AtariAge + Atari Q&A

[Wildstar]

58 minutes ago, Lord Mushroom said:

If you think Atari´s plan is to make games for the original hardware, I completely understand your skepticism. But that is not their plan. It is not what they have done with their existing IP, so there is no reason to think they will do that with the IP they are buying.

Yes. A very good point. This is why I would be skeptical if it were. They need a larger customer base. These new consoles like the 2600+, VCS, etc. makes some sense but they are also targeting games made to run on newer platforms. This is where they need to work on. Careful managing of resources for retrogaming but also on mainstream platforms like Steam. Tapping retrostyle and even making games that uses say... CEL/Toon shading with outlines to follow the cartoon and animation styles like they have on their box art and such. Expanding their portfolio with in-house and third-party games. Even creating a potential mascot character for franchises. This isn't something solely Atari have to do. It isn't like they have to do that themselves. 

[Wildstar]

56 minutes ago, S.D. said:

As for the topic of this thread... I'm still holding out hope that some of the unlicensed "similar but legally distinct" titles we lost could maybe somehow become actual licensed releases.  How cool would it be to get a Sega logo on the box front of our favorite blue porcupine!

I agree. Having them pulled from this site and what not made legal sense to protect them from exposure. Then they can have time to review them and determine if they want to publish them and if they don't, the homebrew person can then take the legal risk of self-publishing. Atari would not want to license their trademark to products that can get them sued by someone else. They should do their due diligence. Like you said, legally distinct titles that are not "derivatives" other than it follows certain genre style like horizontal scroller or SHMUPS, and such. 

[Wildstar]

7 hours ago, Giles N said:

Strange that its mostly japanese gaming companies that have strong, enduring, likeable characters

It has nothing to do with them being Japanese companies. It happens to be popular in North American market as well as happens to be popular in Japan. They noticed how characters relate. They wanted to make games with story and depth and is part of the result of Nintendo's strict quality standards. They say what happed a year or two before the NES release in North America. It was part of their response the video game crash in 1983/1984. Nintendo and then SEGA and various others started to do likewise. When you have a character, a name, a story, the player relates to the character like they did as children playing with their GI Joes. They were also aiming for that age group. 6-12 year old players were Nintendo's main target audience as they were being the Disney of video games. Disney has their portfolio of highly protected characters that are recognized. This was a large part of Nintendo of America's strategy and Nintendo Japan greenlight that strategy and well they succeeded. Sega chose to target more of your 9 to high school teens. Part of it was Sega's less strict policy on content guidelines. 

 

[Wildstar]

10 hours ago, GraffitiTavern said:

Well he's a Bear...the other Atari characters are giant centipedes, triangular spaceships, and a freaking paddle.

Atari during Tramiel's era squandered that opportunity but then Atari was ran like a Commodore computer company but with the Atari name and logo. Jack Tramiel was never big on video games. He was into comuters and related to it better and understood how to sell computers and to a degree, did fine there but was kind of not well gripped with the video game business. He didn't really bring in video game designers or looked at Nintendo in what they did. Commodore's success with Commodore 64 and games was the computer was low cost, it had decent gfx and sound and third-party game developers took the cake in making computer video games. There was somewhat a difference in how video games for computers were made and approached compared to consoles. If Atari got the rights or license or something for The Great Giana Sisters, that could be sticking a thorn in Nintendo's side. There's an actual story behind that.

 

Work out a deal with THQ and who knows. Trace down the IP ownership because Time Warp Productions created it and Rainbow Arts published it and somewhere along the lines it was absorbed into THQ. I think some of the titles are now ar Ziggurat Interactive. So, something there, Atari. 

 

 

 

 

[roots.genoa]

10 hours ago, Giles N said:

Strange that its mostly japanese gaming companies that have strong, enduring, likeable characters: Nintendo (of course) , Sega (yeah, the blue critter but also others) Capcom, Square Enix, Taito (yellow endangered species bird, Bubbly dragons=snotty kids, etc), Namco (quiz: can anyone here at AA, guess at a likeable, fameous character often associated with Namco? Hint: he isn’t a red or blue F1 Car), Konami (The Belmont family).

3 hours ago, Lord Mushroom said:

It is probably because Japanese companies were dominant in the golden era of mascots. A lot of the popular mascots of today were made back then.

That's a key difference of philosophy between Japanese and Western video game design:

• In the West, we tend to want the player to identify with the main character. Hence a focus on first person games, and generic characters (that you can often edit).
• in Japan, they tend to want the player to get attached to the main character. That's why they prefer the third person view, and work a lot on character design. "Chara designer" has always been an important job in Japan, while there's no equivalent in the West, really.

That explains the difference between CRPGs and JRPGs, between a game like Splinter Cell and MGS, or between early games like early Atari arcade games that didn't have characters, versus Pac-Man and Donkey Kong.

Edited October 4, 2023 by roots.genoa

[Giles N]

6 hours ago, roots.genoa said:

"Chara designer" has always been an important job in Japan, while there's no equivalent in the West, really.

Thanks - I didn’t know they had it as important separate jobs (while less so  or not so in the west), but it explains a lot (even the content of japanese games’ end-credits) 

 

Well, at least, here in the west we can boast two strong, charismatic retro-game characters: Turrican and Giana.

Sorry thing that Giana - after like 6 months of popularity - couldn’t really make it until she was changed to be properly westernly, generic, boring and utterly unrecognizable.

 

Guess, the list of western generic game-franchize characters is very, very long, and the list of wierdo-strange fad.-characters, well, fairly very-long.

 

And guess if you’re forced to choose between being a generic nameless type or a unlikeable wierdo fad, why not just be yourself controlling a ship, airplane, car, gun, football etc?

Edited October 4, 2023 by Giles N

[Giles N]

1 hour ago, Giles N said:

Well, at least, here in the west we can boast two strong, charismatic retro-game characters: Turrican and Giana.

No… there’s another…

 

… the ship in Katakis…!!!

 

We - the West - made it to three!!! 

 

 

 

Edited October 4, 2023 by Giles N

[Bakasama]

2 hours ago, Giles N said:

Thanks - I didn’t know they had it as important separate jobs (while less so  or not so in the west), but it explains a lot (even the content of japanese games’ end-credits) 

 

Well, at least, here in the west we can boast two strong, charismatic retro-game characters: Turrican and Giana.

Sorry thing that Giana - after like 6 months of popularity - couldn’t really make it until she was changed to be properly westernly, generic, boring and utterly unrecognizable.

 

Guess, the list of western generic game-franchize characters is very, very long, and the list of wierdo-strange fad.-characters, well, fairly very-long.

 

And guess if you’re forced to choose between being a generic nameless type or a unlikeable wierdo fad, why not just be yourself controlling a ship, airplane, car, gun, football etc?

I dunno, Doomslayer is pretty popular. Of course, he may be nothing more than a brute that kills demons with firearms, there's a certain charm in that simplicity.

[Giles N]

10 minutes ago, Bakasama said:

I dunno, Doomslayer is pretty popular.

In Doom 1 and 2, he was a sort-of black-comedy ‘tough guy’, - not unlike the guy in Army of Darkness, but more brutish.

 

Still, he was more of a face representing the status of the player - healthy, wounded, gored, got-the-chainsaw-grinning (black comedy),

 

In the more recent takes, the game universe has changed, the tone is different (they’ve tried to read some philosophy and dark-world novels, before sending themselves and game-reviewers into total confusion, or at best, by setting the tone of such a game from dark comedy/brutal action to ssomething thats supposedly like to come of as dark,deep, mystical and asking gamers to take it on serious, semi-depressive note, - well, thats what they provide. Not my cake)

And the Doomslayer… recently… like Masterchief… with s mysterious background put in a space coffin…

… with the exception of the storylines I visually couldn’t tell the difference between Masterchief and Doomslayer…

 

… its all in the dark

[Wildstar]

8 hours ago, roots.genoa said:

That's a key difference of philosophy between Japanese and Western video game design:

• In the West, we tend to want the player to identify with the main character. Hence a focus on first person games, and generic characters (that you can often edit).
• in Japan, they tend to want the player to get attached to the main character. That's why they prefer the third person view, and work a lot on character design. "Chara designer" has always been an important job in Japan, while there's no equivalent in the West, really.

That explains the difference between CRPGs and JRPGs, between a game like Splinter Cell and MGS, or between early games like early Atari arcade games that didn't have characters, versus Pac-Man and Donkey Kong.

While it is true to a point as far as game design tradition goes but in reality to the player, the video game design tradition that Japanese companies.... "the Nintendo-style" video game design tradition of the player getting attached to the main character was equally if not more popular in North America as is or than in Japan. The "western" tradition or you can say the Arcade tradition that Atari and others has developed, was invented around coin-op machines where players were usually only a few minutes... as long as the player's supply of quarters or tokens lasted. The early Atari consoles were very limited in capacity of the ROMs to have the story. However, the "Nintendo style" of game design came about as a result of the video games market crash of 1983. The were introducing a new video game console in 1985, with more ROM memory in the cartridges. Nintendo decided they have to make a different kind of game with story, characters that people would get attached to. It was mainly the Nintendo of America that pioneered this new approach to video game design. They studied the prior years, that console players played longer stretches of time. Not limited by the quarters in their pocket. Where did Nintendo get the idea for this new approach to video game design..... they got it right here in the U.S. and studied Americans and looked at the Disney films, the cartoons on TV and live action films, the had characters. Characters with a story, background. 

 

Early famicom games before 1985 were arcade ports. Donkey Kong.... the Mario character at that point was a largely nameless, storyline character. They develop the story over time with the franchise of super mario bros. The evolution to the game design style where players get attached to the main character that has a story, an identity... from that point and into the 16 bit Era. We saw characters with a name. It was successful in the world not just Japan. Mainly U.S.  With arcades, the main character were more or less nameless or otherwise generic archetypes. Hero, you must save the damsel in disress from the big hairy monster. Any of these generic archetypes can be elaborated with a story and deeper in-depth story plot. With an arcade coin op game, you don't have the time to reveal the story. The player may have only a few minutes and the next player comes to the controls. With the consoles, the players are likely siblings and the play longer game sessions. This non-timelimited gameplay of consoles allowed for games at a slower pace, with story and so forth. How we have games like Zelda, Castlevania, and many others. 

 

[Giles N]

1 hour ago, Wildstar said:

Where did Nintendo get the idea for this new approach to video game design..... they got it right here in the U.S. and studied Americans and looked at the Disney films, the cartoons on TV and live action films, the had characters. Characters with a story, background. 

That’s probably true, but they actually made it a high priority for game-design to implement/contain likeable characters or easily memorable characters (if bad guys, or less relevant npc’s)

 

So, even if they ‘borrowed’ the concept of strong personality characters, or easy-to-like, easy-to-remember/attach to-characters from movies and cartoons, they did something about it in their game-industry.

 

In the western game industry, what kind of characters made it as standing out from crowd of generic heroes/heroines…?

 

One could come to think of a few… here and there. Most who never made it to have sequels all the way up ‘til today.

 

And from japanese game-industry, likeable (cute, cool or whatever) or strong characters are all over the place.

 

And these characters feels strong/cool/cute… even put in stories that are like one sentence-long… and easily grasped by a 6 year old kid…

 

Edited October 4, 2023 by Giles N

[Flojomojo]

6 year old kids who play Atari are 49 years old now. 😜

[Wildstar]

1 hour ago, Giles N said:

That’s probably true, but they actually made it a high priority for game-design to implement/contain likeable characters or easily memorable characters (if bad guys, or less relevant npc’s)

 

So, even if they ‘borrowed’ the concept of strong personality characters, or easy-to-like, easy-to-remember/attach to-characters from movies and cartoons, they did something about it in their game-industry.

 

In the western game industry, what kind of characters made it as standing out from crowd of generic heroes/heroines…?

 

One could come to think of a few… here and there. Most who never made it to have sequels all the way up ‘til today.

 

And from japanese game-industry, likeable (cute, cool or whatever) or strong characters are all over the place.

 

And these characters feels strong/cool/cute… even put in stories that are like one sentence-long… and easily grasped by a 6 year old kid…

 

Right, I agree that many Japanese game console companies and developers prioritized it. Sequels with modern gamers (not always... but) tend to need characters that are easy to like or remember or player attach to the characters like those from movies and cartoons. Having a story makes it easier to franchise. I agree that Nintendo (namely the American company Nintendo of America, a subsidiary of the Japanese based parent company Nintendo Co. Ltd.), and others from Japan had really put an effort in franchising their characters and game and this approach to game design with memorable characters.  I propose that Atari (with third-party developers) develop and employ this strategy and build franchises. I don't say all games have to be. A game can be successful without memorable characters and story. They tend to be one-off successes. However, sequels tend to inherit some story. 

 

Games aimed towards 6-12 year olds, the story should be easy to grasp. Games aimed for more mature audience would have a more sophisticated or potentially complex story but even an 8-14 year old should grasp the essence of the story as in the 'big picture'. We should have a good array of games. Atari should strive along that front. Atari can approach things similar to Sega and Nintendo and Sony/Microsoft and take lessons from all of them. They do good for a reason with the games. There is a reason. Especially when you look at the third-party developers that makes these gems.

 

Atari has their arcade games era games and arcade ports legacy and there is that recipe but you have to adapt and apply lessons of others who succeeded and learn from mistakes including those made by others. 

 

 

Edited October 4, 2023 by Wildstar

[Wildstar]

1 hour ago, Flojomojo said:

6 year old kids who play Atari are 49 years old now. 😜

Yes but it is also not 1982. It is 2023. Connect multi-generationally. Don't be stuck in the past. Atari to remain relevant needs to not just look to those 6 year olds back from 1972 - 1982. Got to not just aim to game development only for those 49-59 year olds.

 

Edited October 4, 2023 by Wildstar

[roots.genoa]

Btw I just remembered something else: mascots are very important in Japan, not only in video games. I know US sports team have mascots as well, but in Japan, every city has its mascot, a lot of companies have mascots... Phoenix Wright games make fun of that with a mascot for the police force. But in the West, we tend to dismiss those as childish.

 

Anyway, things have evolved and a lot of western games are now influenced by the Japanese philosophy, and vice versa of course.

Edited October 4, 2023 by roots.genoa

[zzip]

2 minutes ago, roots.genoa said:

Btw I just remembered something else: mascots are very important in Japan, not only in video games. I know US sports team have mascots as well, but in Japan, every city has its mascot, a lot of companies have mascots... Phoenix Wright games make fun of that with a mascot for the police force. But in the West, we tend to dismiss those as childish.

Yeah I noticed that in clips of Japanese TV shows, where there would be a costumed characted just standing there, in a way that seems out of place by our standards.    As you mentioned, costumed character mascots aren't unusual in US culture,  but Japan takes it up a notch or three.

[Wildstar]

4 minutes ago, roots.genoa said:

Btw I just remembered something else: mascots are very important in Japan, not only in video games. I know US sports team have mascots as well, but in Japan, every city has its mascot, a lot of companies have mascots... Phoenix Wright games make fun of that with a mascot for the police force. But in the West, we tend to dismiss those as childish.

 

Anyway, things have evolved and a lot of western games are now influenced by the Japanese philosophy, and vice versa of course.

 

We had a major part to do with it after the end of WW II. This is perhaps why it was successful in both North America and Japan. They were perhaps a little more hyper about it than the U.S. but even today, it connects. Surely more so with the kids, teens, and young adults but some of us either grew past being as enamored and hyper excited regarding mascots or just never into the sports. Nintendo of America was targeting children and younger teens. The same traditional audience as Disney. Nintendo is the "Disney" of video game industry. Especially then with content standards to g rated movies. I have a copy of Nintendo content restrictions like no blood, pornographic, etc. from the NES/SNES Era. Games had to be FAMILY FRIENDLY... the FAMILY COMPUTER after all.... FAMICOM. This was especially the case by Nintendo of America. While the Japanese release were less restricted, the North American version had to meet this strict requirements in order to be published by Nintendo of America. 

[Wildstar]

8 minutes ago, zzip said:

Yeah I noticed that in clips of Japanese TV shows, where there would be a costumed characted just standing there, in a way that seems out of place by our standards.    As you mentioned, costumed character mascots aren't unusual in US culture,  but Japan takes it up a notch or three.

True. Of course they were kind of introduced to the idea by us. They got hyper excited about it. The idea was new to them. Being that they got into this after WW II. We had mascots in games for like 50-60 year and so it was kind of been there done that with Americans but it was new fad thing for the Japanese. So we just are a little less flamboyantly excited about mascots. It's last week's toy to us. It's a new toy to them. We still get excited but less so on average. 

[zzip]

10 minutes ago, Wildstar said:

True. Of course they were kind of introduced to the idea by us. They got hyper excited about it. The idea was new to them. Being that they got into this after WW II. We had mascots in games for like 50-60 year and so it was kind of been there done that with Americans but it was new fad thing for the Japanese. So we just are a little less flamboyantly excited about mascots. It's last week's toy to us. It's a new toy to them. We still get excited but less so on average. 

Yeah, JRPGs too.   They were inspired by our RPGs, but took them to another level

 

[Wildstar]

17 minutes ago, zzip said:

Yeah, JRPGs too.   They were inspired by our RPGs, but took them to another level

 

Yep.

 

[roots.genoa]

10 hours ago, zzip said:

Yeah, JRPGs too.   They were inspired by our RPGs, but took them to another level

 

Actually, the initial point of games like Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy was to offer a simplified version of Western RPGs like Wizardry for kids, the main audience of the Famicom. They were even called LRPG (Light RPGs in Japan).

 

To me, another strength of the Japanese video game design is action. Western developers invented RPGs and adventure games, but the Japanese invented the action-RPG (Hydlide then Ys, although they're also strongly inspired by Rogue) and the action/adventure genre (Metroid, Zelda, etc.). The Japanese also invented the shoot 'em up and beat 'em up genres, and even though the FPS was born in the West, current TPSs would not be what they are today without Resident Evil 4 (Gears of War and later games stole the over-the-shoulder view - imagine if Capcom patented it).

 

Please note that by "invent" I mostly mean "generalize/popularize"; you may find earlier examples, even though they didn't necessarily have the same impact. For instance, Alone in the Dark was the first 3D "survival horror" game, but Resident Evil clearly popularized the genre.

[+Kaboomer]

What is this forum topic again? Wow, we are really not in Kansas anymore! 

[Lord Mushroom]

On 10/4/2023 at 5:45 AM, S.D. said:

I'm thinking of putting a 2600+ into a rental of mine with a box of dirt cheap fun classics, stuff like Combat, Yar's, Pitfall, Demon Attack etc.  Seems like a nice little feature for the guest to pick up & play whenever they want.

I think you should go for a console with wider appeal. Genesis Mini, SNES Classic or Retro-Bit Super Retro-Cade are better options in my opinion. Welcome to the forum by the way.

[+Zeptari]

On 10/3/2023 at 2:27 PM, GraffitiTavern said:

I mostly agree, but I think Atari does suffer a bit from a lack of recognizable symbols besides the logo.

Atari doesn’t suffer a bit from lack of characters/symbols. Atari was an era when gaming was about neon lights and new wave music, basically it’s own thing.it was a time before cartoon mascots and an endless line of me too platformers. 

[famicommander]

2 minutes ago, Zeptari said:

Atari doesn’t suffer a bit from lack of characters/symbols. Atari was an era when gaming was about neon lights and new wave music, basically it’s own thing.it was a time before cartoon mascots and an endless line of me to platformers. 

It's not just mascot platformers. Atari barely has any characters at all; nobody for the player to identify with. Characters to build stories and franchises and worlds and lore around. Crossover fighting games, kart racers, minigame compilations, movie/TV/comic book adaptations, toys, collectibles. 

 

Nintendo, Capcom, Konami, SEGA, Square, Sony... they all own numerous iconic gaming characters from a variety of genres and franchises. If someone says SEGA you don't just think Sonic, you also think about characters from Virtua Fighter, Yakuza/Like a Dragon, Golden Axe, Altered Beast, Shenmue, Shinobi, Streets of Rage, Jet Radio, Space Channel 5, House of the Dead, etc. Konami has Metal Gear, Bomberman, Castlevania, Contra, Suikoden, Adventure Island, Bloody Roar, Yu-Gi-Oh, Frogger, etc. Capcom has Final Fight, Street Fighter, Mega Man, Devil May Cry, Onimusha, Strider, Viewtiful Joe, Resident Evil, Dead Rising, Ghosts N Goblins. Sony has God of War, Uncharted, The Last of Us, Jak and Daxter, Ratchet and Clank, Syphon Filter, Twisted Metal, Spider-Man (movie and game rights only).