lanatrzczka

I always noticed the red-haired guy in the 1977-1978 catalogs. That simple consistency really pulled me into the story of Atari games. I could be that character. The 1979 catalog introduces a white-haired guy for many of the newer games, and that was cool... red-haired guy was still in there plenty. In 1980, the red-haired guy started getting phased out with Superman, Adventure, and Circus Atari all using a different theme from red-haired guy. Of course by 1981 the entire style changed.

Point taken, High Voltage, but we knew as kids that Street Racer was terrible. MY point is that the colorful, well done catalogs greatly enhanced the experience. Would love to know who was behind that. And my talk isn't "rubbish talk". Thanks anyway. This thread is about the early catalogs.

To me the catalogs made the games better. I knew, even at eight years old, that some of the games were poor. But those catalogs provided a story, a fantasy.

Starting in 1977 with the gatefold games, the game catalogs had a distinctive style that I loved as a kid, and still do. To me as a kid, those catalogs were a wishlist of awesomeness. Somewhere around 1981, the game catalogs started getting more generic. Less style. Less fun. Does anyone know the history of illustrators and/or writers of the original catalogs? For example, Burn Rubber

Lol! So you have Combat and Space Invaders? Is that your collection? Ha ha, only busting around...

Is it when you have the comics (Yar's, Bezerk, Defender, etc...)? Is it when you keep a spreadsheet to remember what games you own? I am just a person who has built this thing, but no one in my life understands it. Looking to AtariAge Forums to see if anyone else goes after the "original feeling" when pulling out that warranty card from the box, or reading the Asteroids manual, or using the button on the paddle to flip the teeter-totter in Circus Atari. Is there a difference between a collector and an active player? I guess I am just looking to hear from kindred spirits.

Agreed. And it would have been awesome if they got the box colors right as well... Breakout yellow, Missle Command orange.. oh well. I did take a few minutes to make some comparisons though. The blue Hot Wheels Missile Command is pretty close in color to Video Pinball (but not Defender), the brown Hot Wheels Breakout is almost dead-on in color with Asteroids, the purple Hotwheels Tempest is nearly a match with Video Chess, and the yellow/orange of Hot Wheels Pong is Yar's Revenge. I very well might be reading too much into it, but it does seem like someone somewhere had a list of "Atari colors" to choose from.

I was grocery shopping, and noticed an Atari symbol on a display. I was like "what?"... and then I noticed Atari 2600 game boxes and I was like "WHAT?"... got a little closer and saw that it was an Atari 2600-themed Hot Wheels display. True, it's actually an 2600/arcade mash-up, but one of the cars is actually done up to look like a 2600 woodgrain console. Apparently there are 6 versions; my store only had four, so I got those. I'll upload some pics.

Man, I played Atari Pac-Man over and over as a kid. Yep, the "doo dee doo" sound that started each round was lame. The "fruit" as a box was lame. I could go on and on about how Atari Pac-Man was lame. But I played the heck out of it as a kid. You know why? Because my Mom bought it for me as a Christmas present. And to me, that's why I am on this site today. To relive the memory. To continue the memory, I suppose. I'm looking at the original item now. It's part of my collection. As a kid I apparently felt the need to improve the Pac-Man box and scribbled quite a bit on the back of it. It is of zero value to collectors today. As for the cart itself, in my pac-mania of the day I put a "Pac-Man for President" sticker right over the big label. The cart is now worth zero. But I'll bet that the sticker is one in a million remaing from that time. In the Game Program Instructions I scribbled in 11,1000,000,1500,158000 under "Scoring". I was seven! What a great memory! If anyone gives a hoot, I could scan in my 30-year-old Pac-Man as an example of the joy of a kid. It's funny. I knew nothing of collecting. Was collecting even invented yet? As for ET? It never gave me the simple joy that crappy Pac-Man did. And yes, Even as a kid I knew that Atari Pac-Man was crap. But my mom got it for me. And there's a memory!

LOL, I'll never open the shrink-wrap on my Backgammon! Maybe it ain't worth much now, but I have it unopened, baby!

This is an interesting question. I personally have Backgammon, Superman, Championship Soccer, Video Chess, and Casino. Backgammon is shrink-wrapped new, so I'm not going to open that, but I dug into the others and found... nothing. None of the catridges mention anything about Special Edition, nor do the Game Program Instructions nor do the Video Computer System Catalogs. It's only on the front and rear of the boxes. Of note, Champoinship Soccer's box DOES have a gold sticker on the front that says, "Pele's Champoinship Soccer This Game Program is personally endorsed by Pele." The instructions say the same thing on the cover page. The Superman box mentions the DC Comics trademark, as does the instruction booklet as well. I thought that maybe SE had something to do with licensing, but since Pac Man and Space Invaders are not SE, I figure that theory's out. But it was fun going through the games! Love that box art...

Cosmic Ark is my all-time favorite. Get about three planets into the game and it's really intense! To me it's a must-have. Don't break your joystick, now...

I just wanna throw in my two cents and say that I think you have a very interesting question indeed. How many of us are buying the patches these days? Yep, it's cool to have a collection, but have I *earned* it? Something to think about...

Interesting point. I don't often hear about Space Cavern. Quite the same effect, yes? My Space Cavern is one of my Original Collection items that I bought as a kid with my allowance money. Box and everything still look good 30 years later. Sigh... not eveyone understands...