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disneyloading498 · 3 years

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Harem Atari 2600

Atari 2600 Complete Game List

Harem Atari 2600 Play

Atari 2600 Complete Game List

In short: if you're looking for an ordinary Atari 2600 ROM set, look elsewhere. It can be found almost everywhere on the Internet without too many problems. If you're looking for the most genuine and best documented Atari 2600 ROM collection in the world, then look. Welcome to the all new 'The What Are We Fighting Four'. One part Let's Play, one part podcast. The What Are We Fighting Four is Travis, Joan, Josh, and TV Di.

- A -

Adventures of Max

Little is known about this title other than it was part of the game development deal Atari made with Axlon during the late 80's. According the former Atari programmer Steve DeFrisco

'This was one of the “Designed by Nolan” games, which was never finished. It was to be set in Medieval times, the player is a knight with a sword. That’s pretty much all we had. John moved on to another company and the game was never finished. The opening sequence of the character running and jumping into the hole, and falling to the bottom worked, but that’s it.'

Bagman

This port of the 1982 Stern coin-op was programmed by Steve Hostetler for Atari. According to Steve he was almost finished with the game when they laid him off. Steve sent all his materials back to Atari after he was laid off, and it is unknown what happened to them.

Ballblazer

Previously thought to be only a rumor, programmer Tod Frye recently confirmed that this game was indeed once in development. Although the technically challenged 2600 was woefully underpowered to produce the split screen scrolling required by Ballblazer, Tod apparently had a demo up and running (various reports put it somewhere between 30% and 60% complete). The whereabouts of this demo are currently unknown.

Battle of the Sexes

Developed by Michael Case for Multivision. Multivision president Eugene Finkei talked about this game in the October 1983 issue of Videogaming and Computergaming Illustrated: 'Battle of the Sexes is played simultaneously by 2 players. It's very innocent. Each player has surrogate partners scrolling across the screen. Each player must score with as many surrogates as possible while trying to knock out the surrogates of the other partner. There are different skill levels & variations: it can be played by 2 guys with girls scrolling across the screen or by women with men scrolling across the screen. To score, the player directs the figure to bounce together with the surrogate for a fraction of a second. No genitalia. And you don't shoot the other's surrogates, you merely get them out of the way.' This title was long thought not to have even been started, but the programmer recently confirmed in a 2007 interview with Digital Press that the game was actually completely finished: 'Battle of the Sexes involved male and female figures coming together from the top and bottom of the screen, to either shoot each other or screw each other. The owners kept the only copy. It wasn't as good (as Harem). It was basically like Pong. I knocked it out in a few weeks so we could say we had two games when we approached distributors.' The whereabouts of the one and only prototype are currently unknown.

Bird Programmed by David Lamkins, after he departed Parker Brothers for Activision. David worked in Activision's short-lived Boston office. During that time, he worked on a 'bird game' which was never published. He discussed the game in a 2002 article that appeared in issue #74 of the Atari 2600 Connection: 'I spent my time at Activision working on a 2600 game I called Bird. I’ve heard that Rex (Bradford) later described it as “a pterodactyl on a bombing run”, which is pretty good as a brief description. My inspiration for Bird came party from the Heavy Metal movie (the scenes with the girl riding the bird into battle), and partly from Activision’s Battlezone clone, Robot Tank (the point-of-view perspective of the playing field). The player piloted a bird which had a limited endurance that was affected partly by the intensity of the player’s maneuvers and partly by damage incurred from missiles fired by ground-based hostiles somewhat reminiscent of Dr. Who’s Daleks. The Bird game was really based around subtlety and survival. The player had to be sparing in his moves in order to make it to the next round. It was a shooter game, but not so much an aggressive game. It had kind of a Zen quality to it – probably way too cerebral for the market. I was recently contacted by Activision’s Ken Love, who is in the process of putting together a definitive collection of Activision games, including all the unreleased and prototype games. Ken wanted to acquire a copy of Bird. If any such copies exist, it’s either on a 20-year-old hard drive in some Activision storage locker, or in a dusty prototype cartridge in someone’s closet. That’s kind of a shame. I certainly wouldn’t mind seeing it one more time…'

Blow Out

Developed by Mattel, Blow Out was a party game that had 'Two roller-skating dancers drop darts from a scaffold onto rising balloons. An easy enough task, except these rude guys keep bumping into each other and knocking each other off the scaffold. When the music stops, that's the signal for the next players to take the controllers.'

According to the Blue Sky Rangers website 'David Akers only worked on the game briefly in June 1983 before being pulled off to work on higher priority projects.' It is unknown how far along this game got before being cancelled.

Candyland Surfing

According to former 20th Century Fox programmer John Marvin 'There was a surfing game where you surfed a rainbow. That was taking advantages of something you could do cheaply with the VCS, each scan line you could change the color and you got this great rolling rainbow on the screen. It was more a screensaver than a game, the problem was there wasn't a lot of gameplay in it.'

Circus Charlie A port of the 1983 Konami/Centuri coin-op. Parker Brothers announced Atari 2600 VCS, ColecoVision, and Commodore 64 versions of this title, and prototype boxes were shown in a CES press kit. According to a Parker Brothers internal marketing release schedule, this game was scheduled for a September 1984 release. The C64 version was actually completed but never released by Parker Brothers (it was eventually released by Konami in 1987). According to Phil Orbanes, former Senior VP of Research & Development at Parker Brothers, the VCS version received 'some coding' at the very least, and may have been completely finished. The programmer is unfortunately unknown, and as yet no prototypes of this game have surfaced.

Computer Corridor

Developed by Mattel. According to the Blue Sky Rangers website 'This game started out as an original concept by Ron Surratt and Jane Terjung called Computer Revenge. At the same time, Spring 1983, Russ Ludwick was working on an Intellivision game called Moon Corridors, inspired by the arcade game Battlezone. In mid-1983, Marketing began an agressive campaign to release titles on as many different game platforms as possible. Noting similarities between Computer Revenge and Moon Corridors (mainly a 3-D grid effect), they decreed that the two games should be mooshed into one - Computer Corridor - and released on both Intellivision and Atari. By the time they tested and approved the idea, though, Russ was no longer working at Mattel Electronics and no one else was available to pick up the Intellivision version. A couple of months later Jane also left Mattel, killing the project altogether.'

It is not known how far along this title got before being cancelled.

Count's Castle

Also known as the missing CCW title, this would have a been a math title based on the Sesame Street Count character. An internal Atari memo puts the game at 80% complete, but the game was never finished. Apparently the original programmer left and there was no one available to finish the game.

Cryptogram

According to David Crane he developed this word game after moving to Activision from Atari. The game would display a scrambled phrase that the player would then have to unscramble in the quickest time possible. Players could also enter their own phrases if they didn't want to use one of the built in phrases. This game used a programming technique called 'Filled Venetian Blinds' which alternated the scanlines used by the regular Venetian Blinds technique every frame, making the image look more solid (no more lines) but also slightly transparent due to only half the image appearing on each frame. Unfortunately the game was deemed to be of 'limited interest' and Activision feared it wouldn't sell well enough to consider releasing so the project was abandoned.

Cumulus

According to the Blue Sky Rangers Website 'Cumulus was an original Atari 2600 idea by Jeff Ratcliff. His idea was to take a relatively simple game but use the extra memory available on a Super Cartridge to create spectacular visual effects not seen before on Atari - mainly really cool explosions. He worked on the game briefly in August 1983, programming a demonstration screen showing a high-resolution cloud with an enemy ship above it. While the game was listed on the weekly in-house status reports, it never received the four-digit product number that made a project official.' Sims 4 buying groceries.

A screenshot exists.

David and Goliath

Programmed by Rick Harris for Enter-Tech Ltd. Enter-Tech Ltd. did some Christian themed games for Sparrow who released Music Machine for the 2600. David and Goliath consisted of two stages: On the first David had to herd sheep and on the second David had to fight Goliath. Unfortunately the contracting company ran out of money and the game was never finished.

Dazzler

Port of the 1982 Century Electronics coin-op. Developed by Enter-Tech Ltd. for the Unitronics Expander system (which also went unreleased). The game was on a cassette and not a cartridge.

Dual Scrolling

Based on a programming effect developed by David Akers in which the screen was split in two with each half scrolling a background independently of the other. Although there was no game designed to use this technique marketing apparently loved it and decided that a game could be designed around it.

According to the Blue Sky Rangers website 'After determining the same effect could be created on Intellivision, Marketing put the still-to-be-determined game - temporarily called Dual Scrolling - onto the official release schedule. That was December 19, 1983. Exactly one month later, Mattel Electronics closed. Although no game concept had yet been thought of, Dual Scrolling was one of the few games officially still in development for the Atari 2600 when the doors were shut.'

Flapper

Developed by Mattel. Flapper was to be a unique game where 'You control the Flapper to rescue baby Flappers from an underground maze. The maze is filled with snakes, bats and ghosts. Cave-ins and landslides keep opening and closing the tunnels. Luckily, the Flapper is a unique fellow: he has three types of beanies - chopper for flying, gun for shooting, umbrella for protection - and four interchangeable types of legs: flying, jumping, running and walking. You have to find and change the appropriate beanie and legs for him to overcome the obstacles and rescue the babies!'

According to the Blue Sky Rangers website Flapper was never finished, although some coding did take place. 'While the game was listed on the weekly in-house status reports, it never received the four-digit product number that made a project 'official.' Steve worked on Flapper briefly in August 1983 before being pulled off to work on higher priority projects.'

Flashlight

Not really a game, but another 'cool programming technique' for the 2600 that Mattel thought they could design a game around. Programmer Stephen Roney had developed an interesting programming effect on the Intellivision where a moving circle of light could illuminate the background and any objects within the circle. Another Mattel programmer, Ron Surratt, was asked to duplicate this effect on the 2600. Once it was shown that it was indeed possible Mattel tried to come up with a game to fit the effect, but closed their doors two months later.

Flesh Gordon

This was to be Wizards final game entry, but was never released. Based on the 1974 soft-porn movie of the same name, Flesh Gordon was long thought to have never been even started until the programmer of the game kindly set the record straight.

'Flesh gordon was finished. It sucked, sometimes literally if you know what I mean. It was a horrible game with a lot of sex and the payoff was the ability to hump using the joystick. There was nothing cool or interesting but then wizard video wanted what they wanted. There came a time when they stole a copy of the final or near final version which was sent for their approval. They refused to pay and they went to publish the game using the rom we sent them to approve. It was just about finished but it needed some finishing touches. We never did them. They never officially released it as I understand and that was no loss.'

What happened to the prototype that was sent to Wizard is unknown. Rumors over the years have surfaced that some collectors have access to the rom, but this has never been verified and is highly suspect.

A picture of the box exists.

The Impossible Game

Developed by Telesys, but never released. The Impossible Game was shown at the January 1983 CES show, and mentioned in an interview with Alex Leavens in the Aug/Sept. '83 issue of Video Games Player magazine. According to Alex 'It's a puzzle game, sort of like Rubik's Cube. You don't blow anything up and nobody gets hurt--it's strictly a mental challenge.'

Other than this short interview, the only other information we have on this game comes from Leonard Herman, who actually played the game. According to Leonard, the object of the game was to 'successfully navigate through six levels of 36 squares that are randomly chosen by the computer.' On the first level the player only had to pick one square at a time, but on each new level the amount of squares the player ahd to pick increased (2 on the second level, 3 on the third, etc.).

For more information on The Impossible Game, check out to Leonard's personal write up of the game.

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James Bond: As Seen in Octopussy

Before Parker Brothers decided to turn it into a crappy version of Moon Patrol, the James Bond game went through two different iterations. Originally starting out as James Bond in Octopussy, this version would have taken place on a train and be based on only one movie (rather than a series of movies like the final game). In this game James would have to shoot at and dodge bullets from two armed men as they ran around on a train cart. This version of the game was seen by more than one person at various game shows and was advertised in at least one PB catalog. It is highly likely that this game was completed, but dropped in favor of the 'Moon Patrol' version.

A screenshot the actual prototype running exists.

James Bond: Moonraker Demo

According to programmer Charlie Heath, he did a one screen demo of a James Bond game based on the movie Moonraker. Sadly it appears that the demo has probably been lost forever.

'I'd prototyped a 'James Bond' scene during my first first few weeks, to see what I could do with a VCS: you're in space orbiting earth in the space shuttle, chasing bio-terrorist pods to shoot them down before they break up in the atmosphere, while your shuttle and the pod are being buffeted about by reentry. You see something that looks a bit like a spinning earth bobbing about at the bottom of the screen. If you watch the movie Moonraker, it's one of the climactic scenes, but Parker wasn't interested in it for the Bond license because they wanted to do something that was more along the lines of Pitfall - little guy running around with various spy gadgets.'

'It wasn't much beyond a concept, but it was a pretty functional single screen 1st person perspective shooter. Not up to the level of Star Raiders gameplay, but I thought the pseudo-orbiting-world view was pretty cool and unique at that time. I didn't keep a copy of the code when I left Parker Brothers. It might be buried on a backup tape somewhere at Parker Brothers, but more likely the tape was reused for cereal inventory or something like that.'

Keystone Cannonball (Keystone Kapers II ver #1) Dan Kitchen worked on two unreleased sequels to Keystone Kapers. This first version involved Officer Kelly chasing the crook across the rooftops of a train. 'I had also done a sequel to Keystone Kapers, which was the Keystone cop on a train. And that was actually a neat thing because I was able to pull off some interesting software kernels where I had eight rotating wheels on the bottom of a train where you could normally only have 2 or 6 It was a very cute game. From screen to screen, from boxcar to boxcar fighting and trying to defeat the character from Keystone Kapers, who was the runaway criminal. That was a very huge game as it had non-symmetrical play and had a really nice, large engine at the front of the game and a very large caboose at the bottom of the game.' According to Dan the game never got to a playable state and was only around 20% done before being scrapped for unknown reasons. Recently Dan found his prototype which featured the train and officer Kelly running on top of the cars. You can see a video of it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2u60o2nYEXM Keystone Kapers II ver #2 Dan Kitchen worked on two unreleased sequels to Keystone Kapers. This second version was a vertically scrolling game similar to Crazy Climber and involved Officer Kelly climbing a building while Harry Hooligan threw objects at him. According to Dan this version got to a playable state, but was cancelled for unknown reasons. - L - The Levee Game Programmed by Dan Kitchen for Activision. According to Dan: 'Keystone Kelly appeared in a yellow rain slicker running around ladders and platforms repairing cracks that would appear in a background Hoover Dam-style image complete with warning lights and a beautiful sun setting on the distant reservoir . The screen kernels were written such that I could change the background color on every scan line so the entire screen would slowly fill up with water if the player couldn't cement the cracks in time. There was also a mechanic to 'empty' the water on the player's side of the dam to keep the game going.'

- M -

M*A*S*H II Programmed by David Lubar for Sirius Software. This alternate version of M*A*S*H developed at Sirius was ultimately scrapped in favor of another version developed internally at Fox by Doug Neubauer. Programmer David Lubar describes what he remembers of the game: 'I know I had Klinger at the top of the screen, on guard duty. Once in a while, he'd try to run off, and the player had to stop him. Beyond that, I think the game involved taking supplies to different surgery tents.' 20th Century Fox had announced a M*A*S*H II game and it is believed that this version may have been planned for release as a sequel. A prototype of this game is rumored to exist in the hands of a private collector, but nothing has been released to the public as yet.

Mission Omega

Mission Omega was a space shooter developed by Commavid. According to an interview with some ex-Commavid employees, this game was finished but sent back to the programmer for some 'fine tuning'. The game was never re-finished in time to be released.

Mission X

Port of the 1982 Data East Coin-Op of the same name. Although released for the Intellivision, the 2600 version was never finished before being cancelled for 'unknown reasons'. It is not known how far along the game was before being cancelled.

Monkey Business

Designed by Mattel, Monkey Business was to be one of the few unique 2600 games designed by Mattel (all others were ports of existing Intellivision games). Although not completed, Monkey Business was fairly far along before being cancelled.

A description of the game found on the Blue Sky Rangers website reads as follows 'In the zoo, things have gone awry. Billy the Chimp has escaped and is up to no good. As any curious monkey would, he has managed to free the elephants! It's up to you, as Mike the Zookeeper, to return the elephants to their cages.

Once you have restored order in the elephant section, you must quickly run to the next section of cages. Perhaps you'll have to capture the loose Koalas. Maybe you'll have to avoid soaring hawks, battle fierce tigers or try to grab the slippery penguins. Along the way, you'll find items which will be of help to you, such as a bag of peanuts or a net. So grab your hat and stop this monkey business!'

- P -

Penetrator

Programmed by Bill Heineman for Avalon Hill. This game is not believed to have been advertised or even announced. According to the programmer: 'The game itself was a lot like Activision's Megamania. It was a simple drop from the sky shooter. It was unfinished because I left Avalon Hill to work for Time/HBO on a playcable system for the 2600. The game was probably 50% complete. My source to Penetrator was lost many years ago when the 5 1/4 floppy it was stored on simply went bad. The only EPROMS made were almost certainly erased to make way for Death Trap, etc, because we only had a few dozen and they kept dying on us because we burned EPROMS so many times. Only three dev cards were made, so all the other programmers had to write code, and test on an EPROM.' Avalon Hill's stay in the market was short-lived and it's unknown if any further work was done on this title, or if it was simply erased.

Pepper II

Port of the 1982 Exidy arcade game that was released on the Colecovison. It has recently been confirmed that the same programming team that was responsible for the Atari 2600 version of Turbo was indeed working on this game, but it was never completed (or even reached a playable state) due to the collapsing game market. A prototype case was found for this game, but it was empty as it was just a mock-up used for advertisements. Artwork sheets for the game graphics also exist.

Incidentally, there is no Pepper I. The II in the title referred to the fact that the character had two personalities (angel and devil) and not that it was a sequel.

Porkys

Not the same game that was released by 20th Century Fox, but rather a game based on the cartoon pigs that were seen on the electric sign in the movie. Former TCF programmer John Marvin remembers seeing this game while he worked at the company. According to John 'The game made no sense at all.' It is unknown what happened to this prototype after it was rejected.

- R -

Real Time Chess Real Time Chess (working name) was a strategy game developed by Greg Easter while at Atari. According to Greg: “You commanded one piece and tried to capture other pieces one at a time without stepping on any of the squares they could land on. In simple mode, all of the squares the other piece could move to were lit up. In expert mode, you had to keep that in mind yourself. So it was also a training aid for playing chess, sharpening your mind to keep track of different pieces. That game was about 90% done when I was told Atari would not be releasing any more games no matter what, so there was no point in my finishing it.” Greg said that that several test carts were made, but it is unknown where they currently are.

The Rescue of Emmanuelle Alan Roberts (designer of X-Man) talked about this game in the October 1983 issue of Videogaming and Computergaming Illustrated: 'We are currently working on The Rescue of Emmanuelle, based on the famous Emmanuelle character. It is a male-oriented action game where one has to rescue Emmanuelle, the rewards being that, if you are skillful enough to save her, she is going to thank you, bestow her kindness on you. It's a climbing game. It takes place on the Eiffel Tower. The hardest part in designing the game is that the tower doesn't fit well on the TV screen. We're working on a scrolling system.' It is not known how far this game made it into development before being cancelled.

Robotron: 2084

A Proposed title for the ill-fated Atari Graduate add-on computer. A WIP version of this game was shown at at least one show before being cancelled (along with the Graduate). According to one eye witness, it was 'The most flickery thing I'd ever seen'. This isn't surprising considering the amount of objects that would be needed to be shown on the screen at one time was well beyond the poor 2600's capabilities. A picture of the title screen exists showing some pretty nice graphics for the 2600.

Sharp Shot

Port of the Intellivision game developed by APh Technologies. Mattel decided not to release the 2600 version of this game after it was widely criticized on the Intellvision as being 'too easy'.

Shove It! was a two player game being developed at CBS which would have used a special cable to communicate between two 2600s. According to programmer Bob Curtiss: 'Shove It! was my original concept for a two-player 2600 game that used two 2600 systems, each with their own TV of course. The idea was that someone would take their 2600 over to a friend’s house to play this game with them. A bit far-fetched at the time, but to CBS’ credit they were open to these kinds of ideas. The game was simple – there were 9 rectangular objects, sort of like long pieces of wood or metal, displayed in a 3D view, that you could ‘push’ or ‘shove’ away from you, and they would move toward the other player on their screen. They in turn could shove them back toward you. The two 2600’s communicated via serial data transfer with a serial cable connected to one joystick port on each machine. Did you ever imagine that you could send data from one 2600 to another via the joystick ports? You’d use the joystick plugged in to the 2nd joystick port to select which object you wanted to shove toward the other player, and the push the button to shove it. I had a functioning prototype working within 3 months.' Shove It! was cancelled after CBS decided to get out of the video game business and closed down their Atari 2600 development unit. Stomp it This port of the Bally Midway coin-op (which was also unreleased) was done by Alex Nevelson at Bally Midway but went unreleased. There is no information on how either the arcade game or home version would have played.

Sky Blazer

Sky Blazer was a multi-level air combat simulation game by Broderbund, similar to CBS's Wings. Although shown at the 1983 Summer CES show, the game was never released.

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Snark

Programmed by John Dunn for Atari, but ultimately unreleased. John would later go on to do Superman before leaving Atari. Snark was a combination Maze solver and shooter. Each game generated a new maze, and you were set upon by critters that you had to shoot in order to negotiate the maze.

According to John, Snark 'was my first game for Atari. It was not published while I was at Atari, and perhaps never was - I didn't track it. It had a video spin mode that caused the screen to color cycle really fast, and release was held up because there was some worry this would cause people to have seizures (I know, it's bogus - but this was the early days of video games, and that kind of intense color cycling was unknown territory).'

Snowplow Developed by VSS, Inc. for Sunrise Software. According to Leonard Herman, this game was shown at the 1984 Winter CES (along with Glacier Patrol, another Sunrise title that went unreleased). Leonard described the gameplay in his book 'ABC to the VCS': 'You operate a snowplow which must clear the eight horizontal rows of snow. Snow is cleared by merely moving your plow through it. Somewhere in each row you'll uncover a car which will then move across the row that it is in and must be avoided at the risk of losing a turn. When all the snow has been cleared, one of the six cars will flash on and off and you must get to it before time runs out while still avoiding the other cars. When the car has been reached, another car will begin to flash. After all six cars have been retrieved, you'll move on to a harder screen where you must again clear the snow.' After Sunrise Software folded, the rights to their 2600 catalog were apparently acquired by Telegames, who eventually released Glacier Patrol and reissued Quest for Quintana Roo in 1989. Yet for some reason, Snowplow was never released. What happened to the prototype that was shown at CES is not known, and thus far the game has never turned up in any form.

Solo

Solo was a 3-D flight simulation game by Broderbund. Although shown at the 1983 Summer CES show, the game was never released.

Super Pac-Man

According to an internal Atari memo preliminary coding was started on the 2600 version of Super Pac-Man. The memo lists the game as only being 5% complete, so it is doubtful a playable version of the game exists.

Tarzan

Port of the Colecovision game of the same name. Tarzan was developed by Wickstead Design (the same team behind the unreleased 2600 Pink Panther game). The game finished, but was unreleased due to it requiring a special chip for extra memory. A prototype of the game may exist with one of the programmers. An in-game screenshot, picture of the box, and a manual all exist.

Tank Blitz

Was to be the third and final game in the Milton Bradley Power Arcade series. Tank Blitz was shown at the 1984 Toy Fair along with its Armored Commander controller.

A picture of the cartridge with its controller can be seen here (thanks to Rom Hunter)

Target Omega Target Omega was a submarine simulation developed by Greg Easter for Atari. From Greg: “Another game which was only barely started was an extremely ambitious submarine simulator. There were three choices of views - periscope, radar and instruments. Your goal was to find enemy ships and sink them, as you would in most sub games, only there were additional complications of needing to keep track of fuel, battery power and sustainable pressure. I don’t remember too much of it now.” Given its early stage of development, it is unlikely that any copy of the game survived Those Little Buggers

Developed by Enter-Tech Ltd. for the Unitronics Expander system (which also went unreleased). The game was on a cassette and not a cartridge.

Treasure Hunt

Developed by Enter-Tech Ltd. for the Unitronics Expander system (which also went unreleased). The game was on a cassette and not a cartridge.

Underworld

Was to be a D&D type game by Commavid. A tape labeled Underworld is known to exist, and is believed to contain development source code. The current whereabouts of the tape are unknown.

Untitled Motorcycle Game #1 (real name unknown)

David Crane mentioned working on two unreleased games for Activision that involved riding a motorcycle. The first version was similar to Atari's Stunt Cycle where the player controlled a motorcycle that would jump over buses and other obstacles. According to David the game was abandoned because he ran out of objects (Player/Missile sprites) and couldn't display the buses properly.

Untitled Motorcycle Game #2 (real name unknown)

David Crane mentioned working on two unreleased games for Activision that involved riding a motorcycle. The second version was to be a motocross style game with a large segmented motorcycle that would realistically move up and down over the terrain. Like the first motorcycle game it was scrapped after David ran out of objects (Player/Missile sprites) due to the large realistic motorcycle.

- W -Wacko Port of the 1982 Bally Midway coin-op. This port was done by Tom DiDomenico while he was at Bally Midway but went unreleased.

Zookeeper

Perhaps one of the most famous missing prototypes, Zookeeper was a port of the 1982 Taito arcade game. Zookeeper was finished enough to have have been playable, and may have even been completed. The music/sound effects code for this game (by Robert Vieira) has been found, and is nearly arcade perfect. A video showing the graphics for this game has also surfaced.

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minttearoom · 7 years

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Nick Spencer’s Captain America is Bad, but in these ways

OK ... I made this blog so I could dump my bad opinions on it, so call me out on this if anyone needs to.

-- This isn’t something I care about too much, but I feel like I need to start off by saying that Hydra doesn’t and shouldn’t always have a 1:1 equivalent with Nazis or the political specifics of fascism. In their first appearance, they were a generic mustache-twirling, world-domineering evil enterprise. Although that’s changed because Nazi leaders were retconned in to match the WWII backgrounds of Marvel’s heroes, it’s always been story-dependent as to whether that element really mattered. Sometimes, Madame Hydra trying to take over the world was just Madame Hydra trying to take over the world so that superheroes could have fistfights. There’s a usefulness to a generic SPECTRE-type evil organization for when comics that need a villain to punch. Although it’s important for stories and readers to criticize what that evil entails, there’s a messiness that’s involved when it comes to shared universes and different tools serving different functions in different contexts. This is an issue that mostly irks me when it comes to how the conversations about Captain America are framed, and how they’re framed solely in terms of Hydra, when there’s a little more going on there; this was especially bad after Captain America: Steve Rogers #1 came out. *HOWEVER, this is kind of irrelevant to the rest of what I want to talk about.*

-- I’m not sure if a story about an altered-reality Captain America being evil, or even being a Nazi is off-limits. I’m not a Jonathan Chait “protect malevolent free speech” type, but I do think that you might be able to tell a somewhat meaningful (and possibly respectful) story under these conditions. I understand that WWII is highly sensitive and emotional, and I also understand the situation surrounding Captain America’s creation. However, it’s not like similar stories (or story beats) haven’t been done before -- even one drawn by Jack Kirby. I hate Nick Spencer’s Captain America for a variety of reasons, but part of the reason why is that I think you might actually be able to publish a story like this, even (or especially) in these times, and have it be salient and productive and well thought-out.

-- The problem with Nick Spencer’s Captain America goes back to the beginning of his run. From the beginning, he set out to do a run that broached extremely topical political issues, but keep his comics from making too strong of a stance in any given direction, while insisting that it did have a stance. For example: since the KOBIK/Cosmic Cube plotline, he’s been paying lip service to the idea that there needs to be a discussion about the growth of the security state and what it means to create unimaginable and invasive authority and power when you don’t know who will be in control next. ... Except whenever someone does have anything to say about it,it’s usually only a couple words, or a weak sketch of their stance. You might think this is fine, as long as the conflicts that Spencer brings up are carried through the plot to create meaning. After all, you don’t want to buy comics just to see talking heads debate politics. However, this doesn’t carry through for a few reasons!

-- The first way, most commonly seen in Sam Wilson, is that he’ll bring in some way for the critical/left-leaning position to be criticized. Though this is mostly like to preserve some sort of apolitical company line, it ultimately amounts to centrism, which is a political stance in and of itself, defined by the extremes of political climate in which you’re speaking. You see it first with Rick Jones -- he was a whistleblower hacktivist in the early issues of Captain America: Sam Wilson. The characters in Spencer’s book seem sympathetic to him when he gets caught, but Rick did BREAK THE LAW :( so his rightful course of action is to join SHIELD to help the security state keep on doing everything he despised!

Then came the infamous issue where a Tomi Lahren-type character was inciting hate against a specific undocumented teen -- the new Falcon, Joaquin Torres. Joaquin, understandably, was about to go give her a piece of his mind, but he gets derailed by the appearance of a group of teens who obviously serve as an in-universe warning of the dangers of what he was about to do. These teens, the new Bombshells, not only spouts awkward online academia-derived lingo about safe spaces and trigger warnings but they also advocate violence against racists! They come and fight Falcon and Rage as if to, say “Look out! Don’t become like them!”

You see it when Sam goes to stop Rage from getting in a confrontation with the AmeriCops (Spencer’s convenient robotic representations of racist police brutality). There’s no real strong reason for Rage to have not gotten into a confrontation, as the AmeriCops were ridiculously over-the-cop brutal and terrible, except for concerns about optics and (this is a recurring theme which obviously clashes with some of the issues Spencer wants to bring up) respect for authority.

You also see it when the only true far-left voice in the entire run, Flag Smasher, is the only the only one to fully articulate his issues with corporate influence over politics, the security state, and the no-fly list, and ends up being not only a violent terrorist assassin, but also (amazingly) a plant by Steve Rogers. I can’t begin to say how ridiculous that was.

-- The other way that Spencer undermines the political claims in his run is in how the villains are made overly sympathetic. So much of Captain America: Steve Rogers is about the ideological purity and clarity in Steve’s heart. He is destined to lead Hydra because he is still a great man in the way that Dr. Erskine recognized. (This bears out in the most disgusting of ways in the FCBD issue of Secret Empire, where Steve is still worthy to lift Mjolnir.)

Steve is part of a faction of Hydra lead by some horrorterror old god/sweet old lady named Elisa who becomes Steve’s doting mother figure. She gets in close with his mother, and then dotes on Steve day and night about how he’s good and pure and destined for greatness -- and there isn’t much to undercut this as fascist BS. Elisa goes on and on, essentially dogwhistling what might as well be soliloquy about Steve’s Aryan purity and good heart, yet she never really gets a strong villain moment to underscore the idea that what she’s saying is wrong. The one truly evil thing she she was supposed to have (kill his mother offpanel) apparently never happened! She appears unharmed in later issues of CA: Steve Rogers.

-- This links into the other major problem in Spencer’s run: his depiction of Hydra. From the get-go, he plays up Hydra as not only a fascist neo-nazi organization, but specifically one that parallels modern ethnonationalist movements, all being propagated by the Red Skull. He further links Hydra to literal European nationalist militant movements by having Hydra take over Sokovia (#moviesynergy). Linking back to what I talked about at the beginning, this is all fine, so far; Spencer is making the specific choice in this story to use Hydra as an analogy for Nazism and its connection to the modern day, and this is a story that is obviously just as much about the Red Skull. EXCEPT, over the course of Spencer’s flashbacks to Steve’s altered past, we see that Steve is a member of a faction of Hydra that has always opposed not just the Red Skull, but Hydra joining the Nazis in general!

-- It’s an insanely weird choice to decode: does Spencer want to tell a story about Steve Rogers being allied with the Nazis ... or not? He certainly shows him helping the Nazis in WWII. What’s the point of saying he was secretly opposed to them and the Red Skull this whole time? What is he trying to do with Hydra?

-- For that matter, how much less fascist is Steve supposed to be? He rails out against Red Skull’s cheap inflammatory tactics, yet by the time his Secret Empire is set up, he’s already created an authoritarian state that rounds up Inhumans and puts them into camps! CAMPS!

-- There’s a lot of other, little, infinitely frustrating things. The FCBD issue explained that Wanda joining the HYDRA-vengers probably wasn’t of her own will, but having the Romani girl on the Nazi team is still unsettling, especially if they don’t end up giving her any space to react to it. Spencer’s writing is way lacking in nuance -- whereas Ales Kot gave a thoughtful look at the paranoia that must feed the drive to do crazier and crazier things in the name of security when he wrote Maria Hill in Secret Avengers, Spencer’s Maria Hill shrugs off each evil thing she does in the name of the state with a joke and a condescending comment. Spencer sucks at writing spies and spy stuff in general (there’s no reason he should have gotten two tries at Secret Avengers!), so seeing him try to handle SHIELD in general in the context of this run has been annoying. Also, ... why can Steve lift Mjolnir WHEN HE JUST HELPED KILL BUCKY, jfc.

-- Again, this is partially upsetting because some parts of this aren’t terrible. Sam Wilson is the most effortlessly diverse Captain America book ever, with somewhat decent stories about things like police brutality and immigration when they aren’t being undercut by other elements Spencer sticks in to ~balance things out. Seeing the Champions fight HYDRA in Secret Empire is also pretty unobjectionable. It’s the context and the handling that’s made this all atrocious -- even the publicity of blowing this Nazism thing up to a huge event is pretty dubious.

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flauntpage · 7 years

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DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties

Three Stars of Comedy

The third star: Wes McCauley. The only referee on the planet who should ever be allowed near a microphone was at it again. I'd get in there if I were you, Nate.

The second star: Patrick Eaves. D'aawwww.

The first star: The Golden Knights Twitter… again. Good lord, rest of the NHL, how many times are we going to do this?

Guys, come on. This is like when Troy Crowder showed up in 1990 and started speedbagging everyone. Sure, you can understand catching the first few opponents off guard, but by now the scouting report is out. These folks are not playing. Stay down, NHL teams.

(Side note: Can we start wagering now on which thin-skinned owner will be the first to complain to the league about his team getting roasted on Twitter by the Knights? This feels like a Eugene Melnyk thing, but I'm open to other suggestions.)

Outrage of the Week

The issue: The NHL is using the preseason to crack down on two types of fouls: face-off violations and slashing. That's resulted in a ton of penalties being called, disrupting any sort of flow to the games and confusing fans and players alike. The outrage: Knock it off, NHL—we didn't wait all summer for hockey to come back just so we could watch you call a bunch of nitpicky penalties all night. Is it justified: For the face-off violations, sure. Those have been annoying, and seem like a weird thing for the league to be focusing on. NHL fans love to complain—some of us have entire podcasts for it—but I've never heard any paying customer argue that face-offs were a problem. I wrote a little bit about the face-off crackdown earlier this week, and my basic message was that we shouldn't panic yet because it will probably be short-lived. But if we get to November and we still have linesmen calling three or four of these things a game, we'll have a problem.

So yeah, the face-off thing is dicey. The slashing, though? Not remotely. It's about time the league took a stand on this one.

Two guys cheating on a face-off might turn the draw into a scrum, but it doesn't really hurt anyone. Cracking a guy across the hands with your stick? Yeah, that can do some damage. And there's no reason for it. Reaching out and slashing someone who beat you for position isn't a legitimate defensive tactic, no matter what guys like Jon Cooper say. There's no skill involved. And there's no entertainment value, either. At least a big open ice hit is fun to watch. Seeing a star player get hacked because he had the nerve to actually possess the puck doesn't help anyone.

Well, except for guys who are slow and out of position. Those are the guys who are apparently suffering here. OK…good. Let's phase those guys out. If they can't play defense without using their stick as a weapon, my guess is not too many of us will miss them. Let's swap in a few guys who can keep up with the play and aren't always a stick's length behind the better players.

For years, the NHL has been a league where simply having the puck on your stick meant you had to accept a few hacks across the wrist. It was the price of admission for actually trying to create some offense. It's been that way for so long that it's going to take some adjusting for players to stop reflexively swinging at anyone who skates by.

Will that be annoying for the first few weeks or months or however long it takes the players to figure this out? Definitely. Will penalty boxes occasionally look like this? Maybe. But it's a price worth paying to get this garbage out of the game, and to have it happen before Connor McDavid or Patrik Laine or whoever else gets their wrist broken. Complain all you want about the face-offs if the league actually sticks with it, but the slashing crackdown is long overdue.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

Last week was the 30th anniversary of what many consider the greatest hockey game ever played: Team Canada vs. the Soviets in the deciding game of the 1987 Canada Cup, one that ended with Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux teaming up on their famous winner. The game was an incredible back-and-forth contest featuring an almost unimaginable amount of talent. I mean, just look at the starting lineups.

That's three Hockey Hall of Famers for the Soviets, plus two more guys who each had a strong cases of his own. And Canada has four guys who made it in on the first ballot, including two of the ten players in history who were such slam dunks that the customary waiting period was waived for them.

And then there's this week's obscure player: Doug Crossman.

Crossman was a sixth-round pick by the Hawks in the legendary double cohort draft of 1979. Weirdly, he went within five picks of not one but two other Obscure Player alumni, Bill McCreary and Rick Knickle. He'd make his NHL debut the following season, and spent three seasons in Chicago before being traded to the Flyers for legendary tough guy Behn Wilson. He spent five more years in Philadelphia before being traded to L.A. in 1988, which would signal the start of a five-year stretch in which he was traded six times for everyone from Ray Ferraro to Basil McRae. He was also claimed on waivers once, and ended up closing out his career in 1994 having played for eight teams, only two of which kept him for more than 100 games.

Crossman was a decent defenseman who could play in both ends. He never topped 60 points, but he was a +20 or better for three straight years in the mid 80s, and early in his career was a bit of an ironman. He was never an All-Star nor did he receive so much as a single Norris vote, but he was pretty good.

So… how did he wind up lining up next to the Canadian dream team in 1987?

The easiest answer is that he was a Flyer at the time, and his coach was Mike Keenan, who also happened to be running Team Canada. He'd been solid in Philadelphia and was coming off a big playoff year, and Keenan trusted him, so he made the team. Hey, it wouldn't be Team Canada without a weird pick or two. Besides, it's not like Canada was all that deep on defense that year. While they had future Hall of Famers Paul Coffey, Ray Bourque, and Larry Murphy, they also had to lean on guys like James Patrick, Craig Hartsburg, and Normand Rochefort.

All of those guys had to play a role for Canada to win, but only Crossman got to hear his name announced as a starter in one of the most star-studded games ever played.

Be It Resolved

There's a new trend going around the league. Various teams are holding open tryouts to fill the role of emergency backup goalies. Fans can show up, strut their stuff, and earn the job of backup to the backup.

The concept is getting rave reviews, and seems destined to spread across the league fairly quickly. It seems like the perfect way to give fans a shot at actually appearing in an NHL game. Who wouldn't get behind that? The whole idea is, as one observer put it, "freaking awesome."

Like hell it is. Faithful readers, this cannot stand.

Look, I love me a good EBUG, just like any fan should. The emergency backup goalie is one of those fun hockey oddities, one with a long and proud history. Sure, they never actually play (almost), but it's the mere possibility that makes it work. May the hockey gods bless the valiant emergency backup.

But the key word here is emergency. It's the chaos of an unexpected injury followed by a mad scramble to find someone, anyone, who knows how to hold a goalie stick that makes it fun. The guys who win these tryouts are going to be available at every game. Even worse, they're going to be good. Not NHL good, sure, but good enough not to embarrass themselves. Where's the fun in that?

I want to see some terrified dude hyperventilating into a paper bag on the bench. I want ushers and parking-lot attendants and web producers. I want to see the owner's deadbeat nephew shoved out there against his will. I want to see more scenes like Roberto Luongo stealing an ambulance to make a dramatic return from the hospital, Stone Cold Steve Austin-style, so that the goalie coach doesn't have to go in:

If this tryout thing catches on, we lose all that. Every rink will just have some former junior star in the press box, munching popcorn and waiting to see if he's needed. So be it resolved that we need to nip this in the bud. The noble EBUG has suddenly become an endangered species, and we need to save him—even if he never gets the chance to save anything for us.

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

A cynic might suggest that the entire preseason schedule is just a massive cash grab, in which teams force fans to buy tickets to watch has-beens, never-will-bes, and PTOs signed specifically to circumvent the veteran roster rules, all playing in games in which nothing ever happens. Well, that's not completely accurate. I mean, almost all of it is. But while it's true that nothing important ever happens in the preseason, that doesn't mean nothing interesting ever happens. One example—OK, the only example—came exactly four years ago today.

So it's September 22, 2013, and the Sabres are visiting the Maple Leafs in preseason action. The score is…well, honestly it doesn't matter. But things are about to get goofy, so let's settle in and enjoy the dumbest line brawl in recent NHL history.

We open with play-by-play legend Joe Bowen informing us that Buffalo's John Scott is unhappy about something. If you're looking for backstory, here's what happened just before our clip begins. Long story short, the Sabres thought their guy had been victimized in a mismatch. Scott's their enforcer, so it's his job to exact some payback.

Unfortunately, he's lined up next to Phil Kessel, and The Code clearly states that he's not allowed to pummel a squishy-soft skill player. But Scott can do the next best thing, which is try to make Kessel poop his pants on live television.

Scott politely gives Kessel a heads-up on what's about to happen, at which point Kessel whips around like he just got a whiff of fresh-baked cinnamon rolls. I always thought Scott got a bit of a raw deal on all of this. You hear about how he "jumped" Kessel, but he never really did. Let's be honest, if Scott wanted to hurt Kessel, he absolutely could have. Instead, he basically gives him the "cat batting around a wounded mouse" treatment.

Kessel, of course, doesn't know this, so he immediately tries to break Scott's ankle with a golf swing slash. That's totally fine, by the way, as it's clearly self-defense. Then, after the cavalry arrives and Scott is fighting off two guys, Kessel circles back and hacks him again. That's, um, also self-defense? I would be a bad hockey lawyer.

None of the other Leafs player on the ice are fighters, so they basically gang-tackle Scott—who, it should be pointed out, is listed at 6'8" and 270 pounds. They do a pretty good job, too. Almost too good. Like, it seems like they may have an extra guy. Ah well, I'm sure that won't turn out to be important.

Meanwhile, Kessel pairs off with Brian Flynn for what will be only his second career NHL fight. And he…well, he kind of destroys him. Seriously. It's not quite Clark vs. Brooke, but by the end of it Flynn is leaking blood all over the ice. It will not shock you to learn that this remains Flynn's one and only NHL fight to this day. When Phil Kessel is splitting your face open like it's a jelly-filled donut, there's a good chance you're not very good at this.

Bowen does a reasonably good job on the call, although he's had better.

We get the now standard overhead view of the action, which reveals that all six Leafs seem to be handling business just fine. Wait a second, six? That seems high. Let's see if we can figure this out, now that all the fights are over and there's clearly nothing else that's going to happen.

Uh, did anyone notice anything odd in the lower right corner just there?

Huh, I could have sworn that looked like Leafs goalie Jonathan Bernier heading out of his net for some strange reason. Ah well, I'm sure it's nothing. Maybe he's going to get a drink of water or something.

No, he's apparently going to fight Ryan Miller, who speaks for all of us when he reacts by doing this:

As per Canadian law, Bowen immediately references the Felix Potvin vs. Ron Hextall superfight, which we broke down here. That one was the greatest goalie fight of all time. But this one isn't too bad once Miller finally decides to try. It's so entertaining that the other players forget that it's not 1986 and you're not allowed to crowd around to watch a fight.

As that scrap ends, we see Kessel go over and get one more jab on Scott, who's tangled up with David Clarkson. Wait, was Clarkson on the ice when all this started? He and Kessel play the same position, so it wouldn't make sense unless… oh. Oh no.

"All five players…all six players on the ice, including the goaltenders…" Keep counting, Joe.

After several replays, it's only in the final seconds of our clip that Bowen and friends put two and two together. Or more specifically, they put six and one together, and realize that Clarkson jumped on the ice during the brawl, even though the situation was already under control and he really had nothing to do once he arrived. That means that a player the Leafs have just paid a fortune to get has earned himself an automatic ten-game suspension before his first season even starts. Or, as Toronto fans now know it, "the high point of the David Clarkson era."

The epilogue here is that Kessel was suspended for three games, Clarkson never recovered, and Leaf fans loved Bernier right up until he started doing stuff like this. And to this day, Brian Flynn is afraid to go near a hot-dog cart.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at [email protected] .

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

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amtushinfosolutionspage · 7 years

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DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties

Three Stars of Comedy

The third star: Wes McCauley. The only referee on the planet who should ever be allowed near a microphone was at it again. I’d get in there if I were you, Nate.

The second star: Patrick Eaves. D’aawwww.

The first star: The Golden Knights Twitter… again. Good lord, rest of the NHL, how many times are we going to do this?

Outrage of the Week

The issue: The NHL is using the preseason to crack down on two types of fouls: face-off violations and slashing. That’s resulted in a ton of penalties being called, disrupting any sort of flow to the games and confusing fans and players alike.

The outrage: Knock it off, NHL—we didn’t wait all summer for hockey to come back just so we could watch you call a bunch of nitpicky penalties all night.

Is it justified: For the face-off violations, sure. Those have been annoying, and seem like a weird thing for the league to be focusing on. NHL fans love to complain—some of us have entire podcasts for it—but I’ve never heard any paying customer argue that face-offs were a problem. I wrote a little bit about the face-off crackdown earlier this week, and my basic message was that we shouldn’t panic yet because it will probably be short-lived. But if we get to November and we still have linesmen calling three or four of these things a game, we’ll have a problem.

So yeah, the face-off thing is dicey. The slashing, though? Not remotely. It’s about time the league took a stand on this one.

Two guys cheating on a face-off might turn the draw into a scrum, but it doesn’t really hurt anyone. Cracking a guy across the hands with your stick? Yeah, that can do some damage. And there’s no reason for it. Reaching out and slashing someone who beat you for position isn’t a legitimate defensive tactic, no matter what guys like Jon Cooper say. There’s no skill involved. And there’s no entertainment value, either. At least a big open ice hit is fun to watch. Seeing a star player get hacked because he had the nerve to actually possess the puck doesn’t help anyone.

Well, except for guys who are slow and out of position. Those are the guys who are apparently suffering here. OK…good. Let’s phase those guys out. If they can’t play defense without using their stick as a weapon, my guess is not too many of us will miss them. Let’s swap in a few guys who can keep up with the play and aren’t always a stick’s length behind the better players.

For years, the NHL has been a league where simply having the puck on your stick meant you had to accept a few hacks across the wrist. It was the price of admission for actually trying to create some offense. It’s been that way for so long that it’s going to take some adjusting for players to stop reflexively swinging at anyone who skates by.

Will that be annoying for the first few weeks or months or however long it takes the players to figure this out? Definitely. Will penalty boxes occasionally look like this? Maybe. But it’s a price worth paying to get this garbage out of the game, and to have it happen before Connor McDavid or Patrik Laine or whoever else gets their wrist broken. Complain all you want about the face-offs if the league actually sticks with it, but the slashing crackdown is long overdue.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

That’s three Hockey Hall of Famers for the Soviets, plus two more guys who each had a strong cases of his own. And Canada has four guys who made it in on the first ballot, including two of the ten players in history who were such slam dunks that the customary waiting period was waived for them.

And then there’s this week’s obscure player: Doug Crossman.

Crossman was a sixth-round pick by the Hawks in the legendary double cohort draft of 1979. Weirdly, he went within five picks of not one but two other Obscure Player alumni, Bill McCreary and Rick Knickle. He’d make his NHL debut the following season, and spent three seasons in Chicago before being traded to the Flyers for legendary tough guy Behn Wilson. He spent five more years in Philadelphia before being traded to L.A. in 1988, which would signal the start of a five-year stretch in which he was traded six times for everyone from Ray Ferraro to Basil McRae. He was also claimed on waivers once, and ended up closing out his career in 1994 having played for eight teams, only two of which kept him for more than 100 games.

So… how did he wind up lining up next to the Canadian dream team in 1987?

The easiest answer is that he was a Flyer at the time, and his coach was Mike Keenan, who also happened to be running Team Canada. He’d been solid in Philadelphia and was coming off a big playoff year, and Keenan trusted him, so he made the team. Hey, it wouldn’t be Team Canada without a weird pick or two. Besides, it’s not like Canada was all that deep on defense that year. While they had future Hall of Famers Paul Coffey, Ray Bourque, and Larry Murphy, they also had to lean on guys like James Patrick, Craig Hartsburg, and Normand Rochefort.

All of those guys had to play a role for Canada to win, but only Crossman got to hear his name announced as a starter in one of the most star-studded games ever played.

Be It Resolved

There’s a new trend going around the league. Various teams are holding open tryouts to fill the role of emergency backup goalies. Fans can show up, strut their stuff, and earn the job of backup to the backup.

The concept is getting rave reviews, and seems destined to spread across the league fairly quickly. It seems like the perfect way to give fans a shot at actually appearing in an NHL game. Who wouldn’t get behind that? The whole idea is, as one observer put it, “freaking awesome.”

Like hell it is. Faithful readers, this cannot stand.

Look, I love me a good EBUG, just like any fan should. The emergency backup goalie is one of those fun hockey oddities, one with a long and proud history. Sure, they never actually play (almost), but it’s the mere possibility that makes it work. May the hockey gods bless the valiant emergency backup.

But the key word here is emergency. It’s the chaos of an unexpected injury followed by a mad scramble to find someone, anyone, who knows how to hold a goalie stick that makes it fun. The guys who win these tryouts are going to be available at every game. Even worse, they’re going to be good. Not NHL good, sure, but good enough not to embarrass themselves. Where’s the fun in that?

I want to see some terrified dude hyperventilating into a paper bag on the bench. I want ushers and parking-lot attendants and web producers. I want to see the owner’s deadbeat nephew shoved out there against his will. I want to see more scenes like Roberto Luongo stealing an ambulance to make a dramatic return from the hospital, Stone Cold Steve Austin-style, so that the goalie coach doesn’t have to go in:

If this tryout thing catches on, we lose all that. Every rink will just have some former junior star in the press box, munching popcorn and waiting to see if he’s needed. So be it resolved that we need to nip this in the bud. The noble EBUG has suddenly become an endangered species, and we need to save him—even if he never gets the chance to save anything for us.

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

A cynic might suggest that the entire preseason schedule is just a massive cash grab, in which teams force fans to buy tickets to watch has-beens, never-will-bes, and PTOs signed specifically to circumvent the veteran roster rules, all playing in games in which nothing ever happens. Well, that’s not completely accurate. I mean, almost all of it is. But while it’s true that nothing important ever happens in the preseason, that doesn’t mean nothing interesting ever happens. One example—OK, the only example—came exactly four years ago today.

So it’s September 22, 2013, and the Sabres are visiting the Maple Leafs in preseason action. The score is…well, honestly it doesn’t matter. But things are about to get goofy, so let’s settle in and enjoy the dumbest line brawl in recent NHL history.

We open with play-by-play legend Joe Bowen informing us that Buffalo’s John Scott is unhappy about something. If you’re looking for backstory, here’s what happened just before our clip begins. Long story short, the Sabres thought their guy had been victimized in a mismatch. Scott’s their enforcer, so it’s his job to exact some payback.

Unfortunately, he’s lined up next to Phil Kessel, and The Code clearly states that he’s not allowed to pummel a squishy-soft skill player. But Scott can do the next best thing, which is try to make Kessel poop his pants on live television.

Scott politely gives Kessel a heads-up on what’s about to happen, at which point Kessel whips around like he just got a whiff of fresh-baked cinnamon rolls. I always thought Scott got a bit of a raw deal on all of this. You hear about how he “jumped” Kessel, but he never really did. Let’s be honest, if Scott wanted to hurt Kessel, he absolutely could have. Instead, he basically gives him the “cat batting around a wounded mouse” treatment.

Kessel, of course, doesn’t know this, so he immediately tries to break Scott’s ankle with a golf swing slash. That’s totally fine, by the way, as it’s clearly self-defense. Then, after the cavalry arrives and Scott is fighting off two guys, Kessel circles back and hacks him again. That’s, um, also self-defense? I would be a bad hockey lawyer.

None of the other Leafs player on the ice are fighters, so they basically gang-tackle Scott—who, it should be pointed out, is listed at 6’8″ and 270 pounds. They do a pretty good job, too. Almost too good. Like, it seems like they may have an extra guy. Ah well, I’m sure that won’t turn out to be important.

Meanwhile, Kessel pairs off with Brian Flynn for what will be only his second career NHL fight. And he…well, he kind of destroys him. Seriously. It’s not quite Clark vs. Brooke, but by the end of it Flynn is leaking blood all over the ice. It will not shock you to learn that this remains Flynn’s one and only NHL fight to this day. When Phil Kessel is splitting your face open like it’s a jelly-filled donut, there’s a good chance you’re not very good at this.

Bowen does a reasonably good job on the call, although he’s had better.

We get the now standard overhead view of the action, which reveals that all six Leafs seem to be handling business just fine. Wait a second, six? That seems high. Let’s see if we can figure this out, now that all the fights are over and there’s clearly nothing else that’s going to happen.

Uh, did anyone notice anything odd in the lower right corner just there?

Huh, I could have sworn that looked like Leafs goalie Jonathan Bernier heading out of his net for some strange reason. Ah well, I’m sure it’s nothing. Maybe he’s going to get a drink of water or something.

No, he’s apparently going to fight Ryan Miller, who speaks for all of us when he reacts by doing this:

As per Canadian law, Bowen immediately references the Felix Potvin vs. Ron Hextall superfight, which we broke down here. That one was the greatest goalie fight of all time. But this one isn’t too bad once Miller finally decides to try. It’s so entertaining that the other players forget that it’s not 1986 and you’re not allowed to crowd around to watch a fight.

As that scrap ends, we see Kessel go over and get one more jab on Scott, who’s tangled up with David Clarkson. Wait, was Clarkson on the ice when all this started? He and Kessel play the same position, so it wouldn’t make sense unless… oh. Oh no.

“All five players…all six players on the ice, including the goaltenders…” Keep counting, Joe.

After several replays, it’s only in the final seconds of our clip that Bowen and friends put two and two together. Or more specifically, they put six and one together, and realize that Clarkson jumped on the ice during the brawl, even though the situation was already under control and he really had nothing to do once he arrived. That means that a player the Leafs have just paid a fortune to get has earned himself an automatic ten-game suspension before his first season even starts. Or, as Toronto fans now know it, “the high point of the David Clarkson era.”

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you’d like to see included in this column? Email Sean at [email protected] .

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties syndicated from http://ift.tt/2ug2Ns6

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junker-town · 7 years

Text

There’s only 1 great choice for NBA Coach of the Year

We dissect a crowded field from all angles and find one obvious candidate.

Every NBA award will be controversial this season. For some awards, this is the case every year. But the tight MVP race, the bizarre Rookie of the Year contest, and the always-confusing Most Improved Player battle should all bring out the knives.

Coach of the Year is one of those awards folks don’t get too hepped up about, despite fuzzy criteria and a perennial lack of consensus. This year’s race is really interesting precisely because there are no runaway candidates. There are a few contenders who have separated themselves from the pack as we approach April. We’ll get to them.

But in order to offer a full review of the league’s 30 head coaches — in this unusually stable season — we’ll start by eliminating those not in contention for consideration. This isn’t to say these coaches have done a bad job, just not a job worthy of league-wide accolades.

TEAMS ARE TOO BAD

Kenny Atkinson, Nets Luke Walton, Lakers Earl Watson, Suns Brett Brown, Sixers Frank Vogel, Magic Dave Joerger, Kings Jeff Hornacek, Knicks Tom Thibodeau, Timberwolves

We can scratch off eight candidates just because their teams are awful. Only one coach has ever won the award with a sub-.500 record — Red Kerr in 1967 for the Bulls’ inaugural season, where he went 33-40. Only twice have coaches won the award while going .500: Hubie Brown with the 1978 Hawks and Doc Rivers with the 2000 Magic.

These coaches, some promising and some less so, are all well under .500. There’s no chance for them.

TEAMS DIDN’T MEET EXPECTATIONS

Steve Kerr, Warriors Tyronn Lue, Cavaliers

Kerr will get some votes because the Warriors will have the best record in the league and the coach with the best record always seems to get votes. But Kerr won last year with a record-breaking 73-9 season, and his team added Kevin Durant. There’s some resentment toward the Warriors in general and there will be some penalty for finishing with a worse record, no matter how ridiculous that sounds. (There also has never been a back-to-back Coach of the Year.)

Lue’s Cavaliers, meanwhile, are currently in a dogfight for the No. 1 seed in the East despite having the most talented roster and the best player in the world. Coaches often take the most credit and blame for their teams’ defensive performances. Cleveland’s weakness on that end kills Lue’s case.

Alvin Gentry, Pelicans

Fred Hoiberg, Bulls

The Pelicans haven’t met expectations before or after trading for DeMarcus Cousins. Gentry is probably out the day after the regular season ends.

Hoiberg was right there with Gentry as a candidate for an in-season dismissal. He survived the season (well, so far) but the summer doesn’t look so comforting.

Michael Malone, Nuggets Terry Stotts, Blazers

One of these coaches will make the playoffs. Malone’s reputation as a defensive master is clearly misplaced, and it took him too long to devote his life to the siren song of Nikola Jokic.

Stotts followed up a shockingly good season with Portland with a shockingly mediocre campaign. He’s still a good coach, but falling this short of expectations disqualifies you for Coach of the Year.

Doc Rivers, Clippers

There is serious debate everywhere as to whether Doc Rivers is actually a good coach. I would argue in the affirmative, but ... no, he’s not the Coach of the Year with the Clippers hanging on to the No. 5 seed for dear life.

Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports

Steve Clifford, Hornets Stan Van Gundy, Pistons

Disappointing seasons for well-respected coaches. The Hornets have talent issues, but fell off hard compared to both last season and to the early part of this season. Clifford is likely safe in the offseason, but the shine wears thin when you can’t put together a good team in back-to-back seasons with similar talent levels.

Van Gundy seems absolutely miserable. He gets paid too much to get fired now, but you almost wonder if that’s not what he’s after. This is perhaps his worst season ever in the NBA.

Nate McMillan, Pacers Mike Budenholzer, Hawks Dwane Casey, Raptors

McMillan has done a perfectly cromulent job with a weird roster. Nothing in Indiana is his fault. They are just ... there.

The Hawks have fallen fast, and Bud can’t exactly blame odd front office moves since he also runs the front office.

Casey looked like a contender until Kyle Lowry’s injury helped derail Toronto’s 50-win quest. (It’s again in play after a win streak.) But there are too many better candidates at this point. Casey had his chance, so to speak, last season when the Raptors leaped into contendership.

We have cut our list down to 10.

TEAMS HAVE NO REAL NARRATIVE

Jason Kidd, Bucks David Fizdale, Grizzlies

The Bucks and Grizzlies have been fine, and Kidd and Fizdale are doing fine jobs under difficult circumstances (as in, having no shooting). But neither Milwaukee and Memphis surprised anyone, and neither team is good enough to drive the conversation toward their coaches. The Bucks and Grizzlies just kind of ... are.

TEAM DOES NOT EXHIBIT QUITE ENOUGH WIZARDRY

Rick Carlisle, Mavericks

Carlisle deserves immense respect for pulling a team starring Seth Curry, Yogi Ferrell, Harrison Barnes, and Dirk Nowitzki to relative respectability. A playoff nod would have gotten Carlisle into the conversation.

We are now down to seven contenders.

OVERSHADOWED BY HIS SUPERSTAR

Billy Donovan, Thunder

For all we know Billy Donovan has done an exceptional job as the head coach of the Thunder. But it’s hard to think about anything other than RUSSELL WESTBROOK when you’re thinking about the Thunder.

A FEW WINS SHY OF REAL CONTENTION

Quin Snyder, Jazz

The Jazz are quite good, and will likely hit 50 wins. But they are no better than the fourth best team in the West, and that’s where expectations pegged them in the preseason. It’s not fair to discount the work Snyder has done to get the Jazz over the hump from intriguing upstart to legit challenger, but that’s what we have to do given what other coaches have pulled off. Snyder is hurt by so many of us recognizing that Utah could be awesome.

Down to five. Let’s break each one down.

Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images

THE FOUR RUNNERS-UP FOR 2016-17 NBA COACH OF THE YEAR, IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER

Brad Stevens, Celtics

The boy wizard won over LeBron at All-Star, molded an unwieldy, guard-heavy roster into an elite team, and helped Isaiah Thomas become a flat-out star and local legend. Stevens has the juice of a top NBA prospect as a coach. That tells you something. He’d be an excellent Coach of the Year option.

Scott Brooks, Wizards

This is a classic Coach of the Year case. A new coach arrives at an underperforming franchise, takes a couple months to get the house in order, turns a young player or two into stars and puts together the team’s best record in decades. The Wizards need to finish 5-4 to win 50 games a year after missing the playoffs. That’s huge! Brooks’ involvement in turning Bradley Beal into a reliable scoring star, Otto Porter into a max player, and Kelly Oubre into a key defender will be smiled upon by voters.

Erik Spoelstra, Heat

If ever the coach of a .500 team deserved Coach of the Year, it’s Spoelstra right now. There’s no realm in which anyone thought Miami, with its 11-30 record in mid-January, would end up in the playoff race with LeBron and Wade gone, Bosh out, and Justise Winslow injured. But Spo has turned Goran Dragic, Hassan Whiteside, and Dion Waiters into the core of a juggernaut! If Spoelstra doesn’t win Coach of the Year, perhaps we can nominate him for a Nobel.

Mike D’Antoni, Rockets

Like Brooks, D’Antoni took over a clearly talented team that underwhelmed in 2015-16. Perhaps even more impressive than Brooks’ work to elevate the unreliable youth, D’Antoni has helped unleash James Harden, the likely MVP, and create a wholly inspiring attack while winning tons of games. (Houston is on track for about 57 wins.) A Coach of the Year trophy would also be a nice form of penance from the media for all the dismissive analysis we’ve given to D’Antoni since he left Phoenix.

Any one of those four candidates would be highly deserving of the honor. However, the award should instead go to ...

Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports

THE COACH OF THIS YEAR AND EVERY YEAR FOR TIME IMMEMORIAL

Gregg Popovich, Spurs

Another 60-win season. With one All-Star. (Albeit an MVP-caliber All-Star.) Plus he’s had time to serve as the conscience of the NBA at the same time.

Popovich and Pat Riley are the only coaches to have ever won three Coach of the Year award. Getting Pop another would put him in a class of his own, which is where he belongs.

Give it to Pop. You’ll never regret it.

0 notes

flauntpage · 7 years

Text

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties

Three Stars of Comedy

The third star: Wes McCauley. The only referee on the planet who should ever be allowed near a microphone was at it again. I'd get in there if I were you, Nate.

The second star: Patrick Eaves. D'aawwww.

The first star: The Golden Knights Twitter… again. Good lord, rest of the NHL, how many times are we going to do this?

Outrage of the Week

So yeah, the face-off thing is dicey. The slashing, though? Not remotely. It's about time the league took a stand on this one.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

And then there's this week's obscure player: Doug Crossman.

So… how did he wind up lining up next to the Canadian dream team in 1987?

All of those guys had to play a role for Canada to win, but only Crossman got to hear his name announced as a starter in one of the most star-studded games ever played.

Be It Resolved

Like hell it is. Faithful readers, this cannot stand.

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

Bowen does a reasonably good job on the call, although he's had better.

Uh, did anyone notice anything odd in the lower right corner just there?

No, he's apparently going to fight Ryan Miller, who speaks for all of us when he reacts by doing this:

"All five players…all six players on the ice, including the goaltenders…" Keep counting, Joe.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at [email protected] .

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

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flauntpage · 7 years

Text

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties

Three Stars of Comedy

The third star: Wes McCauley. The only referee on the planet who should ever be allowed near a microphone was at it again. I'd get in there if I were you, Nate.

The second star: Patrick Eaves. D'aawwww.

The first star: The Golden Knights Twitter… again. Good lord, rest of the NHL, how many times are we going to do this?

Outrage of the Week

So yeah, the face-off thing is dicey. The slashing, though? Not remotely. It's about time the league took a stand on this one.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

And then there's this week's obscure player: Doug Crossman.

So… how did he wind up lining up next to the Canadian dream team in 1987?

All of those guys had to play a role for Canada to win, but only Crossman got to hear his name announced as a starter in one of the most star-studded games ever played.

Be It Resolved

Like hell it is. Faithful readers, this cannot stand.

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

Bowen does a reasonably good job on the call, although he's had better.

Uh, did anyone notice anything odd in the lower right corner just there?

No, he's apparently going to fight Ryan Miller, who speaks for all of us when he reacts by doing this:

"All five players…all six players on the ice, including the goaltenders…" Keep counting, Joe.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at [email protected] .

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

0 notes

flauntpage · 7 years

Text

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties

Three Stars of Comedy

The third star: Wes McCauley. The only referee on the planet who should ever be allowed near a microphone was at it again. I'd get in there if I were you, Nate.

The second star: Patrick Eaves. D'aawwww.

The first star: The Golden Knights Twitter… again. Good lord, rest of the NHL, how many times are we going to do this?

Outrage of the Week

So yeah, the face-off thing is dicey. The slashing, though? Not remotely. It's about time the league took a stand on this one.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

And then there's this week's obscure player: Doug Crossman.

So… how did he wind up lining up next to the Canadian dream team in 1987?

All of those guys had to play a role for Canada to win, but only Crossman got to hear his name announced as a starter in one of the most star-studded games ever played.

Be It Resolved

Like hell it is. Faithful readers, this cannot stand.

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

Bowen does a reasonably good job on the call, although he's had better.

Uh, did anyone notice anything odd in the lower right corner just there?

No, he's apparently going to fight Ryan Miller, who speaks for all of us when he reacts by doing this:

"All five players…all six players on the ice, including the goaltenders…" Keep counting, Joe.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at [email protected] .

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

0 notes

flauntpage · 7 years

Text

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties

Three Stars of Comedy

The third star: Wes McCauley. The only referee on the planet who should ever be allowed near a microphone was at it again. I'd get in there if I were you, Nate.

The second star: Patrick Eaves. D'aawwww.

The first star: The Golden Knights Twitter… again. Good lord, rest of the NHL, how many times are we going to do this?

Outrage of the Week

So yeah, the face-off thing is dicey. The slashing, though? Not remotely. It's about time the league took a stand on this one.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

And then there's this week's obscure player: Doug Crossman.

So… how did he wind up lining up next to the Canadian dream team in 1987?

All of those guys had to play a role for Canada to win, but only Crossman got to hear his name announced as a starter in one of the most star-studded games ever played.

Be It Resolved

Like hell it is. Faithful readers, this cannot stand.

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

Bowen does a reasonably good job on the call, although he's had better.

Uh, did anyone notice anything odd in the lower right corner just there?

No, he's apparently going to fight Ryan Miller, who speaks for all of us when he reacts by doing this:

"All five players…all six players on the ice, including the goaltenders…" Keep counting, Joe.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at [email protected] .

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

0 notes

flauntpage · 7 years

Text

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties

Three Stars of Comedy

The third star: Wes McCauley. The only referee on the planet who should ever be allowed near a microphone was at it again. I'd get in there if I were you, Nate.

The second star: Patrick Eaves. D'aawwww.

The first star: The Golden Knights Twitter… again. Good lord, rest of the NHL, how many times are we going to do this?

Outrage of the Week

So yeah, the face-off thing is dicey. The slashing, though? Not remotely. It's about time the league took a stand on this one.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

And then there's this week's obscure player: Doug Crossman.

So… how did he wind up lining up next to the Canadian dream team in 1987?

All of those guys had to play a role for Canada to win, but only Crossman got to hear his name announced as a starter in one of the most star-studded games ever played.

Be It Resolved

Like hell it is. Faithful readers, this cannot stand.

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

Bowen does a reasonably good job on the call, although he's had better.

Uh, did anyone notice anything odd in the lower right corner just there?

No, he's apparently going to fight Ryan Miller, who speaks for all of us when he reacts by doing this:

"All five players…all six players on the ice, including the goaltenders…" Keep counting, Joe.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at [email protected] .

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

0 notes

flauntpage · 7 years

Text

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties

Three Stars of Comedy

The third star: Wes McCauley. The only referee on the planet who should ever be allowed near a microphone was at it again. I'd get in there if I were you, Nate.

The second star: Patrick Eaves. D'aawwww.

The first star: The Golden Knights Twitter… again. Good lord, rest of the NHL, how many times are we going to do this?

Outrage of the Week

So yeah, the face-off thing is dicey. The slashing, though? Not remotely. It's about time the league took a stand on this one.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

And then there's this week's obscure player: Doug Crossman.

So… how did he wind up lining up next to the Canadian dream team in 1987?

All of those guys had to play a role for Canada to win, but only Crossman got to hear his name announced as a starter in one of the most star-studded games ever played.

Be It Resolved

Like hell it is. Faithful readers, this cannot stand.

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

Bowen does a reasonably good job on the call, although he's had better.

Uh, did anyone notice anything odd in the lower right corner just there?

No, he's apparently going to fight Ryan Miller, who speaks for all of us when he reacts by doing this:

"All five players…all six players on the ice, including the goaltenders…" Keep counting, Joe.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at [email protected] .

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

0 notes

flauntpage · 7 years

Text

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties

Three Stars of Comedy

The third star: Wes McCauley. The only referee on the planet who should ever be allowed near a microphone was at it again. I'd get in there if I were you, Nate.

The second star: Patrick Eaves. D'aawwww.

The first star: The Golden Knights Twitter… again. Good lord, rest of the NHL, how many times are we going to do this?

Outrage of the Week

So yeah, the face-off thing is dicey. The slashing, though? Not remotely. It's about time the league took a stand on this one.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

And then there's this week's obscure player: Doug Crossman.

So… how did he wind up lining up next to the Canadian dream team in 1987?

All of those guys had to play a role for Canada to win, but only Crossman got to hear his name announced as a starter in one of the most star-studded games ever played.

Be It Resolved

Like hell it is. Faithful readers, this cannot stand.

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

Bowen does a reasonably good job on the call, although he's had better.

Uh, did anyone notice anything odd in the lower right corner just there?

No, he's apparently going to fight Ryan Miller, who speaks for all of us when he reacts by doing this:

"All five players…all six players on the ice, including the goaltenders…" Keep counting, Joe.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at [email protected] .

DGB Grab Bag: Recalling a Preseason Line Brawl and Nonsense Face-Off Penalties published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

0 notes