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Where were Atari games sold?


Philflound

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Great story! Though your wife probably wouldn't appreciate it.

 

Phil

 

You're right. My wife just doesn't understand that Atari is my very first girlfriend and C64 is my second. Sadly, I know that I'll never see C64 ever again. Now I just have to grab myself a Harmony cart and I'll be able to live my childhood dream of writing games for it. It's nice to finally, 30 years later, have the technology and the resources to do so.

Edited by Blacklight
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Don't ever say never. I picked up a brand new C64 boxed with boxed disk drive and boxed printer for $20 at a garage sale about 15 years ago. I have all my original disks and picked up many more. I loved the C64 and if I had the room, I'd connect it and play games once again. My favorites were Adventure Construction Set, Seven Cities of Gold, and Impossible Mission.

 

Phil

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Adventure Construction Set was my all time FAVORITE C64 game!! To this day, there's not such an easy to use RPG maker that is anywhere near as customizable that also features the fun multi-player (or multi character) ability that that game had. I made so many amazing game with that. Even ones that weren't RPG's. I designed elaborate battle arena mazed for multiple players to run around gaining "power ups", weapons, and skills until they found each other and fought. I also used it to make a giant Japanese movie monster game complete with building smashing action.

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Atari games were also sold at the former Zayre stores, Kohls department stores, Radio Shack (I think), K-Mart (where I got my first Atari 2600), Toys R Us...the list goes on.

 

Sorry for the late response here... I just wanted to mention if it hasn't been already that I don't think Radio Shack sold 2600 games. They has their own Intellivision clone called the Tandyvision and I think they only sold games for that. Could be wrong but that's what I remember.

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Growing up in Dalton, Georgia, I clearly remember getting 2600 games from K-Mart, Sears, Lionel Playworld, and Service Merchandise. I have some pretty clear memories of getting several of the US Games titles cheap at the Hills store in Ft. Oglethorpe, GA, and a bunch of Atari, Activision, & Imagic clearance titles from a bin in the aisle at the local Revco, including Riddle of the Spinx, Star Raiders, Earthworld, Fireworld, and Laser Blast. I also picked up some odd games from Kay-Bee, including Solaris, Tax Avoiders, and Basic Programming.

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Sorry for the late response here... I just wanted to mention if it hasn't been already that I don't think Radio Shack sold 2600 games. They has their own Intellivision clone called the Tandyvision and I think they only sold games for that. Could be wrong but that's what I remember.

 

They sold 7800 games mail order in the early '90's. I remember seeing some 7800 titles in their in store catalog of stuff "they could order". There probably were some 2600 titles alongside them, but even that's been too long ago for me to remember (too much booze during that time, I'm sure.)

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They sold 7800 games mail order in the early '90's. I remember seeing some 7800 titles in their in store catalog of stuff "they could order". There probably were some 2600 titles alongside them, but even that's been too long ago for me to remember (too much booze during that time, I'm sure.)

 

Oh right... I totally forgot about that! That's how I got my 7800 in 1997 or 1998, actually. But I don't think they ever sold 2600 games in the '80s (pre-crash). And believe me, I spent a LOT of time at Radio Shack in the '80s because it was the only place you could get tech stuff in my hometown. (I got all of my Atari games at Kmart or Kay-Bee Toys, but for anything like computers or stereo equipment it was either Radio Shack or out-of-town.)

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Adventure Construction Set was my all time FAVORITE C64 game!! To this day, there's not such an easy to use RPG maker that is anywhere near as customizable that also features the fun multi-player (or multi character) ability that that game had. I made so many amazing game with that. Even ones that weren't RPG's. I designed elaborate battle arena mazed for multiple players to run around gaining "power ups", weapons, and skills until they found each other and fought. I also used it to make a giant Japanese movie monster game complete with building smashing action.

 

Cool, is there a way to play these on a C=64 emulator? I made a few "adventures" in that thing, mostly using my house and yard as the landscape. I wish I still had all that stuff. And the dozens of Genesis songs I encoded to SID files. One note at a time.

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Cool, is there a way to play these on a C=64 emulator? I made a few "adventures" in that thing, mostly using my house and yard as the landscape. I wish I still had all that stuff. And the dozens of Genesis songs I encoded to SID files. One note at a time.

Yes. I run it on WinVice. Here's what you need to do. Adventures required a blank disk for you to have your adventure on. So all you have to do is make a copy of a D64 file and rename it something else like "Adventure.D64" and then put that disk in the virtual drive and have the game re-format it with whatever genera setup you want.

 

As far as the old adventures I created, those are LONG GONE, along with my C64 which my dad sold at a tag sale for $10 with all my games and software when I went away to school. (!@#$%!!!!)

Edited by Blacklight
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Sorry for the late response here... I just wanted to mention if it hasn't been already that I don't think Radio Shack sold 2600 games. They has their own Intellivision clone called the Tandyvision and I think they only sold games for that. Could be wrong but that's what I remember.

At some point you could go into a Radioshack and purchase games. I did so during the Jr. era- they also sold them in the store catalogs in the early 90's.

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My boxes are all packed away in storage, but I recall having seen price tags from Canadian Tire (which also sold the Vic-20 and it's own brand of home electronics -- Pulser, IIRC) and the now long defunct Bi-Way (a regional discount chain that sold packaged foods, cheap clothing, and other random merchandise -- predecessor to the Dollar Store).

 

I also bought several NIB games from Woolco just before it closed in the early-1990s.

Edited by jhd
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Did anyone else buy any games from the Atari offices back in the 80s? My friend's mom took him and me there (I don't remember why or how it came about), they had a table full of games in the lobby or waiting room or whatever it was. I bought Maze Craze and Warlords for 10 bucks each, if I'm remembering right. I wish I could remember more about this. It was the office in NJ, Somerset I think.

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I was surprised many times finding cartridges in stores you would never expect to find them in. Not only grocery stores, but the little mom and pop stores, or the mini marts too. Any store that sold anything would sell these. Mostly the low budget games in the dinky dollar type stores.

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After chatting with a few people online, some places around them STILL sell Atari 2600 games. I guess I'm shocked, as they all seemed to disappear about 12 years ago, maybe more...or I just wasn't paying attention. However, there's no place locally that carries them. Perhaps the flea market...hmmm...guess I have a place to go this evening. :)

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  • 7 years later...
On 9/1/2012 at 11:14 AM, Philflound said:

I wasn't really looking for a list but rather scans of actual labels. Seeing price stickers gives more of a history rather than someone remembering a store that had games.

Phil

Sorry, I didn't see this one until after I posted my memories. If I find a box with a price tag, I'll post that.

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I remember Montgomery ward had an aisle of Atari 2600 were you can play the games where the TV and system built into the aisle and they had chains attached to the cartridges and Some of the chains would be broken. Cuz people were stealing the cartridges hehe.

 

i remember Aafes the Military PX sold Atari 2600 system and games

kaybee

toys r us

sears

emporium

kmart

pak n save

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