I want an Amiga gaming system!

[HopperJF]

Did I mention A600?  :-)

[Wolfe]

If you want an A3000 and money isn't an option you can get a referbished unit from Dividesoft.  They aren't cheap but they look new.

[StarOne]

Seems to be a common misunderstanding that WHDload doesn't cover that many games. I have just counted the number of games I have on my Amiga installed with mostly WHDload, but also JST. I think WHDload is more reliable though, and if there's a WHDload version available, I'd rather use that one.

Anyway, my count ended at exactly 379 games. And there's more to come. These are all games that work as good as or better than the original, considering the loading times and overall speed of the game. I'm certain you'll find more than 95% of all your favourite games that you want to play on your amiga in my collection.

And there's more to come, because I've just downloaded about 1,5 gigabyte of .lzx archives of pre-installed WHDload and JST games, and I have yet to unpack them all onto my HD. I'm betting there's about 40-50% left I haven' tried yet, which means about 150-200 more games. If you're still not happy with the compatibility of WHDload and A1200 with a 030 and 32mb fast, then I give up.

Just mention a game, I'm 90% sure I have it ready to run off my HD.

[mepmepmep]

Do you have Holo Squash? Gotcha :-P

[mugenakuma]

An A3000 sounds cool but I dont want to spend too much cash. How much would I have to spend?

Also from what I have seen the A3000 is really hard to find.

I am now leaning more towards an A500, especially since I am only looking for old school/classic 2D games.

[mepmepmep]

If you don't want to pay a lot but still play a lot A500 is THE choise. I'm not complaining on the other suggestions here, but they seem a bit over the top just for doing some classic gaming. Sure it's nice to have the games on HD, but at what price? Extra processing power will have no positive effect on those old games either, mostly its the other way around. Those old games are OPTIMIZED for the A500. A3000 seems nice but if you're only in it for the games, why spend extra cash on it? Sure you could also go with the A600 for gaming, its quite equal to the A500 when it comes to game support I believe.
Your real problem i think is not choosing machine but:

a) Getting hold of the software, the great golden games: R-type, Silkworm, Chaos Engine, Swiv, Gods, Speedball II... You know... Those;)

b) Overcoming the problem with PAL/NTSC on games or be sure to get NTSC versions.  

Maybe the A600 has an early boot control, possibility to choose PAL/NTSC, like the 1200 has? Someone? If that is the case, the A600 should be your choise because it would solve problem b;)

About the software. Most retailers do not seem to sell those really good games that you want. They often have more recent stuff in stock that either did'nt sell too well or requires a beast of an Amiga to run or comes on CD or both. You'll probably have to look at second hand stuff, eBay or so. Ask around for which games to get (we'll help you:-) ) and then try to get hold of those games. I mentioned a few goldies for you already   ;-).

Good Luck indeed  :-)

[mepmepmep]

Oh, look... Three goodies available for download on one page. Shadow of the Beast, Speedball II and Turrican II. Great games. I hope they are legal, if so get them. Try them in an emulator or transfer to disk when you have your Amiga :-)
here!

[JetRacer]

@leirbag28: There's no such thing as a 16-bit Amiga. It was 32-bit from day one. Busses and custom chips has nothing to do with the definition, only the CPU. The entire 68K family is 32-bit. Calling A500 16-bit is like saying every x86 with SDRAM or DDR is 64-bit.

[jjans]

I am a longtime amiga 500 owner (going on 17 years). I am still using the original Amiga 500 I bought in 1986.  It is true that this system does not come stock with a hard drive.  However there are lots of SCSI controllers for this machine such as the A 590. CD-ROMs and hard drives are easy to get, and are also dirt cheap. A lot of classic original games for the Amiga, came in Non DOS format, which prevented copying to either other disks or hard drives.  There's software available to install a lot of the non DOS games such as WHD-load.

It is true that the Amiga 1200 is a fantastic system that runs AGA games.  However, there's tons of software out there, that was written specifically for the Amiga 500.  If you wish to take a chance to purchase a real Amiga system, I would have to argue strongly in favor of the Amiga 500.  The main reason simply price.  They are a dime a dozen on ebay right now. In fact I have 7 of them. If you wind up being disappointed, then the investment is minimal. They are tough as nails too, as the beer stains, and cigarette ashes inside mine can attest to.

If you like the system, you can either expand the A500, or invest in an A3000/A4000's. I have always been in awe of the bigger Amigas, but have never actually purchased one as I have always been content with mine by expanding. Now I can burn music or data CD's, play music, or with a simple double click, revert the system to play the very first Amiga Classic game I ever purchased, (Darkside). My first PC is long dead, and is now stripped and reborn housing a SCSI CD-Writer, SCSI CD-ROM, and 6 GB of Hard-Drives externally connected to my A500.

There are a couple of issues to consider. First is the monitor (Commodores A1084/1084s). You need this to run the games. A520 Modulators that allow hook up to a normal TV, are not well suited for games( the original intent for the system). Next is the floppy disks. They are 720 KB, getting old, and harder to find. They are not the same format as PC 1.44MB. They are not readable with PC's either.

The monitor,  and 1 hard-drive are the hardware failures I have experienced, that were easily replaced at inexpensive cost. As time marches on this will no doubt change...

I strongly suggest you first try Cloanto's Amiga Forever. I run it on Windows XP and find it quite amazing. I can assure you of one simple fact despite my argument in favor of the A500. You will enjoy ANY Amiga you decide to obtain!!!!

[mepmepmep]

@jjans
You have certainly pushed the old 500 to its limits. CDRW, nice:) Interesting post! But I disagree with a few things.

First is the monitor (Commodores A1084/1084s). You need this to run the games

I do not understand this. Why does he need a monitor to run games like R-Type or Silkworm. The TV-output of the A520 is as good as on any old games console, NES, SNES, MasterSystem, MegaDrive (Genesis) etc. You do not need a monitor for these do you? I could agree if the guy was going to play textbased adventures... but arcade games? I've played Amiga games on a TV-set since '89. Maybe theres something wrong with me;-)

Next is the floppy disks. They are 720 KB

Amiga floppys are 1MB unformatted, 880K formatted, as far as I know. But I agree they are hard to find, and of deteriorating quality. Hmm.. That is an argument for storing the games on HD that I did'nt think of... well, well..

[jjans]

mepmepmep wrote:
@jjans
You have certainly pushed the old 500 to its limits. CDRW, nice:) Interesting post! But I disagree with a few things.

First is the monitor (Commodores A1084/1084s). You need this to run the games

I do not understand this. Why does he need a monitor to run games like R-Type or Silkworm. The TV-output of the A520 is as good as on any old games console, NES, SNES, MasterSystem, MegaDrive (Genesis) etc. You do not need a monitor for these do you? I could agree if the guy was going to play textbased adventures... but arcade games? I've played Amiga games on a TV-set since '89. Maybe theres something wrong with me;-)

Next is the floppy disks. They are 720 KB

Amiga floppys are 1MB unformatted, 880K formatted, as far as I know. But I agree they are hard to find, and of deteriorating quality. Hmm.. That is an argument for storing the games on HD that I did'nt think of... well, well..

In regards to the floppies, I stand corrected as they are indeed 880K, and I'm not sure where I got 720 K from.?*&?? Must have had a brain fart...

As for the A520, you just peeked my interest, as I had no idea they worked that well. I must confess to claim ignorance. It was my understanding from prior reading , that TV's had trouble showing the correct colors of Amiga games. I'd love to see a screen shot of an A520 in action. I have also seen them on ebay for reasonable prices. My wife is gonna kill me thanks to you!!!

The reason I wanted the CDRW was for burning ADF's of my games as bakups, and raw images that I submit to the CAPS project...

Thanks for sorting me out on the errors!

[mugenakuma]

well I definitely have been having a hard time finding some of the games I want.

Looking on ebay was difficult too since I dont know exactly what to look for.

If you anyone could throw out some suggestions for cool 2D Amiga games, which are somewhat attainable I would appreciate it.

So what's the deal with running a hard drive on a A500? What would I need to do this?

Also are floppys that hard to get? If so a hard drive would definitely be a must.

[mepmepmep]

@mugenakuma

If you anyone could throw out some suggestions for cool 2D Amiga games

 :-D Dont tempt me... This thread is NEVER going to end :-P
Well I'll put together a list of some of my favorites for you. And so will probably everyone else too ;-)

[jjans]

Tons of games to check out:
http://www.back2roots.org/

A500 Hardrives:
http://amiga.resource.cx/exp/search.pl?product=A500&company=

http://www.amiga-hardware.com/gvphd+.html

http://www.amiga-hardware.com/hd500.html
http://www.amiga-hardware.com/supradrivescsi.html

[mugenakuma]

Cool, so I can get an A500 hard drive and install disk games on it, correct?

Now I am worried about finding good games for the system. I looked at EVERY page of Amiga games (20 pages) and couldn't really find anything that especially interested me. A few Psygnosis games looked cool.

I have seen some awesome games around the net but where are they?

[mepmepmep]

@jjans

I'd love to see a screen shot of an A520 in action

Look, see here. While I agree that it's not as sharp and clear as on a monitor, you cannot state that these games look totally unplayable and that the colors are wrong, right;-) Also know that it looks better in motion than these stills do.

The shots are from an A1200 and its internal RF but the A520 performs equally well.

I agree though that a TV-set is not totally suitable for workbench usage and text-based stuff as small text can get a bit blurry. I've managed that too however;-) My eyes have probably adapted :-D