How did you find out about The Crash(TM)?

[bradhig1]

Didn't know about the crash until hearing about it online.   I remember dad giving our 2600 and games to a friend after we got our Commodore 64.  Decades later I got the games back when the same friends who had their own 2600 didn't want it anymore and gave me the system and games for games.   I don't have their 4 switch system anymore because the first joystick port was lose and I couldn't fix it.   I regret letting dad get rid of our sears heavy sixer thou.  I have another one now. 

[+GoldLeader]

I'd say in gathering my thoughts on this more recently;  It never seemed like a Crash,  Probably was on paper when you compare yearly sales...But in real time it was just kind of a fizzle...It slowly burned out,  and people's tastes changed,  on a larger scale people were interested on other things (MTV, and music jumps instantly to mind, and me turning 16 in 1984...cars)...At any rate,  when you read descriptions of it they always say Too Many Games and not enough Good Games.   I Never saw this as the problem.  If that was the situation (and maybe it was in some parts of the World,  or for small periods of time),  we would have seen MORE games on store shelves.  Instead, we saw LESS.  You see, I would have bought more,  even if I got burned a few times,  if More had, in fact been available.  It seemed like less selection;  There were many "closeouts", and it seemed like the stores had already made up their minds that the video game "Fad" was over and it was time to get into something else...

 

To my eyes,  locally...Talking a micro viewpoint here, but one that may represent a macro trend;

 

Here's some things that seemed to jump up in popularity as video game interest waned:*

 

Music videos, Cable TV, Satellite

Stereos, radios, boom boxes, car stereos

Cassettes, vinyl, eventually CDs

Bands, guitars, other musical instruments

TVs

Movies

VCRs

Movie Rental places

Waterbeds

Car parts, tools, engines, custom paint jobs, wheels etc.  for the hot rod guys

BMX bikes

Hacky Sacks

Comics,  graphic novels, manga/anime (I still remember it being called "Japanimation")

Fashion, clothes, shoes, sunglasses, Swatches etc.

Food,  going out, the opposite sex (or whatever you're into,  no judgment)

 

 

 

I will say,  it seemed to me, that video games came back, if you will, following the continued success, (a lesser success, but still enough to keep the faith) of computers and the popularity of arcades...And this hit mainly in the NES Era (I'll call this 1987 and beyond)...

 

Note:  They weren't really "Back" in a meaningful way in 1985 or '86.

 

 

*These are all things where money could be spent (instead of on consoles and carts)...Perhaps a cumulative effect, but it still affected the overall video game market.

 

 

 

[zzip]

31 minutes ago, GoldLeader said:

I Never saw this as the problem.  If that was the situation (and maybe it was in some parts of the World,  or for small periods of time),  we would have seen MORE games on store shelves.  Instead, we saw LESS.  You see, I would have bought more,  even if I got burned a few times,  if More had, in fact been available.  It seemed like less selection;  There were many "closeouts", and it seemed like the stores had already made up their minds that the video game "Fad" was over and it was time to get into something else...

In the beginning of the crash, closeout bins with $5 games (give or take) popped up everywhere.    So I think we took advantage of this and bought more games in the short term..   but videogame units started disappearing from the shelves, and the game selection dwindled-  many stores still had some games, but it was a much smaller selection-  they didn't carry all the latest games, and instead they had older games, including obscure titles they probably overstocked on.    I remember having to check multiple stores to find current games that I wanted.   This was in contrast to before and after the crash years where every store that sells games keeps the latest in stock.   At the time, the only store I remember having a truly wide selection of games was Toys R Us.

 

41 minutes ago, GoldLeader said:

Here's some things that seemed to jump up in popularity as video game interest waned:*

 

Music videos, Cable TV, Satellite

Stereos, radios, boom boxes, car stereos

Cassettes, vinyl, eventually CDs

Bands, guitars, other musical instruments

TVs

Movies

VCRs

Movie Rental places

Waterbeds

Car parts, tools, engines, custom paint jobs, wheels etc.  for the hot rod guys

BMX bikes

Hacky Sacks

Comics,  graphic novels, manga/anime (I still remember it being called "Japanimation")

Fashion, clothes, shoes, sunglasses, Swatches etc.

I'd add D&D to the list, which is one of the things that pulled my friend group away from videogames.

 

I'd bet a lot of people got involved in one or more of the above and were paying less attention to the game market.    I can see a casual game buyer missing the crash, but an active videogame fan?   To me it was obvious the stock was disappearing from the stores, the arcades were closing, the magazines were shutting down..    By 85 the videogame scene was a shadow of what it was in 82.   That was probably the low point and it grew from there.

[Keatah]

2 hours ago, GoldLeader said:

I'd say in gathering my thoughts on this more recently;

Perspective on this refines itself as time goes on. Mine no less.

 

2 hours ago, GoldLeader said:

  It never seemed like a Crash,  Probably was on paper when you compare yearly sales...But in real time it was just kind of a fizzle...

Yes. A slowdown, a fizzle, not anything like a crash at all. Not from the hobbyist/gamer point of view. A changing of the guard from tired and rehashed videogame consoles to newfangled computers.

 

As my parents and grandparents sold off my cartridge stuff I moved more into real computing and not just gameplaying. New emphasis on real-world usability of the Apple II. A developing (but short-lived) interest in graphic arts through the Amiga. And a longer-lasting interest in scientific applications on the PC. And an eventual resurgence in both old 1970's games and then modern 1990's games though PC.

 

2 hours ago, GoldLeader said:

It slowly burned out,  and people's tastes changed,  on a larger scale people were interested on other things (MTV, and music jumps instantly to mind, and me turning 16 in 1984...cars)...At any rate,  when you read descriptions of it they always say Too Many Games and not enough Good Games.   I Never saw this as the problem.  If that was the situation (and maybe it was in some parts of the World,  or for small periods of time),  we would have seen MORE games on store shelves.  Instead, we saw LESS.  You see, I would have bought more,  even if I got burned a few times,  if More had, in fact been available.  It seemed like less selection;  There were many "closeouts", and it seemed like the stores had already made up their minds that the video game "Fad" was over and it was time to get into something else...

Locally here in my part of town many stores still stocked the hits. But I had them all, so I wasn't buying them. I became savvy when I got burned on the 5200 duping the 400/800 titles.

 

I also bought a few low-grade titles. And got burned a second time. So I stopped buying those too. Eventually they had to drop in price to somewhere around $3.99 or less for me to even pick up the box and read it. Bargain bin! So when I did buy those, there was little or no profit to be had. And in good time I wouldn't touch anything above $1.00.

 

2 hours ago, GoldLeader said:

To my eyes,  locally...Talking a micro viewpoint here, but one that may represent a macro trend;

Here's some things that seemed to jump up in popularity as video game interest waned:*

 

Music videos, Cable TV, Satellite

Stereos, radios, boom boxes, car stereos

Cassettes, vinyl, eventually CDs

Bands, guitars, other musical instruments

TVs

Movies

VCRs

Movie Rental places

Waterbeds

Car parts, tools, engines, custom paint jobs, wheels etc.  for the hot rod guys

BMX bikes

Hacky Sacks

Comics,  graphic novels, manga/anime (I still remember it being called "Japanimation")

Fashion, clothes, shoes, sunglasses, Swatches etc.

Food,  going out, the opposite sex (or whatever you're into,  no judgment)

 

*These are all things where money could be spent (instead of on consoles and carts)...Perhaps a cumulative effect, but it still affected the overall video game market.

Yes. The videogame craze was no longer a craze. But of course there was room for a maturing more serious market. Not the circus-like explosion of everything. A market that co-exist with other activities and not consume all of one's time.

 

2 hours ago, GoldLeader said:

I will say,  it seemed to me, that video games came back, if you will, following the continued success, (a lesser success, but still enough to keep the faith) of computers and the popularity of arcades...And this hit mainly in the NES Era (I'll call this 1987 and beyond)...

 

Note:  They weren't really "Back" in a meaningful way in 1985 or '86.

1985-1986 was when I was getting into the Amiga. Lots of hopes and dreamed I pinned on that machine. Some realistic and satisfying, others not so much.

[Keatah]

2 hours ago, zzip said:

To me it was obvious the stock was disappearing from the stores, the arcades were closing, the magazines were shutting down..    By 85 the videogame scene was a shadow of what it was in 82.   That was probably the low point and it grew from there.

Arcades in my area were more or less consolidating or becoming fewer but larger, whether there was any real consolidation between 2 business I wouldn't know.

 

I never much payed attention to the shadow-sized market, busier with computers and all the other things instead. All I know was I was getting tired of the lack of depth in the traditional arcade model. And so were my buddies, it was harder and harder to get them to "play Atari" like we did in 1977. So growing up was definitively a huge factor. It just so seems that our "coming of age" phase coincided with the so-called crash. I would argue it was the cause.

 

It was in the mid-1990's that the arcades in my area started going downhill and closing. The signs were there in 1988 - 1992 that they were declining. But a few top hits kept me coming back on an irregular basis. And of course MAME put a firm stop on having to trek 10 miles and 2 hours to an arcade through inclement weather in rush-hour.

[Zookeeper]

I actually don't believe I even heard about it until I started collecting many years later. I was six or seven when it hit.

I also have no contemporary memories of the O2, Astrocade or Arcadia. They were new to me when I began the hobby. Edited July 19, 2022 by Zookeeper
more info

[+GoldLeader]

6 hours ago, zzip said:

In the beginning of the crash, closeout bins with $5 games (give or take) popped up everywhere.    So I think we took advantage of this and bought more games in the short term..   but videogame units started disappearing from the shelves, and the game selection dwindled-  many stores still had some games, but it was a much smaller selection-  they didn't carry all the latest games, and instead they had older games, including obscure titles they probably overstocked on.    I remember having to check multiple stores to find current games that I wanted.   This was in contrast to before and after the crash years where every store that sells games keeps the latest in stock.   At the time, the only store I remember having a truly wide selection of games was Toys R Us.

 

I'd add D&D to the list, which is one of the things that pulled my friend group away from videogames.

 

I'd bet a lot of people got involved in one or more of the above and were paying less attention to the game market.    I can see a casual game buyer missing the crash, but an active videogame fan?   To me it was obvious the stock was disappearing from the stores, the arcades were closing, the magazines were shutting down..    By 85 the videogame scene was a shadow of what it was in 82.   That was probably the low point and it grew from there.

 

D & D!!

I could kick myself for leaving it off!  ?

[CapitanClassic]

12 hours ago, Keatah said:

It was in the mid-1990's that the arcades in my area started going downhill and closing. The signs were there in 1988 - 1992 that they were declining. But a few top hits kept me coming back on an irregular basis. And of course MAME put a firm stop on having to trek 10 miles and 2 hours to an arcade through inclement weather in rush-hour.

One title in early 1991 would bring back a resurgence to the Arcade, and would lead to tons of copy-cat titles, until the Rhythm genre games like DDR.

 

[zzip]

13 hours ago, Keatah said:

Arcades in my area were more or less consolidating or becoming fewer but larger, whether there was any real consolidation between 2 business I wouldn't know.

The mall arcades survived,  the Showbiz Pizza survived, but the strip mall arcades that were springing up everywhere just suddenly disappeared.  The gameroom at the local pizza joint vanished,  all the supermarkets, laundromats, convenience stores, etc that added a few arcade machines during the boom soon got rid of them.   There were probably 10 places a short bike ride from where I lived that had arcade games,  but I think nearly all of them vanished.   Soon I could only play arcade games when I my parents took me to one of the malls on weekends.

 

13 hours ago, Keatah said:

I never much payed attention to the shadow-sized market, busier with computers and all the other things instead. All I know was I was getting tired of the lack of depth in the traditional arcade model. And so were my buddies, it was harder and harder to get them to "play Atari" like we did in 1977. So growing up was definitively a huge factor. It just so seems that our "coming of age" phase coincided with the so-called crash. I would argue it was the cause.

The Laser-disc games seemed like a last gasp for the early-80s arcade boom.   They drew people's attention for a little while,  but they enhanced visuals at the cost of gameplay so people soon got bored

 

Coming of age may have been part of it,   but it seemed other age groups lost interest too.   Adults I knew seemed to lose interest in Atari and go all-in on VCR and video which exploded right around the same time.

[+wongojack]

I was pretty young (6 or 7), so there's no way I would have comprehended an industry "crash" at the time.  It's not like my family purchased a ton of games anyway.  We had between 10 and 15 games for the Atari, so when it got replaced by a C64, it seemed like the game selection increased to me.  It was all just new stuff for my little brain to play with.  I also wanted new Star Wars toys and eventually Transfomers stuff that cost some serious $$.  I'd also add RC Cars to the list and RC planes, boats.  It seemed like there was RC everything.   All of that was competing with (and would continue to compete with) video games for my adolescent $$.

 

I will say that after a while I sort of forgot about playing games on the TV (we had a monitor for the C64) every so often, a neighbor pulled out the ColecoVision, and I wanted to play it every time we went to their house.  That same neighbor was the first one to get a NES too which got me re-interested in game consoles (for a while).  I also watched Star Wars (A New Hope) at their house for the first time.  They recorded it off the TV with their new VCR!

 

I guess wrapping up - nothing seemed like it was ever "crashing" to my young self.  There were new amazing things to experience all the time.  There was no way I could consume them all or afford them anyway.

[Keatah]

2 hours ago, wongojack said:

I'd also add RC Cars to the list and RC planes, boats.  It seemed like there was RC everything.   All of that was competing with (and would continue to compete with) video games for my adolescent $$.

Yes all the RC stuff. The COX .049 engines the oily nitro smell. All that. Model rockets and telescopes were hit in my neighborhood. Or just going into the hobbyshop. Everything was packed on the shelves like a warehouse or even more! Each was a great diversion in between videogame sessions.

[Zookeeper]

Michael's was a fun place to visit in the 80's. All kinds of odd stuff. Pewter figures, stamp supplies, etc. Now all they seem to sell are fake scented flowers that set my allergies off.

[+frankodragon]

I failed to mention about learning about the crash from back in the 90's when I used to receive issues of a fanzine titled, Video Magic published by Frank M. Polosky.  There were articles mentioning about the crash of '83-'84 and one which was forecasted as a second crash in the future as less and less games will be made for newer systems.  As for Frank Polosky, I'm guessing he's retired now.

[+thanatos]

10 hours ago, Keatah said:

Yes all the RC stuff. The COX .049 engines the oily nitro smell. All that. Model rockets and telescopes were hit in my neighborhood. Or just going into the hobbyshop. Everything was packed on the shelves like a warehouse or even more! Each was a great diversion in between videogame sessions.

 

I miss the local mom & pop hobby shops.  We'd buy and build the model rockets, and it's a 50/50 chance it would be destroyed after the first launch - or stuck in a tree if you didn't do it at the large park field!  One guy built the fancy Saturn V model.  When we launched it, right as the engine ignited, the wind blew the pad over, and we just watched it scrape along the parking lot wrecking the whole thing. 

 

 

 

 

[+x=usr(1536)]

6 hours ago, thanatos said:

I miss the local mom & pop hobby shops.

We have one left around here.  I know this because they're host to a Radio Shack Express location, and if you try to buy anything from that section of the store the owner will tell you all about how you can get it cheaper from Newark, Mouser, Digikey, etc.

 

I almost want to go in there one day and buy an R/C car or similar just to see if he actively tries to send that business away as well.

[bradhig1]

Sears at Jamestown mall had an arcade on the lower level around 1982 and it only lasted a couple of years.  There were a few local arcades that closed around 1983 as well.

[adamchevy]

The fist time I knew about the crash was at a Software Etc.  The bins were full of Dreamcast games.  If I could only go back and buy them all for the advertised $5 a game. 

[Ecernosoft]

On 12/16/2021 at 2:55 PM, Rodney Hester said:

I know a lot of folks (particularly in Europe, where home computers dominated at the time) weren't even *aware* there was a video game market crash in 1983...but for those who lived through it, how did you become aware?

 

There was no Internet or the like back then, and my local 6 o'clock news was as likely to cover a pumpkin chucking contest as anything noteworthy, so I was actually rather blindsided by the whole thing.

 

There was once (and sort of still is, in an incredibly limited capacity) a US department store chain called K-Mart, and they were sort of the Walmart of their day - bigger, brighter, and cheaper than anybody else who came before.  (They also had a signature thing called the Blue Light Special, but that'd be a post/novel/rant unto itself...)

 

Like most department stores of the era, they had an electronics section, and that's where you'd find the wall o'games...behind locked glass, of course.  Budget titles were often hung on the wall across the aisle, but the AAA titles of their day - Atari, Activision, Imagic, Mattel - were locked safely away from us nefarious youngsters.  Not without reason, mind you - new releases prior to the crash topped out around $30 US (that's $83.72 today!), making them MORE expensive (relatively speaking) than the premium Xbox and PS4/5 titles of the modern gaming era.  As a result, my very poor self had a VERY small collection of games going into 1983...Combat came with it, I had Asteroids that I picked up on sale from Roses (another failed local department store chain in my area at the time), and Donkey Kong was a (major) Christmas present.  Playing games at other neighborhood kids' houses (there were a LOT of them!) was popular as a result, and it's how I got my first exposure to Defender on the 2600...probably my fondest gaming memory ever (well, that, and watching James Bond on laserdisc while playing it - that family LOVED tech!).

 

I didn't mind having a very small games collection since such a variety of games was so readily available only a few minutes walk in any given direction.  Sure, I'd have loved more, but I barely had enough to even warrant a very small cartridge case...if anything, it made my stash look smaller.  But that was all about to change...

 

I no longer remember the month, much less the date, but I know it was a Saturday in 1983 when my parents hauled me off to K-Mart for the weekly shopping pilgrimage (a sacred capitalist tradition!).  As usual, we went our separate ways - my parents to clothing, home goods, maybe the sporting section (camping was a big thing!)...and me to electronics, every single time.

 

Something was clearly different even as I turned the corner to head down the game aisle.  It was more crowded than I'd ever seen it, and an absolute MESS...cartridges and crushed boxes littered the floor, the wall of budget titles was completely empty, a large bin was in the middle of the aisle with what looked like the budget games having literally been shoveled into it, and the glass display case was...open.  Every door unlocked and slid open, like the end of the world had come and even the gaming gods had forsaken us.  What on earth was going on?!?

 

I soon found out.  Prices weren't scanned by bar code then...they were emblazoned directly on boxes with paper tags and glue backing, with the price hammered out in ink on the sticky tag (that NEVER came off the box cleanly!).  A few boxes - particularly new ones from major publishers - had pre-printed (and honored!) MSRPs on the box and thus were generally untagged, but everywhere I looked, boxes were now *double* tagged...the updated price tag being haphazardly slapped on top of the old one (frequently so much so that the original price was still clearly visible).  The *very first* box I looked at - Adventures of Tron - had such a double label.  It was *one US dollar*.

 

I knew it had to be wrong, and I knew if I tried to buy it I'd be challenged by the store clerk, with a wary manager stomping over to declare it was a mistake and take it away forever (they didn't have to honor ANYTHING back then - if the price was wrong and they knew it, you paid what they said the price should be or you did without!  Or you tried again at a different register...).  I looked at another box next to it (whose title I don't even remember)...$1.  Not even $0.99 (yes, it was a custom even then to make things look "cheaper" that way)...$1 even.  As my eyes scanned across the sea of shiny boxes in the now-wide-open glass fortress, I realized EVERY SINGLE TITLE said $1.

 

There is no doubt in my mind that I set a land speed record that morning getting from the back of the store where electronics was situated to the front where the shopping carts were.  I'm sure I clipped the ankles of 3 or 4 adult shoppers who were silly or suicidal enough to stand in the aisles between me and my destination with my rattling, creaky shopping cart that I was about to make good use of.  I didn't care.  The race was on.

 

The way I saw it, it's easier to put things back later than try to find them when they're gone, so I proceeded to very quickly and methodically grab one of EVERY game in the coveted glass case into the cart (and there were still quite a lot - my parents were early risers, thank God!), then deftly moved to the (now very literal) bargain bin, to be shocked once again to see that the lesser titles had also been discounted...to a _dime_.  Yes, $0.10 per game...titles that the day before had cost between $9.99 and $14.99.  I didn't even bother with decorum - I literally shoved both arms into the bin, and whatever I pulled out with my makeshift body-shovel, down it went into the gaping maw of the cart until it was full, duplicates be damned.

 

I made one last pass down the aisle, slightly more relaxed and willing to be a little more choosy in my inspection to see if there was anything I'd missed in my 11-year-old-powered haul, spotting a huge box of Indy 500 with controllers included that was so large I'd mistaken it for something other than a game.  Finally, satisfied that I'd done all I could to maximize my gaming glee, I headed off with my unwieldy cart to find my parents...and on the way realized I was going to have some SERIOUS explaining to do.

 

Having found them wandering amongst round swinging racks of identical jeans, I breathlessly explained what I'd seen to my wide-eyed parents who were still staring in disbelief at the cart that looked like an Atari warehouse had vomited into it.  My mother's reaction, of course, was that there was NO WAY the games were priced correctly and that someone must be trying to get away with something, so I confidently assured my father that it was all true (because...it had to be, right?  This wasn't a cruel joke, was it?) and drug him and my Mom back to electronics to seek out the department manager (a friend of the family, no less!) for confirmation.

 

He'd wisely taken the day off after having spent the evening before with his crew marking down all the boxes, as were were assured by a team member who seemed to want to stay as far as possible for the pandemonium getting ever louder only a few aisles over.  They'd received word from the district boss the evening prior to do the markdowns with no explanation given, just instruction to do it as quickly as possible, which they had.  The sale was real.  The games, one way or another, would be mine.

 

I worked with my parents to weed out all the duplicates from the budget titles (requiring yet another cart as a reject bin, which I unceremoniously parked in the middle of the game aisle once done), and still had a staggering close to 80 games in my cart, all unique.  All brand-new, in box, and the only thing standing between me and gaming bliss now was the matter of around $24 to pay for it all.  I promised my parents the world.  Birthday?  Check.  Christmas?  Check.  Both covered.  Mowing the lawn without allowance for a year?  Done.  At some point I probably also negotiated away my soul and firstborn, but I didn't care.  I'd just scored more games in under half an hour than I'd ever seen in my life combined.

 

That was exactly how I learned about The Crash.  Granted, even in that moment (and in the days to follow), the true import of it failed to dawn on me.  I didn't appreciate that an industry had just almost breathed its last.  I didn't understand that hundreds of loyal Atari (and other) employees were about to lose their livelihoods, that careers would be destroyed, that reputations would be tattered.  No...at that age, what I understood was that I now had a very serious problem the likes of which I'd never encountered before...where was I going to put all of these games?!?

 

The next day, I dragged my father to Roses again, this time to buy REAL cartridge cases - you know, like Richie Rich must have for his collection - and came away with not one, but TWO giant cases that still somehow failed to contain them all.  The irony is that I paid half as much for the cases as I did for the entire games haul the prior day!

 

I still remember the wonder and awe of being SURROUNDED by brand-new games, still in sealed boxes, in disarray around me on my bedroom floor as I excitedly and eagerly went from one to another, barely able to even choose what to play next from the smorgasbord of options now available to me.  This went on for an entire day and a half before my frustrated mother finally decreed that I'd either clean up the increasingly distressing cardboard mess building in my room or she'd throw it all away, games included.  It was tidy in ten minutes...but the memories lasted a lifetime.

 

That's how I found out.  How did you?

ET. My dad showed me a video called "Atari game over" that talked about ET, PAC-MAN, Atari, and the landfill.

[socrates63]

I jumped from the 2600 to the 800 and computers before the Crash and didn't look back to consoles until the late 90s. I only learned about the Crash when I got back into Atari console gaming about five years ago.

[Crazy Climber]

I found out about it when I joined atariage.  Looking back though it should have been obvious. I bought so many games for $1 to $5 😄 

 

I guess from 83 to 86 or so was just the cheap atari games era for me. Once the NES hit I didn't pay much attention to my atari for awhile...

[Chinese Cake]

Actually being there at the time. I found out about the current Crash narrative from the endless revisionist and agenda driven press articles that go way to far in being overdramatic and taking liberties with what actually happened, and the state of the gaming industry AFTER the bottom was in.. 

 

At the time, the crash was mostly blamed on Commodore, because their price war hurt the consumer computer market (for businesses) and retailers were in a panic slashing prices on hardware and software while also trying to move product from companies who ended up dying or couldn't take back product that was over-ordered. This lead to stores shrinking space, slashing prices themselves, being selective with what they sell which gave less option to the consumer creating disinterest and for games, boredome, and some pulled out entirely from selling computer related products. This in turn happened with the game consoles the exact same way. Both industries started recovering with prices rebounding and profits improving after the bottom sometime in 1985. It wasn't sales that was the problem it was profits, 1 million units of a product at $10 is different than if it was $120.

 

This new stuff about how there were no games until the NES (which took a few years to even sell millions), the issue about no one wanting to play games after the bottom was in (despite productivity software and gaming software sales also being reported creating a contradiction) and something about Pac man and ET which were not things I remember from back then. The Wiki article seems to be sourcing speculation from people who had no idea what was going on or who's source was other people making unsubstantiated claims. Astrocade? Barely any stores had that in-store, but they include systems like it in the list to make it seem there was a flux of consoles on shelves. Atari was literally expecting to sell 1 million VCS in 1986 which was in ln line with Nintendo's US shipment projections for NES, and sold out their 7800's, and devs were still making new games for the former. If this was the end of gaming why did people come back to play the games no one wanted to play that killed the industry they no longer had interest in?

 

i think the reason why it's still considered such an important gaming topic, not saying it wasn't important but people seem to go way out of hand with it, is because of the mythical lore surrounding it, and it being seen as the end of gaming period before it "returned" to life. It wasn't that many years ago where old consoles were less than 8-bit, and the crash was worldwide and not just in NA, and computer gaming spefically is almost always excluded from the discussion. Kind of makes you scratch your head. 

[+wongojack]

21 hours ago, Chinese Cake said:

Actually being there at the time. I found out about the current Crash narrative from the endless revisionist and agenda driven press articles that go way to far in being overdramatic and taking liberties with what actually happened, and the state of the gaming industry AFTER the bottom was in.. 

 

At the time, the crash was mostly blamed on Commodore, because their price war hurt the consumer computer market (for businesses) and retailers were in a panic slashing prices on hardware and software while also trying to move product from companies who ended up dying or couldn't take back product that was over-ordered. This lead to stores shrinking space, slashing prices themselves, being selective with what they sell which gave less option to the consumer creating disinterest and for games, boredome, and some pulled out entirely from selling computer related products. This in turn happened with the game consoles the exact same way. Both industries started recovering with prices rebounding and profits improving after the bottom sometime in 1985. It wasn't sales that was the problem it was profits, 1 million units of a product at $10 is different than if it was $120.

 

This new stuff about how there were no games until the NES (which took a few years to even sell millions), the issue about no one wanting to play games after the bottom was in (despite productivity software and gaming software sales also being reported creating a contradiction) and something about Pac man and ET which were not things I remember from back then. The Wiki article seems to be sourcing speculation from people who had no idea what was going on or who's source was other people making unsubstantiated claims. Astrocade? Barely any stores had that in-store, but they include systems like it in the list to make it seem there was a flux of consoles on shelves. Atari was literally expecting to sell 1 million VCS in 1986 which was in ln line with Nintendo's US shipment projections for NES, and sold out their 7800's, and devs were still making new games for the former. If this was the end of gaming why did people come back to play the games no one wanted to play that killed the industry they no longer had interest in?

 

i think the reason why it's still considered such an important gaming topic, not saying it wasn't important but people seem to go way out of hand with it, is because of the mythical lore surrounding it, and it being seen as the end of gaming period before it "returned" to life. It wasn't that many years ago where old consoles were less than 8-bit, and the crash was worldwide and not just in NA, and computer gaming spefically is almost always excluded from the discussion. Kind of makes you scratch your head. 

Preach it C-Cake!

[Chinese Cake]

38 minutes ago, wongojack said:

Preach it C-Cake!

 

I figured there would be someone here who would know what I was getting at.

 

Sad thing is with the advancements of the internet, old newspaper and magazine archives, well-documented articles and videos, and being able to research anything with a search engine and a little ingenuity on the internet, these narratives are still prevalent. Just with a few minor changes, now it wasn't dead games worldwide, it's not just "the end of gaming"(TM) in North America. But the core unsubstantiated or editorialized journalism, if you can call it that, has remained unchanged.

 

I personally loved the Crash because I was able to get a TES 80, a COCO, two C64's, an XL and a 800, a PCJR, 2 5200's, 3 INTV, an extra Colecovision and Adam add-on for a total across 2 years $550. I then got for all these systems about 51-52 pieces of software for $120 across the same period. I also got two printers that would have cost me over $500 for $119.00, I had among the best games out there.

 

Was a good time, shame companies weren't making money but to anyone that was restricted to only buying stock retailers were trying to give away creating boredom or dissatisfaction, you were able to get the best games for dirt cheap, and if you were a gamer you could get consoles and computers at clear out prices. It's how I got my floppy drives. I wouldn't have been able to afford a 10th as much without that crash.

 

I missed out on getting a new Apple though, they didn't really participate in the price race to the bottom, but i could have gotten several pieces of software, an Apple computer with monitor and drive for about $300 which was an incredible deal but i decided to wait on it as I was buying the other stuff and when the bottom was in took too long and the retailers that were selling it for cheap realized that Apple computers were still valuable and jumped the prices back up.

 

I did get an  Macintosh eventually when that was newer but I missed out on the Apple computer era. 

 

I got an Odyssey 2 as well at a small shop right when the prices were starting to go back up. Good timing. 

 

if you were a gamer the crash was paradise, you weren't going to stop buying games, and people didn't, unless you had bad retailers that wanted to push their over-ordered back stock and nothing else, usually bad bets. If you were a business it was horrifying because you were selling and no money was coming in. 

 

[zzip]

1 hour ago, Chinese Cake said:

if you were a gamer the crash was paradise, you weren't going to stop buying games, and people didn't, unless you had bad retailers that wanted to push their over-ordered back stock and nothing else, usually bad bets. If you were a business it was horrifying because you were selling and no money was coming in. 

It was only good for gamers in the beginning when you started to see the bargain bins. Soon many retailers wanted nothing to do with games, and only carried overstock or an extremely limited selection of new titles if they were carrying anything at all.

 

Many game companies went out of business..  if you had a brand spanking new Colecovision, Vectrex or 5200, it was abandoned after a couple years,  even Mattel fled.

 

Many arcades were closing down - except for the heavily-trafficked mall arcades or Showtime Pizza type places.   Most local supermarkets, convenience stores, laundromats, restaurants that added arcade machines during the boom were dumping them

 

And so few of my peers cared.  If really did feel like games were a fad that had run its course.  I thought it was a really depressing time to be a gamer.   I was surprised when NES made games cool again.

[Chinese Cake]

13 minutes ago, zzip said:

It was only good for gamers in the beginning when you started to see the bargain bins. Soon many retailers wanted nothing to do with games, and only carried overstock or an extremely limited selection of new titles if they were carrying anything at all.

Yeah I mentioned that before. Above.

 

13 minutes ago, zzip said:

Many game companies went out of business..  if you had a brand spanking new Colecovision, Vectrex or 5200, it was abandoned after a couple years

I was buying new CV releases in 84 and 85. I also think "many" is exaggerated many "companies" were just gaming focused departments in larger organizations. But that had little to do with the consumer which was profiting off the low prices. Even when the bottom was in many retailers were still selling console games and computer games at bargain prices until later in 85 where prices stabilized back toward normal. Unless you were unlucky enough to live in a small town or an urban area where you had a limited choice of the same games to buy because they wouldn't take more stock but those weren't as common as people believed they were, games were still selling, just not makin money, and several retailers saw that. 

 

13 minutes ago, zzip said:

Many arcades were closing down - except for the heavily-trafficked mall arcades or Showtime Pizza type places.   Most local supermarkets, convenience stores, laundromats, restaurants that added arcade machines during the boom were dumping them

That had less to do with the Crash and had to do with a separate issue arcades were going through, places were dumping arcades before the crash, there was also major municipal problems with it, as well as city councils going out of their way to impose restrictions, and new regulations that made operating arcades out of a 7-11 costly (until now with their new gaming gambling machines.), along with inflation etc. Connecting arcades to the "video game' crash was always on shallow ground.

 

13 minutes ago, zzip said:

And so few of my peers cared.  If really did feel like games were a fad that had run its course.  I thought it was a really depressing time to be a gamer.   I was surprised when NES made games cool again.

 

Except this didn't happen and I knew this is where your post was going. The software still selling in large number as well as developers jumping back on board consoles that "people didn't care about anymore" contradict this narrative. Shame that you lived in an area that didn't see retailers still selling games, anecdotes are anecdotes though. 

 

Last i checked 2600 was selling boatloads with the NES in the latter's first year. Odd for a system that people didn't care about anymore. 

 

Crash was great for gamers console or otherwise, or people who wanted to use computers in general for other means. If you weren't rapped in a net where you have your local retailers giving you a poor selection of games and barely stocking games it sucks, but I think many people tried to stretch those situations across the entire country when in reality, software and consoles were still selling. There's even articles about people talking about there being sales but no one is making money, so retailers in some cases limited or removed games, just not everywhere.

 

 

 

Edited October 24, 2022 by Chinese Cake