Is an Atari Jaguar worth owning?

[Gentlegamer]

If you don't already have all the "no brainer" consoles (2600, NES, Genesis, SNES, GBA, DS, PS1, PS2, gaming PC, etc) I'd say track all of those down before you get into stuff like the the Jaguar or Turbografx-16 or Colecovision. Those systems just have wider libraries with much better genre representation, so there's a much higher chance of finding a lot to keep you busy. But if you DO already have those systems, a Jaguar can be an awesome complementary console.

 

I think it's a bit insulting to group TG-16 and Colecovision with Jaguar, honestly.

[+remowilliams]

I think it's a bit insulting to group TG-16 and Colecovision with Jaguar, honestly.

 

Yeah that's not very nice to the TG and the CV.

 

In unrelated news, last time I called the Jaguar a piece of crap I got an angry call threatening me with a lawsuit over slandering feces. True Story.

[famicommander]

 

I think it's a bit insulting to group TG-16 and Colecovision with Jaguar, honestly.

It wasn't meant as one. As I said, I love my Jaguar. I wasn't saying that the Jaguar has a comparable library in terms of quality or quantity; just that there are certain hiccups involved in getting into those systems. All of them tend to be expensive, all of them have more specialized libraries, all of them tend to have annoying hardware issues (the TG16 less so than the other two).

 

 

I own pretty much all the major (Nintendo, Atari, SNK, Sony, Microsoft, SEGA, NEC/Hudson, etc) consoles and I have a pretty good grasp of their strengths and weaknesses.

[Saneless]

TxK for the Vita is amazing. It's the reason why I made sure my Mame cabinet has a spinner for the original Tempest.

[ls650]

It used to be you could pick up a Jaguar complete with two controllers, a few of the better common carts, cables, etc, for say $60 to $80. Unfortunately those days seem to be over.

 

If you can get one for a good price they are worth owning. It's too bad that ebay speculators have driven the prices up to ridiculous levels.

[CatPix]

Reading figures, the Jaguar seems to have sold about 200 000 units. I don't know if those are for the USA or the whole world, but... The 3DO sold 2 millions units, and even the short-lived Amstrad GX4000 (sold mostly, if not only, in England and France) managed to sell about 15 000 units in less than a year of existence

So the problem is that bringing attention to the Jaguar mean that retrogamers have to fight on a very small pool of console, because of course, on those 200 000 units, how many survived? I guess for consoles, a 20% surviving rate is a good one (it's probably closer to 10% or less, but heh). So it means that there is about 40 000 units still existing in the world.

Still sound big, but that's a (IMO) high figure, and surviving doesn't mean "available on the market".

So unfortunately, the Jaguar prices aren't likely to drop down.

[ls650]

I doubt there are even 4000 working Jaguars left, never mind 40,000.

[Bill Loguidice]

Reading figures, the Jaguar seems to have sold about 200 000 units. I don't know if those are for the USA or the whole world, but... The 3DO sold 2 millions units, and even the short-lived Amstrad GX4000 (sold mostly, if not only, in England and France) managed to sell about 15 000 units in less than a year of existence

 

It's been determined that the Jaguar sold 125,000 units during its retail life, and an additional 100,000 after it was on closeout. The former number explains the minimal third party support and why the CD-ROM add-on should have never been released.

[CatPix]

I doubt there are even 4000 working Jaguars left, never mind 40,000.

40 000 is a high figure, but 4 000 seems incredibly low

I'm not talking about total working console owners on AA and something, but about consoles into collections, collecting dust in attics, etc... also, I'm talking alos about the European market.The

one where Atari sold more Lynx, where they sold 3/4 of their Atari ST computers? It would be nice to have the figures for Europe about the Jaguar.

[+Ripdubski]

I have one Mint in box, barring 3 times I hooked it up to try and like it. Got in on closeout for $25 from KB long time ago. Worth having, I dont know. I really dont like it and only keep it "just because".

Edited December 27, 2014 by Ripdubski

[ls650]

I really loved my Jaguar collection when the games were new to me. I've played the heck out of my faves, though, and new releases are fee and far between. When there is a new release, I buy it, hook up the Jaguar for a couple of months, play the crap out of it, then eventually play some other system instead.

[Metal Ghost]

For me, personally, I'm glad I owned one at one point, and I'm glad I no longer do.

[Saneless]

The Jag has no moving parts. I would expect the survival rate to be pretty decent.

[Lost Dragon]

@Metal Ghost:Superb post. I loved my Jag at the time, love to chat about it, interview people involved coding for it,but no regrets selling mine when i did, even given daft money i could of sold it for these days.

[Flojomojo]

For me, personally, I'm glad I owned one at one point, and I'm glad I no longer do.

This is me as well. In 2015, if you have to ask, you don't need one. If you like psychedelic Tempest (and you should), there's the Vita, the PSTV, and eventually the PS4 (TxK not out yet on that last one).

[ls650]

I haven't touched my Jag for quite some time, but I'm sure it'll get hooked back up to the TV when Rebooteroids gets released...

[Lost Dragon]

If it was'nt for TxK coming to PS4, i'd have probably bought a Vita TV device (even given price of the bloody memory cards).Just need Tony Crowther to do an HD version of N20 now and i'm laughing.

[SiLic0ne t0aD]

The only thing I'll miss about owning a Jag was playing Doom

[+save2600]

I haven't touched my Jag for quite some time, but I'm sure it'll get hooked back up to the TV when Rebooteroids gets released...

 

Rebooteroids!

 

WTH is the holdup already? Hope I'm not going to need a reboot by the time this finally gets released!

[Video]

Honestly, if you even have to ask, then that's your answer. Buy what you like. Jag has some good games that are worth playing, and had you gotten into it 10-15 years ago when you could get a system and half dozen of the better games for sub $50, hell yeah, it's well worth it. If you spot one in the wild for that kind of price, get it. Even if you hate it, you can sell it for a LOT more.

 

Jaguar had AVP (very wolfensteinish, with high res for it's time graphics) THE BEST CONSOLE version of doom (to that point) Tempest 2000 (one of the, if not the best versions of tempest out there) And the few games that were multiplatform games, the jag did better than the competition, Backtrack, Pinball Fantasies, NBa Jam.

 

It also had a bunch of quirky or even "me too" games on it. A LOT of crap. Checkered flag (I would have enjoyed more if it was...harder...to say nothing of the controlls) Trevor McFurr Crescent Galaxy, Bubsy fractured fairy tails, Kasumi Ninja (not a bad game, but a me too mortal kombat wanna be, I liked Primal rage, but it's a CD game)

 

If you want to get into jag, it's going to cost a pretty penny at this point. There are some noteworty games, but it's only got a library of something like 70-80 carts. The dozen top notch games are well worth having, if you don't already have them for another console. The rest will range in mediocre to flat out bad. Then again, crap is on every system.

[Austin]

WTH is the holdup already? Hope I'm not going to need a reboot by the time this finally gets released!

With self-entitled attitudes like this, it's a wonder that people bother making games for the system to begin with.

 

Needless to say, those guys have been pretty busy juggling even cooler developments alongside the production of Rebooteroids (which is coming, and it's pretty awesome).

[TaskenLander]

So far I am digging the Jag. The controller feels surprisingly good in one's hand. So far I just have AvP; hope to add more titles of worth in the future.

 

Mike

Edited December 31, 2014 by TaskenLander

[+save2600]

 

With self-entitled attitudes like this, it's a wonder that people bother making games for the system to begin with.

 

Self-entitlement? Nah. More like, hurry up and take my money - PLEASE!

[Rick Dangerous]

So far I am digging the Jag. The controller feels surprisingly good in one's hand. So far I just have AvP; hope to add more titles of worth in the future.

 

Mike

 

So you took the plunge?

 

All I can say is that if I knew what I know now, I'm not so sure I'd get into jag. It's just so damn EXPENSIVE, and there are other systems of the era that just give so much bang for the buck as far as playability versus cost. You could easily spend 5-10k putting together a complete jag library these days...i'm probably at the low end of that already.

 

I have no regrets, its one of my favorite systems of all time (for some inexplicable reason (character?)) and i'll keep mine forever. But think hard about your bank account, for the money you are much better off going with a 3DO (cheaper with a far superior library IMO) or even something like Saturn or PS1. Dreamcast is pretty fun and cheap to collect for right now too..

 

Anyhow, hope you enjoy it, looking forward to hearing back from you over in the jag forum once you've got a few more games and spend some time with it.

[TaskenLander]

Thanks.

 

I had been fighting the temptation/curiosity for a long while now and got it for, by ebay standards at least, a decent price so I have no regrets. It was the last 'must have/big want' console on my list (I already own a 3DO, PS1, Saturn, etc) so I was pleased to add it to my collection. I can now consider my console collection finished... for now at least. I want to start focusing on building up my game library from here.

 

I will admit it *was* more of a "curiosity piece" purchase, but I am enjoying it thus far. I'm not one of those collectors who needs or even yearns to have a complete collection of a particular system/game library. I just plan to seek out the titles that interest me/look the most fun.

 

I guess, though, by law I am required now to check out 'Tempest 2000'.

 

Thanks again for the feedback,

Mike