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Even if they could just get a license to release. It would be awesome to have an arcade game collection featuring both sides of Atari. Maybe they could release a few more Lynx/Jag titles as part of the deal too. Midway stopped releasing such collections some time back.

I think they were modestly profitable a year or two back. But right now Atari seems to be trying to expand and raise their profile, they are constantly announcing something new. So it's understandable to not be profitable during such a phase, but hopefully they can turn a profit from some of the things they are setting in motion now. Dig Dug, Pole Position, Kangaroo and probably some others were in the arcade with Atari logos splashed all over them. Atari was building arcade cabinets for other game developers. So I can understand why people are confused about Dig Dug. More so than say Donkey Kong or Mario Bros. Anything that could affect the share price up or down is best revealed in a press release or earnings call than on a podcast where it won't reach all investors.

I don't think this is really necessary. With the tools we have now like Batari Basic, there's new homebrew projects appearing daily. If you lower the barrier to entry too far you will get a flood of low-effort content that nobody has time to play, and it will make it harder for the dedicated homebrew authors to sell their works. Also the systems are too different. A game design tool that can target both the Jaguar and 2600 isn't going to go too deep on either.

Good point, it was always "Let's Play Atari". Hell, marketing couldn't decide if it was the 2600 or the VCS, and then you had your friends with the Sears Telegames models which was called neither, not to mention the odd kids with the Coleco Gemini...

Crystal Castles is another good example. Sure the levels look funny, it's hard to do proper isometric on the 2600. But it's true to the other arcade elements so it kind of works...

For years No Man's Sky fans demanded Space Whales. Starglider II in the 80s had Space Whales, and I doubt it originated there. There's some space whale meme I'm not up on, and Ahsoka is the latest iteration of it. Someday when I'm bored enough, I'll look into where this idea originates.

Nice work! brings back memories of the original AtariAge Magazine from the Atari club in the 80s

Sure, but any game with "Revenge" in the title implies that it's a sequel to something where Vradark was wronged. Will we get the prequel? "Vradark slams his finger in the door" or "Vradark was given onion rings instead of fries"?

Triggers didn't work for me on the modern controller, unless it has to be enabled somehow?

Depending on your setup, selecting 4K may force 4K / 30hz, and the 30hz causes the choppiness, not the 4K. This is an issue on even the PS5 and I think newer Xbox- you have to turn on certain settings in the TV and console to get it up to 60hz. For my VCS, I used to see only 4K/30, but now I see 4K/60 is available.

I don't know what to think of this new Lunar Lander game based on trailers. Seems like they are turning a simple "land on the moon" game into a whole space adventure. Not that there's necessarily anything wrong with it, but Atari has other space games that might be more suitable for that kind of treatment.

When I asked about the status of Murtops- a game that was announced for VCS, David said they had problems getting the developer's VCS system through customs, that was the holdup.

It's generally agreed that Bentley Bear is the most mascot-ready character in the Atari (SA) portfolio. The characters in Adventure could have potential if they were fleshed out more in sequels. I'm sure "Sir Square" would have developed into a real character and the dragons would become less duck-like. Another one with potential would have been SwordQuest. The comics that came with those games established characters and lore that could have been used to build a SwordQuest franchise (even if the first games were weak) One problem is Atari relied too much on licensed characters back then: Indiana Jones, ET, Superman, Bugs Bunny, Road Runner- though some of them were owned by Warner like Atari was. But now they can't use them. But they did pick up a new villain mascot recently: Evil Otto! Looking forward to the Bentley Bear VS Evil Otto game, with cameo appearances by the Bat!

They didn't really plan for it, Atari had GCC making 2600 carts for them, and the GCC guys came up with the 7800 design on their own and brought it to Atari in 83. Atari was at a weird phase where they had no concept of console generations and seemed to think they could release a new console every year and be fine, they were also talking to Nintendo at the time about releasing the NES under the Atari brand, and had designs on an Amiga-based console to be released in 85... Anyway 5200 was plagued with technical issues, high price and complaints about 2600 compatibility. Instead of addressing those they decided to kill it in 84 and offer the 7800 instead. That was probably a huge mistake that hurt Atari's reputation- killing an expensive console after less than 2 years, but we didn't have the internet back then to hear the shrieking. I think it would be better if they told GCC to go back to the drawing board refine the design for an eventual 5200 successor in 86 or 87-- get a real sound chip, improve the high-resolution issues, for example. But there was too much disarray and lack of forward thinking for that to happen.

I was a big fan of Arcade Defender, and the 2600 version was kind of a letdown, but it didn't annoy me as much as Pac-Man. I felt like they tried on Defender and hardware got in the way. Pac-Man never felt like they tried hard enough- they deviated from the arcade in ways that weren't necessary, like the color scheme you mention.

Catbox sounds too much like "litter box" to me

Atari typically publishes to Steam so I'd imagine so.

The people on discord really seem to like it, I'll pick it up later tonight!

Do you have to sign up for early access on discord or is that for feedback?

I'm never quite sure what exactly we should expect from modern remakes. They could go in so many directions. The graphics are so primitive that you're likely to lose something by modernizing them. And the gameplay, For the original games, I often have to ask "Is that a bug or a feature?" Not being able to run and shoot at the same time, or only being able to shoot one shot at a time in Galaxian. Many games had this "one shot" thing going on, and it's usually due to hardware restrictions or being easier to program that way rather than design choices? I suspect they weren't deliberate design choices, so I don't get upset if they don't stick to that- But on the other hand if Berzerk Recharged doesn't include the ability for robots to shoot straight through your neck, it won't feel right (again neck invincibility probably had to do with sprite collision detection rather than a deliberate design choice) Atari has Haunted House coming out next week, I'm excited for it, I the art style looks cool. But it doesn't have a whole lot in common with the original game. In all honesty, I don't really want a modern haunted house game to look like the original with sparse rooms and a pair of eyeballs. I want something creepier. If Atari had evolved their properties over the years like Nintendo did, then modern versions wouldn't feel like a shock to the system, they'd seem more like the logical next step in the franchise. But because so much time has passed since the original release, there's going to be drastic changes that don't please everyone. But for the purists who feel the new versions aren't true enough, the originals are still available. There's a new 2600 Berzerk voice-enhanced coming out, and I'm sure the arcade Berzerk will show up in the next Atari compilation.

Yeah I agree it is cool that Atari has been able to highlight games that would have gotten lost in the shuffle on Steam/Switch. But on the other hand, I wish I didn't have to dual-boot the VCS to switch between Atari's content and my content. It would be cool if there was an official way to add my own content to the Atari side so that I could play everything from a single dashboard. Steam has this, maybe Atari will eventually.

Are you certain you were using the nVidia proprietary drivers and not the Nouveau drivers? I always see weird stuff like that with Nouveau, but the proprietary drivers have been rock solid for me.

I was messing around with terminal colors the other day and decided to see if I could make a VCS logo to use as a login banner. I think it turned out alright so I decided to share it in case anyone else finds it useful. This should work with any Linux installed in PC mode, (maybe even MacOS). just unzip the attached file and copy the motd file to /etc. (if you have an existing /etc/motd, you may want to back it up first sudo cp motd /etc/motd motd = "message of the day", the contents of that file will be shown to a user when the login. If installed correctly, you should see a banner like this when you login via ssh Download: vcsmotd.zip

I would have liked to see something like "Atari Store, powered by Steam" rather than Atari's own DIY store. A Steam-based store might still be Atari themed, feature Atari content, and Steam games certified to run well on the VCS (controller based, performance good) but allow access to the full Steam catalog without guarantees. Of course Valve would have to allow such an arrangement. But still, the VCS can benefit from all the work Valve did on the Steam Deck, the new big picture mode is a lot sleeker. Whenever Atari discontinues support for the VCS, you could just install SteamOS on it, copy your VCS purchases over and are good to go

I don't think Frenzy ever got ported to any Atari platform. I wonder if Atari would consider releasing a 2600 or 7800 version of it?