The 21st European Jaguar Festival attracts a record number of visitors
Marco BreddinPerhaps one of the least well-known retro gathering is held in the German town of Kleinenbroich, staged by Männerquatsch Podcast host Björn Baranski. The village, which is close to the Dutch border, is apparently an excellent location for the annual revival of the once controversial 64-bit Jaguar system by Atari.
From the outset in 1993, Atari overestimated its marketing strategies and production capacities, while the willingness to wait for games that adequately showcased the 64-bit wonder all too quickly waned.
The past is history – well, it’s been burned. Baranski is a true one-off, having gained extensive experience in the games industry in the 1990s and decades of in-depth knowledge in managing game productions. If you ask him about his first encounter with the Jaguar console, you’ll get a full-length story about a smouldering fire in the region.
When you look quizzically at the transparent case on display, the talkative Kaarst native answers with an insider story that leaves much more than astonished looks on people’s faces and amusingly reveals the demarcation line of the German Jaguar community. He first used duct tape to operate his 64-bit console, for a sensational price. Likewise, the friends and acquaintances from the area were happy to operate those burnt Jaguar consoles in seclusion and approval for years.
The organiser only got the transparent casing years later for his first Jaguar, which was operated without a casing and only taped for electrical safety.
Back then, a kind of ‘Lindenstraße’ of taped Jaguar consoles emerged in Baranski’s neighborhood. From house to house, people exchanged experiences and always looked a little wistfully at the charred cases, whose 64-bit circuit boards never gave up. Not even today. Nevertheless, producer and game manager Baranski has left the demanding game business which he started in-between companies like Rushware, Funsoft and Softgold. Still, he is able to gather a team of worldwide Atari Jaguar developers. E-Jag, that is the 21st instalment of the video game meeting founded in the USA, which was once taken over by scene expert Lars Hannig and handed over to Baranski.
At the very latest E-Jagfest, you not only discover 64-bit consoles, but also a genuine and almost forgotten Nuon loaded with Tempest, some cool Retrocades and a very big Jaguar arcade stand. Play on with the historic Atari VCS (2600) or reissued Atari VCS (2020) alongside many Lynx II handhelds, with which people passionately fight for the old Checkered Flag victory or the new one against the machines, in Red by Ancient World.
Here you can play new and tried and tested games to your heart’s content, such as the Jaguar racer Super Burnout from the old French Atari ST demoscene team The Constellations (full story in Return of The Borders).
One of the larger stands comes from France. Frédéric Descharmes is the developer of Yastuna Games and has built up a large collection with rarely complex Lynx adventures, which, in addition to gigantic maps and generous instructions, are presented in elaborate packaging complete with an Aztec temple. For the now 35th Lynx anniversary, this is a fine approach. Atari Jaguar, Game Boy and Game Boy Color also belong in Descharmes’ game universe.
Alarming message: Yastuna is closing its gates. You should hurry and get the Lynx games soon, as the Yastuna webshop will unfortunately be shut down by the end of the year.
Historicising tables are appearing in the fray, for example for those interested in the ColecoVision, Vectrex, C64, Atari XL/XE and Atari ST. You can even compare the classic Atari VCS against the new VCS system from 2020 here. There is plenty of time to explore the solid pixel and module worlds, whether via an SD card-loaded directory via US Teensy ROM cartridge on the C64 (by Sensorium), or with the spin-carts for the Vectrex, compiled by Binarystar Software in Scotland, allowing for razor-sharp precision with the spinner controller.
New software is by no means passé. The talkative Michael Lünzer (Atari Age), presents a series of conversions and new releases via cartridge and great big box packaging. Beach-Head for the Coleco? Yes, it’s available now. The gaming veteran is happy to support the small scene of the formerly 2 million console units sold, which is still strongest in the USA, ‘with about 30 nerds,’ as he mischievously remarks and proudly presents another new Coleco release (Akalabeth – World of Doom).
Surprisingly, Wings of Death can be played on the Jaguar in one corner. New cartridges with Atari ST conversions are continuously being financed and produced via an Atari Age project. But also four people can play here directly on the ST. The likeable Thomas Ilg has equipped his Anarcho Ride Laboratories with the latest version of Competition Pro and invites you to a fun SHOTGUN tournament. The full-time film editor is proud of the six Atari ST/E and Falcon games that he likes to code in GFA-Basic on train journeys. Now with new sprite technology and 50 Hz sync. Big boxes can be obtained from Bitmap Soft.
The two days fly by and show how connected the global Jaguar scene has become. Carl Forhan from Songbird Productions, who has been releasing new Jaguar games since 2000 and is one of two dozen hardcore developers worldwide, has travelled to Düsseldorf for the first time. Baranski impressively confirms that probably more than half of the living Lynx developers have gathered at the European E-Jagfest this time. The Jaguar dev community is bigger. Alongside old industry greats like Ian McCranor (motion capture actor for Katsumi Ninja) and Jaguar developers like Alexander Grade (Jumping at Shadows, Last Strike DX), you'll also meet Atari 7800 veterans like Karri Kaksonen and Walter Lauer, who have modded cases, new game projects and a lovingly made multimodule in store for the 40th anniversary of the VCS (see next picture).
The smorgasbord of offers expands to include hardware extensions, collection modules and plug-in boards. Somewhere in between, and in an iconic way, a 3.5-inch rotating floppy disk is presented as a collector’s item in a focused 3D-printed frame.
With his company, Manual Broska stands for individually manufactured protective covers that are precisely made to customer specifications. Not only big boxes of retro games are possible, but also protective cases for Blu-rays and film collections. Broska is almost alone in Europe with his excellent range of products and now also offers the beautiful floppy disk racks (grey, white, black) and professional Compact Disk (CD/CD-ROM) washing for music and gaming fans alike.
You will receive an exclusive 3D printed case like this one. Each request must be made via a form on www.sammlerschutzhüllen.de and is individually calculated.
