>During the Atari 7800’s life cycle, Atari found themselves struggling to get developers to create 7800 versions of then-popular arcade titles because of a controversial policy employed by Nintendo. When Nintendo revived the industry, they signed up software development companies to create Nintendo Entertainment System games under a strict license agreement which imposed serious restrictions on what they were allowed to do. One of the key clauses was that companies who made Nintendo games were not allowed to make that game on a competing system for a period of two years. Because of the market success of the Nintendo Entertainment System, companies chose to develop for it first and were thus barred from developing the same games on competing systems for two years. The software libraries of the Atari 7800 and Sega Master System suffered tremendously as a result.
So in an alternate history where Nintendo never employed their retarded licensing policies, do you think Atari and Sega could have been much more successful companies in the long run? What sort of implications do you think this would have had on subsequent generations of gaming?
Has there ever been a bigger fall-from-grace than Atari?
>>3308030
>>3308018
>tfw I was a big Nintendo fan as a kid
>tfw I grew up and then realized they were actually the villain
>>3308032
Sega still exists though, even if they are a shameful husk of their 90s glory. Atari was bought out and re-sold multiple times and now there's nothing left of them except the name. When was the last time you bought an Atari game? I think for me it was either Ghostbusters: The Game or Chronicles of Riddick on PS3.
As bad as things are with Sega right now, they're a lot worse for Atari. I can see the argument that Sega has fallen a lot farther, though. They went from a meteoric rise to controlling half the industry in the 1990s, down to being a software-only company that struggles to get decent releases out every year. Pretty much everything that Tom Kalinske built when he was president of Sega of America was eventually undone except for the popularity of Sonic the Hedgehog.
>>3308030
Nintendo.
>their DLC toys sell more than their gaming hardware
top kek
>>3308049
>except for the popularity of Sonic the Hedgehog.
Sonic still being popular is arguably worse than the fact that all their other franchises are not.
>>3308085
Thats autism for ya
>>3308085
Everyone is nostalgic about old Nintendo and buys their merchandise, but no-one really likes their modern consoles. They never managed to shake the perception that they are a toy company, so with Amiibo they just decided to be all they could be and do toys as an alternative to game content.
>>3308145
>They never managed to shake the perception that they are a toy company
Not only that, but Nintendo has occasionally struggled to attract third-party developers, either due to their more restrictive hardware configurations at the time, or their absurd content / censorship practices.
>>3308152
Nintendo kept running their third party approval process as if it was the 1980s when they had a monopoly on the Western market. They didn't consider Sega a threat even when Sega took over half the market, and even though Sega ultimately fell, they opened the doors wide open for other competition like Sony and Microsoft. Even now they still seem to think that they are the industry leader, and that third parties should be flocking to them just for the privilege of having Nintendo approve their game. The truth is that most third parties hated working with Nintendo, and as soon as Sega proved the Genesis was viable Nintendo lost their incentive for developers and publishers to play ball on Nintendo's terms. Sega showed that it wasn't about how much control you could exert over third parties that mattered, but rather how many you could entice to put their best games on your system. Nintendo still hasn't learned from them.
>>3308095
I like to believe the autists buying Sonic still at least help fund Sega's other good franchises, like Yakuza and Valkyria.
They're sort of a necessary evil, like pachinko gamblers.
>>3308018
There was no way Atari wasn't gonna fuck up again, the company was largely run by a bunch of dumb assholes who got some lucky breaks thanks to some really talented people they snatched up.
>>3308032
Naw, Sega still exists.
Staying with carts with the n64 is the worst decision nintendo ever made and it completely fucked them over. They had to pay more for a medium that held less than discs.
>>3309180
Hell even the Lynx was kind of something they just stumbled onto. It was actually made by Epyx, who were a bunch of former Commodore employees who worked with the Amiga. They went to Nintendo first, and they didn't want it because they were already planning the Gameboy, but when they brought it to Atari they said yes. They tried to piggyback the Jaguar off of the Lynx's modest success, but the Jaguar was such a clusterfuck in terms of marketing and management that it pretty much ensured Atari would never be a major player again.
Atari really only had one successful console, which was the 2600, and they managed to drop the ball on it. They let the market get flooded with shitty games rather than having a licensing system and quality control to make sure that shitty unofficial games weren't sharing the same retail space as Atari-sanctioned ones. Nintendo perhaps swung a bit too far in the other direction, but they had the right idea about putting their foot down against shovelware and keeping their retail spaces clean and avoiding excess inventory.
Sega did a lot of things right with the Sega Genesis. It's unfortunate that there was such poor communication and synergy between the Japanese and American branches, because that is ultimately what led Sega of Japan to shove out the 32X at the American market rather than letting them shift their attention towards the Sega Saturn, and that blunder started the chain of events that eventually brought Sega down. It's such a shame too, because I'd argue that the only legitimately bad console Sega ever made was the 32X, but its failure and was inherited by the Saturn and eventually even the Dreamcast.
>>3309247
For what it's worth though, N64 carts don't have loading times, and will most likely be playable for many more years than PS1's discs.
>>3309269
At least you can still find PS1 games with their original cover and manual.
>>3309269
Im not talking about the quality of carts, im talking about how they drove away developers to sony.
>>3309295
That was Square, whom they have patched up a lot with with the FF remakes and Cloud in Sm4sh.
>>3308018
Atari it wouldn't have mattered. They couldn't design controllers worth a shit to begin with.
The Master system would have faired a bit better, but that's not saying much given it's prevalence overseas and sega's primary problem being business decisions made by rabid raccoons.
>>3309267
It's not like atari LET just anyone publish for the VCS. They didn't really have much of a choice given how home computing was still in its infancy and no one had figured out how important locking down your system was.
>>3309308
Even without lockout chips, there are things they could have done to keep the shovelware out. Nintendo took an extra step with the lockout chip, but eventually unlicensed publishers found a way around it.
The real strength behind Nintendo's licensing system was that if stores sold unlicensed Nintendo games, Nintendo would not send them any of their own products, including the system hardware. Legally Nintendo was within their rights to do so, although where they got into trouble is when they tried to use this agreement to keep Sega and Atari's consoles out of stores. The courts eventually cracked down on them because that was a blatantly monopolistic tactic to prevent competition.
While Atari didn't have the technology to prevent unlicensed games from being made, they could have kept them out of stores if they had a more competent legal team.
>>3309305
To be fair the 7800 european controller is pretty good, although it's basically a knockoff NES controller. Unfortunately these things are stupid rare and they never even put it out in the US.
All of Atari's joysticks are just plain bad. I know some people are nostalgic for them but they were never actually good. A lot of them ended up breaking and even when they work perfectly, they are clunky and uncomfortable to use.
>>3308018
It's a shame the atari 7800 never came out in 1984 like it was planned. It's a pretty good console, it's version of ballblazer is pure awesomeness compared to the piss poor nes one.
>>3309327
>Even without lockout chips, there are things they could have done to keep the shovelware out.
>Nintendo took an extra step with the lockout chip...
I don't think that's why Nintendo insisted on a lockout chip. Nintendo collected royalties from any licensed game published for its platform, so they probably wanted to take measures to ensure no one got around their censorship policies and licensing fees.
>shovelware
A number of arcade games were ported to the NES, sometimes by multiple publishers. Off the top of my head, there are various iterations of Pac-Man, Millipede, Galaga, Defender, Gauntlet, et al. Nintendo itself licensed some of these ports, even though they were in violation of Nintendo's exclusivity clause. I'm sure Nintendo was only taking into consideration the popularity of these titles within arcades and sales figures from Atari's home console versions.
And let's not forget that future generations of Nintendo consoles were no strangers to shovelware... and worse: https://duckduckgo.com/lite?q=mary+kate+ashley+nintendo&kg=g&kp=-1
>>3308145
>but no-one really likes their modern consoles
Wii sales says other wise.
>>3308018
>One of the key clauses was that companies who made Nintendo games were not allowed to make that game on a competing system for a period of two years. Because of the market success of the Nintendo Entertainment System, companies chose to develop for it first and were thus barred from developing the same games on competing systems for two years. The software libraries of the Atari 7800 and Sega Master System suffered tremendously as a result.
I always found this dubious, considering Double Dragon came out for the Master System only a few months after the NES version.
>>3309375
>Wii sales says other wise.
You mean Wii Fit, because that's the only reason half the world bought a Wii in the first place. Every other game for the platform is mostly undersold, especially compared to games released for competing platforms. Wii U subsequently struggled with sales over the course of its entire lifespan. And let's not forget the abortive effort that was the GC.
>>3309373
Even the NES succumbed to shovelware after a while. Shovelware is just less of an issue when you have a gauge of quality and the ratio of acceptable to shit stays above some level.
>>3309408
Shovelware is not an issue if you don't blindly buy games.
>>3309401
Wii sports was the killer app on the Wii, but comparing cross platform sales on anything applicable is disingenuous given how different the console fundamentally is.
>>3309373
You are thinking of Tengen's games (Tengen being an Atari brand). Tengen's games were unlicensed and they were at the center of a legal battle over Nintendo's licensing restrictions, which they ultimately lost. They managed to reverse engineer the lockout chip from Nintendo's original patent, which they obtained by telling the patent office that they were planning on suing Nintendo and needed to see the patent. That is why some games like Tetris, Gauntlet, and Indiana Jones have both black cart and gray cart versions. Tengen originally published licensed games, but they started manufacturing their own, unauthorized carts after they got the lock out chip tech for themselves. In the case of Tetris, Nintendo and Atari both had the rights to publish the game, and the two versions are different from each other, and that is the case with several other games too.
Atari's reason for going behind Nintendo's back is because Nintendo only allowed publishers to release 5 games per year, which was far too stringent, especially for a large publisher like Atari. Atari got around it by selling unauthorized cartridges under the Tengen label, Konami got around it by creating a dummy corporation called "Ultra Games," and Acclaim got around it by buying out LJN since they were also buying LJN's annual allotment of games.
Nintendo's 5 games per year clause was more about keeping third parties from getting too big than it was about preventing shovelware, because they didn't want a rival arising on their own platform like what happened with Atari and Activision. The point was to make sure everyone knew they were Nintendo's bitch and that they'd never be as big as Nintendo, which is also why Nintendo required them to buy all ROM chips from them, and made sure they only had access to smaller ones than what Nintendo themselves used so that Nintendo's own games would always be the most impressive.
>>3309375
>>3308035
>console wars
>>3308018
>So in an alternate history where Nintendo never employed their retarded licensing policies, do you think Atari and Sega could have been much more successful companies in the long run? What sort of implications do you think this would have had on subsequent generations of gaming?
If they didn't do that, we'd just get part two of the problems that plagued the Atari era, like every game being ported to every console and PC known to man (and several known to monkeys!) regardless of the quality of the original and/or the ports, and no-name developers (like Quaker fucking Oats) pumping out shovelware like it was going out of style. While Nintendo's licensing policies were draconian as fuck and are by modern standards pants-on-head-stupid, in that time and under those circumstances, they were what was needed.
The problem was that Nintendo was so paranoid about the console gaming crash happening again, this time to themselves rather than Atari, that they didn't loosen up said policies when they really, really needed to.
>>3309494
>While Nintendo's licensing policies were draconian as fuck and are by modern standards pants-on-head-stupid, in that time and under those circumstances, they were what was needed.
>"There were no shit games on Nintendo hardware because the company observed such strict 'quality standards'!"
No. Just no.
I don't care what spin you want to put on it. This is not what the industry "needed" at all. I was just a greedy monopoly being a greedy monopoly.
Let me reiterate: Nintendo does not give a shit about the quality of games released for its platforms, so long as it's believed that said games can generate large sales. You better believe that Nintendo licensed shovelware all the time.
>>3308018
Except it wouldn't because the 7800 was outdated shit that couldn't play late 80s kinds of games.
>>3309360
>It's a pretty good console
It really isn't though; the shit is mostly just a 2600 that can generate more sprites.
>>3309494
>If they didn't do that, we'd just get part two of the problems that plagued the Atari era, like every game being ported to every console and PC known to man
This was still the norm in the NES era. Popular arcade games got 20 different ports.
>>3309512
>Let me reiterate: Nintendo does not give a shit about the quality of games released for its platforms, so long as it's believed that said games can generate large sales. You better believe that Nintendo licensed shovelware all the time.
Conversely, shovelware was at its lowest during the 4th gen.
>>3309397
Technos got around the licensing rules by having Sega publish the SMS port of DD themselves.
>>3309180
>snatched up
You mean inherited. The Ray Kassar people were a bunch of corporate suits who knew nothing about video games, but got hired because Atari had no professional management in the early days. The company were just a bunch of California hippie kids who came into work stoned. They were losing money by the truckload when Warner took over.
So as easy as it is to criticize Ray Kassar, Atari probably would have collapsed in 1980 instead of 83-84 had they not taken over.
Ironically, Atari saved video games from an earlier crash when the market for Pong consoles got oversaturated and melted down. The reprogrammable VCS came along at a fortuitous moment.
>>3309547
I read an interview with RK where he mounted a rather eloquent defense of his time at Atari.
>>3309375
>tfw some underaged people here had a Wii as their first console
It's like this: In the beginning, Atari were the sole source of VCS games. They didn't license outside devs or publish the technical info for the console. When Activision formed in 1980, they were just Atari programmers so they already knew how the shit worked.
But a year or so later, the tech info for the VCS got leaked to electronics magazines and soon it was open season. Any code monkey could now write games for the console. The results were disastrous. It's also worth noting that Mattel and Coleco did have lockout hardware on their consoles and this was entirely an Atari problem.
>>3309557
>and this was entirely an Atari problem.
Computers never had lockout either and made it even easier to program for them.
>>3309267
Atari could't license it no matter how much they wanted to, the 2600 was made with off the shelf parts, once people figured out how to write their own games there wasn't much Atari could do to stop it.
>>3308035
>(((Seth Rogen))) &
>(((Evan Goldberg)))
>>3309401
The GC's main two failures were 1) it didn't have a DVD player, an 2) Nintendo marketed the damn thing as a toy. Just look at it-- if you were an adult, you would assume that the target audience was young children, and you would probably be correct. During its initial shipment Nintendo send out about half as many black Gamecubes as they did purple ones, which says pretty well where their attention was focused.
They ultimately fell prey to the Sega affect yet again-- Sony and Microsoft went after teens and adults, and they got the kids for free, because kids want to be cool like their older siblings.
The Wii was just a mess. It sold well, sure, but only because they made parents think it would trick their kids into exercising. The thing ended up becoming a dust collector, and most people either didn't bother with software outside of Wii Sports and Wii Fit, or they went for the bargain bin trash that appeals to the lowest common denominator. For a system that sold so well, the actual game sales for most Nintendo games was fairly unremarkable compared to their other systems, because it was the same core of players buying them as it's always been. The Wii U, they lost even that.
>>3310264
They didn't write the book. They did a special forward for it because they're involved with the movie adaptation.
>>3310263
As said before, they could have thrown their weight around more than they did. They could have said "if your store wants to stock official Atari products, you must agree to only sell licensed Atari cartridges or we won't work with you," and to publishers they could have said "if you want to sell Atari games in the same stores as us, you must sign our licensing agreement to get the Atari seal." Nintendo did all that, because they had much better lawyers than Atari. The lockout chip was a physical means of deterring unlicensed shovelware, but it didn't stop it completely.
The real shield against unauthorized garbage flooding the market was Nintendo's licensing agreements with publishers, which was enforced by the distribution agreements they had with retailers. This is basically the same system we have with consoles today, although the lockout technology has become more effective which has somewhat de-emphasized the importance of licensing agreements.
>>3310419
>The GC's main two failures...
I'm not sure about compatibility with DVD playback being an important consideration. I think the restrictive size of the media was more of a concern to third-party developers, because it couldn't cram nearly as much content as the standard DVD-5 and DVD-9 media used by the PS2. It might not have been an issue if developers used in-game cutscenes instead of FMV sequences, but that's a separate issue entirely.
>>3310452
another thing with the GC's mini-disc, is that it's proprietary Nintendo tech (it doesn't conform to any book standard for optical discs) and thus licensing fees were higher since Nintendo were the only guys making GC discs.at least that's what I remember from back in the day
>>3310452
The DVD player for the PS2 gave consumers the sense that they were getting a good value when they bought it. True, Nintendo gave people a $100 lower price point, and $100 DVD players became available eventually, but it made the Gamecube look like a poor man's game console. The PS2 and Xbox were already within the $300 sweet spot, so being $100 less didn't help the Gamecube the way Nintendo was expecting. It wasn't like the Wii where they sold a $250 system against the $400 Xbox 360 and $600 PS3. When your competition goes past $300 that's when customers become uncomfortable, and a lower price point is advantageous, as Sony demonstrated again with the PS4 vs. the Kinect-only Xbox One, except these days the sweet spot is closer to $400. Nintendo was never able to get the Wii U down to where it could have been competitive as a bargain system, because they refused to give up on the Gamepad which was expensive to manufacture.
>>3308035
Sega was shit and their collapse was entirely their own fault
>>3310471
It doesn't matter what you think of Sega, and ultimately the poor communication between their Japanese and American branches doesn't really matter. Nintendo made the mistake of ignoring them and thinking they didn't need to adapt to remain competetive. Even if Sega's victory only lasted one generation, they opened the door for Sony and eventually Microsoft. They broke Nintendo's empire, and the reforms and innovations they introduced changed the industry forever.
>>3310452
DVDs were absolutely a big feature. It went a long way towards justifying the PS2 in the eyes of normie parents. They could throw it in the guest room with a Barney DVD or some shit as entertainment for kids too young/retarded to game while they watched sportball, and they could also justify it for their own non-gaming use when they wanted to watch... Ken Burns documentaries... or whatever the fuck old people watch in """HD""".
It doesn't really matter if the parents ever actually used it as a video device, I agree with >>3310467 that it served as great marketing for "value".
>>3309401
>Every other game for the platform is mostly undersold, especially compared to games released for competing platforms
>>3310419
>The thing ended up becoming a dust collector, and most people either didn't bother with software outside of Wii Sports and Wii Fit
Alright, it's really time for people to stop repeating this disinfo and memes.
Wii software sales were over 900 million, that's a attach rate of over 9 games.
PS3 had an attach rate of about 10 or 11 games. So the Wii sold only very slightly less software per console than the PS3.
But I guess that doesn't fit the narrative you guys wanted to promote.
>>3310572
This
The Wii was a massive boon to Nintendo, but it wasn't something they could continue or rely on or the future as the WiiU showed
>>3310572
>Wii software sales were over 900 million, that's a attach rate of over 9 games.
A lot of those games were available in dollar bins. The Atari 2600 had a ridiculous attach rate too, but like the 2600 the Wii had a major shovelware problem-- bad games that were made as low-risk projects and were eventually offloaded onto bargain shoppers. My local game shops can't even keep all the used Wii games they have on shelves, because it would make their stores look like messes overflowing with low quality products. Most of those games were purchased for less than $10 when they were brand new, so a large attach rate really isn't that impressive.
>>3310586
I agree. The Wii's library outside of first party titles is a total laughingstock.
>>3310419
>Nintendo marketed the damn thing as a toy. Just look at it-- if you were an adult, you would assume that the target audience was young children, and you would probably be correct.
But shit, the Famicom was designed to look like a toy yet in Japan everyone and their mother had one.
>>3310419
>They ultimately fell prey to the Sega affect yet again-- Sony and Microsoft went after teens and adults, and they got the kids for free, because kids want to be cool like their older siblings
"When shopping for toys, you will notice that there's usually a suggested age range on the box. In practice however, kids always want something designed for someone 5 years older than themselves. So if your child is ages 3-5, you want to buy them a toy designed for ages 8-11. The best toy for an 8-11 year old is cash or his own apartment."
-- Dave Barry
>>3310806
It was also advertised as a computer, it had a cartridge and keyboard meant for programming in BASIC and it had a cassette recorder for storing programs. It also had its own floppy disks later on.
>>3310806
Irrelevant; Japan and Europe like cutesy things no matter what age. While Nintendo of America's marketing was very, very aimed at kids (one reason we didn't get Family BASIC here), the NES still was designed to appeal to American sensibilities, which was looking like a slab of granite.
>>3310825
>>3310819
Yeah I know NOA didn't think 10 year olds cared about BASIC programming, but there was probably another reason for it--hardly anybody had a home computer in Japan, which was not the case here. There was no reason for Family BASIC when you had millions of Apple IIs, Commodore 64s, and PCs around if you wanted that shit.
>>3310419
>They ultimately fell prey to the Sega affect yet again-- Sony and Microsoft went after teens and adults, and they got the kids for free, because kids want to be cool like their older siblings.
The problem is that Nintendo is just like Disney; they've always been obsessed with having this very uptight, squeaky clean, family friendly image and consequently that makes them extremely uncool to anyone over tha age of 8. By late elementary school, you'd be considered a little bit light in the loafers if you still liked Disney movies. Kids that age want blood, gore, four letter words, and tits, not Mickey Mouse and cute, pastel colored animals. Sony, Sega, and Microsoft gave that to them, Nintendo didn't.
>>3310830
>another reason for it--hardly anybody had a home computer in Japan, which was not the case here.
I'm curious about those numbers.
>>3310856
Over there, computers were mostly for businesses and the educational market. Home computers were rare and there wasn't much software beyond low budget/homebrew stuff made by like one guy. Compared to the US and Europe, computer hardware was markedly more expensive.
To put it bluntly, Europe was computer-centric, Japan was console-centric, and the huge US market could support both.
>>3310867
>Home computers were rare and there wasn't much software beyond low budget/homebrew stuff made by like one guy.
Do you think anyone in /vr/ doesn't know what games Japanese computers were famous for?
>>3310875
Yeh but most of those things were found in universities and not people's homes--the main target market for weeb dating sims and Wizardry were college kids who'd play the things in the school library (Japanese college is a joke anyway compared to their "study hell" high schools)
>>3310938
That's why there was such an outcry when a middle school boy was caught shoplifting such a game.
>>3310825
I think Nintendo only started to casualize hard during the SNES era. Their image and games got markedly cutesier during this time and games also became easier--most of the major Jap game series are watered down or made more easy than their NES predecessors, Square being one of the only devs who's SNES offerings improved on their NES ones.
>>3310945
Japan has very low crime rates; that kind of stuff makes the news a lot more over there.
>>3310938
>Yeh but most of those things were found in universities
Also primary schools.
>>3310867
Let's be fair, though-- Japan did have some pretty cool computers. Firstly there were the MSX computers which were solid as far as cheap 8-bit computers go, and then there was the Sharp X6800, which was pretty much the Rolls Royce of home computers.
>>3310950
>Square being one of the only devs who's SNES offerings improved on their NES ones.
Wrong. 3D World Runner shits all over any of their SNES games.
However, PSX Square is god tier.
>>3310960
MSX was pretty popular but Konami almost singlehandedly kept it alive and the X68000 was a pricey business computer.
>>3310967
The X68000 was too expensive for your average Japanese family, for sure, but it was an incredible gaming machine and had a very solid library of games, including arcade-perfect ports of many popular arcade games.
Also since the MSX was a home computer, it has more kid-friendly games than, like, the PC-8801 (CRPGs are too much for a 10 year old).
>>3310969
Hence why I said those things were mainly sold to the school/business market where college students would be gaming on them in their spare time.
>>3310950
Remember when kids bitched that SMB3 was too hard? The Nintendo Power letters to the editor section back then was full of crybabies.
>>3310960
And finally, the cramped shoebox Japanese homes meant an awful lack of space for a computer setup.
>>3310975
So would students generally buy their own games and just bring them to the computer lab?
I guess that would be plausible, given the portable nature of floppy disks. When I was in school it wasn't worth trying to get anything running on the lab computers unless it could be run off of a flash drive, and we sure couldn't install Steam. Which is a shame, because our machines were pretty powerful and had dedicated GPUs for animation and rendering. When the Minecraft alpha first came out, everyone was playing it in the lab because it didn't require administrative permission to install.
It would kind of suck to graduate from school and have a big stack of floppy disks for a PC that you couldn't afford to buy, though. Maybe that's why PC gaming had such a glut in Japan for so long.
>>3310997
Yeah, even today the laptop market in Japan is huge just because they're all about space efficiency.
>>3310998
I think so. The incident he mentioned with the middle schooler shoplifting a game? Quite likely he wanted to play it in the computer lab at school.
>>3310997
Also this can explain the persistence of 8-bit computers in Europe long after they'd died out in the US; European homes are also shoeboxes and a Sinclair Spectrum took a wee bit less space than a giant-ass 286 PC.
>>3310967
Don't forget the PC-88!
>>3308049
>When was the last time you bought an Atari game?
Atari, aka Infogrames, had the D&D license in the early 2000s, so then.
Not real Atari, and generally not good games either (Though their logo is on ToEE, which is good, albeit very flawed).
>>3311064
Infogrames Atari has published good games. They just can't remain consistent, which is the same problem Sega has except Atari is even worse about it.
I remember when Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee and its sequel came out it was like Christmas. The same goes for the Ghostbusters game, which Atari picked up after Activision threw it away (which is kind of funny given the history between Activision and Atari). Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena was also a good game, but alas Starbreeze is no more.
As of late they've apparently been churning out shovelware and milking re-releases of their arcade hits. The only recent game of theirs I remember hearing about specifically was a re-imagining of Haunted House which was basically garbage.
I think Atari really fell on their face with the last Alone in the Dark game because I recall hearing that it was very expensive to produce, and was a flop. However, its their lack of good releases on a consistent basis that has kept them from getting back up.
It's a shame, because like Sega I'd like to think there will always be a place in the industry for Atari, but after Konami decided to leave gaming and focus on gambling machines that sentiment doesn't seem as solid anymore.
>>3310971
>(CRPGs are too much for a 10 year old).
I get that something like Xanadu goes over their head but Ys or Hydlide?
>>3309331
>clunky
Be careful, you'll trigger some faggot using that word.
I think the 5200 takes the cake though, fucker would always break
>>3309401
>You mean Wii Fit
If Wii Fit is so popular why do you constantly see the balance boards at Goodwill?
>>3311617
It was a fad. And one of my local game shops has as many used Wiis as the rest to their consoles combined.
>>3308185
>Western
You mean American.
>>3309375
Wii U sales say other wise.
Did anyone actually use a Wii except 5 year olds, soccer moms trying to lose weight, and retirement homes where they had the residents work out to Wii Fit?
>>3309408
Allegedly Hiroshi Yamauchi wanted a console that would be really hard to develop for to discourage the mountains of shovelware that plagued the Famicom/SFC.
>>3311763
>Did anyone actually use a Wii
Everyone I knew that had a Wii also had a PS3, they rarely used the Wii. I don't remember anyone using it as their main system.
NES did have a lot of shovelware, still it could have been much worse without their licensing policies. A quick look at unlicensed NES games shows us just what might have awaited. Imagine ten Cheetahmen 2s instead of just one. Even more ominously, the NES era was at the point where graphics had become good enough to make porn games feasible and a few did manage to slip through despite Nintendo's best efforts.
>>3308018
And the 5200, that was just laziness.
>whoops how do we answer the Colecovision
>ok let's just hack up one of our computers and make an ersatz game console
>with controllers from Hell
>>3311773
Mini dicks had the same load time as average dvds. Having to swap dicks in games like RE4 and Twin Snakes was annoying as duck
>>3311773
>The mini discs were there mostly because of Nintendo's phobia of load times
>[citation needed]
>To their credit, it did work
No it didn't.
You can somewhat remedy load times (rather, seek time) by having data placed at the end of the disc, which is to say padding the disc with dummy files will probably do the trick. It doesn't necessarily matter what the capacity of the media is.
But for faster loading times overall, the optical unit would have to be capable of pushing data more quickly.
>>3311780
I think really all they had to do was add compatibility with the 2600 games and accessories and the 5200 probably would have been a huge success. The controllers still would have been ass but devs would have been able to use the 2600 controllers instead which they probably would have done. Then Atari would eventually try to correct their mistake and made the improved "7800" controllers which could be compatible with the 5200. The 7800 wouldn't even have to exist.
>>3310586
>A lot of those games were available in dollar bins
There were shitloads of PS3 games in dollar bins too. It's just that the PS3 shovelware pretended they were AAA titles. Look at Beyond Two Souls, it's a so-called AAA game and it's already in fucking dollar bins. You would get more fun out of Carnival Games for Wii than it.
>>3311784
>mini dicks
>annoying as duck
>>3311625
>It was a fad
Yeah, I was being a smart ass, but on the topic of the balance boards, what a waste of tech. They could have made some pretty sweet games for it but they fucked up.
>>3311845
There's a difference: Beyond Two Souls was an expensive game to produce, and it flopped. Something like Carnival Games is a low-cost game made for no money, which is why it's shovelware. By design, games like that are meant for the bargain bins, and flooding the market with them allowed less than scrupulous publishers to turn a profit. There is no money to be made by letting a big AAA game flop.
>>3311958
Wii was great for light gun games, the ports of ghost squad and house of the dead 2 & 3 and gunblade NY were pretty spot on. I always wanted to see them do a time crisis collection on it that used the balance board as the pedal. Wishful thinking I suppose.
>>3308032
>>3308032
Man, you dont know much about atari if you think sega falling compares.
Atari was xbawks heug back in the day. They had fingers in everything and made money hand over fist. They were similar to Microsoft/Google in terms of how the average joe would think of you if they heard you worked for them.
>>3311763
I use it as a sin punishment machine
People that like Nintendo are adults that got over their "mature" phase and appreciate the whimsical designs. Unfortunately the audience that wants WARRRR brings the big cash.
>>3309882
Computers =/= consoles, silly.
>>3313693
Does it matter? They're all silicon machines used to play games on.
"Computer" and "console" are nothing more than semantics.
>>3313714
Well yeah, computers can be marketed for business use, but how does that come into play when they're only being discussed in a gaming context?
>>3313726
Computer gaming is still a distinct market, it doesn't have the same types of games for the most part, also it's far less profitable than console games.
>>3313727
>it doesn't have the same types of games for the most part
8-bit computer games were pretty similar to console games, though. Most arcade conversions were better on the computers than consoles, as well.
>also it's far less profitable than console games.
Maybe, but why does that matter again? Sales shouldn't be an indicative factor.
>>3313732
>Most arcade conversions were better on the computers than consoles, as well
I can tell you with firm conviction that all the computer ports of Strider, Space Harrier, Street Fighter, Outrun, Guerrilla War, Commando, and others were ass compared against the console ones.
>>3313732
>8-bit computer games were pretty similar to console games, though
Not at all. Computer games were generally CRPGs, adventures, and strategy/sims. These kind of games don't translate onto a console that well--eg. the PS1 port of Civ2 was crap.
Console games are mostly arcade stuff and platformers and they're not so good on a PC (some exceptions aside).
>>3313748
>Computer games were generally CRPGs, adventures, and strategy/sims.
You're only including '90s PC games to help your argument. Go further back and most retro computer games were sidescrolling platformers, like consoles.
>>3313808
Beg pardon?
>>3313824
That's an obvious Yuropoor you're arguing with. Wait for him to jerk off to Giana Sisters and Turrican.
>>3313824
Nice cherrypicking.
http://www.mobygames.com/browse/games/amiga/action/side-view/list-games/
http://www.mobygames.com/browse/games/zx-spectrum/action/side-view/list-games/
Enjoy yourself.
>>3313864
Just because there were some adventure games, CRPG's, and simulators, doesn't mean the majority of games weren't sidescrolling action games, like what you'd find on consoles.
Side scrollers were mainly a UK thing. in Germany we had lots of adventure games and sims but the language barrier means you don't know about them.
>>3313824
When are Murriburgers going to realise that Fatistan is not the centre of the planet.
>>3313891
>mfw a German started two wars he couldn't win near me
>>3313893
wait a minute, aren't you pretending the entire world was limited to your crap cassette tape arcade clones because you didn't have disk drives?
>>3313910
>hating on tapes
Them's fighting words.
>>3313910
Germany had all the same games as us and also you guys developed Turrican and GGS.
>>3313910
We had disk drives, just not on 8-bit machines since they were just children's toys and you had 16-bit boxes for actual work.
>>3313916
>GGS
Wonderful game. Totally shites on that game about the plumbers and turtles.
>>3313926
Bug off, Australia-kun.
>>3313923
Too bad for you because Germany, the US, Sweden, Finland, and anywhere else had disks and that's why we did have multiload games like RPGs.
>>3313932
*sigh*
Like I said, 8-bit computers were kiddie toys and that's why they had just cassette tapes and arcade games. Something like a flight sim or dungeon crawler was too advanced for a child.
>>3313929
Cool strawman to deflect any Nintendo criticism, champ.
>>3313936
We in America had consoles for the kids. That's why computer games tended to go for people 14 and up.
>>3313910
Tapes were a pretty good medium back then. They were reasonably fast with sequential read/write and they offered a lot of space for relatively low cost. Their only real flaw was that they sucked at reading/writing out of order(had to rewind them frequently)
:^)
>>3313945
However, when it comes to multiload access, they're godawful. That's why most Spectrum/C64 games were single load and almost none had any provisions for saving your progress.
>>3313936
Ok, but even on 16-bit stuff like Amiga, almost all Britbong computer games were arcade stuff with bright colors and cutesy anthro animals.
>>3313893
Because they are. Btw enjoy your independence
![fe92aa3acade21da5c5bfbc5b8f6abb7[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/emgRBq3.jpg "fe92aa3acade21da5c5bfbc5b8f6abb7[1].jpg")
>>3309429
>What I am trying to say, Mark, is that the Nintendo Wii was a blip on an otherwise uninterrupted, downward trajectory
![41+C4chtK2L._SY344_BO1,204,203,200_[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/rRj4571.jpg "41+C4chtK2L._SY344_BO1,204,203,200_[1].jpg")
>>3313824
>Zork I
Nice font. Like off this weird book I used to read at my grandparents' house when I was a kid.
>>3310539
Do you remember when Xbox made you buy a special dvd remote just to play DVD's
This guy is pretty unique when it comes to discussing Atari and the 7800, unlike ecelebs and fanboys he actually seems to discuss things and not just parrot Wikipedia.
Saw this posted in an Atari thread before.
https://youtu.be/kxNknap9uPU
>>3314035
Go shill your channel somewhere else, faggot
>>3314035
The 7800 was definitely a symptom of the poor state to which Atari engineering had sunk as the mid-1980s approached. As noted earlier ITT, the thing was practically just a VCS with a crapton more sprites. It had none of the features needed for next-gen games and compared to the Famicom, released a year before the 7800 was originally scheduled to, displays an amazing lack of foresight. Atari seemed completely unable to imagine anything beyond single screen games with a black background.
>>3314047
I'm not shilling shit, retard. This shits been posted many times before in Atari threads.
https://warosu.org/vr/thread/S3143409#p3143506
>>3314047
>shilling a channel with five 8 year old videos and a 300 view 20 minute long atari video
I think he may just be posting this because it's relevant, moron.
Learn what shilling is.
>>3313048
>Wii was great for lightgun games
That it actually was.
>>3314023
No. I remember when they tried and failed to force you to buy a special remote.
>>3314023
The DVD remote was Microsoft's way around the $20 licensing fee that the DVD forum (i.e. Toshiba) had on all DVD players at the time. Eventually as DVD became less and less relevant that fee has gone down significantly, but at the time Microsoft's solution was to have the DVD remote serve as a DRM dongle, and the Xbox would not play DVDs without it. Toshiba agreed to treat the Xbox "DVD Playback kit" as the DVD player device rather than the console itself. They sold it for $30, with $20 going to Toshiba. Microsoft made very little profit from the playback kit, but the cost canceled itself out and in the long run they were effectively able to save $20 on every Xbox sold, since back then they figured (correctly) that most people who watched DVDs on consoles would want a DVD remote anyway.
The DVD remote for the PS2 was completely optional, but Sony still managed to sell a ton of them, especially when they came out with revisions of the PS2 hardware that could be powered on and off by the DVD remote.
>>3313048
The Wii didn't have a light gun and it's waggle gun sucked.
>>3317604
>what is calibration
Also the Wii zapper did suck, which is why you get one of these
>>3317627
>what is greentexting stupid statements unironically
You've obviously never used a real light gun sport. You should give it a try. You'll be amazed the difference.
>>3318965
No one wants to buy an old ass CRT to play shitty light gun games, slick.
atari didn't know how to market their shit.
if they sold fried chicken they'd advertise it as warm dead birds
>>3314035
I appreciate the theorycrafting this guy does about the Jaguar creating more competition and keeping Sega alive. I would've been interested to see Atari make it to the 6th generation.
>>3318965
Used a light gun plenty of times, pops. I know it angers you when people under 40 like games other than the ones you grew up with but you have to accept that technology changes. I get that it scares you but it really isn't that difficult to use. Wii gun games might work differently but I'd gladly adjust just because no other consoles bothered with light gun games after the dreamcast except a couple on PS2. You should try it! It might not be as scary as you think it is, you might even have fun!
>>3308035
>console wars
more like "let's go suck Kalinske's dick: the book"
http://www.sega-16.com/forum/showthread.php?29801-Is-Tom-Kalinske-full-of-it
>>3318971
Wait, what?
The fuck you smoking?
>>3318971
Top kek kid. Millions of people do just that. Just because your mommy says you don't have room doesn't change that fact.
>>3319241
Dude, the wiimote is complete shit as a light gun. You can stick you head in the sand and bury your standards lower than that but it doesn't make it any better. And no, you can't go back. Once you've used a real light gun you are constantly aware of how shit the wiimote is.
I say you, but I guess I should use the more grammatically correct "one". Obviously you have either deluded yourself or have Parkinson's and don't benefit from steady crosshairs. But I'm talking about normal people.
>>3319241
Drop dead, 90s shitbabby.
>>3319720
You forget your meds today, grandpa?
>>3319710
The only reason the lightgun is "better" is because it will trigger a positive result by having it pointed anywhere near the target, vs the wiimote which needs to be pointed nearly exactly at he target.
>>3321424
No. That's not how light guns work (save for the Zapper, but it's garbage).
>>3321449
>linking to the post I already replied to
I know, the internet is confusing, huh gramps?
>>3321429
Yes. That's exactly how light guns work. I think you're thinking of something else entirely.
We need to just ban everyone born after 1987 from here, I swear.
>>3321545
Every single time I see people on here getting into one of these age wars its because someone decided to try and discredit someone else by calling them "sport" or "kiddo". I've never once seen someone start bitching out of nowhere about old people, it's always someone getting upset about young people being on this board or playing retro games. Personally I don't get it, I'm fine with people born in the 90s wanting to go back and play older games, but apparently some people take great offense to that idea, to the point where they start to sound like bitter old men lamenting how disrespectful and uppity the youth of today are.
>>3321556
Or more likely it's just 20something people who know how to start flame wars.
>>3321556
Look, shitbabby. Where were you when SMB first came out in the US and people were blown away and start queuing up around the block to buy a Nintendo?
Oh right, you wouldn't be born for another decade. All you are is a loser hipster child who watched e-celebs and pretends you were alive in 1987 or whatever.
Go masturbate to Wind Waker. That's more up your alley.
>>3321595
Case in point. You don't need to have been around when something was brand new in order to enjoy it.
>>3321595
You weren't there when oxygen was invented. You should stop breathing.
>>3321595
>this post
>>3311852
Luther defeats the god.
>>3322802
It's GOND you 90s shitbabby, not god. Maybe do your research next time, kiddo.
>>3321595
I WALKED BOB DYLAN ON STAGEWHO DA FAWK AR YOU
I really hope in some basement somewhere there's a 47 year old neckbeard whose only joy in life is spewing hate at people on an anonymous imageboard because he doesn't want anyone under 30 playing his precious retro games. Part of me really wants that man to be real.
>>3323483
>47 year old neckbeard
Give me 5 years.
>>3323483
insecure underage spotted
>>3324720
>I guess I just don't get it
You got that part right, sport.
