AtariAge + Atari Q&A

[bloodreptile]

If they had announced a mini XGEs instead of a 2600 plus, I would be happy about now.  Access to 6000 old atari games and a new keyboard. That would be good. I think my 4 or 5 posts are the most I have said this year.  20 plus years on the site 340 posts.

[TrogdarRobusto]

1 hour ago, marakatti said:

BUT... as much as I think the current team at Atari is really the best since Tramiels left the scene in 1996, sadly I don't see Atari paying much respect to the fact that without Atari ST's commercial success in Europe there would have not been Atari Lynx or Jaguar at all.

I think the 8-bit and ST platforms are going to get some love. The team wanted to do more with those platforms on Atari 50 ... for whatever reason it wasn't practical at the time. We can't do it all at once, we'd love to, but if we try we won't do it as well as if we take our time. 

[+jgkspsx]

33 minutes ago, TrogdarRobusto said:

These are all really solid questions and I will find out next week as much as I can abut 7800 compatibility and controller requirements. All may know more as well, we will dig.

Unless somebody tested a Sinden lightgun to 7800 adapter (which is something I am pretty sure doesn’t exist) it is very likely that the games are unplayable but that you can boot to the title screen. Probably should not be marked playable.

[Razzie.P]

15 hours ago, stirrell said:

I also am skeptical about the 2600+ compatibility list. I just can't believe that Atari had access to a Custer's Revenge cart to test but not Popeye or Pitfall II. 

🤣

 

Reminds me of those old dudes who had huge collections of Playboy and Hustler, but not a single title from Shakespeare, Hemingway, Twain, Vonnegut, etc 

[leech]

11 minutes ago, jgkspsx said:

Unless somebody tested a Sinden lightgun to 7800 adapter (which is something I am pretty sure doesn’t exist) it is very likely that the games are unplayable but that you can boot to the title screen. Probably should not be marked playable.

Or an HDMI to VGA adaptor with a CRT...

[leech]

7 minutes ago, Razzie.P said:

🤣

 

Reminds me of those old dudes who had huge collections of Playboy and Hustler, but not a single title from Shakespeare, Hemingway, Twain, Vonnegut, etc 

Ha, I tend to think the compatibility is based on one of the craz collectors... and why would they have the common stuff?

 

Shame, I don't have any playboy or hustler, but I do have an unread book of Shakespeare.   😜

[DirtyHairy]

15 hours ago, duzkiss said:

Anyway, take pride...Stella is on a system from a brand name.  That's a huge win!

Sorry, that does not compute for me. I take pride in all the people in the community that enjoy using my work for free, as I intended.

 

When it comes to companies that are using my work to increase their profit by selling it without having to pay: why should I be proud of that? I merely accept that as it is a byproduct of the license that I choose. I much rather had if they were paying us. And if they don't even publicly acknowledge that it is our work that is powering their product and earning them money, then I don't take pride, but offense.

[marakatti]

17 minutes ago, TrogdarRobusto said:

I think the 8-bit and ST platforms are going to get some love. The team wanted to do more with those platforms on Atari 50 ... for whatever reason it wasn't practical at the time. We can't do it all at once, we'd love to, but if we try we won't do it as well as if we take our time. 

Thank You @TrogdarRobusto

 

I've actually compiled a list of ST-series games and demos released by Atari or brands owned by Atari for the Atari50, but was unfortunately too late.

 

If it's any help, just let me know if you want the list 😊 There are 80 titles at the moment including a small introduction text for titles between 1985 - 1994, from the first ever game seen on the ST screen at 1985 Winter CES (Accessory BreakOut) to Steel Talons Falcon port from 1994.

Edited September 10, 2023 by marakatti
Typing error

[+Karl G]

@TrogdarRobusto - If you are comfortable answering this, I am curious what you role is at Atari? 

[TrogdarRobusto]

16 minutes ago, Karl G said:

@TrogdarRobusto - If you are comfortable answering this, I am curious what you role is at Atari? 

I handle PR and also game distribution ... those two are my day-to-day. 

Edited September 10, 2023 by TrogdarRobusto

[Crazy Climber]

37 minutes ago, christo930 said:

They didn't assume you had a 35 year old power supply.

 

I'm pretty sure this is supposed to be a mass market product.

If this were a low volume product aimed at the retro market from Atariage, i would agree with you.  If it were aimed at us, the pack-in games are a poor choice, IMHO.

No, but they (nintendo) were selling a "new version" of a system people already owned (which is kind of what Atari is doing here, most people that want an atari have one...they're not that expensive)

 

Yeah, I don't know. I cant see this being marketed very far outside the core retro gaming community... obviously not strictly atariage but realisticly not "too much" further...

 

 

[Nall3k]

10 minutes ago, DirtyHairy said:

Sorry, that does not compute for me. I take pride in all the people in the community that enjoy using my work for free, as I intended.

 

When it comes to companies that are using my work to increase their profit by selling it without having to pay: why should I be proud of that? I merely accept that as it is a byproduct of the license that I choose. I much rather had if they were paying us. And if they don't even publicly acknowledge that it is our work that is powering their product and earning them money, then I don't take pride, but offense.

With all due respect, you can’t put something out there as free to use and then turn around and complain when a company incorporates it into a product. Activision is currently counter suing someone who placed assets in a copyright free section on Tik Tock, allowing anyone to use it. He tried suing Activision for doing so, even after he asked them to take it down (they did, even though they were legally in the right).
 

In hindsight, the team behind Stella should have licensed it, and not made is free to begin with. 

[+jgkspsx]

18 minutes ago, Nall3k said:

In hindsight, the team behind Stella should have licensed it, and not made is free to begin with. 

You are saying that open source software, or at least the GPLv2, was a mistake. That is a subject of a lot of debate. It is not an exaggeration to say that the entire corporate world and governments worldwide run on the unpaid work of volunteers. The free and open software community realized that this was not working so well, and many projects since have used more restrictive licenses, but those projects largely die because nobody uses them as a result. This was one notable recent situation where an OSS project regretted the results of using the Apache v2 license and found  out the hard way there are no takebacks for earlier license choices: https://www.infoworld.com/article/3695576/somehow-opensearch-has-succeeded.html

 

That feels like a perverse outcome to me but it is the logical conclusion of free and open software with licenses that allowed them to be used commercially without having to give anything back unless they modified the original sources.

 

I do strongly agree that Atari should contribute meaningfully financially to the Stella project. Licenses and legality aside, it would be a valuable gesture of good will.

[DirtyHairy]

18 minutes ago, Nall3k said:

With all due respect, you can’t put something out there as free to use and then turn around and complain when a company incorporates it into a product. Activision is currently counter suing someone who placed assets in a copyright free section on Tik Tock, allowing anyone to use it. He tried suing Activision for doing so, even after he asked them to take it down (they did, even though they were legally in the right).
 

In hindsight, the team behind Stella should have licensed it, and not made is free to begin with. 

I am not complaining about GPLed code being used in commercial products, I underlined multiple times that I accept this as a side product of the license. But this is business, and it has nothing to do with caring about the community that evolved around the products that the new Atari is trying to montetarize again. And that's the whole reason why I keep insisting on that issue: if there was anything other than business behind the motives of Atari, then I would expect them to act differently.

Edited September 10, 2023 by DirtyHairy

[+sramirez2008]

10 hours ago, leech said:

I'll be sure to test out my Super Twin 78 Arcade Controller when I get my 2600+ as well!  Got it for Robotron ages ago, but still haven't gotten around to using it...

It should work as a twin-stick as well as, two independent controllers (Player 1 and Player 2). 

[Thomas Jentzsch]

25 minutes ago, Nall3k said:

With all due respect, you can’t put something out there as free to use and then turn around and complain when a company incorporates it into a product.

I would have never complained about Hyperkin, because I didn't expect them to do any different. They are profit oriented and take what they can get for free. That's normal business. Nevertheless Hyperkin had licensed (and released) an (very) old version of Stella from a previous author.

 

But Atari pretends(?) that they care for the community and are not solely profit oriented. And quite some people here at AtariAge want to believe that. Yet, as of now(?) they are acting even worse as Hyperkin here.

[hizzy]

1 hour ago, DirtyHairy said:

Amen 😏 The only more even more reasonable alternative imo would be (not financially, but morally, if they indeed cared about the community as they claim): use Stella, give proper credits to it and provide financial appreciation of the effort that was invested into building it by making a donation to the project.

I think the same as you.

 

If they are going to use something like Stella or an emulator from the 7800 that was made by enthusiasts, then why didn't they reach out to the programmers and make some kind of mutually beneficial arrangement? If you're not going to do that, then I don't think they should really be using Stella as the heart of their product. And this should have already been done, prior to the console's launch.

[christo930]

32 minutes ago, Crazy Climber said:

No, but they (nintendo) were selling a "new version" of a system people already owned (which is kind of what Atari is doing here, most people that want an atari have one...they're not that expensive)

 

Yeah, I don't know. I cant see this being marketed very far outside the core retro gaming community... obviously not strictly atariage but realisticly not "too much" further...

 

I would think this would be aimed at a market similar to the PNP units.  They are sold in Walmart, Target and Family Dollar.  It is, however at a different price point and the game selection is fairly small (10 games) for that market.  OTOH, I don't think the Atariage market is big enough for a mass market product made of plastic and a PCB selling for 120 Dollars.

 

Does anyone know if this is going to be internet only distribution?..  Will we be able to walk into a brick and mortar store and buy it?

[+jgkspsx]

2 minutes ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

Yet, as of now(?) they are acting even worse as Hyperkin here.

Could you elaborate on this? I am not sure I understand.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

1 minute ago, jgkspsx said:

Could you elaborate on this? I am not sure I understand.

What do you not understand? Hyperkin licensed, Atari took for free.

[Nall3k]

1 minute ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

I would have never complained about Hyperkin, because I didn't expect them to do any different. They are profit oriented and take what they can get for free. That's normal business. Nevertheless Hyperkin had licensed (and released) an (very) old version of Stella from a previous author.

 

But Atari pretends(?) that they care for the community and are not solely profit oriented. And quite some people here at AtariAge want to believe that. Yet, as of now(?) they are acting even worse as Hyperkin here.

Please give me an example of a company that isn't profit oriented? It's not the software itself they are selling (as anyone can use it anywhere to play these games), it's basically the plastic shell. That's the dilemma of making something free to use, because you can't then pick and choose who gets to use it or who has to pay for it. Night of the Living Dead is another great example, accidentally released in the public domain and many distributers made money except for the people who made it. 

I have no intention of buying the 2600+, mainly because I have Atari 50 and Vault on Steam, and feel those are enough for me. 

[Xyla]

On 9/8/2023 at 1:19 PM, Mercenary said:

Revive Machines currently has an Atari 800XL revived system in the works.

https://revive-machines.com/index-en.html

Will Atari now push systems other than the 2600? Such as the Atari 8-bit systems (the XL and XE in particular, perhaps with something like what Revive Machines is doing), the Atari ST, and the Atari Lynx? There hasn't been much acknowledgement of those from Atari (they were mentioned on Atari 50, but not much), despite being a huge part of its legacy. 

The Atari 8-bit line was the most impressive of the 8-bit systems overall, the ST was a very well received and supported 16 bit machine, and the Atari Lynx was truly impressive, innovative, and ahead of its time. 

I'd really like to see these legacy systems get more love from Atari. They certainly have their fanbases. 

Yes!!!  That RM 800XL is beautiful!  That's exactly the kind of thing this new Atari company should be making.  Too bad they didn't think of it first, but they were too busy matching woodgrain patterns for their next 2600 beaten dead horse console.  Now let's see a 520ST remake as stunning as that.  Take note that the RM 800XL still has the analog video port... any ST remake should retain the ability to output analog RGB as an option alongside the HDMI.  That goes for all hardware remakes... not everyone wants to look at an upscaled HDMI signal.

[christo930]

8 minutes ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

But Atari pretends(?) that they care for the community and are not solely profit oriented.

This is their first, last and only consideration by law.

[Nall3k]

1 minute ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

What do you not understand? Hyperkin licensed, Atari took for free.

Couldn't Atari have pulled a Nintendo and just sued the Stella team and shut the whole thing down?

[+jgkspsx]

7 minutes ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

What do you not understand? Hyperkin licensed, Atari took for free.

My understanding is that putting an OSS license on your code makes any other licensing unnecessary. I know much larger corporations than Atari use OSS software without a word to the creators of the software or any disclosure that that software is being used. There is tons of discussion of this problem in professional software development circles but here is one high-level introduction: https://www.techtarget.com/searchitoperations/feature/Who-profits-from-open-source-maintainers-work

 

I don’t see anything about any kind of licensing other than GPLv2 licensing on the Stella github site: https://stella-emu.github.io/donations.html

 

While I will think poorly of Atari if they don’t donate to Stella, imagine that you’re one person maintaining some Java library that say Oracle uses in multi-billion dollar business software without giving you a dime of compensation or a jot of public recognition. I feel like that’s even worse, and it’s far, far more common.

 

Who did Nintendo pay for the emulators they used in their Virtual Console and Nintendo Switch Online products? Who did Sony pay for the PS1 emulator they use in everything? Who did TheC64/A500 people pay for those emulators? My guess is nobody. Not that that excuses Atari who unlike those companies claims to want to be part of the community. But it would be interesting to know.