Flojomojo

I'd say that modern arcade games (such as they are) would best be described as an evolutionary dead end. I can't remember any real innovation in the arcade since the days of the Dreamcast. It makes me a little sad that you can't really go to the arcade to see the great new ideas that you can't play at home ... especially when the arcade is just big versions of the Candy Crush and Doodle Jump on my phone.

On console, sure. The category is alive and well on mobile, though. Some recent things I like: Pianista Muse Dash OldSchool Musical Frederic Crypt of the NecroDancer (and the Zelda-themed version for Nintendo Switch) Thumper I think the problem here is that music games on console like that can't/won't sell for $30 or more, and definitely not on disk. But they're still out there, just further out to the edges of mainstream than where they were in Parappa and Rock Band days.

Unrelated. Or is it?

Might as well link to the Atari press release, because it contains more information, including some names of the developer. The atarihotels.com website is all "coming soon" including a swag store. I confess I would be mildly interested in a high-quality Atari Hotel bathrobe to complement my Atari Lifestyle of lounging around half-dressed, entertaining beautiful people with overpriced room service food and beverages. https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2020/01/27/1975621/0/en/Atari-Announces-World-Class-Video-Game-Themed-Atari-Hotels.html The company that bought the biggest name from early 1980s entertainment is name-dropping another 80's phenom, so you know it's got to be good. I mean, totally tubular. Radical!! Translated from the French Holdingcompanyese: This seems like easy money, and everyone says if you can't make a good product, "lifestyle brand" is a good way to play a weak hand. Pay no attention to the fact that "gamers" aren't spending that kind of money on Atari games. But maybe putting "the latest in VR and AR" under an Atari roof will add some modern credibility to the Asteroids and Centipede house. The daytime render's resemblance to the buildings in Iron Soldier for the Atari Jaguar are completely coincidental.

<glances over at my fat Falcon 4.0 spiral bound manual> maybe not "popular" in the Call Of Duty way (bazillions of copies with every new release) but flight sims were a mainstay of early computing gaming -- before anything was truly popular.

"3D action puzzle adventure with electronic doodle side game" 😂 Why do we even have genres and classifications anyway? Silly hoo-man brains. It's a crime against gaming that the brand holder for that game is licensing its name to hotels rather than exploring as they once did. I miss the days when being fresh made money. Excellent point about flight simulators. There used to be tons of flight games, but even casual arcade type flight games don't sell. Same for space shooters, at least for big names. There's got to be an economic reason for the lack of a proper X-Wing followup.

Is anyone else doing this, with a hotel? No, and in that sense, it seems innovative. It also seems to be very low risk for Atari. But it's very high risk for the builders, and there's always a fair chance the plans will change or fall through. Has money changed hands yet? Remember all the chatter about a Pong game show, which has either been shelved and forgotten or stuck in development hell like "Atari VCS" with no news? Ideas are cheaper than execution. Talk is even cheaper. Fred's "Atari" is cash-poor and starved for attention, so stunts like this make a big difference to their bottom line. Current events have also taught us that real estate and hotel deals can be an excellent vehicle for money laundering. (No politics!) I'm not suggesting Fred is doing anything illegal, but he seems like he would be an easy mark for someone who is. Whether it's games development, blockchain, or entertainment licensing, he always seems a few steps behind the trends, never out in front.

Some cool exceptions to the rules: text adventure AI Dungeon a framework for generating these on the fly Nice mobile implementation of AI Dungeon, "Infinite Story" on Android and iOS The Interactivr Fiction Compeition, playable on Frotz full motion video Her Story, artsy video game with video clips and a 1990s style interface another idea for a category: how about games that so dominate a genre, there's effectively no competition? Like Minecraft or Roblox.

Whoa. Fred only paid $443 for Atari IP in 2013? How can that be?

@Paul Slocum it's behind a paywall. Can you summarize? Do they name the dollar amounts that the license holders are receiving? Nice work if you can get it.

I know this is off-topic but this seems like a good place to ask -- does the Ti have any hardware similarities with Intellivision, or did Imagic just happen to port a lot of its stuff to different platforms?

I feel like the "it's not really a vector monitor" complaining has slowed down, too. It's a fine compromise, an inexpensive flat LCD that should require zero maintenance for years and years.

Yup. Or anything that relies on a technological gimmick and builds a game (and a series of clones) around it. Light gun games Motion control waggle Stereoscopic 3D Kinect games Power Glove Don't drag me for saying this, but I think VR is in that category as well, at least for me, especially as VR gear is expensive and wire-happy.

Star Wars all day long. I'm astounded that I haven't tired of it yet.

Interesting topic. It's going to be challenging to come up with examples because truly one of a kind things that don't become franchises are often forgotten. I disagree about Defender, people have been riffing on it for decades. Dropzone, Resogun, various Jeff Minter homages, and my favorite of them all, Aqua Kitty Milk Mine Defender. It even has "Defender" in the name.

It's stable enough -- it's not doing anything that would mess with the system or installed games. I like having the big view across many different stores and its to GOG's credit they went there first.

Agreed on the one-stop view, it's nice. I have too many games. Steam does a few nice things though, such as streaming from the big PC to a small screen. I use that just enough to make me wish GOG could do it, too. Maybe it will someday.

Does it share any code or personnel with this old thing? The new one certainly looks nicer than that, for the folks who really dig Night Stalker. GameGavel! Mike Kennedy! That stuff is almost retro itself.

These exist, so they wouldn't even have to make anything. They could just sic their lawyers on them and garnish a piece of the action.

Maybe those are the main ways to play original cartridges. That's slightly more important for GBA games than others, if you value storing your progress that way. But that's not the whole universe of GameBoy. Virtual Console on Wii U has some GBA and DS games for purchase and download. I would think Switch will do that before too long as well. Emulation of the entire GameBoy line is pretty good, so Raspberry Pi comes to mind, as well as the Ingenic-based Chinese handhelds like PocketGo. https://obscurehandhelds.com Analogue Pocket will have a dock and will be the fanciest GameBoy in town when it comes out.

GameBoy emulation is pretty good and doesn't need much hardware. The PocketGo has a 10-yr old processor and is like $30 and a nice IPS screen. This Hyperkin thing should be decent. What happened to Hyperkin's GameBoy clone, anyway? The one with the wrong screen ratio? It was expected more than a year ago if I'm remembering right.

I saw a picture of the back panel and the composite cables caught my eye -- I had the exact opposite reaction as you, no HDMI, no thanks. But there are both, so everyone should be happy. Except those who can't display 720p images, I guess. I've got a nice GBA (several in fact) as well as lots of knockoffs. Playing games isn't the point of the Analogue Pocket, playing them in style on nice hardware is. Same reason people buy fancy cars. "Luxury GameBoy" sounds pretty nice to me, especially in an age of cheap plastic and cruddy screens. Yup. Maybe $59.99. If it were nicer looking, I'd be tempted. It's cute, but I can feel the cheapness just by looking at the pictures.

Not sure I agree with either of these extremes -- it's probably profitable for the people who run it, just like any big entertainment event. I don't think any outsiders are going to benefit from eSports, just as I'm extremely unlikely to be the next Ken Jennings on Jeopardy. By the time folks catch on to a rising trend, it's often too late to get onboard. Bitcoin is a good example of that.

please don't poke the bear