How come a lot getting into retro games skip Atari?

[high voltage]

orgot I made this. Interesting Read

See how wrong your assumption was!!!!!

[Tangentg]

I was born in the 90s and not in America or Europe. I only got the chance to play video games by the time I was in grade 5/6. The first games I happened to come across were all remakes of retro games and therefore the first games I stumbled across were emulated Atari 2600 and NES games, so even though I was born after the time, I grew up playing emulated Atari and Nintendo.

 

But yes, recently a friend brought up the point that when people go for "retro style" these days, or even just general talk about retro games, they tend to imitate/talk about NES, Genesis, or DOS games, but never Atari. I personally think the charms of 80s' consoles are that each of them have a distinctive style: when you look at a screenshot, you could tell with accuracy whether it's a NES game, an Intellivision game, or a 2600 game, for instance. With systems getting more and more advanced these days and being able to draw pretty much anything, this uniqueness is lost and I find that to be a shame.

[danny_galaga]

I think it's due to the fact that many people quote unquote. "Consider it the main console that caused the video game crash". They blame E.T. and Pac-Man for it even though they never played it and know the truth about these games. And that they consider the NES to be "the system that ended the video game crash and saved the gaming industry." A lot of people born around 1990 or later seem to dislike anything about the Atari. These people don't like it cause they never experienced it.

 

Sorry, off topic, but if you have quotes around your quote, you don't need to write out 'quote unquote'. In fact you don't ever have to write the words, because that is what the "" is!

 

Grammer Nazi mode off.[/unquote]

[danny_galaga]

For my part, I only recently got a 2600. And I can't say why because it was the thing I coveted most of all from my friends when I was a kid. That and the Vic 20...

[Spanner]

I First played a Atari 800XL in 1984 at school,we had it in the games room,they only had cartridges for it,I had a c64 at home.then in 1998 I went to a secondhand shop and found a Atari 800XL with a 1050 disk drive for £11 and still have it today and its still working,Round about the same time I found a Atari 130XE,that I am still using now,Atari XEGS I got about 10 years ago(I did have one in 1989 round about that time but got rid of it,so it was the first Atari I got),in its box.I have a Atari ST 520FM and Atari VCS too with about 20 games.

 

I love my Atari's..

Edited September 2, 2016 by Spanner

[Crazymoon67]

I'm 25 so obviously I didn't grow up with Atari. I remember I was 12 when I started researching old Atari games, old NES games etc. I got my hands on a 2600 when I was 20 and I love it. I can play Atari for hours. However, I've only met one retro gamer my age who likes Atari. For most, they stop at NES. A lot dismiss what came before it.

 

I've heard from other retro gamers

"Atari is bad"

"Atari is boring"

"Gaming didn't get good until Nintendo"

"Only hipsters like Atari"

 

Most retro gamers I know also dismiss Sega and love anything Nintendo released in the past. Why is this? I would say personal preference but I'd say a good 85% of retro gamers my age adore Nintendo and dismiss Sega and especially dismiss Atari.

[Crazymoon67]

Great question i dont think its the graphics as the 7800 and jagaur have good graphics. In my opinion my son loves 80's music he is 15 why? Alot has to do with you can still hear it on the radio .i think the same holds true with Nintendo they kept the game that took Nintendo to the top around for many years and yes im talking about Mario brothers in some form or another or version has been released on all there systems over a span of 15 years or more. This was the game that took the NES to the top and its longevity naturaly makes young players who grew up playing the later versions want to collect its like having your favorite baseball players card of coarse you want the rookie card even if you were not born when he started playing and the card was made. So yes its games is why Atari is gone and for the most part there games are gone also i love Atari but yes its my system as a child i make these assesments having got a 2600 in 1979 and bought an NES new in 1985 so ive seen it ALL dang im old lol!

[+CXK]

My experience with the Atari is a little different as well. I started my gaming on an old Commodore 64. I remember typing commands to load the games, waiting for what seemed like an eternity for the games to load,using a control much like the Atari 2600... and the game Alien scaring the living shit out of me (hey... I was only 5!)

 

I moved on to NES and wasted many hours. .. then moved on to SNES. By the time N64 came out, I was pretty much into PC gaming and BBSes (I now run my own BBS... let the nostalgia fly!) But I remember an old Arcade game hidden in the back or a laundromat... or a bus station... many that were ported to Atari (or maybe the other way around) but they always had a special feel to them.

 

I've been thinking about getting a new console for a while and settled on an Atari 2600. Since I'm now grown with young kids to look after, I think introducing them to the Atari 2600 would help them appreciate the advancements of the video game industry as well as the pioneering spirit of Atari.

 

In fact I found a tutorial for VBB and Stella and played with the code a bit. My 7 year old played with the end result and absolutely loved it. Now. It looks like Atari might be a new family fun activity. ☺

Edited November 14, 2016 by Indiana Pug

[Andromeda Stardust]

Awesome Indiana and welcome to AtariAge. I gamed exclusively on Nintendo platforms for about ten years (starting with my first NES in 2002) before I got my Atari in 2012 (well Genesis technically came first in 2011).

[+sramirez2008]

Welcome Indiana. If you don't already have them, try picking up a pair of paddles and Circus Atari. Its a great game for kids of all ages.

[rednakes1]

When I was a kid I had a Colecovision and had friends with Ataris. Recently at a party I told a friend that I was getting back into old gaming systems like Atari and Colecovision and he laughed at me like I was crazy. This is a guy who is a couple years older than me, I'm 40. Maybe he never experienced video games as a kid but he sure enjoys investing tons of hours into his MMORPGs late into the night.

 

I think most people are into the "hi-tech" and not necessarily into the simplicity or nostalgia. For me it's more than that, it's like a time machine, and I don't like spending 50 hours on a game. I just want to pick up and play, and write down my high score.

 

My kids (both under 10 years) enjoyed the Atari for a while but now they're back into PS3 and PS4... they got bored of the old stuff and graphics after a while but they really enjoyed Warlords, Indy 500 and Frog Pond.

[Harrison]

I don't know how typical my experience is, but I was born in 1989 and never even really knew what Atari was. For me, the NES was like history and Atari was like pre-history, if that analogy makes any sense. I only had very vague ideas about it. I only started to learn about Atari when I took the time to do the research. At some point I stumbled onto a list of gaming consoles on wikipedia and ended up reading the articles for every single one.

[Keatah]

To answer the thread title.. They don't know what's good for them!

[high voltage]

Wow, I was 'on fire' back in the old days.

[+Andrew Davie]

 

Sorry, off topic, but if you have quotes around your quote, you don't need to write out 'quote unquote'. In fact you don't ever have to write the words, because that is what the "" is!

 

Grammer Nazi mode off.[/unquote]

 

There should be a word for this. That is, writing down the spoken version of the puncuation instead of the actual puncuation dot dot dot

[Andromeda Stardust]

Grammar Nazis can just go somewhere. In the event someone posts something completely illegible it is warranted, but if it's a simple typo or or wrong phonetic spelling (there their they're, to two too, etc), incorrect capitalization or misplaced punctuation, then it's just trolling and breaks the flow of the entire thread.

[PlayDoh003]

I've read a lot of articles and YouTube content on this topic, and the theories are not only interesting, but they make sense. The NES was and is (and you can argue that the SNES/Genesis are "in the zone" at the moment) one of the main consoles that come to mind when people think of "retro collecting", because the kids of that era have been at an age where the nostalgia Kicked in, and they had the extra money to repurchase (if they didn't keep) their childhood memories. Some just recovered their collections, some sought to continue to go after the games they longed but couldn't get. Of course, there were also the ones who went for a full NES library.

 

Now, it seems that "retro collecting" is in a fad stage where lots of people are doing it, and of course, prices have driven up in general as a result. I really feel sorry for anyone trying to get a full NES library these days. They at least have Bette trace deep pockets.

 

So, why does Atari nostalgia remain in a dark corner somewhere? Well, If the theory above is correct, the people who became nostalgic would have done so more than 20 years ago - well before the term "retro" was even a thing. So yeah - there are outliers like myself who only started collecting Atari (and Intellivision) within the past year, but chances are, the majority of the folks who wanted to collect for these system probably achieved their goals some 15-20 years ago. As was already mentioned, I don't think that the younger generation that grew up on Nintendo really appreciates the "primitive" Atari. They don't realize that before people called video games "Nintendos", they used to call them "Ataris".

 

So this leaves Atari collecting in a state where there is obviously more supply than demand. Sure, this plays into why heavy sixers are desired and more expensive (built like tanks, but not many were made before the bean counters at Warner Communications started cutting corners), and even why boxed complete consoles go for so much.

 

Going by the above, we are on the cusp of the PS2 and Xbox being in the "retro" limelight... You could say that the GameCube is already there because of the overall lower supply, not to mention the multitude of fans that collect Nintendo-anything.

 

So anyway, I probably rambled on too much, but I thought these ideas really made sense.

[zetastrike]

I was born in 1991, had a SNES at my house since 1992, and then a PS1 and a hand me down DMG Gameboy. I didn't grow up on Atari-era stuff, but I've always enjoyed and had respect for it. In 2014 I picked up an 800XL, then a 2600 Jr, then a 130XE, then an Intellivision II, and now a Lynx (but that doesn't really count, the style of the games is very 16 bit console-ish).

 

As I've gotten older, the kind of games on the Atari-era stuff is perfect for me. I can play them for an hour, two hours, 20 minutes, however long I want and still get something out of them. Too many games on Japanese consoles require time commitment that I usually don't have. Even with my Famicom, I spend more time playing things like Exerion, Galaxian, Tetris, Pac-Man. Mario Bros, DKjr than the more mainstream games on it.

 

I don't know what makes me so different than others my age. I just had a vested interest in gaming as a whole from a young age. I never drew a line in the sand and said "I'm not playing anything older than this." It's really arbitrary and shallow to turn your nose up at gaming before the NES, especially when the people who do it often know nothing about it beyond ET.

[Schizophretard]

I've read a lot of articles and YouTube content on this topic, and the theories are not only interesting, but they make sense. The NES was and is (and you can argue that the SNES/Genesis are "in the zone" at the moment) one of the main consoles that come to mind when people think of "retro collecting", because the kids of that era have been at an age where the nostalgia Kicked in, and they had the extra money to repurchase (if they didn't keep) their childhood memories. Some just recovered their collections, some sought to continue to go after the games they longed but couldn't get. Of course, there were also the ones who went for a full NES library.

 

Now, it seems that "retro collecting" is in a fad stage where lots of people are doing it, and of course, prices have driven up in general as a result. I really feel sorry for anyone trying to get a full NES library these days. They at least have Bette trace deep pockets.

 

So, why does Atari nostalgia remain in a dark corner somewhere? Well, If the theory above is correct, the people who became nostalgic would have done so more than 20 years ago - well before the term "retro" was even a thing. So yeah - there are outliers like myself who only started collecting Atari (and Intellivision) within the past year, but chances are, the majority of the folks who wanted to collect for these system probably achieved their goals some 15-20 years ago. As was already mentioned, I don't think that the younger generation that grew up on Nintendo really appreciates the "primitive" Atari. They don't realize that before people called video games "Nintendos", they used to call them "Ataris".

 

So this leaves Atari collecting in a state where there is obviously more supply than demand. Sure, this plays into why heavy sixers are desired and more expensive (built like tanks, but not many were made before the bean counters at Warner Communications started cutting corners), and even why boxed complete consoles go for so much.

 

Going by the above, we are on the cusp of the PS2 and Xbox being in the "retro" limelight... You could say that the GameCube is already there because of the overall lower supply, not to mention the multitude of fans that collect Nintendo-anything.

 

So anyway, I probably rambled on too much, but I thought these ideas really made sense.

 

Something about your post makes me think of a similar question to the OP's: How come a lot getting into retro games kinda skip everything after the NES and why didn't those who grew up with the NES get into it many years before now? For me, I started with precrash systems like the Atari and by the time I graduated from high school the PS2 was coming out. That is a lot of childhood systems and I collect for many of them but since I started with the Atari 2600 I'm a little more fixated on all of Atari's consoles and the precrash consoles competing with them. However, it is just a little more because I'm still very interested in everything up to the PS2. Anyway, I would assume a safe number for the kids that started at the NES would be maybe an average of 5 years younger than me(30ish). So, why don't they have the same fixation for all Nintendo consoles as I would for Atari ones while still being just slightly less fixated on consoles up to maybe the PS3? What I mean is if I were just 5 years younger but everything else remained the same about me I wouldn't just really be into the NES but also Super NES, Nintendo 64, Game Cube, the entire Game Boy line, etc. as more of a Nintendo fan than an Atari one and instead of starting to collect more online around 2000-2001 it would have been 2005-2006. But it is already 10 years after that. In other words, why is the NES still booming today instead of in a dark corner somewhere already along with all the other Nintendo consoles I listed like Atari is now? It just seems like the retro gamers whose childhood started at the NES and experienced the other Nintendo consoles after have already been grown up(maybe 5 years later than me) but are 10 years behind me at experiencing the buying frenzy. To put that another way, it seems like maybe 10 years ago most Nintendo collectors would have bought up all that they wanted already from most of the Nintendo retro consoles, those consoles would be like how retro gamers don't care too much anymore about precrash ones, and the OP's question would instead be something like,"How come a lot getting into retro games skip Nintendo and are mostly into PS1 collecting? I mean, the PS1 is 22 years old. So, it seems like the kids that went through the whole Nintendo vs. SEGA console wars would have already went eBay buying frenzy over consoles from those times and the kids that started with the PS1 would soon be going Ebay buying frenzy over that. I know I'm rambling but it just seems like the NES and all 8-bit consoles would seem too archaic to the young adults today, there would be maybe a limit for them where they don't go farther back than 16-bit consoles if that, and the PS1 or maybe Nintendo 64 would be the main systems them going eBay buying frenzy over now. There just seems like there is some time gap, consoles being skipped over in between, or something because the NES's popularity today feels like it should have happened and peaked 10 years ago or so.

[Andromeda Stardust]

^^Because repetitive gaming and crude rectangles and beeps and farts are very much an aquired taste. This coming from someone who grew up in the NES generation and didn't touch an Atari until 2012. The games look and sound like crap to the untrained palette. That's all people think of when they hear the name "Atari." That and ET and the Alamogordo landfill incident.

 

It also helps that Nintendo is still in the hardware business today. People just assume the NES was the first gaming system (or at least the first one that that doesn't suck) and go from there. Given the NES's sprite pushing system made possible by separate CHR ROM, and it was the first system to achieve arcade like graphical fidelity, and games became longer and more complex. You're not just limited to playing a single screen again and again with increasing difficulty.

 

The difference in refinement from Atari 2D to NES 2D is like going from chunky N64/PS1 3D graphics to Game Cube / PS2 era. In fact many retro gamers dislike 5th gen 3D as well. Their loss.

[totallyterrificpants]

We should have the Atari fans fight the Nintendo fans: Hell in the cell!

[PlayDoh003]

Kosmic makes a really good point in that Nintendo is still very relevant today, as is their IP - which brings up another. In that era, none of the manufacturers had a "mascot", per se. You could say that Namco created the first true mascot of video gaming (Pac-Man), and Nintendo managed to create the first mascot to carry a home console.

 

Atari never really managed to create an endearing character in their time. Sure, they created some really iconic games, but not characters. About the closest thing to a mascot that any of the early manufacturers had was maybe Mattel's "Running Man". And while Mario himself also started out as just a sprite made out of 3 colors, he's had the benefit of evolving over time, becoming ever more recognizable.

[Andromeda Stardust]

Kosmic makes a really good point in that Nintendo is still very relevant today, as is their IP - which brings up another. In that era, none of the manufacturers had a "mascot", per se. You could say that Namco created the first true mascot of video gaming (Pac-Man), and Nintendo managed to create the first mascot to carry a home console.

 

Atari never really managed to create an endearing character in their time. Sure, they created some really iconic games, but not characters. About the closest thing to a mascot that any of the early manufacturers had was maybe Mattel's "Running Man". And while Mario himself also started out as just a sprite made out of 3 colors, he's had the benefit of evolving over time, becoming ever more recognizable.

You make an excellent point. Namco and especially Pacman is very much still relevant today. Just look at the Namco plug and plays. The Pacman / Galaga arcade machines which are everywhere. Pop Vinyl figures. New games featuring the yellow mascot.

 

Where are the Atari mascots? Yeah so Atgames sold a few flashbacks. Whoppie-do. No love for the red Fuji symbol.

[Schizophretard]

^^Because repetitive gaming and crude rectangles and beeps and farts are very much an aquired taste. This coming from someone who grew up in the NES generation and didn't touch an Atari until 2012. The games look and sound like crap to the untrained palette. That's all people think of when they hear the name "Atari." That and ET and the Alamogordo landfill incident.

 

It also helps that Nintendo is still in the hardware business today. People just assume the NES was the first gaming system (or at least the first one that that doesn't suck) and go from there. Given the NES's sprite pushing system made possible by separate CHR ROM, and it was the first system to achieve arcade like graphical fidelity, and games became longer and more complex. You're not just limited to playing a single screen again and again with increasing difficulty.

 

The difference in refinement from Atari 2D to NES 2D is like going from chunky N64/PS1 3D graphics to Game Cube / PS2 era. In fact many retro gamers dislike 5th gen 3D as well. Their loss.

 

I get the difference people see between Atari and Nintendo, Nintendo still in the hardware business today, and all of that. What I don't get is why it seems like the little kids and teenagers who grew up with NES seem to be more into it now in their 30's and 40's instead of their 20's and 30's? I mean, you and I are the same age, we're both the NES generation except I experienced Atari too, and around 2000 we both became adults with jobs to start buying the systems we were into with not even having to rely on eBay entirely yet because it was easy to get them in the wild and for cheap and yet it is more recent times when the NES started seeming in high demand again. Around 2000 the Super NES, Genesis, and a lot of other consoles were cheap and out in the wild too. So, it seems like, just like with Atari, the NES along with other consoles from back then would have already been collected by those who are most likely to want to collect them because they grew up with them making it so that there wouldn't be many people left today trying to get them. So, why is it in high demand today instead of 10 years ago or earlier and why isn't it all about the PS1, N64, or some other more modern retro consoles today? Is there something about retro gamers that don't go as far back as precrash systems that causes them to have a big delay to start becoming a retro gamer or something? There just seems to be some kind of time gap to me because it feels like this should have all happened already. I mean, I worked with a guy in his 20's once that made me feel much older than I should when I told him I was a retro gamer and he said something like,"You mean like the XBOX? That is what I played as a kid."

[Andromeda Stardust]

I started collecting in 2002 with just the NES and it grew from there. Yeah I miss the prices at GameXChange and EBGames circa 2003-2004. Tons of great games available cheaply, and there was more of a rental style atmosphere where gamers would return stuff to the store for credit to pick up different games. It was more of a revolving door rather than the hoarder culture we have today. Mostly the people selling in just wanna cash out and the people buying don't sell their stuff back. Then the resellers come in pricing shit on their smart phones and stealing any good deals if they're below market. And mostly sports and garbage titles languish on shelves, neglected and unappreciated.