+Psionic Posted June 23, 2007 Share Posted June 23, 2007 My 5200 came with Super Breakout and other than it being a 4-player game I did not think it was the right game to include. If Atari had included Pac Man the 5200 would have out-sold Colecovision by a mile. By the time Atari switced to Pac Man as the pack-in game it was too late. Well, Atari dropped the ball there...unfortunately it's probably because they were greedy and wanted people to buy Pac-Man separately...bad marketing move. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Brasky Posted June 24, 2007 Share Posted June 24, 2007 Wait until Pac-Man Collection is released for the ColecoVision and then CV will have the best Pac-Man (and Ms. Pac-Man)on ANY system. PMC is also going to include Pac Man Plus, which may be the only home port of that game. That was an unauthorized sequel Bally made without Namco's permission. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ymike673 Posted June 24, 2007 Share Posted June 24, 2007 My 5200 came with Super Breakout and other than it being a 4-player game I did not think it was the right game to include. If Atari had included Pac Man the 5200 would have out-sold Colecovision by a mile. By the time Atari switced to Pac Man as the pack-in game it was too late. Well, Atari dropped the ball there...unfortunately it's probably because they were greedy and wanted people to buy Pac-Man separately...bad marketing move. Exactly what I thought at the time. Pac Man was probably the hottest selling 5200 game when it was released. (about 2 months after the 5200 was put on sale), but who knows how many more Supersystems Atari would have sold if Pac Man had been the pack-in game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Psionic Posted June 24, 2007 Share Posted June 24, 2007 PMC is also going to include Pac Man Plus, which may be the only home port of that game. That was an unauthorized sequel Bally made without Namco's permission. Weren't Super Pac-Man, Jr. Pac-Man and Pac & Pal (speaking of games with no home port) all unauthorized originally? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big_Mo Posted June 24, 2007 Share Posted June 24, 2007 PMC is also going to include Pac Man Plus, which may be the only home port of that game. That was an unauthorized sequel Bally made without Namco's permission. Weren't Super Pac-Man, Jr. Pac-Man and Pac & Pal (speaking of games with no home port) all unauthorized originally? Super PAC-MAN was done in Japan by Namco, with feedback from Bally/Midway. I know. I've see the docs in Japanese. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian R. Posted June 24, 2007 Author Share Posted June 24, 2007 Wait until Pac-Man Collection is released for the ColecoVision and then CV will have the best Pac-Man (and Ms. Pac-Man)on ANY system. PMC is also going to include Pac Man Plus, which may be the only home port of that game. That was an unauthorized sequel Bally made without Namco's permission. Nope. Pac Man Plus is on the Pac Man Collection for the 7800. It was made by our own... PacManPlus. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ymike673 Posted June 25, 2007 Share Posted June 25, 2007 I thought of another reason why Super Breakout and not Pac Man might have the first pack in game. When I purchased my 5200 (When it was originally released) there were only a few other cartridges released by Atari at the same time. I bought Missle Command and now that I think about both those games can be played with no problems using the 5200 controlers. Maybe Atari decided to use Breakout as the pack in game to minimize complaints about the controlers when the Console was first put on sale. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Helmet Posted June 25, 2007 Share Posted June 25, 2007 Wait until Pac-Man Collection is released for the ColecoVision and then CV will have the best Pac-Man (and Ms. Pac-Man)on ANY system. PMC is also going to include Pac Man Plus, which may be the only home port of that game. That was an unauthorized sequel Bally made without Namco's permission. Nope. Pac Man Plus is on the Pac Man Collection for the 7800. It was made by our own... PacManPlus. There is also a version of Pac Man Plus that PMP did for the 5200 as well. Fun hack. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chuckwalla Posted June 25, 2007 Share Posted June 25, 2007 DAMN, I LOVE those old classic video game commercials (thanks for the link!) - fantastic nostalgia! It's a bit of a devious (misleading?) commercial but brilliant from a marketing point of view. That's weird because I recently bought my second Atari 5200 system (mint and complete in box) and the first game I play on the system is Pac Man. The "Pac-Man (Atari 5200) (How To Beat Home Video Games 3)" video is cool too: Great stuff! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
8bitgamer Posted July 20, 2007 Share Posted July 20, 2007 That was a great ad. Probably the most ironic commercial of all time. http://brettweisswords.blogspot.com/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phuzaxeman Posted July 20, 2007 Share Posted July 20, 2007 Nice post! I love YouTube and all the retro cartoons and ads. (I watched a bit of Valley of the Dinosaurs the other day .. remember that?) Anyway ... I remember that commercial! That's when I bought my 5200, when Pac-Man was the pack-in. I still love 5200 Pac-Man just as much as the coin-op version, the same way I love 5200 / A8 Donkey Kong just as much as the coin-op. It's funny. I've got PacMan for the 7800, which can be said to be a more accurate and faithful version of the arcade game. But there's just something about PacMan on the 5200 that keeps bringing me back to it. I didn't have a 5200 back in the day. My family went from the 2600 to the Coleco. I remember what it was like going from DK on the 2600 to the Coleco. The leap with PacMan from the 2600 to the 5200 must've been just as jaw dropping. And, yeah, I knew DK wasn't released for the 5200, hence the " " the sound on the 5200 pacman was amazing and better than the 7800 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TwiliteZoner Posted August 5, 2007 Share Posted August 5, 2007 Atari only had the license for computer versions of Donkey Kong. Coleco had the console license. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NE146 Posted August 5, 2007 Share Posted August 5, 2007 the sound on the 5200 pacman was amazing and better than the 7800 There is an Atari 8-bit version of the same game with much better sound than the 5200 version. The pacman chomping sound is more accurate to the arcade version.. more "waka waka" Same game though.. different sound. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Psionic Posted August 5, 2007 Share Posted August 5, 2007 Atari only had the license for computer versions of Donkey Kong. Coleco had the console license. Your point? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JamesD Posted August 5, 2007 Share Posted August 5, 2007 Well, Atari dropped the ball there...unfortunately it's probably because they were greedy and wanted people to buy Pac-Man separately...bad marketing move. Pac-Man might not have been ready to ship when the 5200 was released. The 5200 should have included just about anything other than Super Breakout when it was introduced. The Pong/Breakout type games had pretty much run their course by that time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Psionic Posted August 5, 2007 Share Posted August 5, 2007 Pac-Man might not have been ready to ship when the 5200 was released. Well then, then should have gotten Tod Frye to do it and told him they needed it done for the launch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jetset Posted August 5, 2007 Share Posted August 5, 2007 Well, Atari dropped the ball there...unfortunately it's probably because they were greedy and wanted people to buy Pac-Man separately...bad marketing move. Pac-Man might not have been ready to ship when the 5200 was released. The 5200 should have included just about anything other than Super Breakout when it was introduced. The Pong/Breakout type games had pretty much run their course by that time. Imagine if Atari could have had the 8-bit version of Donkey Kong or even Pac-Man as a pack in. They would have whalloped the CV right from the gate instead of finally catching on and outselling it right before the crash. Such a shame. The best system of its era and they include possibly the worst pack in game of all time. They probablly could have included PacMan too. Wasn't it already released for the computer line by the time the 5200 was released? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gabriel Posted August 5, 2007 Share Posted August 5, 2007 I like to believe that Super Breakout was a test game for the 5200, and it was never meant to be sold. Yet, when the 5200 was launched, the marketing guys wanted a pack in. When they saw Super Breakout they said to themselves "no one will ever buy this separately, so let's make it the pack in so we don't waste one of the games people actually want." It was ultimately more short sighted that it is at first glance, because every store which demoed a 5200 used Super Breakout as the demo game, right next to a Colecovision running Donkey Kong. Anything would have been a better pack in than Super Breakout, even nothing at all. The game definitely stereotyped the 5200 for the rest of it's days. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JamesD Posted August 5, 2007 Share Posted August 5, 2007 (edited) I like to believe that Super Breakout was a test game for the 5200, and it was never meant to be sold. Yet, when the 5200 was launched, the marketing guys wanted a pack in. When they saw Super Breakout they said to themselves "no one will ever buy this separately, so let's make it the pack in so we don't waste one of the games people actually want." It was ultimately more short sighted that it is at first glance, because every store which demoed a 5200 used Super Breakout as the demo game, right next to a Colecovision running Donkey Kong. Anything would have been a better pack in than Super Breakout, even nothing at all. The game definitely stereotyped the 5200 for the rest of it's days. I'm not sure I totally agree with it being a test game... remember, they just needed to convert 800 titles. Other possibilities I can think of: Easiest to convert. Shows off the controllers. Nostalgia for some of the first 2600 games. (wasn't breakout a pack in on the 2600 for a while?) They hadn't cranked up game production until managers gave the final ok but by that time they had to go with what they had ready in order to get the packaging done and ready for the holiday season. I think it's a little of all of the above. If they had done the original packaging, then slapped on a label "Includes bonus game Pac-Man" with a small picture of the game on the sticker and had two games in the pack for a release promotion it would have jumped off the shelves. The loss on the 2nd game would have been well worth it to have a large number of machines out there to attract developers to port their games to it. Edited August 5, 2007 by JamesD Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fres Posted August 5, 2007 Share Posted August 5, 2007 That CV AtariSoft Pac-Man looks and sounds pretty good. It might well be the best version. However, the Datasoft version for 400/800/XL/XE is certainly close. More authentic chomp sound that the 5200 ver., as mentioned earlier. http://www.atarimania.com/detail_soft.php?...VERSION_ID=5987 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TwiliteZoner Posted August 5, 2007 Share Posted August 5, 2007 Atari only had the license for computer versions of Donkey Kong. Coleco had the console license. Your point? My point was that someone asked why Atari never ported Donkey Kong over to the 5200. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TwiliteZoner Posted August 5, 2007 Share Posted August 5, 2007 That CV AtariSoft Pac-Man looks and sounds pretty good. It might well be the best version. However, the Datasoft version for 400/800/XL/XE is certainly close. More authentic chomp sound that the 5200 ver., as mentioned earlier. http://www.atarimania.com/detail_soft.php?...VERSION_ID=5987 What is the story behind the Datasoft version of Pac-Man? It appears to be a clone of the Atari version? I take it that it was released after the Tramiels took over Atari? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Helmet Posted August 6, 2007 Share Posted August 6, 2007 (edited) Atari only had the license for computer versions of Donkey Kong. Coleco had the console license. Your point? My point was that someone asked why Atari never ported Donkey Kong over to the 5200. Because they didn't have the legal right to put a console version of DK out. The only legal way to have a 5200 version of DK out back in the day would be for Coleco to have ported it over to the 5200. Coleco owned the exclusive console rights. That said...one of my favorite 5200 games now is the ported 8-bit version of DK That 5200 cart gets played alot! Edit: Misread your post...you summed it up nicely. Edited August 6, 2007 by Lord Helmet Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
else Posted August 6, 2007 Share Posted August 6, 2007 (edited) Because they didn't have the legal right to put a console version of DK out. The only legal way to have a 5200 version of DK out back in the day would be for Coleco to have ported it over to the 5200. Coleco owned the exclusive console rights. Course, Coleco didn't have the legal right to put a computer version of DK out, and they did (on the ADAM). But that happened after the 5200 had been out for a while.... Edited August 6, 2007 by else Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NE146 Posted August 6, 2007 Share Posted August 6, 2007 What is the story behind the Datasoft version of Pac-Man? It appears to be a clone of the Atari version? I take it that it was released after the Tramiels took over Atari? Beats me.. I've been asking that question on and off on these forums for near 6 or 7 years Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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