Wizard of Wor for VIC-20 FOUND!

[DwightDMoody]

The catalog does not list WoW as a current or pending cartridge but it does list several cartridges that they had available which are not usually on the rarity lists, so these were actually produced and offered in this catalog.

I think that at the end of the Vic's life, there were tons of games going through the normal process of development that got cancelled along the way or underwent conversion to the C-64, like WoW. So potentially there are 1) unfinished cartridges at various stages of development; 2) finished cartridges in prototype form that never made it into production; and 3) games that were produced but never were widely distributed because the Vic got cancelled. In the first instance, we will find games that aren't full games or are buggy because they were never finished. In the second instance, we have finished games that are very rare because only a few were produced in-house for testers and for outside reviewers (advance copies). In the third instance, boxes of finished product was either landfilled or put in shipping containers and sent to electronic liquidators, who may have sent them to South America or Europe where it was thought there was a market for these items still. There is an Ebay seller from Venezuela that apparently got hold of a large quantity of Vic-20 games through this process (BTW, he is offering a super rare Boone Crater Raider NIB on Ebay for only $79 plus shipping. I got mine from him years ago). I have purchased numerous items from foreign sellers, and except for a single instance of US Customs slicing up my NIB Ape Escape in their rabid search for contraband, have never had a problem.

So, in my humble opinion, we should not be making negative comments when someone comes across these items, because there is every chance that they are legitimate. If something was stored in a dry environment, it will look brand new even though it is 30+ years old. We certainly do not want to bad mouth someone who gets so offended that they take the legitimate prototype item and throw it in the trash because they are sick and tired of the abuse they are getting because of it. On the other hand, transactions should always be done through PayPal, because if it turns out to be a scam, at least you can get your money back from PayPal.

[Boray]

In my humble opinion, critical thinking is essential before doing any kind of business. In this case, it prevented one or many people from being very disappointed. If the seller was honest, also he must have been pleased with the outcome.

[RJBowman]

If games got all the way to the final prototype stage, why didn't they produce just a small run of cartridges to recoup a little bit of the development cost from the few remaining die-hard VIC users?

[DwightDMoody]

I think it had something to do with contracts, which often are set up so that the distributor is required to take a certain amount of product UNLESS the project is cancelled by the manufacturer, in which case they will get zero deliveries. Short runs are expensive and at the end of the Vic-20's life, stores were selling everything for the Vic at significant discounts (I wish I had bought all the Xonox games when they were 5 for $50, they would be worth well over $100 each now). When people are trying to get rid of Vic-20 merchandise, no one wants to purchase short-run, expensive items.

Getting back to availability. So if there was, let's say, 50 advance copies made to send to reviewers, etc., that is all there is. If they made another short run and had product ready to ship, then management decided that it would not sell in the US market, they could either destroy the product or liquidate it to recover some of the production costs. If liquidated, the product likely went overseas where there was still a market and could be sold for a profit, if it was purchased for pennies on the dollar. That is where a lot of the Boone cartridges went, along with a lot of other titles, there was a guy from Venezuela selling NOS items for quite a while on Ebay. I do know that a lot of 8 track music went directly to the dump and the company just wrote off the production cost as a tax deduction. I think a lot of Vic-20 stuff may have had the same fate, but hope that some enterprising person bought a bunch of liquidated stuff as an investment and it may yet show up in an estate sale, storage unit sale, etc., which would mean that it would show up on eBay at some point.

[fsporsche]

Since I have been getting flooded with massive emails regarding this board/cartridge I am going to explain how I acquired it. I purchased a storage locker which was filled with dvd's, video games some Commodore 64 and vic-20 items.
As I have some spare time to go through the storage I have been putting things on eBay for sale as you can see from what I have listed. There are a lot of shoe boxes taped up that I have not even gone been able to look at what maybe inside. As I am able to get some time to myself (when my wife lets me) I was able to find this vic-20 board/cart and decided to sell this on eBay with no reserve as-is since I don't have anyway to test it or know anyone in my area who has a vic-20. Since the tag is labeled wizard of wor proto I listed on eBay. I hope this explains to everyone a little better and cuts down my emails.

I joined this community many years ago and have been here to help others with questions and answers. I am not here to recieve nasty comments and destroy my integrity for a $40-$50 Board/Cart that i found in a storage locker i purchased, i might as well just throw it out and not even offer it to anyone at all. Unfortunately i do not have a working vic-20 at the present time to test this out that is why i listed it on ebay as untested. But i would to the winner as him to send me a copy of the rom if the game was legit and if it was not i would surely refund the money.
I am also part of the atari community/Jaguar and enjoy being part of these sites.

Currently i have someone not too far from me that is looking into this to see if it is the actual WOR game and than i will precede from there.



I am just very upset that we are suppose to be a supportive site for the commodore vic-20 community and not bashes.

[Vic20-Ian]

Fred, fully agree with your points.

There is a lot of passion about finding WoW and some people seemed to forget their manners.

I hope that you find proof positive and stay connected with the Vic-20, the friendly computer.

[orion70]

Fred, I'm sure nobody here intended to be less than friendly. Only, most of us were arguing that this cart has a recent label, and chip numbers corresponding to a well known, widespread cart - and this goeas against the cart being a real WoW prototype.

This DOES NOT imply that YOU were trying to cheat on this: you have simply found it in a box, intend to refund the buyer whener it turns out to be something different from WoW, and that's great. It would have been even better if you had the opportunity to test it yourself, and/or dump it BEFORE putting it on Ebay. That's all. No bashes.

[fsporsche]

thanks for the response...
If i had a working vic-20 i would of defiantly tested it. But for now i have another person who will test for me to see if its real or something else.

I will keep the community informed of my findings and hopefully its
the real thing and than we can go from there.

Everyone enjoy the holiday...

[ral-clan]

Hi Folks.

I'm the fellow that Ward Shrake mentions who has an early 1980s computer store catalogue (from Nova Scotia, Canada) listing Wizard of Wor and other unreleased CBM cartridges. I believe

Since this catalogue is from a very early point in the VIC's history, I'm guessing the info was simply reprinted by the dealer based on some early CBM VIC-20 promotional material he/she received, but which was never delivered upon.

The catalogue can be seen in the Wiki:

http://sleepingelephant.com/denial/wiki ... ard_of_Wor

Other than Commodore's screenshot on the box, I think this is the only other piece of evidence I'm aware of that indicated Wizard of Wor was being marketed (before being cancelled, or whatever).

[orion70]

Any news about the cartridge?

[tokra]

*BUMP* Has been another 2 months now.

[Mike]

As Parkinson's last law states, postponement is the deadliest form of refusal.

If this had been a real prototype of WoW, I suppose the people concerned would have pulled out all the stops to confirm its existence. OTOH, if it wasn't the case, the natural reaction - after causing all the fuss - would have been to let the furor die down. Simple as that.

For me, the case was settled as soon as I saw the number on the ROM chip matched with Voodoo Castle - regardless upon whom a prank was played.

[joshuadenmark]

Perhaps one of our talented coders can make this happen?

Personally I will be pleased to buy a hard copy (cartridge) version for christmas.

Source code found here:
http://www.ballyalley.com/ml/ml_source/ ... 022104.asm

[Boray]

Perhaps one of our talented coders can make this happen?

Personally I will be pleased to buy a hard copy (cartridge) version for christmas.

Source code found here:
http://www.ballyalley.com/ml/ml_source/ ... 022104.asm

Code: Select all

; CPU Type: Z80

[orion70]

OK, do it from scratch then