|
|
Post by gamezone on Jun 29, 2012 0:04:58 GMT -5
That sounds like the Asari I remember. Disliked them for going after K.C. Munchkin because it was better than 2600 Pac-Man.
|
|
|
|
Post by VectorX on Jun 29, 2012 0:23:45 GMT -5
Yeah, they shouldn't have won that lawsuit, nor this load of b. s. either. However, I'm sure most of the people that ran these shops that got that notice didn't have a company lawyer look into it (they wouldn't even have one unless someone's kid hurt themselves and they threatened to sue and the like) or else they'd probably take on Atari. But then it could be like the thing that I mentioned about Tramiel anyway, like along the lines of "sorry, I looked into it, but technically Atari didn't do anything wrong. Try contacting your local congressman along with getting all distributors you can to support you to see if a bill can be drafted within a few years", which, by then, once the crash happened, most of these stores would be gone anyway.
|
|
|
|
Post by TrekMD on Jun 29, 2012 7:01:39 GMT -5
It's unfortunate this kind of behavior exists. Instead of competing, companies try to find ways to suppress competition. It is happening today in the tech world and I guess it happened then with video games. It is a shame Atari was part of that.
|
|
|
|
Post by gamezone on Jun 29, 2012 9:02:55 GMT -5
You are so right TrekMD! When companies compete everybody wins.
|
|
|
|
Post by TrekMD on Jun 29, 2012 9:05:16 GMT -5
You are so right TrekMD! When companies compete everybody wins. Yep, competition fosters innovation!  |
|
|
|
Post by detonator on Jul 18, 2012 19:21:28 GMT -5
Personally, I think Atari is hands down the greatest game company ever... they made the greatest arcade titles ever. Absolutely no doubt about it... Namco comes close second though.
But as the other posters have said, they have a history of making colossal mistakes. And besides the ones that have been already mentioned, they completely missed the boat with the emulation too.
Williams released a pack with Stargate, Bubbles, Robotron and Defender and it sold really well. I don't remember what kind of position Atari (as a company) was back then... but this was an unforgivable mistake. Releasing Battlezone, Asteroids and all those classic games for PC would have been an instant, gigantic smash hit in the 90's.
Then the emulation came and it was too late. They woke up 2-3 years after that and missed this great opportunity. I think Atari Greatest Hits for Windows was released in 2000.... three years after those games had been emulated.
Vectrex is the greatest console ever, but with Atari games it would have been completely unreal.
|
|
|
|
Post by VectorX on Jul 18, 2012 19:30:16 GMT -5
Personally, I think Atari is hands down the greatest game company ever... they made the greatest arcade titles ever. Namco comes close second though. I've got one of the 500 plug and play systems for my tv, being Retro Arcade Featuring Pac-Man, having 12 titles on it. I never realized how phenomenal Namco was until then, really. But as the other posters have said, they have a history of making colossal mistakes. And besides the ones that have been already mentioned, they completely missed the boat with the emulation too. Williams released a pack with Stargate, Bubbles, Robotron and Defender and it sold really well. I don't remember what kind of position Atari (as a company) was back then... but this was an unforgivable mistake. Releasing Battlezone, Asteroids and all those classic games for PC would have been an instant, gigantic smash hit in the 90's. Microsoft did one first. I think it had Tempest, Asteroids and a few others on it (Missile Command possibly). But yeah, they did it later... .... three years after those games had been emulated. Yep. And getting back to the earlier part of the post, I've got that Williams package you mentioned, although minus Bubbles, as that was included on the PlayStation version (I have the Genesis version, which also has Joust and Sinistar, same as the SNES version). Vectrex is the greatest console ever, but with Atari games it would have been completely unreal. Hell yeah! |
|
|
|
Post by detonator on Jul 18, 2012 19:45:07 GMT -5
Yeah... I bought that Williams pack as well... ordered it from the States... and counted days when it was shipped. It was absolutely fantastic. Yes, the PC version also had Sinistar and Joust too... forgot them. Stargate was named "Defender II"... that was weird. Talking about emulation... I was at work (back in 1996?... I think) when my brother called me and told about Neil Bradley's EMU, which emulated all Atari vector games. I quit that work day right there. Then it turned out my machine couldn't handle the emulation... I think I had a 486... then I walked straight to the computer store and bought a brand new Pentium 100Mhz.  Living the golden age of video games was great but emulation was probably even better... it was a childhood dream becoming true. MAME didn't have support for the vector games at first... so Neil's EMU was the emulator of choice back then. Discussions were heated on the Usenet and even the great Jeff Minter was there... he was completely excited about Tempest. |
|
|
|
Post by VectorX on Jul 18, 2012 20:16:15 GMT -5
Yeah... I bought that Williams pack as well... ordered it from the States... and counted days when it was shipped. It was absolutely fantastic. Yeah, I rented that from Blockbuster, then asked for it on my birthday a few months later. It only has some very slight control issues (diagonals are kind of hard to do on Robotron, sometimes your ship "stalls" on Defender) but that's it. Stargate was named "Defender II"... that was weird. I could understand that back in the 2600 days when there was the lawsuit stating that there was some kind of game called "Stargate" that had exclusive home rights to the name and no other release could be called that. But all these years later it STILL couldn't be called "Stargate"? That's what struck me as weird. Talking about emulation... I was at work (back in 1996?... I think) when my brother called me and told about Neil Bradley's EMU, which emulated all Atari vector games. I quit that work day right there. Then it turned out my machine couldn't handle the emulation... I think I had a 486... then I walked straight to the computer store and bought a brand new Pentium 100Mhz. Oh no!! That's funny (Well, probably not at the time...) Living the golden age of video games was great but emulation was probably even better... it was a childhood dream becoming true. MAME didn't have support for the vector games at first... so Neil's EMU was the emulator of choice back then. Thanks for that, I hadn't heard about this until now. |
|
|
|
Post by TrekMD on Jul 18, 2012 23:27:13 GMT -5
The whole thing with Stargate being renamed Defender II was silly to me, but such is legalese! Now I think the issue of the name has to do with a certain TV show...
|
|
|
|
Post by VectorX on Jul 18, 2012 23:54:30 GMT -5
Yeah probably. Funny how that's still a problem nowadays (or at least until the late 90s)!
|
|
