7800 vs.....

[gdement]

To the point above about QBert, I just looked up the Colecovision QBert ROM and it looks like it's 8KB. The 7800 version is 32KB if I'm not mistaken.

[kenfused]

To the point above about QBert, I just looked up the Colecovision QBert ROM and it looks like it's 8KB. The 7800 version is 32KB if I'm not mistaken.

b*nQ is 48K (mostly because the cost over 32K is virtually nothing). It could probably be jammed into 32K with some work like removing the intro, arcade like high score entry, packing some stuff here and there, etc.

 

Q*bert on the 8-bit/5200 is only 8K ROM and probably could have benefited some with some extra ROM.

[Artlover]

We are talking about consumer electronics here, not expensive arcade games. Of course someone had thought about putting 1MBit of memory inside a cartridge long before that, however how much could it had costed back in 84? Mbit cartridges started to show up in 1986 (probably later in the US), because ROM started to get cheaper. Need proof? The Super Game Module. Why would Coleco want that if they really thought 32KB was good enough? And why would Coleco want to deal with an expensive add-on if they could simply produce bigger cartridges? Having the technology available doesn't mean that you can use that for consumer electronics. Price will dictate what you can and what you cannot use.

{Boy, this is getting really stupid now.....}

 

I think I already mentioned cost as being a factor regarding large carts, did I not? (rereads his post...) Yup, sure did.

 

My original statement was purely a "conceptual" point. No where did I remark or claim it was practical, and the point that it was or wasn't practical doesn't change the fact that it "could" have been done, which is "ALL" I said.

 

To that end, I never even specificly mentioned cartridges, you're the one who keeps forcing it in that direction till you threw the SGM in. Cassettes, digital data packs, floppies, silicon, punch tape, carved stone tablets, magic. Whatever. Capacity existed, regardless if it was utilized or not.

 

You're the one that brought up and stressed the point that colecovision carts only came up to 32KB, not me. So, no, I don't need proof of anything. But thank you tho, because your mentioning the SGM, which became the Adam, only goes to prove that Coleco already had higher game storage capacities of 256KB available to the consumer way back then in 1984. Twice as much as the newer 128KB carts you keep wanting to talking about.

 

If you keep arguing about nothing, will you eventualy also disprove your other two claims of unlimited time and more resources?

[malducci]

Finally the CV uses a Z80, which was used by more than 80% of all arcade games during the 1979-1984 period. Aside Atari, how many companies consistently used the 6502 for arcade games? Don't you think that means something?

 

I think the z80's built in DRAM circuitry meant something to developers (i.e. cost and simplicity). Other than that, nothing else really. The 65x was cheaper and faster.

 

Even though the video quality here is poor, the videos give a good idea of how much stuff the CV could handle on screen. Some of the later stages could be a real challenge for a NES...

 

Not any more of a challenge than it was for the MSX. I'd say less so.

Edited September 24, 2008 by malducci

[opcode]

You're the one that brought up and stressed the point that colecovision carts only came up to 32KB, not me. So, no, I don't need proof of anything. But thank you tho, because your mentioning the SGM, which became the Adam, only goes to prove that Coleco already had higher game storage capacities of 256KB available to the consumer way back then in 1984. Twice as much as the newer 128KB carts you keep wanting to talking about.

 

If you keep arguing about nothing, will you eventualy also disprove your other two claims of unlimited time and more resources?

 

Sorry pal, I am not taking your bait... And besides, it's kind of useless conversation, so I am leaving now.

But before I go, I just want to add that the 128KB CV cartridges you mentioned are indeed cool. They are called MecaCarts and you can thank Bryan for creating them. And btw, they can store up to 1MB, not 128KB as you mentioned, so we can say that they are a lot better than anything Coleco had back in 1984, no expensive add-on necessary, no loading times, no crappy tapes, etc. But don't let that bring you down, I am sure Coleco could have came up with something similar a couple of years later, they were just waiting for memory prices to come down...

[CV Gus]

I think I see what the problem some people are having with this thread is: this is 2008, so why a comparison between two such 1980s systems?

 

I suppose it's because I've been around since PONG first hit the arcades. Thus, nothing has happened in the world of video gaming that I haven't seen.

 

In 1984, the whole works collapsed. The typical answer is "the glut," but if that was true then there should have been another during the mid-1990s at latest, because a video gaming magazine I still have compared roughly ONE DOZEN systems- and this does not take into account people who stuck with earlier systems.

 

In other words, the crash was a case of suicide.

 

One sure-fire way of committing suicide here is to abandon a system in favor of one that really doesn't offer more.

 

The reason the CV caused so much excitement- again, you have to consider the era- was that arcade games were advancing at a fantastic rate. Within a few years we went from Space Invaders in black and white to Zaxxon. Thus, the good `ol 2600 just couldn't keep up. When we saw the photos of Ladybug and Cosmic Avenger on the CV, well!

 

The 5200 was supposed to have done the same. And while it never equalled the CV overall, for games like Qix, Defender, Centipede, Berzerk, and Ms. Pac-Man...not to mention Robotron: 2084- it too handled games like the 2600 couldn't.

 

The 7800's trouble started from day one. Now there were TWO systems before it from Atari, one not yet two years old! And what did it offer? Ms. Pac-Man. Robotron: 2084. Centipede. Games that, while not ancient in 1984, had been there, done that.

 

But as a CV owner, I couldn't help but wonder what the big deal was. Sure, the 7800 games looked better (usually), but even then- I did program on Commodore computers- I knew that the CV's abilities were often not used. Mr. Do!, Victory, Space Fury, Q*Bert, Frogger...if the 7800 looked more impressive, was it because the 7800 was better, or because the CV was held back?

 

In other words, look at it like this- assume the 7800 and CV were from the same line (you can figure the 5200, if you'd like, instead of the CV for what follows here). The decision would be: stick with the CV, or "move up" to the 7800?

 

But what if a third possibility was offered: rather than dumping the CV for the 7800 for better-looking versions of the same games, overall, what if we program a line of games for the CV that are improved versions of what came before?

 

I own DKJ. for the CV. It has 3 screens.

 

I also own the FOUR-screen version. It's rough around the edges, true, but that could've been cleared up. Thus, on the COLECOVISION you have a complete 4-screen version. Since- as pointed out by Opcode- the cost of extra memory was going down, these 'super games" would not have been so pricey.

 

Hell, maybe you could put two on a cartridge. Cheaper than two cartridges.

 

Look at Q*Bert. O.K., now look at Q*Bert's Qubes. Likewise Mr.Do!, and Mr. Do!'s Castle.

 

If people are willing to purchase a whole new system for the same (improved) games, would they not be willing to simply purchase improved versions for the original system? This would have the advantage of retaining ALL of the games- if not, tell me of the 7800 version of Berzerk, or Qix.

 

The only way the 7800 would work is if it was not so much better able to handle existing games (e.g. Ms. Pac-Man)- which it wasn't, really- but if it could handle FUTURE games.

 

 

So that's why I wanted to know what was what between the 7800 and CV. I've had the CV since 1982, and the 7800 since 1988. I still play them (the CV more often, of course!).

 

And to be honest, I'm just not really so sure that the CV would've done much worse, toe-to-toe, with the NES than the 7800.

 

Last night, I played Sky Jaguar (thanks, Opcode! ). Granted, the scrolling is choppy, as this was a direct translation of the MSX version.

 

But we know that the CV COULD HAVE done much smoother scrolling. And the scenery is splendid.

 

But more to the point is the sheer, unbelievable amount of on-screen action. Balas, Hammers everywhere, while the screen is filled with shots from everywhere, it seems, during the two Boss stages. It would seem as though a CV version of Xevious would have been pretty good. Isn't Zanac like that?

 

Matt Patrol shows that a motion-intensive side-scroller could be done nicely, too. As do those Gradius-games mentioned above (YES! Many of these computers FINALLY play YouTube!!!).

 

This: Was the 7800 so much better than the CV that it was worth it?

 

Now that Opcode is here, we shall know for sure!

[CV Gus]

Oh, one more thing-

 

Probably everyone here already knows this, but if not- the use of "Meg" was twisted during the 1990s.

 

When someone said "THIS CART HAS TEN MEGS!!!!!!" what he meant was "128K."

 

This was because "Meg" was short for MegaBIT, not MegaBYTE, which was 8X more. Thus, a 32K CV cart was 1/4 Meg.

 

It was a marketing ploy, because it sounded more impressive.

 

 

For CrazyAce- could the green hills in Matt Patrol have been "reshaped" to look like the lunar city from Moon Patrol? With a different-colored interior, as long as the "2-colors/8 horizontal pixels" rule was not broken?

Edited September 27, 2008 by CV Gus

[Crazyace]

The Colecovision and MSX are pretty much identical in certain ways , so the blocky scrolling in Sky Jaguar isn't a problem with the port - it's a limitation of the chip.

I dont know the limitations that well - I think better vertical scrolling could be implemented on the CV, but it wouldn't be easy.

 

The 5200 was a bit strange - it was old tech already when launched , and it's sprites were quite weak - it would have been so cool if the antic/gtia had been redesigned

I wonder if it would have been more successfull if it had just been a 'console' version of the atari400 with the same cartridges.

 

I think the danger with changing graphics in MattPatrol is that you run out of characters, as you need 8 copies of the city to produce the illusion of smooth scrolling. Even if the graphics were improved it wouldn't be possible to have the city scroll in front of the mountains

[Gorf]

We are talking about consumer electronics here, not expensive arcade games. Of course someone had thought about putting 1MBit of memory inside a cartridge long before that, however how much could it had costed back in 84? Mbit cartridges started to show up in 1986 (probably later in the US), because ROM started to get cheaper. Need proof? The Super Game Module. Why would Coleco want that if they really thought 32KB was good enough? And why would Coleco want to deal with an expensive add-on if they could simply produce bigger cartridges? Having the technology available doesn't mean that you can use that for consumer electronics. Price will dictate what you can and what you cannot use.

 

First of all...switch banked carts are dinosour tech....

 

Yes, cost is a part of the reason but the fact is, the Arcade machines where using the same chips

as the consoles....the arcades just had more of the chips. Most games of the 8 bit era in the arcade

were using the same RAM, 6502, 8080, Z80, 68k and so on. Arcade machines were not produced

anywher near the same number of units as consoles were. Also the Arcades went for $4000+ dollars

so even seeling a few of those would get you your money back and some. A console HAS to be priced

for a consumer and not a business like an arcade. Therefore, they need to sell a shit load of units to

be able to offer it at the under $200 dollar price, or whatever the average was/is.

 

 

If Atari made addons for the 7800, it could have been upgraded, to match or come close to the Arcade

machines...maybe even surpass a few. They could have done this at reasonable pricing too.

 

As far as CV vs 7800...these machines were comparable to each other and at the same time had better

featuers than the other away in particular areas. Coleco has more sound. 7800 has mutlicolor multi-palette

sprites. I like the fact that you can manipulate the DLL's...I dont think you can do DLL's on the CV....never

looked at it deeply enough.

[DracIsBack]

if the 7800 looked more impressive, was it because the 7800 was better, or because the CV was held back?

 

Don't go there! While I agree with the points raised about comparison development from one point in time vs. another, no one in their right mind would think that the 7800 was anything but held back under the Tramiels.

 

Did the world see the best the Colcovision could offer? Probably not.

 

Did the world see the best the 7800 could do either? Not on your life.

 

 

I'm just not really so sure that the CV would've done much worse, toe-to-toe, with the NES than the 7800.

 

Yes, you've repeated this over and over again. Could the Colecovision have done a more NES-like experience than displayed in Colecovision games. Sure ... with worse scrolling, fewer colors and fewer moving objects than the 7800 or NES. Again, want to make this interesting? Stop comparing early 1980s simple games and tell me how the Coleco would do on the games I listed.

 

If you had to do SRAPYARD DOG and ALIEN BRIGADE on the Colecovision, what would be the considerations?

 

This: Was the 7800 so much better than the CV that it was worth it?

 

It's kind of a pointless discussion because the Colecovision was dead. End of story. :-)

 

Now that Opcode is here, we shall know for sure!

 

Did you beg and please and hope that he would invade the 7800 forum to go on about the Colecovision? :-)

 

Seriously though ... he said the exact same thing that others have said that have been repeated ad nauseum.

Edited September 24, 2008 by DracIsBack

[Paranoid]

If you want to make the "CV versus 7800 but assume they were from the same line" argument...

 

I think the problem there is that the CV has many of the same flaws I see with the 7800.

 

The colors are flatter, the sounds shriller, and the movement less precise than what the 5200 was capable of.

 

I can apply that last sentence to either the 7800 or the CV equally effectively.

 

So, given all 3, systems, and assuming they were all from the same line, I think the 5200 (And by extension, the Atari 8 bit PC line) had the most potential.

 

Being that the Atari 8 bit line lived on well into the Amiga 16 bit era, I think it is clear that this is more than fantasy.

 

Of course, for all I know, the Coleco foundation evolved into something down the road, other than the Adam, too.

 

But I see the basic argument. I think that what 7800 fans make as an argument is pretty valid, though...

 

The 5200 (and to a lesser extent, the CV) had been around longer, and the programmers had learned tricks and were exploiting those to enhance games. The 7800 had a bunch of stuff that had sat on a shelf for awhile, was dusted off, and put out onto the market in a rush - part of why they play like sluggish beta games but have basically Ready For Market graphics. If you gave the 7800 designers enough time, they certainly would have started to creatively exploit the technology just like 5200 and CV programmers, and then it would have been no contest. But before that happened, development stopped dead for the 7800 and it ended up on deep discount at KB toys.

 

Maybe that is true, maybe it isn't. From a technical perspective, you can argue one or the other...

 

For subjective personal experience, I'd say I'd rather have a CV or 5200 than a 7800, EXCEPT for the CC2 and the ability to play 2600 ROM titles on the 7800 with a CC2.

[CV Gus]

My point behind all of this, DracIsBack, is this:

 

If the 7800 was not really much better than the CV, which was far more popular than the 5200, then- assuming development for the 7800 started back in 1983 (the 7800 was announced in old video game magazines in mid-1984; I still have them), Atari had a near-guaranteed failure from Day One.

 

I would assume that Atari engineers had $150-$200 in their budget to pick up a CV, their biggest competitor in those days, and look it over. I assume that they could figure out what it could do. Since nobody in 1983 really foresaw the total collapse of the industry in 1984, there was no reason to assume that a system that had already passed the 1,000,000 mark at that point was going down in mid-1984 (officially- the CV was around well into 1987 in my area).

 

Therefore, when the 7800 was due to be released in late 1984, the CV was, by any guess, still going to be around at that point, with its legions of owners. Still strong. Along with Coleco.

 

NOW do you see where I'm going with this?

 

Since Atari had no reason to assume anything but that the CV, which helped trash their 5200 hopes, was still going to be around and stronger (due to the inevitable "learning curve") in 1984, then the only way to beat it was with a system that, unlike the 5200, was SO MUCH BETTER that the CV had to lose.

 

And the only way that was going to happen was if it was able to supply truly (by 1984 standards, which is why I keep bringing up Joust and Moon Patrol) awesome games, which would give CV owners whiplash.

 

BUT-

 

If the 7800 was not in fact that much better, then Atari's 7800 effort was doomed from the start. I will grant that the 7800 has advantages- just as it did over the 5200. But, if those advantages were not enough, esp. by 1984 standards (you didn't exactly have 10-plane scrolling "Mortal Kombat"-style games back then), then 5200 owners were going to say "WHAT?! YOU *%$#@&%!$#@% jerks dumped me and my 5200 for THIS $%#&?!," while CV owners would say "What, man, I'm not abandoning my CV and all these games for THAT. You think I'm stupid or somethin'?"

 

Since the CV was by far THE third-generation console, this is why I made the CV-7800 comparison here.

Edited September 27, 2008 by CV Gus

[DracIsBack]

If the 7800 was not really much better than the CV, which was far more popular than the 5200

 

Do you have NPD data to back up the sales figures of the 5200 vs Colecovision? How about NPD data to back up the sales of Colecovision games relative to 5200 games? Otherwise, claims of "far more popular" are kind of silly. A lot of the stats over which is popular/run rates are sketchy at best.

 

At the end of the day, the 5200 and Colecovision were both killed by the crash.

 

 

Since Atari had no reason to assume anything but that the CV, which helped trash their 5200 hopes, was still going to be around and stronger

 

Not really relevant. The 7800 was designed in 1983/4. In 1983, the industry collapsed. While the industry was collapsing, the 7800 was in development and the Colecovision was dying along with the 5200 and the rest of the industry. Atari was quite likely more concerned about computers than what Colecovision was going to do because the ADAM and faltering industry had killed any chances of it continuing.

 

But, if those advantages were not enough, esp. by 1984 standards (you didn't exactly have 10-plane scrolling "Mortal Kombat"-style games back then), then 5200 owners were going to say "WHAT?! YOU *%$#@&%!$#@% jerks dumped me and my 5200 for THIS $%#&?!," while CV owners would say "What, man, I'm not abandoning my CV and all these games for THAT.

 

None of the competitors that followed had 10-plane style scrolling games like Mortal Kombat. They had games like SUPER MARIO BROTHERS, ALEX KIDD IN MIRACLE WORLD, SCRAPYARD DOG, LIFE FORCE etc. That was what made them different from the generation before (where things tended to get faster and faster, repeat etc)

 

"Power" and "Superiority" are all relative as all of the systems that followed the Colecovision were 8-bit systems. They all offered a relatively similar number of colors on screen, they all had tiles, they all had mono sound, they all had finite processing power, limited resolution etc. Nothing that followed was a tremendous leap up from the Colecovision compared to - say - what the Genesis and SNES were above the SMS/NES/7800.

Edited September 27, 2008 by DracIsBack

[CV Gus]

The industry did not collapse in 1983- it was 1984. In 1983, everyone assumed that it would simply be a "shake out" that would weed out the inferior companies.

 

The problem is that much of the economy is not driven by anything real, but by psychology. This is why news reports have such an impact on Wall Street activity.

 

"Experts" were saying that computers would wipe out video gaming as far back as 1981. The fact that we are still playing with PS3s and X-Box 360s have proven them totally wrong, but in those days the industries were made afraid by it. Yet, sales for home video gaming remained strong. It was a contest between what sales figures indicated and what "experts" said. Should've been no contest, but- as anyone from my generation will tell you- nobody ever asked us what we wanted- some Baby-Boomer "expert" always did this (a Dilbert "One Off" activity, by the by).

 

If Atari and Coleco- esp. Coleco- had ignored the experts and stuck with solid gaming, then the collapse would not have happened- this was a case of industrial suicide, plain and simple.

 

The reason the NES made it so big was because that suicide left a tremendous want in an allegedly "dead" industry. Nintendo resurrected it, nothing more. In fact, they were notorious for asking American experts questions, and then doing something else. The 7800, ironically, was only an issue because of Nintendo and the NES.

 

Reliable sales data does not exist. I'm going by observations from those days (I was there), and the fact that CVs are much easier to find in garage sales than 5200s. And yes, I've asked around for them. Also, as far as I know, someone picked up the CV after 1984, which is why it was around after Coleco itself(e.g. Alcazar was a 1985 game, and Tank Wars was 1986). It was around well into 1987, and not just in the buck-a-game basket.

 

The 10-plane bit was a comparison. Note the use of the word "exactly."

 

 

Fact of the matter is, and you keep missing this, is that Atari DID start with the 7800, even completing it and a batch of early games (Joust, Centipede, Galaga, etc.). Therefore, they intended to release it after dumping the 5200 (why would they dump the 5200, by the way, if it wasn't getting trashed by the CV? You don't dump a moneymaker, which is why the 2600 stuck around so long).

 

The CV was there in 1982. So, they knew about the CV when they started the 7800.

 

And that's my whole point. If the 7800 was not much better than the CV, which is what I'm trying to find out here, then clearly it was a dumb move on Atari's part. Here's why:

 

 

1) If you want to release a "next generation system," it had better be much better than what's already out there, not just "somewhat."

 

2) Most of the 7800 games were already done at that point on the 5200. Centipede, Joust, Robotron: 2084.

 

3) Now consider this, Drac- just who were the buyers Atari was aiming at with the 7800? 5200 owners would be sore at Atari for what amounted to abandonment, and they already HAD most of the 7800 games on the 5200, while others- like Pole Position 2 and Galaga- could have/should have been made for the 5200.

 

It had only been less than two years since the 5200 was widely available, so it wasn't a case of trying for a new generation of gamers.

 

CV owners? With relatively few exceptions, esp. in 1982, each console had games only available for it in that generation of consoles. The CV had Ladybug, Frenzy, Wizard of WOR*, Turbo, Cosmic Avenger, DK and DKjr., Pepper 2, etc. The 5200 had Berzerk, Qix, Tempest*, Pole Position, Pengo, Vanguard, etc. We CV owners had made our choice. So if those games didn't lure us over to the 5200, why the hell would we go for the 7800? It would have been even worse, if Joust, Pac-Man, and Dig Dug had been 100% completed and released (I believe that is why they never were- for the 7800. Oh, what a tangled web...). So CV owners were out, esp. since in 1983 and 1984 great games were released (Pepper 2, Frenzy, Tapper, Burgertime, Star Trek, Bump `N Jump, etc.).

 

It was a guaranteed failure from the first, really. Atari should either have stuck with the 5200, or made games for the CV (e.g. Joust).

 

* At that point, we believed these games were going to be available.

Edited October 1, 2008 by CV Gus

[+Allan]

Reliable sales data does not exist. I'm going by observations from those days (I was there), and the fact that CVs are much easier to find in garage sales than 5200s. And yes, I've asked around for them. Also, as far as I know, someone picked up the CV after 1984, which is why it was around after Coleco itself(e.g. Alcazar was a 1985 game, and Tank Wars was 1986). It was around well into 1987, and not just in the buck-a-game basket.

Please stop repeating this over and over. Many of us were there as well. There just is no proof either way. I find more 5200s than Colecovisions at tagsales/fleamarkets but that still doesn't prove anything. Until somebody finds some official sales figures from both companies, nobody is going to know the truth.

 

Allan

[Crazyace]

According to it's copyright screen TankWars is 1983.

I always found the 5200 a bit wierd - it's a slightly better Atari 400 - why not just put a membrane keyboard on it?

 

The 7800 is really cheap in some ways, the CV and the 5200 both had at least 16k ram, and nice® sound chips - the 7800 had 4k

[Crazyace]

Also, I wrote some code that shows an arcade effect ( 2 layer real parrallax scrolling ) that isn't possible on the CV, but seems quite easy on the 7800. It even works in the higher resolution mode.

If you accept the 160 pixel res limitation I think the 7800 version of Donkey Kong is better than the coleco version - the barrels are multi coloured.

[DracIsBack]

Now I see what Vigo was getting at when it comes to discussions with you ...

[gdement]

Fact of the matter is, and you keep missing this, is that Atari DID start with the 7800, even completing it and a batch of early games (Joust, Centipede, Galaga, etc.). Therefore, they intended to release it after dumping the 5200 (why would they dump the 5200, by the way, if it wasn't getting trashed by the CV? You don't dump a moneymaker, which is why the 2600 stuck around so long).

 

The CV was there in 1982. So, they knew about the CV when they started the 7800.

 

And that's my whole point. If the 7800 was not much better than the CV, which is what I'm trying to find out here, then clearly it was a dumb move on Atari's part.

 

The 5200 and ColecoVision (if I'm not mistaken) were both expensive machines, and didn't have that much market share. Warner wanted to release something that could actually replace the 2600 in a big way. I don't think they saw the installed base of 5200/CV owners as the primary target.

 

Besides being expensive, the 5200 also had reliability problems. You can't sell games to somebody with a broken system. I don't have hard data on that aspect, but I knew 2 people with a 5200 when I was a kid and neither of them worked. When I asked, they both told me the controllers were broken. Needless to say neither of them had very many games for it.

 

The 7800 was cheaper, downward compatible, and had simple, easy to use controllers. It had a good chance of reaching people in 1984 that the 5200/CV didn't. Tramiel's execution pales compared to what Warner could have done, in terms of marketing, distribution, and better timing.

[Paranoid]

So, CV Gus, I can barely follow the language of your posts, but I agree, I see a lot of conjecture there.

 

5200s are allegedly far more common "in the wild" than ColecoVisions, because Colecovision actually turns out to have more significant LONG TERM reliability issues than the short-term reliability issues (almost all related to the unusual controller and difficulty in repairing/replacing it in 1984) of the 5200. The 5200 lived long enough to have a major revision in the number of game ports and the way the device interfaced with power and the TV, as well, which also allegedly resulted in a more reliable 5200 machine.

 

I was there, I owned both, at the time, and I owned an ADAM as well. Today I own several 5200 units that still work remarkably reliably and a single Colecovision that was far harder to come by and is a little sketchy.

 

The ColecoVision was dominant for a single factor, and that was because it was released at a time when Donkey Kong was the run-away dominant game in arcades across the country, and ColecoVision got the exclusive license to DK. That is it. The entire rest of the library was made up of very obscure arcade titles that had little mass appeal and in-house titles that were equally quirky. Even then, in total numbers, I don't think the ColecoVision dramatically outsold the 5200, and the fact remains, the crash killed both the 5200 and the CV, and did a number on the 7800. The only console that really survived the crash was the 2600.

 

As for the contention regarding the PC replacing the gaming console being "proven wrong"... were you in a coma for the C-64/Amiga/Atari ST era of personal computing? Really, post-crash until the arrival of the Sony Playstation 1, with the POSSIBLE exception of the NES 8 and 16 bit computing dominated gaming and consoles were kind of relegated to being niche market players. In fact, I hate to tangent into THIS debate, but the NES, I was introduced to it because my 5 and 8 year old nieces got one for Christmas. Other than the Super Mario Bros. line of games, I didn't see that the NES had a lot to offer in competition with my C-64, let alone my Amiga or Atari ST. Consoles became something for kids and the technically illiterate. Why would I want to be limited to the candy-coated, expensive, poorly translated games of a NES when I could instead pirate all the 8 and 16 bit Warez that I could buy blank floppies for and enjoy deep, dark plots?!? I know that there are a lot of younger gamers here who have fond memories of the NES, SNES, Genesis 1, and GameCube... but for a period of time there, home PCs dominated. As a matter of fact, this dominance lasted well past the Amiga with the arrival of the 386 and 486 and VGA. It really was the PS1 that finally closed the technical gap between consoles and home PCs and made consoles a viable alternative for the "serious" gamer.

 

I believe there is hard data available for number of sales of 5200 and CV, and probably 7800. My bet is it is pretty granular, too, even with breakdown of sales by year. I seem to recall seeing this stuff around the retro sites, if not here on Atari Age. Probably the Wikis have good information on this.

 

I do think cost had a part to do with it. The 5200 was an Atari 8 Bit without a keyboard and minus a couple of other parts. It cost a lot. The 2600, was a much more simple machine. You only have to look at the motherboards to realize this. The 7800 was in most ways more like a 2600. There also, I've always had a sense that the companies were too reactive and didn't have enough patience. The 5200 controller, more or less, because the defacto I/O device of choice for the PC and the Apple. Lots of people eventually adjusted to analog joysticks. The membrane keyboard is virtually identical to what you will find in any number of inexpensive cordless phones and cell phones to this day. But in the emerging gaming market of 1983, 1984... issues like controller interface and backwards compatibility were a HUGE deal and something that manufacturers were acutely aware of.

 

My guess is the 5200 thing went something like this...

 

"Hey, the Atari 8 bit PC is HUGE and popular and can deliver very high quality games, but expensive. Lets repackage it as an inexpensive console, and we'll make a bundle"...

 

"What about that INTV thing with their ads about their controllers"...

 

"Oh, we can do that. It is called an analog joystick. PCs and industrial machines use them"...

 

"Ok... sounds good. Do it"...

 

A few months later...

 

"Our GINORMOUS base of 2600 users is upset because the 5200 isn't backwards compatible, the joysticks keep breaking, the power is burning out the switchboxes, and our planned 2600 expansion costs us more to make then we sell an entire Atari 2600 for"...

 

"Ok... lets dump it..." and the 7800 design began.

 

In the meantime, ColecoVision was experiencing their own problems, including buggy games that were prone to crash designed by relatively green programmers, the same kind of expansion problems, a disasterous ADAM roll out, horribly painful joysticks, a library of completely obscure and off the wall titles... oh... and the frickin' CABBAGE PATCH KIDS...

 

Then the crash... and... well... The C-64 on the other side.

 

I dunno. I was there, I remember it like this... Maybe you live in some sort of Evolution of Gaming alternate history.

[CV Gus]

Now I see what Vigo was getting at when it comes to discussions with you ...

 

 

Only because you cannot understand what I'm trying to get at here. I myself, when starting this thread, hadn't thought of the "who did Atari think would buy the 7800 in 1984?" question.

 

Right now, our economy is in such trouble that the federal government is going to spend 700 BILLION dollars on a bailout. That's YOUR tax money, Drac- got it? YOU are paying for it.

 

But this mess did not come about because of the past few years. This is the inevitable result of unbelievably stupid decisions, and short-sighted planning, on the part of American business leaders for decades now. A mess we- that includes YOU, Drac- are going to be stuck with by those who made it for the rest of our lives.

 

Since this is a video game website, and this is a 7800 area, I'm dealing with that particular area of the economy. In this case: why did Atari crash and burn? How did the NES make Japan the big name in the multi-million dollar video game industry? Was it just because they failed to release the 7800 a few years earlier? Was Japan really a sneaky bunch of cheaters?

 

No.

 

I'm trying to find out if this was a case of such stupidity, that Atari was doomed long before anyone even heard of the NES. Japan-bashing was big back then, and few were blaming American CEOs for the fact that the NES was so big by 1988.

 

Yes, American video gaming crashed back in 1984. But WHY did it do that?

 

If there was any truth to the "computers will take over" argument, then the NES would not have been as big as it was- even bigger than the CV ever was. Nintendo made a fortune on that. So, no, it was NOT a "niche" thing.

 

Saying a computer is better than a console, and therefore will trash the consoles, is like saying that because a truck can do more than a car or motorbike, all you'll see on the road are trucks- with a few exceptions. Consoles are cheaper, easier to use, can concentrate all of their abilities on games, gaming will not tie up the family computer, etc. Computers never did and never will eliminate consoles, because they operate on two entirely different levels. But I've always noticed that many computer nerds were hostile toward consoles, even back in the early 1980s. They actually seem to see consoles as competition to their god-like machines.

 

As for CV/5200 sales- again, why would Atari dump a moneymaker? They HAD to have been very disappointed by sales, either that or they were the biggest bunch of idiots in the history of American industries.

 

 

If the 7800 was not much better than the CV- and I've never said that it wasn't in many ways, just not enough- then, by extension, it probably wasn't all that much better than a 5200. Therefore, it was a doomed project from the beginning.

 

But you have to consider what kind of games we were dealing with back then.

 

At that point, in 1983, when the 7800 was being developed, the kinds of games in which the 7800 would have an advantage over the CV and 5200- just weren't really in the gamers' conscousness at that point, if they even existed. Operation Wolf-style games? In 1983? No- it was Zaxxon, Xevious, Maze-style games, etc. All of which could be handled by the CV or 5200, for the most part (the 5200 Robotron is plenty respectable). Even Crossbow could have been handled nicely by either one.

 

So, when looking at the 7800, people- 5200 owners especially- would want to know how it would handle the sort of games that the 5200 and CV had already done. We couldn't see the future.

 

In that regard, the 7800 just wasn't all that spectacular. Not like the 2600-to-CV jump.

 

It has only occurred to me recently how hopeless the 7800 effort was. Like most other people, I had assumed that it was released too late, its initial games were outdated, and former 5200 owners weren't about to trust Atari again.

 

But if the 7800 was not technologically advanced enough over the CV and 5200, then what chance did it ever have? Even if the industry had NOT crashed in 1984, the Tramiels had NOT taken over, and Atari DID go ahead with a late 1984 release, as they had planned (Electronic Fun and Electronic Games). Would gamers have really been interested enough?

 

THAT'S what I'm trying to figure out here. Because, quite frankly, what ruined Atari and Coleco (ADAM computer, gahhh...), appears to have ruined many other parts of the economy, too.

[Paranoid]

Read this one, it is Atari-centric, but fairly accurate.

 

http://www.neatorama.com/2008/05/05/the-ri...-fall-of-atari/

 

http://vgsales.wikia.com/wiki/Launch_price

 

There are a ton of sites like this out there with some pretty solid data. I couldn't find the actual unit sales by console by year, but I'm positive I've seen those stats, too. They certainly exist. Atari and Coleco were keeping track of how many units they were producing and selling.

 

I'm not saying a PC is better than a console, I'm saying for a period of time the console was all but dead, especially among serious gamers, as PCs like the C-64, Amiga and Atari ST and then the early VGA 386 and faster Intel and AMD machines. No one I knew took consoles seriously during that period. They probably had them, but only for those few built in titles that were exclusively licensed, and which were almost inevitably cute platformers with addictively repetitive play. This lull period of console gaming was the heyday for PC gaming, going back to titles like Ultima 3 and IV and working all the way up through Wing Commander, Doom, Quake, and the birth of the FPS.

 

Consoles really didn't have the power to compete at any point along that line until the PS1... and by the time you get to the PS2 and Xbox... um... the consoles had pretty much BECOME PCs. Again, that doesn't mean better or worse. The WII is the number one console right now, and it doesn't have the power to compete with the 360 or PS/2. But Wii, like the original NES, has built broad appeal based on a very narrow line of games. Outside of that narrow scope with massive appeal, there aren't a lot of "serious" games that translate well to the Wii Experience.

 

That is the problem with these debates. We're talking about a couple of different things. Is it RAW number of units sold that we're defining success on? Even then, though, I'd have to say the C-64 alone most likely buries the NES... especially if we limit it just to the NES and not the Famicom or clones that are still available. But anyhow, Or do we want to talk about actual POWER? But the mistake is in thinking that ONE has any real bearing on the other. RAW power does not guarantee success, and even sales numbers can be a bad measure of success. Sometimes a lot of people buy something and it is still, overall a failure at what it does.

 

I guess it is like a college debate. Unless you clearly define the parameters of the argument (and Lord knows we're woefully horrible at doing that around here), then you can't really have a valid argument.

[Paranoid]

BUT...

 

Again... technologically advanced doesn't necessarily translate into BETTER - and I think the Atari 7800 is an early acknowledgement of that. The 5200 was built on Atari 8 bit architecture, and was a "superior technology" showcase. But it wasn't nearly as successful as it "should" have been.

 

Instead, with the 7800, Atari went back to basics. It had built in 2600 support (really a wise move, as the 2600 outlasted 'em all, especially globally), it went back to familiar DB-9 digital joysticks, and it brought an enhanced mode that could produce relatively modern graphics, sound and gameplay. It probably was fairly inexpensive to produce, too. If the Atari 5200 was over-reaching, the 7800 absolutely was NOT. I can see how, from a marketing perspective, it might seem like a sound way to go.

 

It just didn't pan out that way. As certainly as the MAIN reason for the CV success over the 5200 had more to do with DK than anything else, the reason NES sold more was because POST crash, no one trusted Atari (or console gaming much, either) and that NES had addictive gameplay in Super Mario Bros.

 

The reasons are clear to me.

[DracIsBack]

Only because you cannot understand what I'm trying to get at here. I myself, when starting this thread, hadn't thought of the "who did Atari think would buy the 7800 in 1984?" question.

 

I understand this: You're very obviously the kind of guy who'd argue whether or not shit is brown if it meant a chance to argue.

 

Right now, our economy is in such trouble that the federal government is going to spend 700 BILLION dollars on a bailout. That's YOUR tax money, Drac- got it? YOU are paying for it.

 

I'm not because I don't live in the US.

 

I'm trying to find out if this was a case of such stupidity, that Atari was doomed long before anyone even heard of the NES. Japan-bashing was big back then, and few were blaming American CEOs for the fact that the NES was so big by 1988.

 

It's well documented. Go to a little thing called Wikipedia and look up enter these four words:

 

video game crash 1983

 

(note, not 1984).

 

Then, for fun, try this search:

 

http://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch...&submit=sub

 

and this search:

 

http://query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch...&submit=sub

 

 

Yes, American video gaming crashed back in 1984. But WHY did it do that?

 

Read above.

 

If there was any truth to the "computers will take over" argument, then the NES would not have been as big as it was- even bigger than the CV ever was. Nintendo made a fortune on that. So, no, it was NOT a "niche" thing.

 

Then ask yourself why articles like this appeared in the New York times in 1983?

 

 

UNDER 1983 CHRISTMAS TREE, EXPECT THE HOME COMPUTER

Published: December 10, 1983 This is the year in which the home computer will join the sled and the bicycle under the Christmas tree.

 

In numbers that outstrip even the most optimistic predictions, Commodores, Ataris and Colecos are being snapped up from the shelves. Americans have embraced the home computer as their favorite gadget for a Christmas present, replacing the food processors and video games of Christmases past.

 

''Last year, computers were new, unique and expensive,'' said Egil Juliussen, president of Future Computing Inc., a market forecasting concern that expects 2.5 million home computers to be sold this Christmas, twice as many as last year. ''This year, they're cheap, and they have become the gift.''

 

Only six months ago, a fierce price war erupted among home computer manufacturers, sending many into a tailspin from which it appeared some would not recover. This year, the industry will lose almost $1 billion.

 

 

Then ask why Atari planned "The Graduate", Coleco did the Adam Expansion module for the Colecovision and Mattel announced the Intellivision keyboard? Why did Atari have a keyboard and computer software for the 7800? Why does the 7800 press release compare to computers before it does other video games?

 

 

As for CV/5200 sales- again, why would Atari dump a moneymaker?

 

You're confusing "profit", "revenue" and "units sold".

 

In that regard, the 7800 just wasn't all that spectacular. Not like the 2600-to-CV jump.

 

Here's a thought: The Atari 2600 came out five years before the Colecovision. The Famicom and 7800 came out 1.5 to 2 years after.

 

But if the 7800 was not technologically advanced enough over the CV and 5200, then what chance did it ever have?

 

Probably more than it did, *IF*

- Tramiel was able to get it to market earlier; and

- Tramiel recognized the types of games that were on the NES right away and released them in 1986 instead of 1989/90; and

- Tramiel had cleaned up the channel; and

- Tramiel also spent $30 million a year advertising; and

- Tramiel worked to continuously push bounds; and

- Tramiel hired better developers; and ...

- Tramiel had not been distracted it the XEGS; and

- Tramiel had not released the same games on the 2600, 7800 and XEGS; and

- Had not released games that were marketed as "for 2600 and 7800"; and

- Had completed the library so that key genres like sports and RPGS were reprisented; and

 

etc. etc. etc.

 

But that is related to the NES and has jack-shit to do with the Colecovision. The technology, imo, was not the driving factor on why X succeeded or Y failed.

Edited October 3, 2008 by DracIsBack

[CV Gus]

I think I see the problem here- I should explain this in a more organized fashion. As it is, I'm trying to explain too much in a scattershot way.

 

First, and I'm surprised that nobody else here has mentioned this, is the theory that the 5200 was never supposed to have existed- it was the Atari 7800 that was the "real" 5200.

 

Back in 1981 or 1982, it was obvious that the 2600 could no longer handle arcade-to-home versions well enough. Arcade technology had advanced tremendously over the past few previous years, but not so the 2600.

 

As a result, Atari started planning a "next generation" system. Some called it the 3600, but details were too vague. Since Atari was by far the #1 name in home gaming, they were not worried about taking their time; plus, the 2600 was still a moneymaker.

 

At this point, and to their horror, they found out that Coleco was also designing a new system. This was no Telstar Arcade; this console was GOOD. Damn GOOD. Even the early previews showed that it could blow the doors off of any console out there.

 

This worried Atari for two reasons: The fact that Coleco would gain on them easily with the best console out there, and that other companies would go with them, licensing their games for the ColecoVision. By the time their (we'll call it for now) "3600" came out, they would be left in the dust, without any real arcade games for it, except for their own ("Atari" was a single huge company back then).

 

There wasn't time to complete the 3600 project. They needed something, and FAST.

 

Thus, they stripped down an Atari (400) computer, making it into a gaming machine (note how people not interested in a computer DID buy a "game-playing computer"). Since they were familiar with their own games and technology, they were able to rush out an initial batch of games, too.

 

But this put Atari in a bad position. They had thrown their hat into the ring with the 5200. But they still had what we will now call the 7800.

 

Atari had two choices at this point, neither of which looked really good. They could stick with the 5200 for as long as reasonably possible, but then they would have a problem: by the time it was time to retire the 5200- say, four years later, in 1986- the 7800, developed in 1983, would itself be behind the arcade technology. Too far behind.

 

The other choice was this: retire the 5200 after only about 1 1/2 years, and release the 7800. This way, the 7800 technology would not be too outdated, but then, what about the 5200 owners? Wouldn't they be furious at being abandoned after so little time (many letters written to gaming magazines at that point indicated that this was the case).

 

Now here is a point I've made before- no way did 5200 sales ever match CV sales, overall. If they had, and the CV did sell at least 3 million units (it could have been as high as 6 million), then the 5200 was a real moneymaker. Why would Atari risk the anger of their customers in order to dump a moneymaker after a mere 18 months, in the hopes that those customers were complacent enough to buy another console which at first only offered games they had already bought for the 5200- esp. since some of those games weren't even much better (e.g. Ms. Pac-Man)?

 

Apparently, 5200 sales were disappointing enough that they decided on the second option. In early 1984, before the Crash, they announced that the 5200 was done, and they were going to release the 7800.

 

You all know the rest. The Crash happened, the Tramiels took over a split-up Atari, and well, it was really sad, watching it slowly die.

 

***************************

 

Now, in order to understand this next part, you have to remember that here we are talking about 1983. Nobody foresaw the Crash, and there was no reason for it, really. Blaming a "Glut" ignores the fact that the mid-1990s had more systems and games (many bad) out there than did 1984, yet, a second Crash did not occur. It was know-nothing "experts" and unbelievably stupid management that caused it- and know this: my explanation blames the older generations for bad leadership; the "glut" theory maintains that younger people were stupid enough to spread their money too thinly- because we couldn't tell a bad game from a good one. In other words, they made the decisions, but we get the blame for the failures. As usual. But would YOU have bought I Want My Mommy or Dishaster over Ms. Pac-Man or Robot Tank? And most of those lame games weren't even carried by most stores in any case!

 

But in any case, the 7800 was developed in 1983. But at this point, Atari already knew about the CV. Hell, they knew about the 5200- after all, it was their own system, based on technology that had been around before "the 5200!"

 

Earlier in this thread, games like Scrapyard Dog and Alien Brigade were mentioned. But you have to remember that in 1983, these sorts of games did not really exist yet, or at least were not significant. In those days, the games to be considered were the games like Turbo, Vanguard, Zaxxon, Pac-Man, etc. Even Guantlet wasn't there yet.

 

Therefore, whether or not the CV (or the 5200, even) could handle such games was not an issue. The only thing that mattered was how much better could the 7800 handle the kinds of games that one would consider back in 1983 than a 5200 or the more popular CV.

 

THIS is why I keep bringing up games like Joust, and keep comparing the (100% completed?) version to the 7800. Obviously, the difference is not that great. Visually better, true- but not by enough. Likewise Ms. Pac-Man vs. the 5200 version.

 

 

It is especially important to consider this based on the kinds of games one would consider from a 1983 point of view. There was no reason at that point to think that Coleco would be gone by 1984. There was no reason to think the whole industry would collapse. Therefore, the CV, seen from 1983, was still going to be around by late 1984.

 

But clearly the 5200 wouldn't be, since Atari itself had decided to abandon it.

 

Thus, at that point, it looked to be a matter of Atari 7800 vs. ColecoVision.

 

I honestly believe that this was why Joust, Pac-Man, and Dig Dug were never released for the CV. All three games, had they been completed, would have been superb. But, had they been, then think about this: by that 1984 release, the CV would have had excellent versions of Dig Dug and Joust to match up to those of the 7800 versions, making it even less likely that people would have gotten a 7800. And Pac-Man could somewhat indirectly have matched 7800 Ms. Pac-Man.

 

 

So, this is why I'm trying to find out, in a more technical sense, how much better a 7800 was than a CV. If it was not that much better than a CV (or a 5200, for that matter), then the 7800 project was doomed from the start, even if the Crash had not happened, and even if "old Atari" had not died.

 

In other words...just what the hell were they thinking?

Edited October 4, 2008 by CV Gus