Wade Rosen Interview - Venture Beats

[GraffitiTavern]

Interview with Wade Rosen was posted yesterday(March 4th), mostly a standard interview with the odd factual error. (Jeff Minter made Tempest 2000 onwards, not the original)

https://venturebeat.com/games/how-atari-is-leveraging-50-years-of-nostalgia-wade-rosen-interview/

 

Some Highlights:

• "We probably want to do more with 50. We think there’s more that can be done there, more that can be built upon. As great of a collection as that is, it’s really just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the history of Atari. We’re continuing to build that and flesh that out."
• Mentioning specifically the APA deal as a way to get more into the TV/movie space for licensing
• The hotel deal is still in the works apparently
• Blockchain stuff has seemed to be deemphasized somewhat and crypto dropped
• "I see Nolan pretty regularly. He’s a strategic advisor at Atari now too." Nolan Bushnell now seems to be officially with Atari SA
• "We’re shooting for 11 (games) this year. Some are smaller titles, like the Recharged line, which are really for the fans, clear remasters of great games. There are a couple of surprises in the Recharged line, too. A few deep cuts and some fan favorites that aren’t necessarily thought of as Atari, but are now wrapping in. Those will be cool surprises. We have some larger games as well, across the whole spectrum. I think people can expect to see some pretty cool content from us that’s not just on consoles."
• Finally mentions hardware announcements later in the year, specifically something which will expand the utility and hardware capabilities of the VCS

[GraffitiTavern]

Any idea what these larger titles are or the new VCS hardware is? Pleased to see the crypto stuff phased out, as well as the idea Atari 50 will be expanded. I would totally buy DLC or an expanded Quadratank 2 for Switch or something.

[+Stephen]

If they want money makers, they should STOP preventing lLamasdoft from releasing a tested and working VR version of T2K / Tempest 4000 for starters.

[Mockduck]

There wasn't a lot in the interview that close watchers didn't already know, I think the most "new" news is the hint that maybe there'll be DLC or a part 2 of Atari 50th. The VCS hardware thing is the same who-knows-what that they've been talking about for more than a year, maybe some kind of USB plug in with an external graphics card and/or 2600 cart slot? Atari is still into Crypto, but instead of land-buying in The Sandbox and trying to launch their own currency they are focusing on NFT and NFT+physical collaborations with artists and other players in the field, see the recent Misfit X collection and the Billy Butcher stuff. So more collaboration with people selling in the space rather than trying to build out some kind of land, although they're still doing their thing in The Sandbox allegedly.

 

The hotel thing was never Atari, although too many people think it is. It's always just been Atari taking money from some hotel developers with a big idea, we'll see if it ever happens. 

[GraffitiTavern]

2 hours ago, Mockduck said:

Atari is still into Crypto, but instead of land-buying in The Sandbox and trying to launch their own currency they are focusing on NFT and NFT+physical collaborations with artists and other players in the field

When I said crypto, I specifically meant cryptocurrency, so them dropping Atari token and Rosen saying they are specifically moving away from the financial end of blockchain. I still think the blockchain stuff is stupid, and wish they could just collaborate with artists normally instead of trying to turn everything into an NFT, but glad it doesn't seem to be as big a focus of the business as it has been the past few years.

As for the VCS, yeah they were hinting at nebulous new hardware last year too which never ended up dropping, I don't have much hopes for it. Notable that it seems they will keep up support at least through this year, which means VCS will have a longer life cycle than the 5200 or Jaguar.

[+x=usr(1536)]

4 hours ago, Mockduck said:

The hotel thing was never Atari, although too many people think it is. It's always just been Atari taking money from some hotel developers with a big idea, we'll see if it ever happens. 

True, though it's bound to be thought of as an Atari project due to the way the Atari branding has been slathered all over the designs.  Granted, that could change - but as the business decisions show, Atari is inarguably involved with it as one of their projects.

 

FWIW, the hotels still strike me as being a dead-end.  Licensing the concept out to an existing hotel group might work as a tentative first step, but moving straight into hospitality without that being a core competency of the company seems like putting the cart before the horse.

1 hour ago, GraffitiTavern said:

I still think the blockchain stuff is stupid, and wish they could just collaborate with artists normally instead of trying to turn everything into an NFT, but glad it doesn't seem to be as big a focus of the business as it has been the past few years.

Agreed.  And people aren't buying NFTs like they used to, either.  It's like everyone woke up one morning and from their collective hangovers said, "I paid how much for a jpeg last night?"

 

Dropping the financial side of it was a good move.  The potential for liability there was not insignificant.

[Lord Mushroom]

On 3/6/2023 at 1:34 AM, GraffitiTavern said:

• The hotel deal is still in the works apparently

When Atari unilaterally cancelled the deal, they were threatened by a lawsuit. Maybe they gave in. Or maybe they had deals with two companies, and only cancelled the deal with one of them.

[Flojomojo]

I would think the pandemic smacked the hotel idea pretty hard. Travel and hospitality industries were way down for a long time. 

 

Wade’s interview was pretty vague. I like him a lot better than his predecessor but it’s hard to make huge strides with the constraints on the company. 
 

Adding more stuff to Atari 50 would be great. I can think of long lists of Lynx and Jaguar games that would be fun to have in that emulator, and more reimagined games with the quality of Vctr Sctr would be a treat. 
 

Caverns of Mars Recharged drops soon. 

[CapitanClassic]

36 minutes ago, Flojomojo said:

I would think the pandemic smacked the hotel idea pretty hard. Travel and hospitality industries were way down for a long time.

 

Technically, it was the reaction to the pandemic, not the pandemic itself. I knew tons of people who would love to travel during the pandemic (because prices were down so low), but couldn’t guarantee that immigration was going to let them in/out.

[Lord Mushroom]

32 minutes ago, Flojomojo said:

Wade’s interview was pretty vague. I like him a lot better than his predecessor but it’s hard to make huge strides with the constraints on the company.

Yes, but quantity and quality of games are growing by a very high percentage, if he is telling the truth. If they can keep up that momentum, it wouldn´t take long for Atari to become a major player. That is going to be very difficult, though. 

[+x=usr(1536)]

36 minutes ago, Flojomojo said:

Wade’s interview was pretty vague. I like him a lot better than his predecessor but it’s hard to make huge strides with the constraints on the company. 

The one thing I will give Rosen credit for (particularly in comparison to Chesnais) is that he's not having a SQUIRREL! moment with every shiny object to make its way down the pike.

 

He was handed a steaming pile of a company, to be sure.  My impression is that he is working to right the ship, but that he's working with an essentially ground-up reorganisation due to years of inherited lack of focus and incompetence.

 

Still waiting to see what the end result is, though, and I have no expectation of him being the saviour of the company.  We'll see how it plays out in the long run.

[Lord Mushroom]

39 minutes ago, Flojomojo said:

I would think the pandemic smacked the hotel idea pretty hard. Travel and hospitality industries were way down for a long time.

I don´t think the pandemic was such a big problem to Atari hotels. It was a huge problem for existing hotels, but the pandemic was probably expected to end before the Atari hotels were supposed to be finished.

[Mockduck]

21 hours ago, GraffitiTavern said:

When I said crypto, I specifically meant cryptocurrency, so them dropping Atari token and Rosen saying they are specifically moving away from the financial end of blockchain. I still think the blockchain stuff is stupid, and wish they could just collaborate with artists normally instead of trying to turn everything into an NFT, but glad it doesn't seem to be as big a focus of the business as it has been the past few years.

As for the VCS, yeah they were hinting at nebulous new hardware last year too which never ended up dropping, I don't have much hopes for it. Notable that it seems they will keep up support at least through this year, which means VCS will have a longer life cycle than the 5200 or Jaguar.

I think Crypto is stupid as are NFTs but I don't fault Atari from taking in as much money from it as they have from their games division, easy money for their bottom line. Seems like it has been successful for them financially, even if it's stupid. 

[Flojomojo]

Yeah, there’s the “art” side of the business, and the “money” side too. They need to be balanced. 

 

Fred Chesnais tried a lot of things that I thought cheapened the brand, but he was swinging for the fences because he wanted to enrich the company. 

 

Wade is making moves with games that I like (I’ve bought all their Recharged games, Atari 50, Tempest 4000 on Switch, and Akka Arrh) but what I like is rarely what makes the most money. 

[GraffitiTavern]

1 hour ago, Flojomojo said:

Fred Chesnais tried a lot of things that I thought cheapened the brand, but he was swinging for the fences because he wanted to enrich the company. 

 

True, but when you are a legacy brand like Atari, to cheapen the brand is to doom it in the long run, the reputation(and licensing) is what makes you money. A lot of the stuff he did made money from FOMO but ran the reputation of the company into the ground. He was prioritizing the need for short-term cash over the long-term viability of the company. I think that's an issue with many publicly-traded companies btw, not just Atari SA.

[Lord Mushroom]

1 hour ago, Flojomojo said:

Wade is making moves with games that I like (I’ve bought all their Recharged games, Atari 50, Tempest 4000 on Switch, and Akka Arrh) but what I like is rarely what makes the most money. 

He says there will be some larger (innovative) games this year. We might find out then, if he can move Atari forward, and not just regurgitate the past. It will be interesting to see if those games are based on old IP or not.

[Nall3k]

One of the possible games releasing this year is Dark Chambers. Someone posted a short video of gameplay on twitter, but it's gone now. Food Fight is supposedly still in development too.

[Flojomojo]

Dark Chambers is Dandy/Gauntlet with a different name but if they can somehow make that old game fun again, I'll give it a try. 

 

Food Fight is perfect in its 1984 form and they'd better not ruin it. 

[zzip]

On 3/6/2023 at 10:23 AM, Mockduck said:

The hotel thing was never Atari, although too many people think it is. It's always just been Atari taking money from some hotel developers with a big idea, we'll see if it ever happens. 

Steve Wozniak was somehow involved in that Atari Hotel deal, right?

 

 

[Flojomojo]

1 hour ago, zzip said:

Steve Wozniak was somehow involved in that Atari Hotel deal, right?

Seems like it.

Quote

"How did the idea get to this stage? I met Shelly and Napoleon at an event, I was presenting Steve Wozniak with the new Atari product. Steve Wozniak was an employee back in the day, he and Steve Jobs were both Atari employees, but he left and went on to found Apple. I had wanted to make Atari hotels for a long time and I finally found people who wanted to share that vision and passion and that’s how it came out.

 

[roots.genoa]

I'm not sure Steve Wozniak ever was an Atari employee, but whatever. Except if you take into account the fact he was doing Steve Jobs' job (who wasn't qualified at all to work at Atari).

[zzip]

44 minutes ago, roots.genoa said:

I'm not sure Steve Wozniak ever was an Atari employee, but whatever. Except if you take into account the fact he was doing Steve Jobs' job (who wasn't qualified at all to work at Atari).

Yeah, I thought that's how it worked out.

 

Although I'd clarify and say Steve Job's was unqualified for the job he held at Atari.  He may have been qualified to be CEO though

[MrMaddog]

On 3/7/2023 at 5:04 PM, zzip said:

Yeah, I thought that's how it worked out.

 

Although I'd clarify and say Steve Job's was unqualified for the job he held at Atari.  He may have been qualified to be CEO though

 

I believe that Al Alcorn said that they only hired Jobs just so they can get Woz to do some work while they hang out together like they did when making Breakout.

 

Woz was working for HP at the time and was very loyal to the company, only when they rejected his computer kit idea did he leave to co-start Apple.

[GraffitiTavern]

Update: They actually corrected the error with Minter

Quote

 Minter is a legendary arcade game designer who gave us classics like Tempest [2000], a remake of the 1981 game Tempest by Dave Theurer.