Intellivision Amico’s trademark changed to ‘abandoned’

[Bill Loguidice]

12 hours ago, mr_me said:

It didn't have to be a thing for most people. It just needed to be a niche with a large enough install base to support new game development. It may have been a long shot to get there but it would have been nice to at least see it play out, even if it failed in the market.

 

As you may or may not remember, I was an early supporter and thought that at least the goals publicly indicated, and confirmed by Tommy T. (as unreliable as a source he turned out to be), were realistic to create a sustainable platform. In other words, even though I thought the Amico was only slightly more "necessary" than the unnecessary VCS, I did agree it could carve out a sustainable niche based on the original vision. Naturally, as prices increased, the years passed, the incompetence shown, etc., that window began to close. Now said window is hermetically sealed. Theoretically, another company could take the basic ideas of this platform (simple games, local multiplayer focus, low cost, etc.) and run with it should they be high stakes gamblers, but it's not going to be the Amico team.

 

12 hours ago, mr_me said:

He was talking specifically of Amico Shark Shark and Missile Command.  Some people prefer the ergonomics of a directional pad over a thumbstick. And it shouldn't be difficult to see how someone would find a trackpad superior to a thumbstick for Missile Command, a mouse works really well too. As far as optimising on other platforms, another company did that for Amico Shark Shark and Astrosmash.

Not my point, but the fact remains that these games clearly haven't been optimized for other platforms as the myriad well-documented issues show. It doesn't matter who was responsible for the lack of optimization. They all have issues of some type on every platform they were ported to (and it seems even the Amico platform itself has some performance issues). My point was that there's nothing inherent in or about these relatively simple games that shouldn't make them just as good, if not better, on these other platforms. We can quibble about "what controls best" for a particular game, etc., but there are plenty of control options out there (including touchpads), and that's hardly been the issue with these anyway. In other words, if a particular game suddenly supported a touchpad, it wouldn't do anything to resolve the other issues. And again, we can circle back to the stunning achievement of Amico Home and its multiple device requirement actually making games more difficult to play, not easier. 

[Bill Loguidice]

2 hours ago, Flojomojo said:

As for the people who have not collected their refunds or disassociated themselves from this project, I have no words. Still hoping to get a SUPER RARE collectible to put on their shelves? You'd think dignity and self-respect would be worth more than that. 

This is the absolute truth. If they haven't pulled out by now, they never will. 

[jerseystyle]

5 hours ago, Bill Loguidice said:

This is the absolute truth. If they haven't pulled out by now, they never will. 

At this point how could they? Those last die hards (DJC, scumbag 1, scumbag 2, Consumo, and Buzz Killington) have made this their entire identity. In a way it’d be better for them if it never releases… then they could just keep kicking the can and blaming the “haters”. 

Edited January 4 by jerseystyle

[MrBeefy]

4 hours ago, Bill Loguidice said:

They all have issues of some type on every platform they were ported to (and it seems even the Amico platform itself has some performance issues). 

They were never finished. At least the pack ins weren't. Fundable had them listed at 95% and that was after 2020. Notice only two have made it to stores, and that is probably because Those two games and IPs were sold off to another company. BBG probably finished the games for them as part of the deal.

 

There is no reason for Farkle, Skiing, Back Talk Party, or Cornhole to not be offered through the Home App. The only reason is they weren't finished. There was evidence of that back when Alvarado was fixing Cornhole.

 

I heard rumors they were begging devs to come work for free to finish games for them. Side Swipers is still a demo.

 

The only other games to make it are Missile Command, and Dart Frenzy. They aren't made by Intellivision. Dart Frenzy is thought to be an updated port of a Wii game. I would expect to see Ridged Force Redux and Finnigan Fox as the next games they focus on. Those games were already completed and not made by Intellivision.

 

I'm surprised they haven't pushed out Evel Knievel as it has already been on the Amazon App store. Unless there is some weird licensing fee that they can't on the Home App.

[livingonwheels]

1 hour ago, MrBeefy said:

They were never finished. At least the pack ins weren't. Fundable had them listed at 95% and that was after 2020. Notice only two have made it to stores, and that is probably because Those two games and IPs were sold off to another company. BBG probably finished the games for them as part of the deal.

 

There is no reason for Farkle, Skiing, Back Talk Party, or Cornhole to not be offered through the Home App. The only reason is they weren't finished. There was evidence of that back when Alvarado was fixing Cornhole.

 

I heard rumors they were begging devs to come work for free to finish games for them. Side Swipers is still a demo.

 

The only other games to make it are Missile Command, and Dart Frenzy. They aren't made by Intellivision. Dart Frenzy is thought to be an updated port of a Wii game. I would expect to see Ridged Force Redux and Finnigan Fox as the next games they focus on. Those games were already completed and not made by Intellivision.

 

I'm surprised they haven't pushed out Evel Knievel as it has already been on the Amazon App store. Unless there is some weird licensing fee that they can't on the Home App.

Publishing the next game is a little ways down my list right now, but I hope some time next month.  Probably Rigid Force Redux Enhanced.  Although people here (one in particular 🐶 🐾 ) are pressing for Finnigan Fox, which is a possibility.  Personally I'd prefer something more multi-player like Biplanes, Skiing, or even Cornhole (although I worry about people accidentally tossing their phones at their TVs).- Alvarado on Discord today.

[SteveTheColecoDude]

1 hour ago, MrBeefy said:

The only other games to make it are Missile Command, and Dart Frenzy. They aren't made by Intellivision. Dart Frenzy is thought to be an updated port of a Wii game. I would expect to see Ridged Force Redux and Finnigan Fox as the next games they focus on. Those games were already completed and not made by Intellivision.

 

As well as Dart Frenzy being a port of the WiiWare game Dart Rage from 2008, the company who did Missile Command for Amico did a Missile Command for Xbox Live in 2007, and it looks very similar - https://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/store/missile-command/BVNHG5KK7QDP

 

So that is probably a port too.

[mr_me]

8 hours ago, Bill Loguidice said:

As you may or may not remember, I was an early supporter and thought that at least the goals publicly indicated, and confirmed by Tommy T. (as unreliable as a source he turned out to be), were realistic to create a sustainable platform. In other words, even though I thought the Amico was only slightly more "necessary" than the unnecessary VCS, I did agree it could carve out a sustainable niche based on the original vision. Naturally, as prices increased, the years passed, the incompetence shown, etc., that window began to close. Now said window is hermetically sealed. Theoretically, another company could take the basic ideas of this platform (simple games, local multiplayer focus, low cost, etc.) and run with it should they be high stakes gamblers, but it's not going to be the Amico team.

 

Not my point, but the fact remains that these games clearly haven't been optimized for other platforms as the myriad well-documented issues show. It doesn't matter who was responsible for the lack of optimization. They all have issues of some type on every platform they were ported to (and it seems even the Amico platform itself has some performance issues). My point was that there's nothing inherent in or about these relatively simple games that shouldn't make them just as good, if not better, on these other platforms. We can quibble about "what controls best" for a particular game, etc., but there are plenty of control options out there (including touchpads), and that's hardly been the issue with these anyway. In other words, if a particular game suddenly supported a touchpad, it wouldn't do anything to resolve the other issues. And again, we can circle back to the stunning achievement of Amico Home and its multiple device requirement actually making games more difficult to play, not easier. 

There are the two ports by BBG Entertainment.  I heard of performance issues with online gameplay, these games weren't developed with online play in mind so it could be a difficult fix. That aside, what are the issues when it comes to local play with the two BBG ports?

 

Regarding the Amico Home ports, I wouldn't be surprised if there are issues.  The company that had a team of internal game testers and funded the third party development of most of these games is long gone. There's one guy preparing all the ports, not sure how he's compensated, and the people that developed the games don't seem to be involved. Wifi connection issues are dependent on other people's hardware so connection reliability can vary. Talking about requiring multiple devices being an issue, console gaming requires multiple devices. If you want to play a two player game for example, that's three devices, the console and two controllers. The workaround they put together with phones emulating controllers isn't suppose to be easier than an out of the box solution with actual game controllers.

 

There must be some version of Missile Command on Playstation that uses the Playstation controller trackpad. The trackpad being in the middle of the controller isn't ideal. Have you tried any?

 

Porting directional pad control to a thumbstick is of course completely feasible. While a thumbstick can duplicate the functionality of a directional pad, it performs differently.

The Amico party/casual multiplayer games that use controller displays and microphones can probably play fine with phone controllers.  But I think to get the attention of developers to create local multiplayer games using displays on game controllers you'd need a system out there with such controllers as standard.

[roots.genoa]

5 hours ago, livingonwheels said:

although I worry about people accidentally tossing their phones at their TVs

And yet he's not worried about Dart Frenzy... 🤔

[Flojomojo]

10 hours ago, SteveTheColecoDude said:

 

As well as Dart Frenzy being a port of the WiiWare game Dart Rage from 2008, the company who did Missile Command for Amico did a Missile Command for Xbox Live in 2007, and it looks very similar - https://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/store/missile-command/BVNHG5KK7QDP

 

So that is probably a port too.

A port of a game that was released to thunderous indifference 16 years ago seems unlikely to do any better today. https://www.metacritic.com/game/missile-command-1980/

 

Last I checked, Amico Missile Command had “50+” downloads on Google Play, which I assume includes the “generous” free codes as well as $15 purchases. It’s in “early access” still so there are no publicly viewable reviews of it.  

 

Weird thing: I don’t see any mention of Atari or copyrights/trademarks anywhere. 

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.StainlessGamesLtd.MissileCommandAH&hl=en_US&gl=US

[+Stephen]

6 hours ago, roots.genoa said:

And yet he's not worried about Dart Frenzy... 🤔

[+GoldLeader]

4 hours ago, Stephen said:

 

OOPS!   There's a Cornhole the size of a Wii Controller in that monitor!

[mr_me]

10 hours ago, Flojomojo said:

A port of a game that was released to thunderous indifference 16 years ago seems unlikely to do any better today. https://www.metacritic.com/game/missile-command-1980/

 

Last I checked, Amico Missile Command had “50+” downloads on Google Play, which I assume includes the “generous” free codes as well as $15 purchases. It’s in “early access” still so there are no publicly viewable reviews of it.  

 

Weird thing: I don’t see any mention of Atari or copyrights/trademarks anywhere. 

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.StainlessGamesLtd.MissileCommandAH&hl=en_US&gl=US

The old xbox game got good reviews. The thing bringing down the average were complaints of the thumbstick being a poor control. Others said it's too difficult which is not surprising for a classic arcade remake.  Some of the graphics are a bit odd, you're not commanding missiles.

 

Crediting the trademark owner is between the licensor and licensee. The licensor might not want their company name on a product. Usually the licensee wants to mention the trademark owner but not necessarily.

[MrBeefy]

Intellivision is actively deleting refund requests from their Discord. Is anyone other than the resident Beep Boop surprised?

 

Hey @Tommy Tallaricohow about you try and find a sliver of integrity and refund those people?

 

 

[Flojomojo]

4 hours ago, mr_me said:

The old xbox game got good reviews. The thing bringing down the average were complaints of the thumbstick being a poor control. Others said it's too difficult which is not surprising for a classic arcade remake.  Some of the graphics are a bit odd, you're not commanding missiles.

 

Crediting the trademark owner is between the licensor and licensee. The licensor might not want their company name on a product. Usually the licensee wants to mention the trademark owner but not necessarily.

Aren’t you the contrarian? Those aren’t good reviews, and it’s highly unusual for Atari(tm)(R)(c) not to protect its intellectual property and demand that others do the same. 

 

I challenge you to find another instance of someone else publishing Atari works without acknowledging their ownership. 

 

They have sued many companies for far less. 

[mr_me]

If there is a licence agreement between the two parties the IP has been protected. If that agreement has expired, they can sue them. However, it's not a publishing of an Atari SA works. The copyrights to the code, graphics, and sounds belong to either IE or Stainless Games.

 

And regarding the old xbox game, it did get good reviews. I also said it got poor reviews.

Edited January 5 by mr_me

[bojay1997]

42 minutes ago, mr_me said:

If there is a licence agreement between the two parties the IP has been protected. If that agreement has expired, they can sue them. However, it's not a publishing of an Atari SA works. The copyrights to the code, graphics, and sounds belong to either IE or Stainless Games.

 

And regarding the old xbox game, it did get good reviews. I also said it got poor reviews.

Are you an attorney now?  There is zero chance that any company would decline a standard trademark notice on IP they have licensed in this way.  You're just wrong about this and you need to stop posting clearly false information especially in a field you know nothing about.  

[mr_me]

10 hours ago, bojay1997 said:

Are you an attorney now?  There is zero chance that any company would decline a standard trademark notice on IP they have licensed in this way.  You're just wrong about this and you need to stop posting clearly false information especially in a field you know nothing about.  

So what would the terms of the agreement require, that a TM or R label be applied to the name or that it also say that it's a trademark of Atari Interactive Inc?

[rayik]

51 minutes ago, mr_me said:

So what would the terms of the agreement require, that a TM or R label be applied to the name or that it also say that it's a trademark of Atari Interactive Inc?

The Answer

[mr_me]

Either way, Atari SA may not care to have their company name on this product so that's between the two parties. As long as the name is being used with their permission the IP is protected.

Edited January 5 by mr_me

[Bill Loguidice]

I didn't download Amico Home, and have zero interest in doing so, but in looking at the Missile Command listing on Google Play (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.StainlessGamesLtd.MissileCommandAH&hl=en&gl=US) and the Astrosmash listing (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.roguerocketgames.AstroSmash) there is zero indication of copyright, credits, trademarks, or anything else related to "legal" on the listings or screenshots. Now, none of that is in the least bit unusual on a Google Play listing. On the Apple App Store, there is a copyright for the Amico Controller app (© 2023 Intellivision Entertainment, LLC.), which, as far as I know, is the only thing available on the App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/amico-controller/id6468690454

So the question is, for those who have Missile Command, Astrosmash, etc., are there copyrights, licenses, credits, etc., listed anywhere when playing the games? Classically, when Atari or others have licensed or developed stuff like this, their logos appear before the games start and certainly have all the legalese in the credits.

[bojay1997]

50 minutes ago, mr_me said:

Either way, Atari SA may not care to have their company name on this product so that's between the two parties. As long as the name is being used with their permission the IP is protected.

Wrong.  It's not about whether they care or not.  If you want to assure your trademark is protected, you assure that every single licensee clearly places it prominently on every single licensed product.  This is not up for debate and your belief that there is no risk to the trademark holder by failing to assure that it is done is just plain dumb.  

[mr_me]

Having that text on the product can help strengthen the trademark, as does having it licensed and used on an appropriate product. But in this case there's also some negative goodwill associated with the product. Maybe Atari SA can use the lack of that text to terminate the license.

Edited January 5 by mr_me

[mr_me]

3 hours ago, Bill Loguidice said:

I didn't download Amico Home, and have zero interest in doing so, but in looking at the Missile Command listing on Google Play (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.StainlessGamesLtd.MissileCommandAH&hl=en&gl=US) and the Astrosmash listing (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.roguerocketgames.AstroSmash) there is zero indication of copyright, credits, trademarks, or anything else related to "legal" on the listings or screenshots. Now, none of that is in the least bit unusual on a Google Play listing. On the Apple App Store, there is a copyright for the Amico Controller app (© 2023 Intellivision Entertainment, LLC.), which, as far as I know, is the only thing available on the App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/amico-controller/id6468690454

So the question is, for those who have Missile Command, Astrosmash, etc., are there copyrights, licenses, credits, etc., listed anywhere when playing the games? Classically, when Atari or others have licensed or developed stuff like this, their logos appear before the games start and certainly have all the legalese in the credits.

The developer has their logo in the Missile Command game but that's not an indication of any ip ownership. I don't think there is any legal requirement for credits other than an agreement between parties.  Back in the 1970s you had to have a copyright notice to have a legal copyright but that requirement changed long ago.

 

edit:

Sorry, I didn't see the developer logo in Amico Missile Command, I was thinking of the old Xbox game I was looking at earlier.  The links to the Google store pages do have the developer names in the addresses, which looks like the package name.

Edited January 5 by mr_me

[Flojomojo]

I just think it's weird to see an Atari product sold by someone else without the usual boilerplate attached. 

 

 

Those are some examples I found in a minute of poking around recent new product pages. I don't know have any visibility into Intellivision's arrangement with Atari, nor do I particularly care -- other than it's funny to see all the different ways Amico can screw things up. Intellivision's failure to attribute IP ownership in a mobile store page is not their greatest fault, not by a long shot. 

[bojay1997]

22 hours ago, mr_me said:

The old xbox game got good reviews. The thing bringing down the average were complaints of the thumbstick being a poor control. Others said it's too difficult which is not surprising for a classic arcade remake.  Some of the graphics are a bit odd, you're not commanding missiles.

 

Crediting the trademark owner is between the licensor and licensee. The licensor might not want their company name on a product. Usually the licensee wants to mention the trademark owner but not necessarily.

Not usually, always.  There is zero chance Atari or any other company licensing their IP to a third party would waive a trademark notice.  None at all.  Give it up.  If they didn't want their IP associated with Amico, they wouldn't have licensed it.  Since you're an AI, you should self report this whole thing as a hallucination.