Retro Rogue

That was May 1984 when he left and that Commodore was hitting those sales, not 1983. And a lot of those sales had to do with being the victor in 1984 of an ultra aggressive war that Jack initiated on the home computer market (low end market) during 1982 before the C64 was even released. In the microcomputer market overall (low and high) Apple, Tandy and Commodore owned the majority of the market already. Your 1200XL history is also a little screwy, the 1200XL was introduced in '82 and was underway long before the C64 was out. Likewise, the "1000" was a series of which the 1200XL was a part of (there were two versions in development). The changes in what became the 1200XL were early on, not as a quick response to C64. Nothing done in the engineering and manufacturing of a consumer device is done quickly or in a snap response to something, it takes time to do those kind of changes. As for the 600XL and 800XL, the 1200XL's compatibility problems caused the immediate sales issues and the creation of the 600XL and 800XL started very shortly afterwords to return back to the two computer high end/low end market model since 400 and 800 sales proved the format was still viable, to join the in progress more expanded higher end models (1400 and 1450XLD). Those were all supposed to hit stores in time for the Christmas season but Morgan's thirty day freeze of all projects and delay in choosing a manufacturing location assured that didn't happen. 600XL and 800XL slowly started to hit during Christmas, but not near capacity to fill all the orders, and Morgan had raised their price, which all drastically hurt sales for the season. Plus he cancelled the rest of the 1000 line (1400 and 1450XLD) among other computer related products.

The 414s panel from this last weekend's Midwest Gaming Classic.

"Remember when we wondered if Gen Con could ever come back to Milwaukee? Eh, who needs it: the Midwest Gaming Classic is here to stay." http://milwaukeerecord.com/city-life/milwaukee-records-favorite-moments-from-the-2015-midwest-gaming-classic/ Also in the article: "Almost all the classic systems are getting plenty of play, but no one—and we mean no one—is touching the Atari Jaguar. Hell, we’ve seen more people suffering through that off-brand Zelda game on the CD-i than go near Atari’s not-really-64-bit flub. We still love you, Jag."

For anyone that missed it at the show:

Completely the opposite. Jim Heller, the man who dumped the materials in the first place was involved with the dig, told them what he buried, and actually helped them locate it. He also took plenty of pictures of what he dumped and what they found was completely representative of it. Some of the pictures are in my article that Spud mentioned (and I have a lot more that Jim sent over to me to scan in for archiving). It was all store returns for credit mixed in with materials from the Service Center operations in El Paso (console and computer parts and accessories - which were dug up as well). About 750,000 carts were dumped consisting of over 60 titles (including 5200 titles). I just did another interview with Jim in fact this last weekend at the Midwest Gaming Classic:

Two speaking events I'm announcing: This Saturday 11am at the Midwest Gaming Classic​! Meet the man who buried E.T. and other Atari games in the desert In 1983 Atari buried truckloads of games in the Alamogordo, NM desert, an event that captured imaginations everywhere as its legend and the myths surrounding it grew over the decades that followed. Famously excavated last year in front of news crews and world wide attention, a little known fact was that the man who originally dumped the games was on hand and had assisted them in re-finding the games (and told them what they'd actually find). Now for the first time, Jim Heller publicly (live via skype) tells the full story of what really went on those 32 years ago. Learn the real stories behind this video game pop culture phenomenon, and how in the end it was just another day on the job for Jim. As the documentary Atari: Game Over found out, although it wasn't a mass dumping of E.T., the stories behind the scenes were far more interesting than even the legends themselves. MC'd by Atari Inc. - Business Is Fun co-author Marty Goldberg. Sunday 1 to 1:50 PM The 414s: The Original Teenage Hackers The 414s, the group of teenage hackers from the early 80s who rose to national and then international attention at a time when the public awareness of hacking was just rising. Hailing from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, members became superstars of the media, appearing on magazine covers like Newsweek and testifying in front of congress. Together with the release of the classic movie Wargames in 1983, they inspired a generation of kids to spend countless hours in their bedroom on their Apple, Commodore and Atari computers hacking. This year a group of Milwaukee filmmakers produced a documentary on the group that's now appearing on CNN. The MGC is proud to show this documentary to be followed by a panel with the film makers and original 414 member Tim Winslow.

Thought this would be relevant to those following this thread. This Saturday 11am at the Midwest Gaming Classic​! Meet the man who buried E.T. and other Atari games in the desert In 1983 Atari buried truckloads of games in the Alamogordo, NM desert, an event that captured imaginations everywhere as its legend and the myths surrounding it grew over the decades that followed. Famously excavated last year in front of news crews and world wide attention, a little known fact was that the man who originally dumped the games was on hand and had assisted them in re-finding the games (and told them what they'd actually find). Now for the first time, Jim Heller publicly (live via skype) tells the full story of what really went on those 32 years ago. Learn the real stories behind this video game pop culture phenomenon, and how in the end it was just another day on the job for Jim. As the documentary Atari: Game Over found out, although it wasn't a mass dumping of E.T., the stories behind the scenes were far more interesting than even the legends themselves. MC'd by Atari Inc. - Business Is Fun co-author Marty Goldberg.

Spielberg asked for Howard to do it, Howard had just finished doing Raiders and having worked with him Spielberg wanted him to do ET as well. Its more that there's been a lot of different myths surrounding it that sprung up over the years, and they'd all developed into an incestuous stew that fed off each other and grew. With regards to the site itself, there were the stories that a)There was a burial of something there, b) There was a mass burial of ET, and c) There was nothing verifiable buried there. The weight of b combined with c lead a to become obfuscated and marginalized. Enough so that even when newspaper clippings were shown they were still held in doubt because of the stigma of the mass ET burial claim. As far as the movie itself, they need to recount the main myths in order to deconstruct it like they did.

If a heavy sixer was returned for servicing, they wouldn't have replaced the entire case with a light sixer case unless the original case was heavily cracked (i.e. that was the reason for the service return). Otherwise, the transition between the manufacturing of heavy and light sixers in mid '78 wasn't like "drop all the parts of one and solely use new parts for the other". The two are closely related internally, and its pretty regular to see parts of one or the other in lights because of that interchangeability. Even the earlier molds for the light sixer bottom still had anywhere from full speaker risers in them to nubs to none.

Just out today. Randy did an interesting thing and cut back and forth between separate interviews he did with 400/800 co-creator Joe Decuir​ and Curt and myself to create a narration of the origin history of Atari's landmark computers. http://floppydays.libsyn.com/floppy-days-episode-33-the-atari-400800-part-i

It's just a repeat of what they already stated to the press when the first started coming to light publicly earlier this week: Atari values and protects its intellectual property and expects others to respect its copyrights and trademarks. When Llamasoft launched TxK in early 2014, Atari was surprised and dismayed by the very close similarities between TxK and the Tempest franchise. Atari was not alone in noticing the incredible likeness between the titles. Several major gaming outlets also remarked at the similarity of features and overall appearance of TxK to Tempest; one stated of TxK, “This is essentially Tempest.” There is no lawsuit. Atari has been in continuous contact with the developer since the game launched in hopes that the matter would be resolved. http://www.ign.com/articles/2014/02/19/txk-review “This is essentially Tempest, a classic Atari arcade game (technically the spiritual successor of Tempest 2000) and even an updated look can’t obscure its retro roots.” – Scott Butterworth - IGN http://www.gamespot.com/reviews/txk-review/1900-6415666/ Though it is technically only a sequel to Atari's Tempest in spirit, this Vita shooter sports the same vector-style visuals, the same tube-based gameplay, and even the same yellow player ship as the 1981 original, all refined into a stunning modern interpretation. – Britton Peele - Gamespot http://www.gamingnexus.com/Article/TxK/Item4332.aspx Although it doesn't use the name, TxK may as well be the proper sequel to Tempest 2000 (or Tempest 3000, if you are more of a Nuon fan). It doesn't just look and control like Tempest, but it actually uses many of the same power-ups, a few of the level designs and a similar bonus stage. And that's not even taking into account that it uses the same vector-style graphics we've seen employed in all previous Tempest games. TxK is the Tempest sequel I never thought would come out.” – Cyril Lachel- Gaming Nexus

I assume you're talking about some of my Facebook posts, which really have been more that there's two sides to this and people have only been going by Jeff's writings (some of which are contradictory). And really there's been similar posts regarding Atari's rights over the last few pages here as well. Honestly, there's more to the matter than is being let on. They were in negotiations FOR ALMOST A YEAR. You're not in negotiations for that long if it's one side was unwilling to do something and just wanted you shut down as is being claimed. And how have they handled things? They were in negotiations for almost a year, and my understanding is Jeff made his lines in the sand as well as far as what he felt he was entitled to do, and asking it to be pulled was part of the normal recourse. If two parties try and work things out and both fail to meet in the middle, it's a failure of the two parties and both own it. Likewise, Jeff is the one that turned it into the very one sided public spectacle it's become. Atari SA is no saint, especially with some of the legal things that have happened in the past. But I prefer to hear all the details before definitively stating it's all just one or the other. As far as the claims on missed royalties, I'd need to see where that claim is coming from paperwork wise. We have a copy of his original agreement with Atari Corp. for Tempest 2000 for the Jag (which includes the Atari Interactive PC one), and it's a work for hire contract. If it was in a different contract, it would be great if he made that available. Either way it's irrelevant to this, as that was Atari Corp., a completely different company. Likewise, it also does not grant any rights to use the elements of the Tempest brand (which includes all the Tempest games) that are clearly appropriated in this latest version (and which he alluded to in his older blog posts). Everyone keeps harping on "Well he said he didn't use any source code or music," and I don't recall seeing that was what this was specifically about. There are so many other ways he could have done a "tube shooter" (in appearance and play) that didn't directly latch on to the Tempest legacy (which he went out of his way to attach it to). We were sitting in the Atari Museum group back in February 2014 stating this was going to happen because of all that, and it did. I can't imagine he couldn't have predicted it either and made the appropriate adjustments to avoid it, which leads one to wonder if he simply just didn't want to. As I've stated, I hope both are able to reach an agreement and that Jeff is able to release the game on other platforms. But I don't think it'll be purely just because he doesn't have money to pay legal fees.

http://strategywiki.org/wiki/Tempest/Getting_Started

Fred Chesnais is the scum of the earth, he's the one who ripped Curt and I off for a lot of money when we were working with him to try and relaunch Microprose and doing the Gene Simmons Guitar Hero controller. http://www.syzygycompany.com/portfolio-guitar.html He's also the one that was trying to change the bankruptcy auction the last minute to instead be completely ala carte and spread the Atari IP to the wind so he could make more bucks. As far as this downplaying Jeff's involvement in T2K, there's no way they could possibly know enough to claim that. The only thing they'd possibly have is some paperwork they inherited which would mean they're making great leaps of logic. They'd have to of tracked down original Atari Corp. people involved with T2K to get anything concrete, and they would have used Curt and I to do that which they haven't. Short of helping to negotiate for AtariAge members and their projects, we pretty much refuse to have anything else to do with the company as long as Fred's involved. But as far as Txk is concerned, Curt and I were predicting this would happen a year ago in the Atari Museum Facebook group. There's just too much closeness between the games, the look, play, feel, etc. And honestly, if it was truly an unrelated game just in "a similar style" to the previous ones then he shouldn't have set up the direct link between them like he did here. I would have stayed completely clear of a lot of this verbiage: http://blog.us.playstation.com/2013/04/24/cult-studio-llamasoft-blazes-onto-ps-vita-with-txk/

That's how my family got their MIB Vectrex and MIB 3D goggles was a closeout warehouse that the overstock had been sold to in '85.

Not really. Those "tens of millions" were spread across lots and lots of companies in both coin and consumer over 1973 - 1983. And they were given different options for the licensing based either on one upfront sum or royalties based on earnings. Maganvox wasn't stupid, they'd rather get paid for a license over drowning a company in a license they couldn't afford, which is why they had those two options. I've never heard of any of these companies (or anyone at them) claim about going out of business for these relatively small payments compared to what most of these companies were making by the early 80s.

What Stardust said. I'm shooting for the Fall. There's a lot of additional research going on right now actually in relation to the very early days as we discover and vet more and more resources.

I'm working on the second edition of Business Is Fun, a book on the Alamogordo burial and dig, another one on Mattel Electronics and feature articles for several magazines. Plus the day job. So yes, been busy.

It was horrible. Cannibalism was rampant everywhere and the only safe spots were walled off nation cities like New Chicago and New New York.

The Atari Museum was very happy to be able to contribute to the Videogame History Museum's display.

It looks like you're basing a few alternatives on a misunderstanding of those topics and what was actually going on with them. Otherwise always cool to see these "What I would of done" scenarios. There was no Game Gear or Gameboy when Atari started the Lynx. Likewise, the GameBoy and Lynx were introduced around the same time. The Gamer Gear was later. I.E. it wasn't introduced on a market already owned by the GameBoy and Game Gear as you suggest. It was already a reduced budget, and the criticism against the Tramiels and Atari Corp. has always been they spent way to little on advertising and promotion. That's just not possible in the industry, that's simply the way it works because of the cost of development and resources vs. bringing a next gen console to market. You're assuming it was a choice. During that period, needing to sell the system at a loss in favor of making your margins in software was becoming the norm. In order to not sell at a loss, the system you're selling would need to be older hardware. At that point you're not talking about the Jaguar anymore, you're talking about a different console. Comparing it to high end multimedia systems that were also consoles is just not an apt comparison to justify bumping the cost. The Neo-Geo system was priced primarily as a rental device, not a consumer device (i.e. for video stores like BlockBuster to purchase these and rent them out, or hotel chains to purchase them and rent out time). The 3DO while suggested at about $699 was more in the $400-$500 range and quickly dropped in price, plus it again was being portrayed as a premium CD multimedia system. Unless the Jag included the CD unit there's no way you could justify launching at that price range, you would have sold even less Jaguars than were actually sold. Not to mention your desire to cut down advertising even more (a move backwards to marketing 101) would have compounded that sales problem. If Atari Corp. had done what you mentioned above, it wouldn't be the Jaguar it would have been something else.

The Atari Museum was happy to help out with the impressive Atari display the Videogame History Museum is putting on right now at the Game Developers Conference. Here's a few pics, and you can see more at the Atari Museum Facebook group - https://www.facebook.com/groups/105586892805903/

I got the sarcasm just fine. There's a difference between whether it's being viewed as appropriate or not, especially in light of some of the vitriol that was going on in this thread. And I'm not the only one who was looking at it as such.

There's nothing more to "communicate," it's exactly what I posted. There's already two other threads discussing the console itself and what it entails, this was simply to link to the pictures of the original Jaguar molds used in the console. Hence the relevant post in the Jaguar section.