XE was a faliure, I thought it should have been marketed better + joypad!

[robcatron]

IMHO, the ST failed in part because it alienated the existing Atari userbase by not being an upgrade across all areas. A8 users would be upgrading to 16-bit computing, but sacrificing a sound voice and having a more restricted color palette, and no hardware sprites. The Amiga was the true heir apparent but required Atari users to cross over into enemy territory to support. 16-bit computing was also very expensive in the mid 80s. Even the ST at its cheaper pricepoint was a big leap up in price vs. the A8 or C=64. Many A8ers like myself just stuck with the A8 and became pissed off at Tramiel Atari's neglect. So Tramiel Atari was pretty bad at bringing in new users to the fold. They won over some musicians with the MIDI, and got some europeans interested in the ST, but that was about it.

 

 

Interesting point - concerning that the Amiga was the heir apparent. I agree. I am going to incite a riot here, but let me tell you - after I got older, and Atari and Commodore both faded, and I knew all of the facts - and most importantly took my blinders off - I would have went Amiga instead of ST. I was gung-ho Never Say Die Atari all of the way (I hung onto the STe until I couldn't get anymore software for it and had to buy a PC in about 1995).

 

I now truly believe it was the next gen Atari 800, and I had such massive "blinders" on concerning my love for Atari and loathing of Commodore, that I truly overlooked something that would have had as much or more of a profound impact on me in 1989-199x that the 8-bit did in 1981-198x.

 

Rob

[Ransom]

Interesting point - concerning that the Amiga was the heir apparent. I agree. I am going to incite a riot here, but let me tell you - after I got older, and Atari and Commodore both faded, and I knew all of the facts - and most importantly took my blinders off - I would have went Amiga instead of ST. I was gung-ho Never Say Die Atari all of the way (I hung onto the STe until I couldn't get anymore software for it and had to buy a PC in about 1995).

 

I now truly believe it was the next gen Atari 800, and I had such massive "blinders" on concerning my love for Atari and loathing of Commodore, that I truly overlooked something that would have had as much or more of a profound impact on me in 1989-199x that the 8-bit did in 1981-198x.

 

Rob

 

That's a good point. In my case, I was just tired of having to deal with small market products, so rather than buying an Amiga or a Mac when I left the 8-bit world, I bought an MS-DOS box. In retrospect, I would have been happier with an Amiga than with anything else on the market. But at the time (1990) it just seemed like another dead end product, and I was sick of that. If more of us had chosen the Amiga, it might have survived like the Mac did.

[+poobah]

Interesting point - concerning that the Amiga was the heir apparent. I agree. I am going to incite a riot here, but let me tell you - after I got older, and Atari and Commodore both faded, and I knew all of the facts - and most importantly took my blinders off - I would have went Amiga instead of ST. I was gung-ho Never Say Die Atari all of the way (I hung onto the STe until I couldn't get anymore software for it and had to buy a PC in about 1995).

 

I now truly believe it was the next gen Atari 800, and I had such massive "blinders" on concerning my love for Atari and loathing of Commodore, that I truly overlooked something that would have had as much or more of a profound impact on me in 1989-199x that the 8-bit did in 1981-198x.

 

Rob

 

That's a good point. In my case, I was just tired of having to deal with small market products, so rather than buying an Amiga or a Mac when I left the 8-bit world, I bought an MS-DOS box. In retrospect, I would have been happier with an Amiga than with anything else on the market. But at the time (1990) it just seemed like another dead end product, and I was sick of that. If more of us had chosen the Amiga, it might have survived like the Mac did.

Same here, go figure!

 

I kept my MegaSte until I bought a 386 with a VGA card (you can blame it on Star Wars:X-Wing, that game was amazing at the time)

Even then, I still did some work on it, it was so much easier to program than the PC.

 

Oddly enough, I use Macs now. It seems like the percentage of Macs among former Atari owners is higher than the general populace.

Edited May 10, 2009 by poobah

[AEX]

If more of us had chosen the Amiga, it might have survived like the Mac did.

 

Yeah, and if we had all chosen Atari ST's, Lynxs', Jaguars', TT's, Atari "might" have survived too

 

I've never bought a system because I was "loyal" to it, although I have a particular fondeness for Atari because it was my first... But my first car was a Renault 5 (Le Car!) and although I've had many different brands of car over the years, I am currently back driving a Renault all these years later, but its not due to brand loyalty (something I can't say for my computer which is not an Atari unfortunately!). It comes down to specs and price and even sometimes the overall design, couple that with a personal emotion you get when you just like something more than something else.

 

I enjoyed the Amiga and the ST. I also enjoyed the Archimedes systems and some other niche systems over the years, but all these computers had pros and cons and many of the manufacturers are no longer with us. I used my Amiga primarily for DPaint and the ST for DTP (ASM and some MIDI apps), and even with my ST Bias, I knew the ST could not compete with the Amiga on so many levels, but at the same time the Amiga had issues as well.

 

We could debate the "what if's" until the cows come home - bottom line and to get back on topic, the XE(GS) was a great design and apparently the focus groups loved it. The machine actually sold out, and for the Tramiels, that was the whole idea.

 

Karl

[DracIsBack]

The machine actually sold out, and for the Tramiels, that was the whole idea.

 

I've heard that a few times, but I have trouble believing it. I hardly ever saw the thing in stores in Canada or US (even less than 2600jr and 7800). Atari (Canada) seemed to have no interest in it. I didn't even see it at local Atari computer stores. You also never see sales data for the XE Game System itself. Of the three Atari consoles, Atari dropped support for the XEGS first and data from their Atarian magazine suggested it was the least popular Atari console.

 

I got the sense that retailers bought into it and Atari sold out their inventory into retail but that it fizzled at a retail level and was quickly dropped.

 

 

 

Don't get me wrong - I love my XEGS (warts and all) and always make sure I have a working model. But I have a hard time believing it ever moved in great numbers. I think Atari and retailers initially expected it to but it didn't actually deliver on that promise.

Edited May 10, 2009 by DracIsBack

[WizWor]

Atari failed because it had no leadership. There was no vision. The 2600 was a cool console and the 400/800 was an excellent home computer, but there was no roadmap for success. People bought these products in a vacuum. There was no reason for a vcs player to buy an A8 and there was no reason for an A8 owner to get an ST. I'm not saying there wasn't brand loyalty (we're still here), but brand loyalty is not a compelling reason for consumers to buy a product.

 

I bought a PS3 this year. It got me thinking about the Atari. I bought my PSOne the Christmas the Dreamcast came out. I bought the PSOne because I believed the PS2 would be better than the Dreamcast and that I would be able to use my PSOne games on the PS2. Once I bought the PSOne, it was inevitable that I would buy the PS2. When the PS3 came out, I did not upgrade. The PS3 was prohibitively expensive, I was still happy with my PS2, and I wasn't sure that one of the other consoles would not be a better next system. In the end, I bought a PS3 because blu-ray beat hddvd and I decided the PS3 was better than the other consoles.

 

Ironically, the *removal* of backwards compatability lowered the price to the point that I jumped in.

 

Equally ironic is that Nintendo (who unseated Atari) sits right now where Atari was in the 80's. It's top selling WII has been eclipsed by more advanced consoles. Nintendo has to decide how far to milk the WII and come up with a plan for a successor. Nintendo could come out with a peripheral that would extend the life of the WII by providing HDTV output, they could come out with a backwards compatable successor, or they could use their treasure to produce a next gen console -- which might be difficult to write games for or might be too expensive for people to buy.

 

I don't know what Atari could have done. If they had created an open architecture, they may have gone the way of the IBM pc. If they had focused on backwards compatability, they may have priced themselves out of the market. Or maybe they would have become Apple -- 10% of the market and a loyal base. Fact is that Atari created a great toy for a lot of people and inspired others to create greater toys. Lucky us. Lucky them.

[S1500]

When you are a company that is re-releasing video games or the consoles that house them for 10+ years while other companies have moved on to innovate & evolve, it's a recipe for failure.

[WizWor]

When you are a company that is re-releasing video games or the consoles that house them for 10+ years while other companies have moved on to innovate & evolve, it's a recipe for failure.

maybe

[Ransom]

Oddly enough, I use Macs now. It seems like the percentage of Macs among former Atari owners is higher than the general populace.

 

I agree, it seems that way. (I'm a Mac user, too, but only since OS X came out. Unix + Easy to maintain is too good to pass up.)

[mcjakeqcool]

Yeah, and I guess by the time the Jaguar came out, people waited to upgrade there SNES or Mega Drive as they had already sold there 7800 to buy a SNES or a Mega Drive, the Jaguar was ingored in the majority of cases. Am I correct?

[Atari8guy]

When you are a company that is re-releasing video games or the consoles that house them for 10+ years while other companies have moved on to innovate & evolve, it's a recipe for failure.

maybe

 

Interesting link, but there needs to be a generational lag before something becomes "retro", I don't think early 80's video games in the late 80's counts for most of the population, so that was the issue for Atari....Look at NES Collecting, compared to Genesis collecting.....The kids that grew up with Genesis haven't quite hit their disposable income years yet and its heavily reflected in the price of the carts....(I collect both).

[Bill Loguidice]

Yeah, and I guess by the time the Jaguar came out, people waited to upgrade there SNES or Mega Drive as they had already sold there 7800 to buy a SNES or a Mega Drive, the Jaguar was ingored in the majority of cases. Am I correct?

 

While it's true that the Jaguar, 3DO and other systems suffered a bit from being "transitional" or between traditional generations, the main reason, plain and simple, was not external to those platforms, but internal, i.e., lack of software. In the Jaguar's case there were huge gaps between releases and quite a few of the third parties who committed never delivered what they said they would. In fact, a similar situation occurred with the aforementioned 3DO, even though there was a strong partnership with Electronic Arts. Software rules. And of course once the Sony PlayStation hit in 1995, all of the transitional systems were doomed anyway, since Sony correctly gambled on 3D, whereas others didn't.

[oky2000]

The Atari XE Games System was a faliure, so I think that if it was marketed better and given a joypad instead of that stupid joystick (I loved it on the 2600 when I was playing pacman, but Flight Simulater 2 on the XE is a diffrent matter intirely. Lol!) I think it would have been a sucsess, though I still think it would have been pretty pathetic compared to the Mega Drive and SNES, I think if Atari made a true 16 bit system (Anything, even a ST gs!) the Jag would have been a lot less of a faliure when stacked against the Saturn, PS and N64, infact Atari may have even had enough money to made the Jag 2. Unfourtently this never happened, anyway let me know what you think!

joypad or game pads suck!

:roll: joypad and nes type controllers do suck. joysticks are sooo much better.

 

Not really,the NES/7800/Amstrad/SMS pads DO suck, but a properly designed and engineered joypad works very well especially compared to a 2 button joysstick. Go and try the Sega 6 button pad which is both tiny and incredibly tactile with diagonals being a piece of cake.

 

Sure some people do prefer joysticks but not all joysticks are better than all pads and after playing some Megadrive games for hours I don't get cramp. And making a 2 button hand held joystick that works as well as a 1 button joystick (table top Saturn/Neo Geo style ones excluded) is not a simple thing ergonomically speaking.

 

As for whether the XEGS was worth it well Atari wanted to keep their machines selling in the market place and so a change of casing and tiny re-wiring was worth it to get rid of so much inventory. Both the C64 and A8 consoles never had a hope in hell against either the NES or SMS.

 

SMS had superior Sega arcade conversions to any 8bit and then there was R-Type which is up there with the ST/Amiga level.

NES was a very good machine for 2D arcade games with the right combination of resolution and anywhere on screen colours and they did put extra power in the carts too.

 

It was always a doomed project but I guess it was damage limitation for Atari and to try and address the .

 

Now had they put Rescue on Fractalus as the pack in game (remember the SNES was on a slower take up in the west until the Streetfigher 2 package) and got rid of the keyboard and light gun for cost reasons then it would have sold a lot better, especially if people had been given the chance to play RoF. That game on the A8 was the jewel in the crown and it is pure madness not to have it as the pack in game really, it looked as fast and smooth as something you would expect on 16bit computers.

 

Chicken and egg, all the software houses in the west had given up on the tiny A8 market and unless there was an impressive 3 month initial sales period they would have left it. Had the above package been chosen and the price cheap enough I think short term it would have worked ok for Atari as this would have brought in a new generation of budget console buyers to the brand.

 

As for old games it doesn't really matter, the NES had Donkey Kong and Galaxians etc in the line up so as long as they were excellent conversions then it would have been ok especially if they put two games for the price of one etc.

 

As for the C64GS most people would get a proper C64 instead and within 5 game purchases have made enough of a saving compared to the toy like limiting C64GS vs C64. Cartridges are way too expensive especially as some single loading turbo tape games were loaded in <5 minutes for 1/6th the price really. In the case of the C64 the massive back catalogue of games made the C64GS console a really dumb idea financially.

[robcatron]

Ok, back on topic after my Amiga/ST comments:

 

I would look at the XEGS in relationship to the last 10 years of video gaming:

 

What if Sony or Nintendo decided today to put out a Sony PSone XEGS or a Nintendo 64XEGS - along with re-releases of many of the games that were big 10 years ago? I don't think they would make it. Once the initial nostalgia runs off (quickly) and the a few die hard Sony and Nintendo Fans pick them up, they would die.

 

That is sort of the clear cut way that I see it. I don't think it would be any different, and doomed to failure.

 

Rob

[Bill Loguidice]

Ok, back on topic after my Amiga/ST comments:

 

I would look at the XEGS in relationship to the last 10 years of video gaming:

 

What if Sony or Nintendo decided today to put out a Sony PSone XEGS or a Nintendo 64XEGS - along with re-releases of many of the games that were big 10 years ago? I don't think they would make it. Once the initial nostalgia runs off (quickly) and the a few die hard Sony and Nintendo Fans pick them up, they would die.

 

That is sort of the clear cut way that I see it. I don't think it would be any different, and doomed to failure.

 

Rob

 

There are some differences, though. When the XEGS was released, there was still at least another four years of potentially prime (reasonably profitable) 8-bit computer software development, which of course ended up mostly in the C-64 and to a lesser degree Apple II camps. So the difference there between your analogy and the reality of the XEGS was that the platform was still viable and relevant, unlike a rereleased PS1 or N64 would be today. That would be the equivalent to releasing the XEGS in 1994. Also, going computer to console makes a bit more sense than going console to computer. It's easier to scale back features rather than add them. Of course even going computer to console, there's never been any success (XEGS, CD32, etc.).

[Retro Rogue]

Atari failed because it had no leadership. There was no vision.

 

 

Which Atari? Warner's Atari Inc. had a ton of vision and a lot of great stuff in the works when Warner decided to piece it off.

 

I could possibly agree about Atari Corp. (Tramiel's company), but not that he didn't have any vision - just that his vision and its execution were not well played out, or always in the best interests of the brand (vs. his bank account).

[mos6507]

Warner's Atari Inc. had a ton of vision and a lot of great stuff in the works when Warner decided to piece it off.

 

The failure of Warner Atari has been dissected ad nauseum. Warner Atari was particularly inept at developing the home computer division. The Tramiels just took the ineptitude to the next level.

[mos6507]

The ST Failed??? The ST saved the company in the long run, with sales of 8-Bit systems and old Warner inventory supplying cash to keep the company afloat early on.

 

The Atari ST was kind of like the Chrysler K-Car. Yeah, it kept the company alive, but was as much a step back as a step forward.

 

The ST was a new machine and the 8-Bit line continued to be supported right up to 1991, you wouldn't have had any A8 support UNLESS the ST was a success for the company.

 

The Tramiels didn't really support the A8 in the last few years as much as they just kind of let it run on vapors. Then again, aside from the Falcon, they kind of did the same thing with the ST after it launched.

[carmel_andrews]

XEGS was about 4-5years too late, If warner's vision had gone as far as redesigning the 5200 to be xegs alike (and give it more memory)...It might have offered something and also get some decent support instead of just re-releases and also low quality budget game software (like it did get)

 

After all, didn't the 5200 sport a 'hidden' sio port

[atariksi]

XEGS was about 4-5years too late, If warner's vision had gone as far as redesigning the 5200 to be xegs alike (and give it more memory)...It might have offered something and also get some decent support instead of just re-releases and also low quality budget game software (like it did get)

 

After all, didn't the 5200 sport a 'hidden' sio port

 

The 5200 does have the SIO signals available on the card edge connector, but I haven't seen anyone use them. For some reason, it seems they purposely made the 5200 incompatible with Atari 800 although it has the same chipset (except PIA). They memory mapped the chips to different locations, warped the pots to make a worse joystick than A800, used an edge connector for SIO signals instead of the 13-pin connector, made the cartridges bigger and use different signals, etc.

[oky2000]

I dunno, the thing is the difference in CPU grunt with each successive generation means emulation of the previous model is the only way forward. The Gamecube had the Zelda games from N64 on a disc, and Sony always makes some backwards compatibility, well except with the cheapest versions of PS3 which only play PS1 games etc.

 

The PS2 in the bargain basement bins is selling quite nicely, especially in less developed countries so I guess it does work so the PS2 Slim is the cheap ass version of the original $399 PS2 8 years on

 

Or I suppose those Megadrive and SNES things on a chip built into controllers and the C64 DTV are all XEGS in a way too.

[mos6507]

What made the mid 80s unique in computer history, which I've said before, is that:

 

a) Aside from Apple IIs in the schools and the slow rampup of office computing, most home computers at that time were owned by kids/teens who had limited money. Really, in the early days of computing (77 to 82 or so) 8-bit machines were very expensive. RAM was very expensive. Floppy drives were very expensive. Everything really started to take off between 82-84 when things began to get cheap.

b) the initial 16-bit offerings were an order of magnitude more expensive than 8-bit machines

 

By 1984 8-bit computing had gotten extremely cheap, so cheap that (to me) I felt that's how little computers were supposed to cost. However, from the late 80s onward PCs and the like were consistently at the $1,500-$3,000 pricepoint and the idea of moving from a cool game-player to something with CGA graphics running DOS seemed like a step down for what you'd be paying. This took a looong time for me to accept. In the meantime, I just kept using my A8. I used my 130XE all through college (up to 1992) primarily as a word processor machine. I even used it on the internet for about a year (VT100 emulation, flickerterm, etc...) From then on I picked up a used Amiga 1200. It wasn't until 1998 that I got my first PC and I just hated dropping over a grand on it. But by then at least there was Windows98 and 24-bit graphics cards. Remember when people were making a big deal about eMachines and the sub-$1,000 PC? It really took a long time for state of the art computers to drop back down into 8-bit style pricepoints.

 

So there were really still two markets in the late 80s. The 8-bit segment was still viable for the cost-conscious and I don't think the Tramiels really did enough to exploit it.

Edited May 12, 2009 by mos6507

[Ransom]

Good analysis, Mos.

[+Allan]

The XEGS was a well thought out design and concept, and was the perfect platform to consume older stock inventory Atari still had of 8-Bit parts.

 

Except for those extremely ugly pastel buttons! I kills the look of the XEGS.

 

On that note, I would love an XEGS extended keyboard case with the 1200XL keyboard inside of it, attached to a longer cable.

 

Allan

[Bill Loguidice]

The XEGS was a well thought out design and concept, and was the perfect platform to consume older stock inventory Atari still had of 8-Bit parts.

 

Except for those extremely ugly pastel buttons! I kills the look of the XEGS.

 

On that note, I would love an XEGS extended keyboard case with the 1200XL keyboard inside of it, attached to a longer cable.

 

Allan

 

 

The XEGS was my first Atari 8-bit, but the controller ports are tough to get to, the keyboard is mushy and the pastel buttons are rather odd. It screams more "plastic toy" than techie. Nevertheless, I love the inherent concept and a slicker case design, better keyboard and more accessible ports would have been very, very cool. Nevertheless, low end computers - and even some higher end computers - rarely had really nice keyboards.