Bentley on the VCS, please!!!

[bluenomadgaming]

It is Bentley’s 40th birthday this year and I want to celebrate this Bear.  Bentley Bear deserves to be the mascot of Atari so badly.  However, to do that, he needs a new amazing game to solidify his status.  
 

I am thinking of a Castle of Illusion type game but animated like Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom.  Sort of a style game with collectibles and different hats that give him powers.  Introduce a new character or two for his world and watch it sell like crazy.  
Now Atari, give us a stuffed Bentley on the website with the Atari Mania design.   
 

What do you think?   What kind of game would you give Bentley to take him to Mascot level face of the franchise?

 

[roots.genoa]

3 hours ago, bluenomadgaming said:

but animated like Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom

Do you realize the number of years it took to make the game look that way?

[bluenomadgaming]

15 minutes ago, roots.genoa said:

Do you realize the number of years it took to make the game look that way?

Zero because it is a what if.   But yea, I love that game hence the style and scope that I want for the birthday bear.  He deserves it.  

[digdugnate]

Dr. Bentley- he comes onto your VCS screen and pronounces it DOA. 

[MrBeefy]

🤔

https://atariage.com/store/index.php?l=product_detail&p=1198

[joeatari1]

11 hours ago, digdugnate said:

Dr. Bentley- he comes onto your VCS screen and pronounces it DOA. 

Why are you here again?  It's not fun anymore, it's not funny anymore.  There are 50 other areas of this forum for you to spew your negative toxicity.  For a "console" that you claim to not have any interest in, you sure do go out of your way to make it miserable for the others that enjoy it.

[Atari_JaguarVCS]

I'm finding it more and more easy to ignore the VCS haters these days, especially since we have an Atari employee that visits the forum frequently that can confirm the VCS is doing better than ever and is not dead yet 😅. I can see the VCS is doing better than ever myself, I'm looking forward to release after release and having an absolute blast with the device and have done for almost 3 years. It's kinda not even worth hating on the VCS anymore, its proven everyone hater wrong and continues to do so. It will lose official support at some point like everything else does but its lasted a lot longer than those haters and Youtubers said it would back in the backer launch of 2020, they gave it 6 months.

[bluenomadgaming]

I know.  If I didn’t like a console and lll

1 minute ago, Atari_JaguarVCS said:

I'm finding it more and more easy to ignore the VCS haters these days, especially since we have an Atari employee that visits the forum frequently that can confirm the VCS is doing better than ever and is not dead yet 😅. I can see the VCS is doing better than ever myself, I'm looking forward to release after release and having an absolute blast with the device and have done for almost 3 years. It's kinda not even worth hating on the VCS anymore, its proven everyone hater wrong and continues to do so. It will lose official support at some point like everything else does but its lasted a lot longer than those haters and Youtubers said it would back in the backer launch of 2020, they gave it 6 months.

Preach.  But even if it makes it 4 or 5 years, they will Find a way to be negative about it.  I love this company and I like the VCS.  It is amazing that I am playing a new Atari console in 2023.   
 

This “failure” has more games than any other console except the 2600.  It is chugging along and I will hear for the ride. 
 

ps Long live Bentley 🐻 

[Atari_JaguarVCS]

They will always find something to be negative about but that cant be about it having no games anymore, its got a great game library behind it with the killer app Ends Reach out today. Another thing though when official support goes, it'll still live on with community fan made game releases and such in a similar way to the Atari Jaguar i can see it right now. Its got its own group of users that love the device and will keep it alive, some are even learning game development just so they can support it! then there's always PC mode. I still play games on my 20 something year old win 98 gaming PC from back in the day so I'll always have a use for my Atari VCS 800 being primarily a retro gamer anyway 😅. One of the most common thing haters do is to hate on the spec of the device when compared to the ps5 and Xbox series x and the likes when this console has never been aimed at competing with those console, the VCS is about modern indie/retro games and homebrew now, half the games on the system don't even push the console to its limits, BPM boy and Ends Reach are probably the only ones that are taking full advantage of it on Atari OS so its spec perfectly fine for its purposes. I have seen a lot of haters recently been converted and now support the VCS so maybe one day there wont be any trolls in the forum lol.

[Synthpopalooza]

Well, how about ... Atari officially licenses Bob Crescenzo's Bentley Bear Crystal Quest on the VCS? 

[digdugnate]

13 hours ago, joeatari1 said:

Why are you here again?  It's not fun anymore, it's not funny anymore.  There are 50 other areas of this forum for you to spew your negative toxicity.  For a "console" that you claim to not have any interest in, you sure do go out of your way to make it miserable for the others that enjoy it.

 

Just here to bring a little sunshine in your life.  You don't like what you read, block me.

[MrBeefy]

14 hours ago, Atari_JaguarVCS said:

its proven everyone hater wrong and continues to do so. 

Serious question. What exactly has it proven exactly?

 

All I see is a failed console that lost the company a huge chunk of money. It hasn't made up that money from the looks of it. Which points to it being a bad idea, mismanaged, or most likely both.

 

It doesn't have any exclusives that are system sellers. It got clearance down to $99 to try and dump stock it was moving so bad. It could easily be replaced by a PC and be more capable.

 

I see a user base whose don't show confidence in the console when something doesn't have the for VCS on it. The company seems to know it too by not making their games console exclusive.

 

It's great that people are having fun with it. That doesn't make the console a success or prove anything.

 

I have fun playing my 7800, but that doesn't change from it being a huge failure that sucked compared to things like the NES. And I was having fun playing my WiiU last night while my son played Switch. I had a blast, but it was a flop console.

 

It's okay to say you like something, and know it's a lemon. Like with the WiiU, the wife and I played it so much and it was fun. But it didn't have the software library to make it great. It was first party games then nothing. This was reinforced by how that software got new life on the Switch.

So once again I ask, what has it proven? Explain it to me, please.

 

[zzip]

14 hours ago, Atari_JaguarVCS said:

I'm finding it more and more easy to ignore the VCS haters these days,

Yeah it easier, but mostly because they don't turn every VCS thread into a taco party anymore.

[Atari_JaguarVCS]

They can keep hating and throwing up pictures of Mario Kart which i actually own on the Wii U. I have a Switch, PS5, Series X, a PC and a whole stack of other consoles some successful in there life time and some a failure in there time like the amazing Sega Dreamcast so it all means nothing to me the hating on the VCS, its not even supposed to compete with these consoles even if there failed or not failed, its technically just a mini PC anyway that's not being given a fair chance as it doesn't get sold outside the US so what would you expect and how would you expect the device to compete when its currently held back, you buy the VCS and you can install your OS of choice and your good to go and the device suddenly has more games than any other system available to it via PC mode and if you install Steam and add a external USB CD or DVD ROM drive its endless what you can do with the system and not to mention emulation, its just refreshing and great to see the Atari OS side of things pick up the pace and thrive though with new fun games which often not only look better on the VCS they play far better than on any other system sometimes especially if they have classic spinner support on the joystick although Tempest 4000 is a mess. I enjoy all games on all the various platforms, although the VCS 800 i just have a soft spot for especially since it keeps proving the haters wrong in the way its still getting new games released exclusive or not and more and more support each month when people said it would be dead within 6 months in 2020, its done pretty well lasting this long. In the main time I'm getting ready for End's Reach a killer VCS exclusive that you cant play on any other system 😃 looking forward to getting lost in Ends Reach its going to be a good time. 

[MrBeefy]

3 minutes ago, Atari_JaguarVCS said:

They can keep hating and throwing up pictures of Mario Kart which i actually own on the Wii U. I have a Switch, PS5, Series X, a PC and a whole stack of other consoles some successful in there life time and some a failure in there time like the amazing Sega Dreamcast so it all means nothing to me the hating on the VCS, its not even supposed to compete with these consoles even if there failed or not failed, its technically just a mini PC anyway that's not being given a fair chance as it doesn't get sold outside the US so what would you expect and how would you expect the device to compete when its currently held back, you buy the VCS and you can install your OS of choice and your good to go and the device suddenly has more games than any other system available to it via PC mode and if you install Steam and add a external USB CD or DVD ROM drive its endless what you can do with the system and not to mention emulation, its just refreshing and great to see the Atari OS side of things pick up the pace and thrive though with new fun games which often not only look better on the VCS they play far better than on any other system sometimes especially if they have classic spinner support on the joystick although Tempest 4000 is a mess. I enjoy all games on all the various platforms, although the VCS 800 i just have a soft spot for especially since it keeps proving the haters wrong in the way its still getting new games released exclusive or not and more and more support each month when people said it would be dead within 6 months in 2020, its done pretty well lasting this long. In the main time I'm getting ready for End's Reach a killer VCS exclusive that you cant play on any other system 😃 looking forward to getting lost in Ends Reach its going to be a good time. 

So you have nothing beyond, "I like it" and the market "is unfair" while also calling it a mini PC which can be purchased without an Atari logo. 🤣

 

Thanks for proving my point that the market has shown it to not have proven anything. Unless the goal is to lose the company large chunks of money. Then it has really proven itself! 😂

 

If it was as stable as you hoped then people shouldn't be getting scared or upset like at how LLB might was possibly not going to be launched on VCS. 😜

[Atari_JaguarVCS]

13 minutes ago, MrBeefy said:

So you have nothing beyond, "I like it" and the market "is unfair" while also calling it a mini PC which can be purchased without an Atari logo. 🤣

 

Thanks for proving my point that the market has shown it to not have proven anything. Unless the goal is to lose the company large chunks of money. Then it has really proven itself! 😂

 

If it was as stable as you hoped then people shouldn't be getting scared or upset like at how LLB might was possibly not going to be launched on VCS. 😜

Dude i really don't care about LLB, if its on the VCS fair play if not i could play it on every platform under the sun but personally i wont be touching it of its not on the VCS until it goes on sale ill buy it if i feel in a generous mood and play it VCS PC mode, its like Davpa said enjoy the games that are coming to the VCS and whatever will be will be with LLB lol you can keep hating on the system and hanging around a forum for a device your clearly out to mock, life is to short why not hang around in a forum for a device you really like and enjoy? . I'll just play the games on the VCS for now and enjoy the awesome ride whilst it lasts on the Atari OS side of the system cause when it ends ill go PC mode and keep using it, it can fail tomorrow for all i care but for now its still here and proving the haters wrong 😅. 

[zzip]

1 hour ago, MrBeefy said:

I have fun playing my 7800, but that doesn't change from it being a huge failure that sucked compared to things like the NES. And I was having fun playing my WiiU last night while my son played Switch. I had a blast, but it was a flop console.

It's a matter of different priorities.   It's great that people have and love their 5200s, 7800s, and Jaguars.    But to me they are all dead-end systems with small libraries.   I had a Jaguar, got bored of it and sold it.   I don't have the space to keep and maintain all the old hardware hooked up to TVs for the few times a year I might feel like playing them.   I discovered emulation and never looked back.   To me the VCS is the ultimate emulation box.   It fits well in my entertainment center and doesn't look out of place like the typical ugly-ass mini PC would.   It can play virtually any game released for any Atari system,  but in my house it gets used to play Wii games more than anything else, by the kids.

 

Yes someday Atari will stop supporting it.   But it doesn't matter, unlike Atari consoles of the past, it won't be dead when that happens, you can easily slap Steam Big-Picture mode on it and still have a console-like experience and access to thousands of games without having to wait for homebrewers to come along and support the system.

 

1 hour ago, MrBeefy said:

All I see is a failed console that lost the company a huge chunk of money. It hasn't made up that money from the looks of it. Which points to it being a bad idea, mismanaged, or most likely both.

Ok fine, but five years ago,  hardly anyone on this board cared about what current Atari was doing.  They were mismanaging the company in other ways that were often barely connected to gaming.   But in the past couple years we've had a flurry of Recharged games, new IP acquisitions and so on that have caught the interest of even people without VCSes.   Whether it makes money or not, the VCS was part of that new back-to-roots focus and it helped focus attention of the Atari community back on Atari,  and at the present time Atari is the most interesting it has been in many years.

 

Plus there have been plenty of hardware projects in the past that were failures or lost money--  5200, "ST Book", TT, Falcon, Jag, and so on  should we consider them all mistakes that should never have been produced  or are we better off for having them?

[MrBeefy]

1 hour ago, zzip said:

Ok fine, but five years ago,  hardly anyone on this board cared about what current Atari was doing.  They were mismanaging the company in other ways that were often barely connected to gaming.   But in the past couple years we've had a flurry of Recharged games, new IP acquisitions and so on that have caught the interest of even people without VCSes.   Whether it makes money or not, the VCS was part of that new back-to-roots focus and it helped focus attention of the Atari community back on Atari,  and at the present time Atari is the most interesting it has been in many years.

The VCS was part of the group mismanaging Atari. The flurry of games is from the new guard. Think of how much better off they would have been to pivot sooner and not waste.

 

So yes games now great. Doesn't change the VCS is a flop. Do I like seeing homebrews like Amoeba Jump, or Bob's FailSafe in the store? Absolutely! But the console is still a flop.

 

I almost nabbed one at the $99 price to do what you did and make it an emulation box. But it isn't like the only way to do it and isn't that cheap of a PC (unless you live in a country that PCs are stupid high, then VCS makes sense).

 

To act like it was a great thing, or a great success is just borderline delusional. You can point out its shortcomings and still be a fan of it. Or is that too foreign of a concept?

 

3 hours ago, Atari_JaguarVCS said:

its still here and proving the haters wrong 😅. 

Citation needed. It exists and has Atari logo. High bar there. 🤣

 

Maybe the next bar of greatness is how it doesn't burn the house down? 🤪

[zzip]

19 minutes ago, MrBeefy said:

I almost nabbed one at the $99 price to do what you did and make it an emulation box. But it isn't like the only way to do it and isn't that cheap of a PC (unless you live in a country that PCs are stupid high, then VCS makes sense).

 

The $99 bundle came with two controllers that retail for $60 a piece.   So that was practically a steal.    Even still, the VCS came out during the chip shortage when a lot of the other small PCs went up in price,  so I never really found it to be overpriced, and even if it was, I didn't mind paying a little extra to have the Atari-styled case.   Yes there are other solutions for living room retro-box, and I tried it with a Pi before with unsatisfactory results.. 

 

33 minutes ago, MrBeefy said:

To act like it was a great thing, or a great success is just borderline delusional. You can point out its shortcomings and still be a fan of it. Or is that too foreign of a concept?

Great thing and financial success are two different things.  I never argued it was or was going to be a great financial success for Atari.

[Giles N]

20 hours ago, Synthpopalooza said:

Well, how about ... Atari officially licenses Bob Crescenzo's Bentley Bear Crystal Quest on the VCS? 

I think it should be licensed out from those who retain it now.

 

The reason is because I think it ‘needs’ to stay around for oldschool hardware-cart releases.

 

I think its’ license should be obtained by Atari to have in the VCS-store, and on a side-note for this thread: Blaze or other Indie companies to obtain a licensed run for an Evercade Cartridge containg the best Atari 2600, 5200, 400/800/XL(etc),7800 homebrew/aftermarket releases.

(this would actually also provide general Atari-interest).

 

Now, as it is - all such things are whishes and ideas, and then there are those also master the dimension of real-world paperwork and official deals.

 

I’d sure like Crystal Quest to be in the VCS store, and I’d like it to appear on and Evercade cartridge… and - never satisfied - I even want it to be obtainable in the AA store with old-school cartridges, manuals and all.

 

Just how many possibilities that can simultaneously be indulged is a question I leave to others.

 

Edited July 29, 2023 by Giles N

[OBLIVION23]

Love this idea, how cool would it be to have a new Atari Karts with Bentley Bear in his starring role!

 

But also would like to echo that Atari should license Bentley Bears Crystal Quest and distribute it on the VCS asap

[MrMaddog]

13 hours ago, OBLIVION23 said:

But also would like to echo that Atari should license Bentley Bears Crystal Quest and distribute it on the VCS asap

 

If Atari could put Failsafe on the VCS, from the same developer, then why not?

 

 

[joeatari1]

3 hours ago, MrMaddog said:

 

If Atari could put Failsafe on the VCS, from the same developer, then why not?

 

 

Lawyers.

 

Atari owns the I.P. for Bentley Bear and it was used in this game without permission from Atari.  So in order for Atari to make everything legal, lawyers.  I don't know what the exact details would be, but since Atari owns the I.P. but not the work, they would have to come to some sort of mutual agreement or settlement about the release.

[MrMaddog]

On 7/29/2023 at 7:32 PM, joeatari1 said:

Lawyers.

 

Atari owns the I.P. for Bentley Bear and it was used in this game without permission from Atari.  So in order for Atari to make everything legal, lawyers.  I don't know what the exact details would be, but since Atari owns the I.P. but not the work, they would have to come to some sort of mutual agreement or settlement about the release.

 

The same arguement could apply to Failsafe which is pretty much Counterstrike(c) II.

 

But at least this version of Atari, unlike the last one, was willing to work with homebrew devs instead of sending the usual C&D letter.

 

Of course I don't know (nor want to) know the overall legal process but it must be possible with Failsafe already released by Atari themselves.