😮....anyway...Magic times
Best 8-bit system of that generation...an arcade port king.
100% all day
I thought it was 4 bits
@tsitracommunications2884 definitely 8bit 👍🏻
There was something magical about this console for those of us old enough to have experienced it back in the day. The combination of the era, the aesthetics and its obvious superiority over the available competition made it special.
Exactly how I feel, every word 👍
There are no words that can describe how much I always loved this console. The look of it alone is absolutely insane and second to absolutely none.
100% 👍🏻
Always wanted a ColecoVision when I was growing up. Had one friend that had it. Made him show my the Smurfs game. Hey I was into Saturday Morning Cartoons in the late 70s and early 80. Great video. Cheers!
We had this console and it was a blast! I loved Dig Dug, Mousetrap, and Smurf Rescue. Was telling my 8 yr old how far gaming has come and wanted to show him the games I played. Brought back some great memories. Thanks!!
That’s lovely to hear, it’s a great kid friendly system to start your eight year old on 👍🏻
My friends and I all had Coleco's back in the day. Our parents coordinated game purchases so we could lend games to each other. It was an amazing system for the time.
I’m well jelly! Very lucky
in 83, having a Coleco was every kids dream in NA. Crazy part is, the Japanese we're already on the Famicom that year.
Lucky you, here in Austria the ColecoVision was super expensive...so I ended up with a crappy 2600.......and hated it.
I had a Colecovision back then. Everyone I knew had an Atari 2600. I remember getting a Colecovision for Christmas with my brother back in 1982. It looked like magic on that fuzzy CRT screen.
You and I are the same age, and I do remember when my brother and I got the ColecoVision. It was so amazing. Our only issue was that borrowing games was more challenging, because I only knew one other kid who had it. Quite a few years ago I snatched up a console, bunch of games, joystick controllers, etc to give to my brother for Christmas. Brought back a bit of the old days!
This was my first ever games console. I loved it so much. It's still in my loft somewhere.
Seems your list is missing Venture though, that was a great game.
I'll check it out! Thanks
All the games were good in their own special way, and bring back a TON of favorable childhood memories. I was just happy to get something new when I was a kid... Loved Activision's HERO. Thank you for this!
Hero just works, I don’t know how, but the formula never tires on me. You can just pick up and play in an instant. The Atari version with its limited graphics plays a blinder as well. But yes, all the games had there own charm, but the quality of arcade conversions is off the chart on the ColecoVision. The games might not always look the same, but they play the same and sometimes because of the absence on not needing coin after coin, flow better and play in a more balanced way.
oh yeah! Loved HERO
I had a Colecovision console back in the day. It was far superior to units like Atari and Intellivision. Graphics and sound were excellent. At the time, it was hard to imagine how anything could get any better. My son and I would spend countless hours playing all the machines. Apart from playing games, we enjoyed going to various stores that carried game cartridges to pick up the next new game. We had a mountain of games. Lots of fun.
So, I grew up with the 2600 and then the C64. I was always jealous of the Colecovision owners collections, and now I finally have one on the way from eBay. Hearing you say you wish you had one back in the day sums up my past 40 years lol. Cannot wait until Monday arrives. Great game choices and observations.
I wish you all the best, especially with all the available homebrew. Since you grew up on Atari, let me recommend your next watch ☺️ Atari 2600 ua-cam.com/video/Pm0j78U3Bag/v-deo.html
@@ClassicReplay thank you! I will watch next. I subscribed and am looking forward to your videos. Take care.
These games look amazing, my memory has truly fogged up from when I played these back in the 80s. Colecovision was the best of Gen2.
Love it! My parents got my brother, sister and me a Colecovision for Christmas in 1982. A year later we got Turbo. It was the best home system by a mile back then. I play some of the games with my kids today on our Raspberry Pi.
I remember my sister got straight As and it was her birthday so she convinced our mother to buy her Zaxxon in the spring of 1983. We bought it of all places at a local video rental store for $40. I remember as my mother paid she turned to my sister and me and said, "This is a lot of money. You better play this game a lot." Ha!
Thanks for sharing, great times. Zaxxon and Turbo must have felt amazing playing them back then.
@@ClassicReplay I still remember setting up the Turbo steering wheel with the gas pedal and how you used your joystick to shift - it was a driver's prep class for me. Zaxxon was billed as the first 3D, or 3D-like game. The big mistake I made was for my 8th birthday I asked for the Atari adapter. That way I could borrow titles from my friends who only had Atari systems at home, or they could bring games over on play dates. Once I did that my mother realized Atari games were half the price of Colecovision and soon for Christmas and birthdays we pretty much only got Atari 2600 games. I wound up with the Atari versions of Q-Bert and Frogger. Sigh... Rather than 20 Atari games I'd have preferred 10 more from Coleco.
But still, you had the best of both worlds for a time and got to experience Turbo like no other.
@@ClassicReplay True, having Turbo was amazing. Another favorite of mine that isn't on your list was Mr. Do! I even liked the music on that one during gameplay. Miner 2049er was another fun one, and was the last game we ever got for Coleco or the Atari adapter before the market crapped out for a few years and before Nintendo swooped in and revitalized it.
I’ve done two other ColecoVision vids, this is the follow in to the one you’ve already watched 😉 ColecoVision | The PlayStation of the 80s
ua-cam.com/video/-jjcI0_536Y/v-deo.html
I had a ColecoVision as well. It was my first console. I don't recall the logo on the front of the machine saying "CBS" though. I had the super action controllers as well...I believe there was a game pack where it came with 2 super action controllers, as well as Baseball and Football. There were plastic overlays that went on the key-pad of those as well, which had the layout of the baseball diamond, etc. And, the faster you could spin the wheel on the super action controller, the faster your player would run. I'm pretty sure Jumpman Jr. was where "rage quitting" was born. Either that or Pepper II. Once you got up to a high enough level, it became darn near impossible. I had those games I mentioned already, along with Space Panic, Zaxxon, Donkey Kong, Smurfs, Burger Time, Q-Bert, Pitstop, Venture, and Time Pilot. Thanks for the fun video!
I couldn’t agree more, especially rage quitting in Pepper II 🤣 fantastic memories, thanks for sharing 👍🏻
Thanks for sharing. I owned one back in the day and now have some of these games loaded on my custom arcade. Some of the games are indeed better than their original arcade version
It certainly feels that way to me 😉
I had a Coleco Vision! But I’ve never seen some of these games!
Time to dust the old gal down and go back in 👍
My family had one, I remember most of these games. I enjoyed it.
Cheers my friend, please share 👍
I just discovered your channel this morning. I absolutely love it, man. A real gem.
Thank you so much! What a lovely thing to say! How did you find out about it just out of curiosity, UA-cam search, Google etc? Thx again 👍🏻
Track & Field was a great port from the arcade to the Colecovision console sound and all.
Zaxxon was my personal favorite. I was one of the spoiled kids. I had the atari and coleco at my house...the intellivision at my grandma's. The Coleco was head and shoulders my favorite. Time Pilot was another great game. 👍 Love your video!
Better to be lucky than Rich 🍀
Loved my coleco very much. Mr do, mr do’s castle, Congo Bongo, had the baseball with the special controllers, time pilot is also so classic. Was great because I had the adapter and could play all my 2600 games on it as well.
Lucky or what 🍀
I especially enjoyed hearing the voice of the late Willie Rushton. Very unexpected. Thanks, made my day!
Glad you enjoyed it
I had a home-made wheeled rack with an Atari 2600, an Intellivision and a ColecoVision stacked on it back in 1983, but the ColecoVision got the most use. I would play Zaxxon for hours and never did get very good at it. Sold my ColecoVision and games for $200 on eBay and moved on to PC Gaming, but I still miss my ColecoVision.
I bought the Colecovision back in 1985 with a few games from this list. Donkey Kong, Zaxxon, Burger Time, Q-Bert and Pepper II were my favorites. I had completely forgotten about Pepper II, lots of joy seeing it here.
It's a great system, must have been an amazing system to own back in 1985, good quality arcade conversions. Pepper 2 just does everything right, keeps it simple and plays really well even today. Thanks for watching ;-)
Had a Colecovision as a kid. It was our first console and was so excited to have after years of being jealous of my friends and their Atari or Intellivision. Top two games were Zaxxon and Ladybug. On Ladybug, the later levels got LIGHTNING fast. You had the ability to flip the doors and sort of trap yourself safely just to catch your breath and get the cramps out of your hands. Still to this day my absolute favorite home console game of all time.
I saved up my allowance for months to get my hands on Q*Bert. Fought with my little brother over top scores all the time with LadyBug, Zaxxon and we used to have to cry to Mom when sister was hogging the console with Carnival.
Reading through the comments and seeing Smurf: Rescue in Gargamel's Castle reminded me that at the end of the level and if you timed your jump just right to get to Smurfette, your Smurf guy would pause looking like he had a little weenie. Thank you for this video and bringing back all these memories, I should go dig it out as I still have it somewhere.
Wonderful memories... Thanks for sharing. Now go dig that console back up, it still loves you.
Mi primera maquina tambien fue el amstrad cpc en 1988, pero mi vecino tubo un par de años antes un clon de la atari 2600 y no se parecia a esto en nada. Es increible que en esos primeros 80s hubiera una maquina con esas excelentes conversiones de arcades. La de monedas que hubiera ahorrado si hubiera crecido yo con esto,jajaja. Great video. Thanks so much, my friend.
Where is Venture??!! Loved that game!!! The green "wow-wow" man (as my sister and I called him) scared the crap out of us though when he appeared on the screen! LOL!
This brings back memories. I had one of these when I was 8 or 9 in 1984 or 85. Played a few of the games listed here.
Very lucky, this would have been like having the arcade in your home for the time.
My friend Jimmy had a Colecovision,
we only had the commodore 64 back in the old days. My favorite at that time was the one medieval era type games that you could choose the sort of weapon you'd use to try to outcombat your opponent with; was like a prototype of the mortalkombat types of games. I can't recall what the title was. People have reminded me numerous times and I keep forgetting the title.
I’m new relatively new to the ColecoVision scene, so if you find out let me know 👍🏻
@@ClassicReplay I found it, it was Knight Games, that was so fun back in the day
I didn’t realise you could get Knight Games on the ColecoVision 🤷🏻♂️
@@ClassicReplay Aw yea! There's lots of games that are on multiple different systems and platforms. Thanks for having this neat channel, I will get to watching more
I had Knight Games on the Amstrad, a UK based computer, check that out as well.
I'm delighted to hear that the Colecovision can impress a new player so many years on. As you know, many of the games let you play at level 1,2,3,4 (4 being the hardest). You might not think it from the title, but a game you should try is Smurf Adventures, especially on level 4. That plus a sequel to Frogger called "Frogger 2 Threedeep"
Yes, I’m not sure technically if this is a great console or not, when compared with others, but the programming of games feels masterful, you can tell the majority of games were carefully crafted and as I’ve mentioned before, it feels like an arcade machine in the home. I’m just sad I didn’t own one back in the day 😢
@@ClassicReplayWhen it came out was the closest to arcade games you could get at home, nothing in the 8-bit scene came close.
@@jimbotron70 every word 100%
I owned a Coleco Vision console back in the day. I got it after it was popular. I can't remember the exact year, but it must have been around 1985/86. I got it from Woolworths for £29.99 and it came bundled with Donkey Kong. Once I bought it, I was bragging about it at school and one of my mates said ' I've got 'Zaxxon' cartridge for that, so I managed to buy it off him for £5. Both 'Donkey Kong' and 'Zaxxon' were near-perfect ports of the arcade originals. I also had a game called 'Pepper 2' which was a weird game where you had to do zips up around squares on the screen. It was weird, but very addictive!. Great console, it could well be still up the loft at my mums! gonna go round tomorrow and have a search for it.
Great story! Thanks for sharing. Long live these memories.
You are right, as a young teen when this was released, I can tell you, ColecoVision would be the Equivalent to XBOX ONE / SERIES X/S! It was incredible system.
100% and nobody in their right mind should argue against it
I owed this system back in the day. it was amazing! I had several of the games you reviewed, too. Watching this makes me want to re-buy it on eBay :) Thanks for sharing, this was a fun trip down memory lane!
Don’t do it, I’m already I’m my wife’s bad book for buying one and can’t stop playing it 🤣
My family had this console. Sooo good. Lady Bug was a fun game. Same with Smurfs
Lucky or what 🍀
My favorites was Quest for Tire, Wargames and Grog's Revenge. Both Donkey Kong also.
War Games is still fun to play as is Donkey Kong
Awww, you didn't include "Star Wars: The Arcade Game." Glad you included "Wargames," though. That one was always high on my list, too. =)
+James Anthony it wasn’t great if I’m honest
I had an uncle who got a Colecovision when it came out. When my family was visiting his house I got to play it for a week. He nearly bought all the games and peripherals for it. I was blessed to be able to play Front Line with the Super Action controller. It was an amazing experience. Front Line was like a primitive version of Icari Warriors. I think the game required the Super Action controller which made playing this game a rare experience. The four action buttons on the grip of the controller changed the direction of where you fire.
That would have been one of the best weeks of my life 😊
Definitely agree with your number 1: _Turbo_ Great memories. A couple years ago, I checked to see what it take to play Turbo, like when I was a young kid. Like $450, for a working Coleco system with controllers, working steering wheel with pedal and the Turbo game itself, all used on Ebay. LOL Unfortunately, had to settle for the nostalgia in my head and $450 still in my bank account.
Unfortunately you can only play it with a wheel. Even emulation struggles to correctly emulate the steering wheel. I was lucky enough to play Turbo at a retro event back in 2018, played it for at least an hour. They really should have built in controller support. These days I play the arcade original, with spinner or trackball and it works a treat. Happy days though and thanks for watching.
This was one great system! Nice colors, fast graphics, good sounds! I don't see this wasn't a huge hit back then.
It came out just before the Videogame Crash of 1983...
Was 16 in '82. Loved Zaxxon. Would love to play it again.
Just Google it, there’s loads of ways to still play it 😉
There was another console called “Odyssey” you should look in to. Their big game
was “Q-Bert”. I can’t put a year on the when the consule came out, believe there was also an Odyssey 2.
Thanks for this. I will look into it, sounds familiar, I think I saw one in a catalogue as a kid 👍🏻
The Smurf’s was an awesome game too seriously 😂
I need to properly sit down and play it. Thanks
I'm almost 49 years old now and a stroke and cardiac arrest survivor and had a 2600 system when my brother Chris and I were kids, remember that my cousin Paul had this system it was great
Good health to you my friend, sorry to hear you’ve been through the wars at such a young age, here’s to another 49 years 👍🏻
@@ClassicReplay thank you I guess only 49 years LoL I was called a blue baby, was born with a whole in my heart. But really appreciate the good Cheer. Be safe wherever you are in this crazy world
Awesome video I had most of the games this was my first video game console and this brings back memories and makes me want to get one now ! 😂thanks for the video
I’m happy you enjoyed watching. I’ve done quite a few ColecoVision vids, here’s my latest ua-cam.com/video/0DMQumIKfqA/v-deo.htmlsi=DNPY80NxcWDSW0Oo
Frontline was absolutely awesome on Colecovision. Super Action Baseball was lots of fun too
@Neb6 ya the super action controllers were super fragile.
Galaxian was my favourite space shooter arcade at the time, with Galaga a close second. If only I’d known I could have had an arcade perfect conversion to play at home. I had an Atari VCS, which I loved, but damn the Coleco looks amazing!
I know, feel exactly the same way, we missed out big time 😢
The Qbert version i had on my Colecovision look nothing like the one in your video... Its was way better. Mr Do was another great game on the Colecovision , which was hand down the best console of its time. Great memories !
@@mikaelvilhelmsson1484 I think you meant to write that the game in this video presented as Q*Bert is actually Q*Bert Qubes so (s)he actually had the original Q*Bert.
I opened this video, looking down expecting it to be 11+ years old and it's from last year! 😂
Incredible.
Glad you enjoyed it! What’s your history with the ColecoVision, did you own one back in the day?
@Classic Replay I'm afraid my answer will probably be a bit lame for you, but I was a bit too young to experience the Colecovision in person. How I did experience these games however was that in the late 90's there were a lot of "X in one" cartridges for the Gameboy Color of questionable origin that would contain usually 100+ older games from other systems, and then maybe 1 or 2 current games or ROM hacks. I experienced many of these through that and still recognise them. Gyruss definitely left an impression on me with how different the approach was with the cylindrical movement axis, and also the sense of inertia in Defender.
And now coming full circle I've been looking at hardware that mimics the Gameboy and can emulate Colecovision, so was looking at what my options were!
Love the enthusiasm in your videos, though. It's clear they left a strong impression on you and blew you away at the time. I can certainly at least relate to that, going from Gameboy graphics, to 3d to the ray-tracing we now have on the latest games. Things have plateaued a little lately, but the fundamental advancements we were seeing back then quite frequently were mind-blowing!
So fun to sit around talking the same way we did in '83.
83 is just a number 👍🏻
@@ClassicReplay yes & ronald reagan was just a president
@@popeyejones9256 A better actor
ive hoovered around the edge of retro gaming for years. im that kid at school that was into PCs before anyone. im that guy. The coleco graphics at the start of this video - that was my childhood. Ive rarely seen the versions of games i played, in vids - ive just realised i must have had a coleco vision, or the arcade galleries around me were coleco - coz coleco is what i need to setup as a retro gaming setup. ive started to build a retro game machine a few times but given up as the software seems to be clunky but the realisation im team coleco means i need to honour it and build a coleco setup.
I mastered Lady Bug. One of my all time Colecovision favorites.
How about Mouse Trap that was a fun one also!
@@josephfrank1472 don't you have to have the plastic controler overlay to play the game to tell what buttons to press to open doors?.....i remember this....
I got ColecoVision for Christmas when I was 13. It blew away the other systems at that time. Seeing Zaxxon brought back a few memories. The memory is a bit hazy, but I seem to remember flipping that game over a few times, but then I seem to recall it would get to a point where you'd go so far the screen would freeze.
I’m so jelly, I’d have loved one of these as a kid. Arcade in the home. I get home from work and the second I’ve got an ounce of free time (very rare) I play on my Collectorvision Phoenix
@@ClassicReplay Not to make you even more jealous, but I remember getting Turbo with the steering wheel and pedal, and a different controller that's a bit difficult to explain. You held with one hand and there were buttons for each finger, and you'd use your other hand to control the joystick on top. Yeah, good times.
@@RichAraujo sounds amazing! I definitely missed out growing up. I bet it’s worth a small fortune if you still have it.
@@ClassicReplay I stupidly throw it and the games away years ago. The boxes in which they were stored were mistakenly kept in a shed in the backyard. Years later, I found them and realized the heat had done quite some damage. It wasn't easy to toss, and I should have kept it despite its condition.
@@RichAraujo oh no 🙊 that’s awful 😢 I think I’d have been devastated
My next door neighbors had a Colecovision. The game crash hit not long after unfortunately. It was the best thing out there for gaming next to home computers. A few of my friends and myself had C64, Atari 800/xl, and TI994a and I can easily say Colecovision held up really well. Where Atari 5200 failed miserably Colecovision succeeded. Everything was about comparing Donkey Kong ports back then. And Colecovision had a really good Donkey Kong port. My TI994a had all 4 levels but the Colecovision had animation on the part of the gorilla and really good arcade quality like everything else they did. Zaxxon was a really big deal back then also. It looked and played well on this system. Did not know it had Q*Bert's Quebes on it.
Massively underrated system that should have been a world beater in sales. Fantastic arcade conversions. It must have been like having your very own arcade in the home 🏡
I had a ColecoVision in the early 80s and still have one in my collection. It was ridiculously better than any other console available at the time and is still my favorite retro console to play today. The only drawback was not nearly as many games were released as other consoles like the 2600. Unfortunately the NES came out after a couple years and obsoleted ColecoVision.
Yes, brilliant console. I never personally gelled with the NES, wasn’t all that popular in Europe.
Thanks for sharing it. In my opinion some essential titles are missing: HERO, BC's quest and BC's quest II. They are simply incredible.
I agree! But couldn’t fit them all in. Plus I personally believe that Hero is better and best played on the Atari 2600.
@@ClassicReplay Great version, one of the best Atari 2600 games! It is true that there are versions that don't play the same, for example the Atari 5200 version plays much worse. However, the Coleco version plays practically the same, play it for a while and you will see that it is also very pleasant to play.
No doubt, but I’m flawed with nostalgia 😉 The C64 version looks a mess, but plays great and the Atari 800xl from memory plays good as well. Same for Amstrad
By the way, two tips for Donkey Kong on Coleco. One, tap twice up or down to climb the ladders at twice the speed. Two, on the first screen, go to the half ladder, go up, go down, take two steps left (I think), and jump right- you will fall through the floor and after a few second land next to Pauline and Donkey Kong. I got these from a gaming magazine I read at the time. The scene skip is kind of pointless except for the novelty of it, but the double speed ladder climb is really useful.
Cheers 🍻
Colecovision is what I had at the arcades back in the time (they were rented by time). I remember playing a LOT of Jumpman Junior (called Jumpin' Jack Flash in america?) and River Raid
River Raid still plays a blinder, fantastic arcade conversion. Thx
Ok, im bitting, but there better be Buck Rodgers in your list! ;)
Phew 😅
Just played it yesterday and Buck Rodgers definitely belongs.
nothing like just being born and coming home to a Colecovision 😊
1982 Great year
Amen to that 👍🏻
Both Q*Bert games were released for this console, and would probably make a top-6 list of my personal favourites, otherwise my list would include Jumpman Jr; Ladybug;; Gyruss & Mr. Do!
There is a prototype Atari Pac-Man game for this system, it plays great too
Didn't Tengen make Pacman for this console at one time? The Mr Do game looked as good as the nes game.
Tengen released Ms. Pac-Man for several systems including: Megadrive, SNES, and possibly NES but nothing for Coleco. I haven't seen Mr. Do! for NES before but I have played it for SNES, which is a near arcade perfect port.
thx 4 your compilation, Zaxxon does look incredible, I got my C64 in december 1984, so I missed out on Colecovision, but I remember one friend who showed me some games on his colecovision (?) durin' the summer holidays of 83(?), and i kinda felt jealous.
Exactly my point. I felt the same way.
You're so close to your 1,000 subs. Happy to help. Subbed.
Thank you for your support. I’m currently making a new ColecoVision video 😉 almost there 👍🏻
To this day I still can't believe this was a pre-nes console. You would never think it came out in 1982. I think many of the arcade ports like Q-Bert, Frogger, Centipede and Galaxian almost look better than the arcade machines...
I have to agree, it’s as though they built the perfect console, but nobody realised until it was too late. I played a few games this evening and came away once again shaking my head in disbelief as to how good this console and the games are. I’ve said it already, owning this console on release with a handful of games would have been like unleashing the arcade in the home.
My cousin and I had the Coleco Vision as kids and my other cousin had the Intellivision. I had the Atari adapter and Super-Action Controllers. My cousin had the Steering Wheel and Roller Controller.
I recall the advertisements said “experience the arcade at home”. I’ve read articles since about how they acquired the rights to Donkey Kong (the president said he wouldn’t come back without the rights but Nintendo said here’s the deal, take it or leave it- he took it). The Coleco Vision probably would have survived the video game crash of 1983 and dominated if not for how buggy their Adam computer was. Technically Intellivision survived, but Mattel dumped it and an employee took it, but they seemed to focus on NES games and compilations of their old games. Meanwhile Nintendo forayed with their own console and asked Atari if they would be the international distributor outside of Japan- Atari declined- and Nintendo took a chance and dove fully in. And thus the old era ended.
I do miss it a little. Atari, Coleco, and Intellivision were a blast for the time.
Great times!
I had a colecovision back in the day. Still have it actually. One thing you are missing is how annoying the controllers were. The games play a lot better under emulation as you can use a decent d-pad controller, a keyboard, etc.
100% agree! This is the one thing that concerns me about the ColecoVision. I’ve been looking into it, but thank goodness you can use other standard joysticks or even a Sega Megadrive game pad. I’ve read that you still might need the original controller plugged in for certain key config or key presses, but that for me is a fabulous design decision to allow for the use of standard d-pin joysticks. I very rarely use the joystick that comes with a console anyway, for instance my GX4000 bundled pads never see the light of day over my Master System pad or Cheetah Joystick 🕹
Once we got the Super-Action Joystick, I typically used that over the stock ones. The stick worked much better that the original as I recall.
I actually find the controllers incredibly comfortable
How about Subroc, Looping, Smurfs paint and play, and probably the greatest coleco game...The Heist!!
Never played it, looks interesting 🤔
On Donkey Kong - when going up a ladder - get on the ladder and press up twice in quick succession - and you will zip right up the ladder
I had a Colecovision in the '80s and it was far superior to Atari and any other systems out at the time. I loved Q-Bert and glad to see it on your list! I still remember when we got the steering wheel module and Turbo, that was almost an unbelievable experience back then. A couple other games that I really enjoyed were Mousetrap and Venture, and I still remember how my sister would scream when the Hallmonster (which we called Vroom-Vroom) entered one of the rooms when you took too long to pick up the treasure.
Sounds like great memories 👍
I have always wanted to try that steering wheel module! It looks so amazing. I've honestly wondered, with emulation, if it could be used for driving games on other systems. Shit, it looks so awesome, I would use it on an X Box / Playstation with modern titles if I was able.
Coleco Adam had great games too.
Time pilot. Mr. Do. Dragon's Lair.
I’d like to do a video on the Coleco Adam. I need to find someone with the hardware 👍
Had It. Ķnew it was special way back when.
I had Colecovision back in the day. Time Pilot, Venture, and Mouse Trap were some other great games for it.
Great games there…
Hey welcome to the Colecovision fanbase, or whatever it is. It has always been my personal favorite Pre-NES console! Likely because of my nostalgia receiving it and several games the Christmas it was released and truly feeling like I had the arcade experience at home. Also, I like that they got a lot of the odd or quirky titles that were not grabbed up by competitors so their are some good classic arcade titles that never really appeared elsewhere. To this day my favorite game on it is Mr.Do!
I’m well jelly! I’d have loved to have owned this console back in the 80s - Can’t believe how much I missed out with this one. If only their marketing would have been SEGA or Nintendo quality I might have picked one up. I always thought it a poor man’s Atari until now. Mr Do! Is great, but as mentioned there’s so much quality, I couldn’t fit everything in. Thanks for your kind words 👍🏻
@@ClassicReplay Hey no problem. Of course it really is amazing to think it was also expandable with those add-on modules, crazy today to think of any gaming console allowing you to play a competitors games with an add-on! I started my channel early on in 2008 ONLY because I was so excited kicking off my new retro collecting hobby and I wanted to share my first pick up of BOXED Super Action Controllers ! Literally the first thing I got because I was looking forward to getting another ColecoVision, it was a low quality shot video shot with a potato but I didn't care because I was sharing my ColecoVision excitement. Later as my channel grew I would be BLOWN AWAY by a kind and generous donation a subscriber sent (I do not monetize and have never asked for anything) honestly when the person offered I really didn't expect anything to turn up, that kind of thing only happened to the big channels I thought but turn up it did and even looking back with my wife filming you can see how excited and utterly amazed I was to see the contents including a BOXED VCS 2600 expansion module, a Sensor Touch ColecoVision compatible controller and more. 😮I rarely do videos these days as I don't collect anymore due to circumstances, I cannot justify it with little money and no room these days as my entire collection resides in boxes in storage, behind the couch etc but eh, I certainly had my fun over the years, amassed and nice collection met many incredible, fun and generous people from around the globe. So just keep doing what you do and have fun! I shared your video in my videogame Facebook group FYI. I am amazed the quality of your videos especially compared to mine is excellent, you deserve far more subs imho.
mine too was Mr Do ...looked just like the nes game did but the monsters did not eat the apples or turn into apples oh i wanted mr do's castle but never got it this was the only console that had that game besides computer i think.
@@popeyejones9256 Mr do wasn't on the nes
the colecovision version graphicswise was almost as good.....mr doo's castle was only on colecovison and atari systems and some computers & never was made again
War Room was the first real time strategy game, you slid those covers over the controller numbers... Played that for hours as a kid.
Idk Bomb Squad might've come out before it
Spy Hunter with the steering wheel is the best way to play it! It made it feel like the actual arcade game.
I'm yet to find a steering wheel, I'm desperate to play this and Turbo properly, as intended. But still waiting for my Colecovision to arrive.
Space Fury, Mouse Trap, Popeye, and Smurf: Rescue in Gargamel's Castle were also good.
Thx for letting me know 👍🏻
Loved mouse trap
I had the Adam which was the computer version of the Coleco vision. Buck Rogers and Rocky Boxing were my favorites. Wish I still had that and my Intellivision.
Was it a good computer? Pros/cons?
@@ClassicReplay I was pretty young at the time, so I don't remember much about the computer part, but I mostly used it for games. I played Buck Rogers non stop. I remember my Dad bought it at a store called Zayre's. It was on clearance for I think $599. Which was a lot back then! I remember getting the steering wheel and gas pedal and playing Turbo. Also those goofy controllers you stuck your hand in with the 4 different color buttons. I played Baseball and Rocky a lot also! Good times!
I had one of these systems growing up, you have to play the Smurfs game and the Popeye game. A really under-appreciated console!
I will, thanks for the recommendation 👍🏻
one of the best christmas gifts i ever received. had just about every peripheral except the 2600 expansion pack.
My god, you must have been born into money 💰
@@ClassicReplay just my father got more into playing it than me, so i'm pretty sure he was buying games for himself :P)
@randyval2 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
We had Turbo, Donkey Kong and Zaxxon for ours in the early 80's. We wanted more games but the cash flow wasn't there. Brilliant Console ✊
Not bad though, three of the best, although didn’t Donkey Kong come built in with the console?
@@ClassicReplay
Yeah well I must admit, Zaxxon I was in love with! Turbo was like a racing game that only the Gods could produce and Donkey Kong I played till my hands literally had calluses.
I saved for 25 school days to buy Zaxxon, my Mother gave me $2 a day here in Australia for lunch so I went those 25 days without lunch to buy Zaxxon, the game cost $50 AU over here.
And actually no, Donkey Kong was a separate Cartridge, not a single game at all was built into the Coleco it was standalone Cartridges. My brother who was 4 and half years older than me bought the Coleco (He's 51 now) and I'm 46 as I think you also mentioned you're the same age in this video, so cool 😎😎
Oddly enough my next system was the Atari 2600 (a downgrade) then the C64, Amiga 500, Amiga 1200 and then PC.
Anyway, enough of my waffle brother, you've gained a sub from me.
Great video ✊✊✊
@@ClassicReplay
Forgot to mention as well, when we first got our Coleco, both Donkey Kong and Turbo were bundled with it, but we had to buy the Steering Wheel setup for Turbo separately.
@@perihelion7445 honestly, it’s great to hear these stories. Shocking how you went back to a 2600, but from then on you smashed it with pretty much the best system from each generation. I think we all have that one system or game we love the most, I have so many fantastic memories of my first computer. Zaxxon is a work of art on the ColecoVision as is Turbo. How did the steering wheel perform, I’m thinking of getting one for Turbo and Pole Position 👍🏻
I remember when my parents asked my sister and I which console we wanted for Christmas, the Atari or the Colecovision. We both said Colecovision because it looked better. We played our Colecovision so much we burned the thing out and our dad had to get us a replacement. 😆 Fun fact: Coleco made an expansion module that allowed you to play Atari 2600 games, which obviously didn't sit well with Atari. They took Coleco to court and eventually entered an agreement where Atari would licence out some of their games to Coleco. So that's why there's Atari games on the Colecovision.
That would have been an amazing Christmas present, I’d have loved the ColecoVision growing up. You were lucky to get a replacement 😉
The "big black brick" that regulated the power supply to the console was probably good for its day, but was quite terrible. As you say, it got INCREDIBLY hot. So much so that, as you pointed out, where the power connection sat on the main circuit board actually melted the soldered connection! Thankfully, my dad was an electrical engineer, so when my Coleco stopped working, he took it apart. He noticed the weak solder joint at the power supply, redid that solder joint much stronger ... and my coleco was back in business!! It would still fail about once a year and we'd have to re-solder it, but we kept it up and running for a long time. ;)
Excellent video!! Subscribed to your channel:)
I remember playing LadyBug and DonkeyKong Jr. back in the day when it came out on the Coleco.
I remember driving to sears just to see the Colecovision & 2600 new game demos at that time there wasn't any mall or video games stores in my area at that time. I was a young adult.
Solid list. Get a super action controller and Rocky. I hated Zaxxon in the arcade. Fell in love with it on the Coleco! Should also try Montezuma's Revenge, came out in I believe 84. Very fun game, feels like the spiritual sequel to Pitfall! I also hated the Smurfs but loved "Smurf: Rescue in Gargamel's Castle". This was a system that was light years ahead of its time.
100% agree! Brilliant console for the time!
Great list! I highly recommend Venture as well.
Here’s the problem, I’ve not played a bad game on the ColecoVision from memory. Compiling a list of best games is ridiculous, can’t be done without upsetting someone 😉
I had a Colecovision in its day. And it _was_ great, it was the best thing going in its time.
100% agree! Especially for the time...
I loved Gorf and Turbo. We had the racing wheel and it was awesome.
Very jelly! I’d have loved Turbo with the wheel as a kid 👍🏻
@@ClassicReplay It was cool but it stopped working after a short time. It was neat when it did work tho
You completely forgot Miner 249’er, which was THE best, most fun, most original, most frustrating game around. Plus I think it had around 14 completely different levels that were all very creatively done. I had a ColecoVision. My fav’s were Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr, Zaxxon, Ladybug, Popeye, Artillery Duel, but Miner 249er was tops. I also loved Slither, the game that came with the Roller Ball controller, and Centipede and Milapead
Steady on mate, I’m massively new to the ColecoVision. I didn’t forget, I only know what I know 🤣 So far it has been a wonderful discovery for me. Check out my other ColecoVision video on the best new homebrew games 👍
Can I recommend your next vid ☺️ColecoVision King of Kong #colecovision #retrogaming #donkeykong
ua-cam.com/video/-jjcI0_536Y/v-deo.html
With Bump and Jump if you get up lot of speed you could jump over to the far right and go off the screen. At end of run it would appear and drive over the landscape to the end.
I will try that this evening. I love hearing about this kind of stuff. Thanks 😎
Hey ya I had the Colecovision and it was amazing and when all my friends got to play it they knew there consoles were junk..This was a good list but I would have like to have seen Choplifter on it ….Slither want bad also Mr do was huge and Mouse 🐁 Trap ….Maybe we need a top 40 list..😅
A top 40 would probably kill me 🤣
Man, all you need is a better mic and you'd be killing it! Excellent format and each game gets just enough coverage 👌
Thanks for watching and especially your comment. Try my newer vids and let me know your thoughts
I was the only one in the neighborhood to have one,lots of good games and memories,also I had the expansion module that played Atari games,as well as the super action joysticks
Your house would have been like a local arcade to any other kid in your street 👍🏻
Never seen the CV Tutankhamen before.... wow. It actually looks like an egypitan tomb of sorts. the 2600 version, i had no idea what i was doing or looking at.
Straight port of Tutankham arcade.
Jumpman Junior was a rare gem.
The best! I'm on the lookout for an affordable copy ;-) It's a great console to collect for.
We never had a Atari 2600 and my best friend down the street got this system the first day it was released back in 1982 and his dad bought the steering wheel and sports controllers that were great for baseball and Rocky. We unfortunately got the Atari 5200 and had a ton of games but the damn controllers just broke after about three months of use. About a year later in 1984 we got a coleco vision with 25 games and two sports controllers. I still have it and should break it out. Then 1985 happened and Nintendo was the new great thing. I never got one of those but I gravitated towards the Sega Master system I still have and I do have a Nintendo that I got about 15 years ago still works and such great times growing up in the 80s playing coleco vision. I never forget when my dad went to buy the new Atari 5200 I was telling him to get the coleco vision and he would listen to me I was only 9 but I knew the coleco vision was better but he thought the 5200 because it was newer and more expensive was the machine to get. After about three months of that damn machine and horrible controllers breaking it went into the closet. That thing was huge 😆 the power supply was like a brick and it got hot. The rf switch was godawful too. Just horrible setup.
OMG! The 5200 looks horrendous, I've purposly steered clear of it for as long as I can remember, that was a right cock up from Atari. The Atari 7800 was a fabulous little console though. I'm so jelly you managed to secure a Colecovison in 1984, especially with 25 games, that's amazing. I can't imagine switching to any other console if I'd have owned a Colecovision back then, probably would have waited until the Sega Megadrive or SNES came along, as personally, unless the games dried up, I'd have been more than happy with a colecovision. I think the NES and the MasterSystem were great consoles, I own both today and play a lot of their games on real hardware and emulation, but I can't quite put my finger on it, I still enjoy the colecovision just as much.
Thanks so much for the video!
No worries, please share to reach more like minded people ☺️
Destructor, Heist, and Wing War I played so much back in day.
What a system, massively underrated
@@ClassicReplay Yes it was.. now I got the Colecovision mini and it is the next best thing!
@@Peatmoss0979 I’ve just purchased the CollectorVision Phoenix Video Game System, well chuffed 👍🏻 collectorvision.com/shop/colecovision/collectorvision-phoenix/
@@ClassicReplay wow this is awesome.. Definitely going to read more into this thanks.