Spirit Tracks: Chatting Retro with Bob from RetroRGB

Remember how I had a podcast?   All joking aside, I'm really, really proud of this one. Please join me in extending a very warm welcome to the wonderful Bob from RetroRGB.   Bob has done tireless work gathering information on how to preserve every aspect of classic video games: Not just the systems and the games themselves, but the whole experience of retro gaming. From the best way to hook up your old consoles to a modern flatscreen digital HD TV to the best way to track down and safeguard a CRT to build your own personal arcade, Bob's website RetroRGB is a wellspring of everything you'd ever want to know about the technical side of video game history and preservation. Over the course of an hour and a half, Bob and I share our thoughts on the retro lifestyle, some of our favourite video game memories and talk about what keeps us coming back to the old classics and retro aesthetics year after year.   This podcast is a real collaboration between RetroRGB, Eruditorum Press and the Forest of Illusions YouTube Channel. For the first time, I'm doing a proper crosspost: My YouTube viewers will get a video podcast (and, for the first time, get to see me in person), while fans of EP's podcast network get an audio-only version hosted, as always on the Pex Lives Libsyn (if that version isn't up yet when this goes live, it will be in the near future and I'll update the post accordingly). But more to the point, Bob was kind enough to not just guest on my show, but actually do all the technical work recording, mixing and uploading it too. I could not have gotten this out in time today were it not for him, so I wanted to give him an impassioned public thanks here as well.   Some liner notes:

 

“In Search of Scanlines”, the Tested.com article that set me down this path. My Life in Gaming on Retro Gaming on CRTs and the Analogue NT Mini FPGA console Bob and Jose Cruz from IFixRetro turn an unwanted consumer CRT TV into an arcade monitor. Do not try this at home. The name of the Japanese poetic structure I was stumbling over is kishōtenketsu. Here's the full poem I was trying to recite from memory, and that I of course butchered horrifically:

Daughters of Itoya, in the Honmachi of Osaka. (ki)

The elder daughter is sixteen and the younger one is fourteen. (shō)

Throughout history, daimyo killed the enemy with bows and arrows. (ten)

The daughters of Itoya kill with their eyes. (ketsu)

Where to find Bob: The main site is RetroRGB.com. Just to get you started, here are some of my favourite pages: RGB Guide, including an introduction to RGB RGB Monitors Dedicated pages for the NES/Famicom, SEGA Mega Drive/Genesis, SNES/Super Famicom and a breakdown of the various Game Boy model revisions and mods. Bob has a YouTube channel as well, so be sure to subscribe if you want to get caught up on all the latest developments in the field of retro gaming and retro game preservation. Also please consider supporting his Patreon to help keep him going. You can also follow RetroRGB on Facebook and Twitter. You all should know where to find me by now. This show was a blast to make, and I hope you all enjoy it!