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Atari 2600 "Red sea crossing" Real or fake


Max_Revolver

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>>> How is Pepsi Invaders not an "official" product when it came from Atari themselves? <<<

 

Pepsi Invaders was neither available to purchase from a retail store, nor available through a mail order promotion.

It was merely a marketing action taken by them to wow over some Coca Cola executives.

It was never and never will count as part of the official Atari 2600 collection.

It is a great novelty / curiosity / rarity for an Atari collector to have in his/her collection.

Nothing more, nothing less.

A Pepsi Invaders cartridge enhances an Atari 2600 collection, it does not complete it.

Period. End of discussion.

 

>>> Also I take offense to your "NintendoAge era" demographic which I am a part of. <<<

 

Remember the early 1990's argument among gamer's regarding which is better, the Sega Genesis or the Super Nintendo?

Both were great systems. Both had pluses & minuses.

Those who owned one, always trashed the other.

The opinions of those who owned BOTH, carried more weight.

"The apple that is too high up on the tree to reach tastes bad"

 

I bring this up because I own the complete NES collection. Stadium Events among them, of course.

I own all the main stream cartridge based gaming systems for that matter.

And I will give credit where credit is due. Stadium Events is indeed a holy grail.

But the vast majority of Nintendo era gamers & collectors, ignore and trash the Atari era.

 

I agree with most of your comments regarding rarity & desirability.

The eras however are very different in many ways.

I don't have time to get into all the details right here and now, but suffice it to say this:

What would be considered a re-release or relabeling of a game in the Atari era, is not always so in the Nintendo era.

And what would be considered homebrew and/or unofficial in the Nintendo era, is not always so in the Atari era.

So comparing the two can be very controversial and often causes much debate.

 

At the end of the day, the word "holy grail" has become just as recklessly used in the last few years (especially on eBay)

as the word "rare" began to be abused ten years ago. Holy grails have different meanings to different people.

People have their own "personal" holy grail" and each system has its' own holy grail. etc.

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>>> How is Pepsi Invaders not an "official" product when it came from Atari themselves? <<<

 

Pepsi Invaders was neither available to purchase from a retail store, nor available through a mail order promotion.

It was merely a marketing action taken by them to wow over some Coca Cola executives.

It was never and never will count as part of the official Atari 2600 collection.

It is a great novelty / curiosity / rarity for an Atari collector to have in his/her collection.

Nothing more, nothing less.

A Pepsi Invaders cartridge enhances an Atari 2600 collection, it does not complete it.

Period. End of discussion.

Nintendo produced the NWC. Would you not consider that a Nintendo "product"? To be a product does not require it be sold at retail, only that the parent company produced it.

 

>>> Also I take offense to your "NintendoAge era" demographic which I am a part of. <<<

 

Remember the early 1990's argument among gamer's regarding which is better, the Sega Genesis or the Super Nintendo?

Both were great systems. Both had pluses & minuses.

Those who owned one, always trashed the other.

The opinions of those who owned BOTH, carried more weight.

"The apple that is too high up on the tree to reach tastes bad"

Sonic and Mario are both awesome. Bonk is the shit, too bad most folks didn't know who he was :P

 

I bring this up because I own the complete NES collection. Stadium Events among them, of course.

I own all the main stream cartridge based gaming systems for that matter.

And I will give credit where credit is due. Stadium Events is indeed a holy grail.

But the vast majority of Nintendo era gamers & collectors, ignore and trash the Atari era.

Congrats on the complete set!

 

I can attest to the trashing Atari part, as I used to believe the playground hype. I collected Nintendo starting in 2002 and bashed Atari for ten years before getting one in 2012.

 

I agree with most of your comments regarding rarity & desirability.

The eras however are very different in many ways.

I don't have time to get into all the details right here and now, but suffice it to say this:

What would be considered a re-release or relabeling of a game in the Atari era, is not always so in the Nintendo era.

And what would be considered homebrew and/or unofficial in the Nintendo era, is not always so in the Atari era.

So comparing the two can be very controversial and often causes much debate.

A big distinction between 1st party, 3rd party, and unlicensed. The way Atari and Nintendo conducted business, were polar opposites. Everybody and their grandma made Atari games until there was so much glut of crappy games they couldn't shovel it into landfills fast enough. Nintendo controlled their market with an iron fist, forcing developers to only release games on their platform, limiting stock to create demand, and suing unlicensed developers into oblivion.

 

At the end of the day, the word "holy grail" has become just as recklessly used in the last few years (especially on eBay)

as the word "rare" began to be abused ten years ago. Holy grails have different meanings to different people.

People have their own "personal" holy grail" and each system has its' own holy grail. etc.

"Holy grail" is whatever a person makes of it. In 2004, when I walked into GameXChange and picked up a Tengen Tetris, it was my Holy Grail at that time. I still love that game, even though most would not consider it a "grail" at all, I did back in 2004... :D

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Ditto the above.

 

Your mixing apples and oranges here. Yes, Nintendo produced the NWC cart. As Atari produced the Pepsi Invaders cart. Neither one "completes" their respective cartridge sets or collections, they "enhance" them.

 

I never questioned wether or not Atari produced Pepsi Invaders in any of my statements. (nor Nintendo with regards to NWC). That's completely unrelated to the initial debate.

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Ditto the above.

 

Your mixing apples and oranges here. Yes, Nintendo produced the NWC cart. As Atari produced the Pepsi Invaders cart. Neither one "completes" their respective cartridge sets or collections, they "enhance" them.

 

I never questioned wether or not Atari produced Pepsi Invaders in any of my statements. (nor Nintendo with regards to NWC). That's completely unrelated to the initial debate.

Nintendo / Atari "produced" the carts, released them to people outside the company, therefore it's a "product." I said nothing about availability at retail or being required for a "complete" retail set. Does Quadrun count? It wasn't made available in stores...

 

Nintendo and Atari both have fairly well defined licensed sets. For Atari, this means first party shells. Nintendo is gray carts with the seal. With Famicom, the lines are blurred a bit. The Famicom is more comparable to Atari with regards to diversity. Just look how many third party carts there are...

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You think your being slick by splitting hairs here. Let me assure you, your not capable of throwing a curve ball at (me) or us here at AtariAge.

 

Atari didn't "release to people" the Pepsi Invaders game. It was given away to Coke executives. There was never any opportunity for a normal person to purchase the item at retail. Yes, several of them trickled down from Atari & Pepsi employees into the hands of normal people both before & after the initial event itself. But you either got it for free by luck, or you hunted it down and paid for it in the years to follow.

 

Quadrun was 100% officially released & 100% purchasable by anyone & everyone who either ordered it from AtariAge magazine or contacted the proper channels at Atari in California. And, furthermore, had it been more successful & had the demand been present, Atari would have eventually sold it at retail just like silver Gravitar & Atari Video Cube eventually were.

 

The NWC doesn't have the Nintendo seal of quality, yet it was produced by Nintendo & is a Nintendo product. Regardless, it was not just NWC contest winners who got cartridges. Some additional cartridges were obtained through Nintendo Power magazine. But unlike Quadrun, it was not a fully dressed retail product specifically manufactured with the intention to be purchased by customers.

 

And yes, agreed, Famicom is a messy nightmare. You could purchase famicom cartridges from vending machines in Japan. It's all over the map.

 

Look, there will never be a 100% agreed upon final number for each and every systems complete cartridge collection set. But I'll settle for 99%. And at the end of the day, the final decisions made by the historians, gamers, collectors, and so forth will be made by them based on all the available facts & information; NOT on wether or not they actually have the controversial items in their personal collections.

 

I have literally spent THOUSANDS of dollars on items for my collection, just to have that ability. Because when you actually have it and still say it doesn't count, it carries FAR more weight to it. And, more importantly, when you don't have it and say that it does, then you truly understand & appreciate its significance.

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You think your being slick by splitting hairs here. Let me assure you, your not capable of throwing a curve ball at (me) or us here at AtariAge.

 

Atari didn't "release to people" the Pepsi Invaders game. It was given away to Coke executives. There was never any opportunity for a normal person to purchase the item at retail. Yes, several of them trickled down from Atari & Pepsi employees into the hands of normal people both before & after the initial event itself. But you either got it for free by luck, or you hunted it down and paid for it in the years to follow.

Last time I checked, Coke executives were "people", so were the contest winners who won NWC carts. Neither had any offiliation with Atari or Nintendo. So yes, I consider Pepsi Invaders and Coke Wins to be "released" products, because they were "released" to people outside the company. But you had to be damn lucky, and be in the right place at the right time, to get one.

 

And I am absolutely 100% in agreement with you that neither should be considered a part of an official "retail" set. But both are "products" of the parent company, and given out to people on the outside. It's not like prototypes or anything secretive and confidential that were loaned by the company for review purposes. Most clearly say "property of _______" on them, and most surviving protos were removed from company premisis at some point by an employee or other party, typically in violation of rules.

 

Suffice it to say that promotional items are not retail products, nor are they protos. They are promotional items, released for free as part of an event to promote the company. I think it is fair to say that promotional items are still released products, are they not? In the case of promotional games, many exist. In Japan, numerous carts were released for competitions, both on Famicom and PC Engine. They are fairly more numerous than NWC or Pepsi Invaders, but tend to fetch high value regularly on eBay.

 

But saying that promotional games are not official products is a misnomer. They were willfully released to the public.

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This is getting silly.

 

But by definition a product release is when a product is made available to purchase for the general public.

 

So a game that was made privately for a small group of people and never sold anywhere is not a release.

 

And no coke execs are not people :D hehe

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