From Bedrooms to Billions: criminal lack of Atari 8-Bit

[Foebane]

The first documentary with this name had practically no mention of the Atari 8-bit series, just Speccy, Speccy, Speccy and C64, C64, C64. Heck, even the BBC Micro got more love than the Amstrad CPC!

 

The Amiga Years documentary addressed this a bit, but it was still only like a footnote.

 

I'm sick of the Speccy and C64 getting all the love and plaudits for solely creating the 8-bit games industry, it's an injustice!

 

[GroovyBee]

Taken from http://www.frombedroomstobillions.com/about-the-film, emphasis mine :-

 

"... documentary movie telling the remarkable, true story of the British Video Games Industry from 1979 to the present day."

 

In Britain during the early to mid 80s the Atari 8bit was a minority machine, the Speccy and C64 were the popular choices of the day. However in the US, the Atari 8bits were considerably more popular than they were over here.

 

 

[Foebane]

So? By your logic, the A8 should be covered too, In Britain, like the C64 was. After all, the A8 wasn't totally neglected in the UK, with plenty of conversions. I just wish they'd covered the machine with the better hardware.

[Mclaneinc]

Its a shame, it should have got a look in but they chose to cover the issue purely from the Brit viewpoint and just ignored the Atari was sold in order to do a more in depth of the C64 and Spectrum. It does annoy because the Atari was here in the UK and it sold well but never gained the same media following that the C64 and Spectrum had, remember the Speccy was a British computer so it was always going to sit well in the UK but they just leap frogged the 8 bit for the film.

[Mark Wright]

Setting all of the "mine's better than yours" squabbles and tedious specs comparisons to one side, it's a fact that the Atari 8-bit machines irrefutably enjoyed two distinct leases of the life in the UK, both significant. It's no surprise really that any contemporary revisionist re-telling of the UK's history of home computing should overlook the Atari, but here's my quick effort to make amends..

 

FIRST UK ATARI ERA

 

In the early months of the 1980s, the Ingersoll imported Atari 400/800s sold by the likes of Maplin and Silica Shop reigned supreme. They were very much the coveted rich man's plaything. As the press swooned, these hugely expensive machines quickly earned the reputation as the "must-have" home computers in the UK and attracted the sort of consumer who wanted and could afford the best car, best suit (etc.) The small community that sprung up to support the machines was the first of its type in the UK, but was severely limited by the elitist price-tag of all things Atari. Later, the homegrown ZX81 and domestically-priced Vic 20 attracted mass mainstream sales, much to the disgust of hardened UK Atarians who viewed these inferior machines as retrograde and unworthy. Nevertheless, the British voted with their pockets and, by 1983, much preferred to spend £6 on a Spectrum or C64 cassette (or copy it for free) compared to £25 for an ageing Atari cart.

 

Why is this short but important period overlooked? Well, it's mostly undocumented so today's teenage Wikipedia surfing "historians" know no different. However, those of us who were of excitable school age in the early 1980s might remember our first encounter with a home computer being a posh friend showing off Star Raiders or Miner 2049'er. Once machines finally appeared that were affordable to most impoverished UK households of the era, we didn't beg for them due to relentless TV advertising (it didn't exist) it was because we hoped for an approximation of something we'd seen on a rich mate's Atari. By 1984 this had all changed, with the rapid rise of and later dominance of the Spectrum and C64, the Atari was suddenly yesterday's machine - an expensive relic.

 

This era was generally hooked on Star Raiders and last played Drop Zone before losing interest.

 

SECOND UK ATARI ERA

 

By 1986 the first wave of UK Atari owners, making their final down payment on their £1000 investment, found themselves rubbing shoulders with a new breed of upstart Atarians. Jack Tramiel's offloading of fire sale priced 600/800XLs into UK retail channels (Dixons and Currys on the high street and catalogues like Great Universal and Kays) resulted in thrifty and naive, but well-meaning parents snapping up bargain close-out Ataris for their "computer obsessed" kids. In a matter of months, hundreds of thousands of discount packages were sold, to an army of youngsters craving the modern games enjoyed by their luckier friends - Uridium on the C64, Underwurlde on the Spectrum. A culture clash soon ensued between the elders with their lofty programmimg and hobbyist ideals and the instant gratification expected by the new recruits, plain for anyone to see in the magazines of the time (Page 6 especially!) This one-time Rolls-Royce running on $50 cart fuel had become a Ford Fiesta, content to survive on £1.99 fodder like Vegas Jackpot and Action Biker.

 

Why is this important renaissance period overlooked? At the time, the UK press was fixated with the unravelling of Sinclair. The fact that throughout 1985 and 1986 hundreds of thousands of 600/800XLs made their way into UK homes, thanks to Tramiel's Dixons dumping, went largely unreported - though it didn't go entirely un-noticed. Database Publications launched Atari User off the back of it. US Gold financed its expansion plans when Atari titles that were gathering dust suddenly started to shift. The original stalwart Atarians used to paying $50 for an import cart (or long since engrossed in the Multiboot/Menu disk piracy scene) were soon outnumbered by the less discerning newcomers, and the likes of Mastertronic, Americana, Players, Zeppelin, Red Rat, English Software, Tynesoft, Microdeal, Code Masters (even Ocean, Elite, Gremlin and Bubble Bus taking a chance) churned out a ready supply - of mostly sub-standard, disappointing fare. But at least it meant the tiny Atari corner in the local software store wasn't entirely empty.

 

This era was generally wowed by International Karate and thought Gauntlet was a load of expensive brown shit.

 

And - as a rough estimate - I'd suggest less than 5% of the former have ever posted here, and maybe 2% of the latter (me included!)

[Ely]

My friend got his 400 (then a replacement 800 very soon after) in the 1st Era (I want to say 82/83), he was the reason I bought my Atari in the 2nd era (Dec 86 from Silica Shop; The 130XE was £99 and 1050 was £129.99). I met my now best friend at College in Sep 86, and he had an 800XL (and 1050) which I assume came from Dixons in about 84/85. There's no doubt it was a much smaller user base, but I was so happy that I wasn't using the Dragon 32 my Dad bought in Dec 82 it didn't matter.

[Mclaneinc]

@Mark, that is why people were a tad annoyed that docu's like the one mentioned and in general the media at the time simply ignored the Atari and even now when there's nothing to confuse the issue they still in retro terms just forget whatever foot print the Atari had. I can understand at the time to a point although still incredibly arrogant to ignore the Atari 8bit but these days good old journalistic values (oops, are there any?) meant that a proper full account of history should have followed no matter how small the machines part, as long as it had a database of games it should have been given a nod.

[kiwilove]

Another doco that hardly mentions Atari - is the Commodore Wars one.

 

I haven't finished watching it - at the 1 hour mark, it starts covering the C-64. By which time it has shown the Caverns of Mars title screen - about 3? times (only a second on screen) while the audio continues the Commodore story. (the Atari advert for Yar's Revenge plays in the background also. Why on Earth the doco makers have these Atari only games present - is a little mystery? Maybe in reviewing their program - they simply have no idea these were Atari games? Or maybe it's their unsaid reference to Atari?) While the doco is insightful about that important time through to 1980-1981 - which claims successful mass sales of the ZX-81 and Vic-20 - while I always regarded these machines as bad introductions to the home computing scene simply because they were not capable computers at all - and only stepping stones to their successors.

 

I would of course rate the Atari 400 as the better buy - though it did cost a great deal more.

 

It's not a waste of time watching the Commodore Wars doco - as it does place you into that time period very well - though it mentions 'Atari' fleetingly - and I have yet to watch the last 39 minutes of it - which should enter into Amiga territory? (and Atari ST? since Tramiel features so prominently in it) ...

As a fan of Atari 8-bit computers - you have to get use to them being hardly mention in docos that cover the 8-bit generation.

 

Harvey

[kiwilove]

Note - for the above...

The Atari 800 (and 400) are mentioned from 1.05 onwards.

When describing the C-64 - the doco makes it sound like Commodore invented the usage of sprites and sprite collision.

 

Anyway - with the C-64 aggressive pricing - it did receive about 1/2 million computers sales in a month - and it was the top 8-bit machine of it's day. It is revealed why Jack left Commodore - the company he started - makes it sound like Bushnell - when he left Atari - how it was a difference in running the company that caused the rift.

This doco does not go into the 16-bit era - which of course would reveal how crazy and mixed up (ie. the Tramiels jumping ship and becoming direct competitors to Commodore) it would come to be.

 

It was revealing how Clive Sinclair did not want nor forsee how his creation (the Spectrum) would be such a videogames machine - because of not having a graphics chip.

 

Harvey

[calimero]

What is criminal in "From Bedrooms to Billions" is lies that R J Mical and Dave Needle spread for decades how Jack Tramiel want to get Amiga chips but couldn't... and bla bla.

 

And now all this lies got to documentary ?!?

 

WTF?

 

They even FAKE news paper article! This is criminal!

 

http://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?t=30697

[Mr Robot]

I came along right at the very beginning of the "Second Age", finally having saved enough to get a home computer, couldn't quite afford the more expensive C64, didn't want a crappy spectrum keyboard. The 800XL was a bargain and 'better' than all the other choices. Mine came with Star Raiders and Miner 2049'er on cart. I watched awesome British born software like Mercenary arriving and then quite rapidly it all just descended into budget cassette titles. I never pirated software on my 800XL, I paid for commercial titles, got a lot of stuff from the Page 6 PD software library and typed in the listings from Atari User Magazine (The UK Database Publishing one).

 

The release of the ST was the final nail in the coffin of the XL. The 130/65XE machines were (just like the C64c/C128) footnotes to the 8-bit line.

 

I can see why the Atari range got left out of Bedrooms to Billions, in the UK it was a niche machine that got artificially inflated popularity due to price cutting at the time in its life where it was already on the decline. It sits somewhere between the Dragon32/Oric/BBCb, and the C64/Spectrum and is doomed to fall into the cracks because of it. That doesn't make me love it any less.

[DGS-Atari]

Second era for me, October 1985 down to Dixons for a large box containing an 800XL, 1010, a joystick, and European Countries&Capitals, An Invitation to Programming, and The Lone Raider on tape. All for £59 if I remember correctly. Bargain!

[RAM]

Can't remember when exactly, but I do remember getting an 800XL from Dixons in Nottingham and carrying the box on the bus, my friend Ivan also got one about the same time although I can't remember who got one first, probably him, he only had a Vic20 so it was a big step up! Then we'd go into town to a shop called Intoto (ironically just round the corner from where I live now and it's a fashion shop) where I'd look at the games and Ivan would look at the programming books! First game I played on it was Pitfall II and it was light years ahead of the Spectrum games I was used to! My Dad then went to the local TV store where he got me a massive (as in old fashioned massive!) colour TV to play games on. Happy days...!