How powerful was the cancelled Atari Panther compared to the Atari ST/Amiga?

[zzip]

43 minutes ago, Leeroy ST said:

Which has nothing to do with your false claims of Atari not putting effort in video games. You not being impressed by what came out are called feelings.

Not my feelings at all.   I hate Super Mario Brothers.   I disliked the NES.  But fact is, while Atari had the mindshare of us early-80s kids,  Nintendo won the mindshare of late-80s kids with that and other games,  Atari had nothing to counter it.  They kept pushing late 70s/early 80s consoles and games trying to squeeze every last drop of cash out of those things.   That is why Nintendo is a big gaming company today and Atari is a nostalgia brand.

[Leeroy ST]

2 minutes ago, zzip said:

Not my feelings at all.   I hate Super Mario Brothers.   I disliked the NES.  But fact is, while Atari had the mindshare of us early-80s kids, 

And you have to be stopped right here because you are going to go off topic once again to something that has nothing to do with the argument you started with. They did what they could with the systems and if it wasn't good enough (same with Sega) it wasn't good enough, there's no ifs about it. But they did try.

 

(I will say though that Atari is still a "big" gaming company kind of, I mean it's inforgrams so. But that's another topic of how I'm pissed off they stole the name.) 

Edited September 24, 2020 by Leeroy ST

[zzip]

34 minutes ago, ColecoKing said:

You are talking about only a 6 month different for a game that at time was 2 years old?

The game may have been technically released in 1980, but it didn't become a craze until 81.  Early 82 was when it was nuts, spawning hit songs, breakfast cereals, etc.    By fall, Donkey Kong was getting more attention.

 

37 minutes ago, ColecoKing said:

Also yes, Revenue, the difference is moot in this case as games are $10 supposed to be $80 revenue cuts down with profit. No one in the industry was making money that's why it crashed and many layoffs and bankrupcies. If game cost $80 to make $30 of each cart and you have to drop it from that to $20 or less you are screwed.

For one, games were never $80 back then.  They were priced between $20 and $40 generally.   Games in the discount bin were usually $4.99

 

But this isn't unique to games.   Go into a record store and you find the cutout bin,  go into a bookstore and you find the bargain books section.  Overstock and selling things at a discount alone doesn't destroy industries.

 

41 minutes ago, ColecoKing said:

Demand never drive up everyone was buying bargain price video games. Some places retailers took out games but that's because there was no money in putting games on shelf, the rest moved everything to bargain bin everyone was buying it.

We were buying more games.  Instead of bugging our parents for $25 games, we could buy $5 games with our allowance.    5 games @ $5 brings the same revenue as 1 game @ $25.   Yes it destroys profits,  but as I showed, revenues were decimated,  that shows that demand for games dried up dramatically.

 

43 minutes ago, ColecoKing said:

No one in 1984 or 1985 was saying games are bad let's not buy any you brought what you could, even new games release in 1985! It took most of that year for money to come back into the industry.

Every kid in school was into games in 1982 when Pacman was the hottest thing around.  By 1985, it was distinctly uncool to be into games.   Yes there were still gamers around, but we kept it quiet and in whispers.  When the NES blew up, suddenly it was cool to be into games again.   I knew a lot of people who weren't playing anymore, or not playing as much.     Yes those of us still into games were still buying them where we could still find them.   But there were a lot less of us buying games.

 

48 minutes ago, ColecoKing said:

We never had another situation like that again because of standardized pricing and regulations put in place, even outside of video games. Today, a company can't make a COD clone when standard price is $60 for a game and sell it and mass market it at $20. It would have to be a small project with low budget or maybe indie game. A major AAA game doing that would be instantly criticized or worse before the game was even put on the shelf.

Games release at all price tiers today, I see $60 games, $40 games, $20, $15.   The $60 games often go on sale for $30 or less.

[desiv]

8 minutes ago, zzip said:

For one, games were never $80 back then.  They were priced between $20 and $40 generally.   Games in the discount bin were usually $4.99

True, but have you considered running that $40 thru an "adjusted for inflation" calculator?

You might be surprised.

And in this discussion, we shouldn't forget the ..er.. creative business tactics Nintendo used with 3rd party devs.

(To be fair, it was a practice that Jack Tramiel would have thought was a great idea, if it were he who did it.) 

Edited September 24, 2020 by desiv

[ColecoKing]

Anecdotes are anecdotes

But this isn't unique to games. Go into a record store and you find the cutout bin, go into a bookstore and you find the bargain books section. Overstock and selling things at a discount alone doesn't destroy industries.

EVERY COMPANY was LOSING MONEY to companies selling games at lower prices. EVERY COMPANY had to cut prices on consoles EVERYONE had to play catch with the name guys on the block who was selling games at mass reduced prices by the amount I use in my $80 example. You can reduce it to $60 or $40 if you want which were more common price but I though it got point across better.

Industry was already fragile, what you think happen to revenues if barely anyone is earning revenues? Yes 5 games at $5 is the same as $25 for 1 game TOO CONSUMER not company. Company already selling 1 game at a loss now they lost quintuple the sales on 5 game? Bankruptcy, The more games that were brought the worst the industry crash. Prices started to come back up after 1984 same with Computer prices slowly.

You think that 5 games at $5 give gaming company same profit? No, it makes loss bigger! Some had to write off the stock and retailers just put in anyprice and that write off was sometimes the end. Others they drop price themselves burning their companies to the ground to keep up with price competition. Console also do the same thing you have $199 console it's not $75 you are paying people to buy it!

Yes you do, but how many todays AAA games you see of COD quality selling at $20? none. It would cause backlash, like company creating stronger console than Xbox and PS5 and selling it for $150. Assuming they don't immediately file bankruptcy they can't do that it will be sent to court.

[mr_me]

4 hours ago, Leeroy ST said:

...

 

If anything you just prove my point that almost every person on the opposing side isn't interested in being historically accurate, just how they feel which isn't relevant. I not even a fan of the 7800 or the 2600, partial fan of the ST, yet I only posted actual articles verifying what "happened" at the time and yes Atari Corp did put effort into games despite peoples feelings with the resource they had, which were limited until ST money came in and event hen were still limited. Atari Corp was never that big of a company. 

 

Like I said if people want to argue on whether 7800 was impressive than ok that's a completely different argument to making the false claim Atari Corp didn't put effort into the 7800, they used the resources they could. 

 

https://atariage.com/forums/topic/310881-how-powerful-was-the-cancelled-atari-panther-compared-to-the-atari-stamiga/?do=findComment&comment=4639147

 

In the above post I went through the newspaper articles and historical information presented.  Objectively, it's not proof of anything.

 

Even the hiring of Michael Katz, according to their own press release, was for the "management of the sales and marketing functions for Atari's domestic lines of computer hardware and software ".  It added "and responsible for the initiation, development and management of a new division offering entertainment electronics products".  Entertainnent electronics (video games) is only part of his role; and also note it is a new division in a company that was one year and six months old.  A company that was created to introduce a new 16/32-bit computer in to the market.  I'm sure Michael Katz took video games seriously at Atari Corp but he only had a $300k marketing budget to launch the atari 7800.  I wonder how he felt about that; did Atari Corp use their resources effectively.

 

Tramiel brought excellent low cost computers to the masses at Commodore in the early 1980s.  The focus was hardware not software.  At Atari Corp he created a new low cost 16/32-bit computer.  Atari Corp did supply and manufacture video games created by others.  Successful or not a video game company creates video games.  Atari Inc created Asteroids and Missile Command.  Nintendo created Donkey Kong and Zelda.  Mattel Electronics pioneered sports video games and created many other unique video games, Sega was known for their driving video games, and created Sonic and others.  I know Atari Corp did create some video games in the 1980s, what are they.

 

4 hours ago, ColecoKing said:

Mr_Me evidence is 1 million US sold 5200 to 1.5 million CV in october 1984 when 5200 was already on clearance and pulled out at the beginning of the year, that gap can't work without the 5200 being ahead then CV inching ahead by 500,000.
 

 

Can you site a source for the 1.5M colecovision US sales.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/1983/08/01/business/coleco-strong-in-marketing.html

 

Atari reported 1M atari 5200 consoles total after it went out of production in may 1984.  They were all ntsc so mostly in the united states and canada.  The article link above has 1.4M colecovisions total through mid 1983.  And since pal colecovisions weren't introduced until the second half of 1983, those are almost all ntsc, mostly in the united states and canada.  I'm still trying to understand how the atari 5200 outsold colecovision in the united states.

[Goochman]

Maybe we could take a different angle here.

 

I can say I agree 100% with LeeRoy that Atari Corp was in the "Video Game" business.  They def hired people to market and sell consoles and carts.

 

Where I think we differ is in the seriousness of Atari's attempt.

 

Not sure if anyone has any #s but maybe this could clear things up - what percentage of the companies limited resources were dedicated to the Computer line vs the Video Game division.  If its less than 30% then I think we have our answer in that the VG biz was not the main focus.  My guess is it was prob less than 20%, but dont have the numbers.

 

[mr_me]

It doesn't have to be their main focus.  Video games is not the main focus at Microsoft.  The same can probably be said about Sony.  They do have to give them the resources they need for a chance to be successful.

Edited September 25, 2020 by mr_me

[Goochman]

9 hours ago, mr_me said:

It doesn't have to be their main focus.  Video games is not the main focus at Microsoft.  The same can probably be said about Sony.  They do have to give them the resources they need for a chance to be successful.

Well, Microsoft can sell XBOX hardware at a loss without a problem.  They can dedicate more $$$ than most companies bring in a year which is still small beans to MSFT overall.

 

We're talking Atari in the mid 80s.  No money losing Divisions we going to fly so with its limited resources it says alot as to the level of resource commitment Atari had at the time.

[mr_me]

Nobody is comparing them to microsoft, just saying a video game company can have other business interests.  A $300k marketing budget and no investment in developing new relevent titles to support the effort isn't good enough for a video game company at the time.

[zzip]

15 hours ago, ColecoKing said:

Industry was already fragile, what you think happen to revenues if barely anyone is earning revenues? Yes 5 games at $5 is the same as $25 for 1 game TOO CONSUMER not company. Company already selling 1 game at a loss now they lost quintuple the sales on 5 game? Bankruptcy, The more games that were brought the worst the industry crash. Prices started to come back up after 1984 same with Computer prices slowly.

You think that 5 games at $5 give gaming company same profit? No, it makes loss bigger! Some had to write off the stock and retailers just put in anyprice and that write off was sometimes the end. Others they drop price themselves burning their companies to the ground to keep up with price competition. Console also do the same thing you have $199 console it's not $75 you are paying people to buy it!

You are confusing revenue with profit.   I already said in my post that profits would be wiped out by deeply discounted games.   But If consumers spent the same money on five games as they did on one that cost 5x, then revenues would be the same.

 

However let's assume consumers bought the same number of games at the discounted price, meaning demand for games is unchanged.  And I'll go with the highest price games at the time (generally $40)  and go with a the common price of bargain bin games: $5    That is a reduction of 87.5% cost

 

home video game revenue before the crash was $32 billion.  If crash was caused by cheap games and not consumer demand, then revenue should have fallen to $4 billion.   This is worst case. Some of the discounted games started at $20 or $30, and not all games ended up in the bargain bin.

 

However the revenue fell to $100 million which is much lower.   That shows a significant drop in demand no matter how you slice it.

 

16 hours ago, ColecoKing said:

Yes you do, but how many todays AAA games you see of COD quality selling at $20? none. It would cause backlash, like company creating stronger console than Xbox and PS5 and selling it for $150. Assuming they don't immediately file bankruptcy they can't do that it will be sent to court

I just looked in the PS store,  here's a few AAA games that originally sold for $60 and their current sale price:

 

Anthem:    $11.99

Battlefield 1:  $7.99

Need For Speed: $7.49

Tom Clancy's The Division: $7.49

 

And several others.  This happens all the time.   Only brand new games can command the $60 price tag,  after a few months you can get them at half-off.  After a few years, you can get them at steep discounts.   But is last year's Need for Speed title worse quality than this year's $60 Need for Speed?   Not usually!   You are getting the same quality for a lot less money.

 

[zzip]

18 hours ago, Leeroy ST said:

If anything you just prove my point that almost every person on the opposing side isn't interested in being historically accurate, just how they feel which isn't relevant. I not even a fan of the 7800 or the 2600, partial fan of the ST, yet I only posted actual articles verifying what "happened" at the time and yes Atari Corp did put effort into games despite peoples feelings with the resource they had, which were limited until ST money came in and event hen were still limited. Atari Corp was never that big of a company. 

I was a fan of Atari, I was in a user group, worked on their newsletter and had my finger on the pulse of Atari news and community reaction.   So I watched all this unfold in real time.   Newspaper articles generally tell the story the company wants to tell at the time.  They don't always show where a company's actions don't match its promises.   Insiders often tell a very different story once they've left the company than what they told the press at the time.

 

[ColecoKing]

Mr_me 1.5 million I found older source than one before September 1984 Iowa Gazette and St. Louis Disptach both "Coleco sold 1.5 million Colecovisions in United States but you can't find an Adam anywhere. luckily, you can turn your Colecovision into an Adam Computer with the Adam Expansion Module"

Zzip

here's a few AAA games that originally sold for $60 and their current sale price:

home video game revenue before the crash was $32 billion

You can't be serious? You saying Anthem was $11 at launch for first year? No? Then why would you even think this is proof of anything?? New games were much less than regular price back then, proper example is Anthem releasing brand new AA game at $15 instead of $60. That never happens and would be send to court, same with console if they launch new powerful AAA Xbox PS competitor at $150, goes right to court.

I am also not confusing revenue with profit you don't know how they are related. You can have high revenue and low to know profit but you still have to generate income for revenue, if NO ONE GENERATING INCOME REVENUE DROP. $5 for 5 game Revenue is the TOTAL income generated by the sale of goods or services related to the company business. Company is not getting same profit OR Revenue with 5 $5 games and than 1 $25 game, that not how it works.

Also 32 billion? Where you get nonsense numbers? It was 3.5 billion or 4 billion based on how it was calculated. 1995 was $30 billion, you think CV, Intell, and Atari was bigger than 3DO, Jaguar, PSX, Saturn, SNES, Mega Drive, and others in 1995?

If the industry was worth $32 billion there be no crash and those three would be some of richest companies in history of the planet. Even if you add arcades you aren't going to get more than $12 billion and that was peak arcade.

[mr_me]

46 minutes ago, ColecoKing said:

Mr_me 1.5 million I found older source than one before September 1984 Iowa Gazette and St. Louis Disptach both "Coleco sold 1.5 million Colecovisions in United States but you can't find an Adam anywhere. luckily, you can turn your Colecovision into an Adam Computer with the Adam Expansion Module"

This is from the new york times article I posted earlier dated 1983 August 1.

"Since its introduction last fall, Colecovision has sold about 1.4 million units, according to the Video Marketing Game Letter, an industry newsletter." 

 

Pal colecovisions weren't introduced in europe until the second half of 1983 so those are ntsc colecovisions.  What this suggests is that colecovisions sold well through 1983Q2 but had a disappointing Christmas 1983.   The Atari 5200 might have had a strong Christmas 1983 and outsold colecovision in the united states for that quarter.  How may atari 5200 were sold in 1982, how many in the first half of 1983.  It could have outsold colecovision in the united states at christmas 1983 but we need more atari 5200 sales data not more colecovision data.

[Leeroy ST]

14 hours ago, mr_me said:

The focus was hardware not software. 

Yet he had a bunch of software for the ST/ Weird how what you're saying and what actually happened are different.

 

14 hours ago, mr_me said:

I'm sure Michael Katz took video games seriously at Atari Corp but he only had a $300k marketing budget to launch the atari 7800. 

There's two problems with this quote and the first will be mentioned below, the 2nd is your 300k nonsense and doesn't come from any reliable source other than some book that doesn't have a credible citation which is quoted on wikipedia.

 

 

They also confirm this later in 1987 (this is from 1986) they spend millions on marketing. Not 300k. Was it as high as Nintendo and Sega? No, also who was the company most strapped for cash and the most broke at the start of 1986? Atari. Hmmm could it be? A connection?

 

4 hours ago, mr_me said:

A $300k marketing budget and no investment in developing new relevent titles.

As shown above, 300k is nonsense made up number.

 

Also were developing games, so I don't know where you're pulling this crap from. Even converted a licensed game from a third party that couldn't publish on their platform early (Namco), some were delayed until 87. You seem to just be spreading fud.

 

Here's also another thing that you and other ignore for some reason and goes into the first point I mentioned above:

 

 

 

 

 

So I feel like this is where the "feelings" and "reality" conflict the most, you and zzip (made up 300k number aside) seem to mostly be claiming that somehow the amount "spent" somehow connect with how much Atari "tried" with games while ignoring all evidence showing otherwise with all the expenses and things they did.

 

But this is mostly because you refuse to admit and will continuously dismiss Atari Corp had very little cash. This is something that continues to shut off your brains and I don't know why you guys won't just let it go.

 

Of course Atari could only spend a couple million on advertising and millions more than that on production of consoles, retail deals, and cartridge creation. I wouldn't be surprised if 1986 Atari overall in all relevant categories spend over $15 million, doesn't matter, that was all they had. Nintendo was going to spend over $10 million on ads and likely close to double that on production, Sega spend 9 million on ads and maybe half that on production (Sega wasn't in much better position than Atari in software).

 

This makes perfect sense for a company that lost 14.5 million in 1985, due to reviving the 2600jr project, to revving the 5200, to starting software development, and launching the ST computer line with it's own software and they were just getting into developing first party stuff for that as well.

 

The same ST that people were skeptical and though Atari was overpromising because they didn't think Atari had the resources financially to launch the ST computers in the first place.

 

I don't know why you guys continue to believe that Atari had more money than they did or that there was some magic money tree they could have went to. If you wanted Atari to spend $9 million on ads alone you should have gotten rich and loaned the money to Atari in 1985. 

 

I mean seriously, they were already losing money on the lottery that the ST line would work. They did the best they could, if you don't like what came out of "best they could" fine, but don't lie and say, because you felt like it wasn't enough for you personally, that it meant they didn't put in any resources when they didn't have any damn money.

 

If anything the ST was lucky because of some pricing and other mistakes competitors made which made a low-cost mid-range machine look good. Amiga haven't virtually no software in comparison probably helped with that as well. If ST failed we'd probably either have nothing or Warner may have eventually sucked it up and stopped trying to sell the company, 

 

 

[Leeroy ST]

1 hour ago, zzip said:

I was a fan of Atari, I was in a user group, worked on their newsletter and had my finger on the pulse of Atari news and community reaction.   So I watched all this unfold in real time.   Newspaper articles generally tell the story the company wants to tell at the time.  They don't always show where a company's actions don't match its promises.   Insiders often tell a very different story once they've left the company than what they told the press at the time.

 

No, that excuse doesn't apply to these articles. Articles for example, talking about Atari's lack of cash or insiders being skeptical that Atari could afford to launch even the ST are important. Articles about what products were brought back and were clearly sold are important. You're just angry that Atari wasn't able to do better so you blame it on effort instead of lack of cash when it's very very very very very very very very clear Atari Corp didn't have cash, and you can try to make excuses that they could have went to a magic money tree but that didn't happen.

 

They ended up spending more as more money came in like any other company and if you were still disappointing then that's fine. But why spread false narrative they didn't try? Just said that you didn't like how they handled the resources they had and the result of it. There, problem solved.

 

I personally think all 3 were poorly executed, with all 3 being incremental upgrade with old parts holding back gaming for years. But when talking about Atari Corp I'm not going to pretend they didn't have money.

 

What's funny is relative to Atari Sega did have money, spend more money, and they still did a pretty poor job overall, although likely to you they did much better than Atari, but both had similar results in the marketplace so cash strapped Atari managed to match a company with more games and money. The old 70's 2600 outsold both combined and it even had new games, new outdated style games that were apparently still popular despite people constantly hating on the 7800's launch window. 

 

[zzip]

1 hour ago, ColecoKing said:

You can't be serious? You saying Anthem was $11 at launch for first year?

NO!  I never said it was $11 the first year.   I'm saying you can buy AAA games at bargain bin prices even now.   If the argument is that they couldn't sell full-price games in 84 because stores had bargain bins full of cheap games.   I'm asking why is that different when we still buy games for cheap?   Back then the bins tended to be full of games like "Sneak and Peek", "Lost Luggage", but not so much "Ms. Pacman" or "Crystal Castles",  so if you wanted the bigger games, you were still paying full price.

 

2 hours ago, ColecoKing said:

Also 32 billion? Where you get nonsense numbers? It was 3.5 billion or 4 billion based on how it was calculated. 1995 was $30 billion, you think CV, Intell, and Atari was bigger than 3DO, Jaguar, PSX, Saturn, SNES, Mega Drive, and others in 1995?

3.2 billion, I missed a decimal point.   But still 90% discount doesn't get you to $100 million.  People were simply buying fewer games.

[zzip]

10 minutes ago, Leeroy ST said:

No, that excuse doesn't apply to these articles. Articles for example, talking about Atari's lack of cash or insiders being skeptical that Atari could afford to launch even the ST are important. Articles about what products were brought back and were clearly sold are important. You're just angry that Atari wasn't able to do better so you blame it on effort instead of lack of cash when it's very very very very very very very very clear Atari Corp didn't have cash, and you can try to make excuses that they could have went to a magic money tree but that didn't happen.

I'm not mad that they didn't, I'm just stating the fact that they were more focused on their ST line than anything else.   They put their resources there, and everything else was minimal effort by comparison.   That's the product Jack wanted to sell, and that's why he bought the company.   Fine.  For the record, I owned Atari computers at the time,  I didn't have a 7800 or 5200.  I had a 2600 that collected dust.  So the focus on computers was good news for me.   I'm just saying how things went down, and the moves they made in the early days pretty much doomed the chances of any Panther or Jaguar console of having a chance, because they blew the market advantage they had in the games market.

 

Prior to him buying it, Atari was a video game brand that had a line of computers on the side that did OK in the marketplace, but weren't really profitable.   When Jack bought it, he turned into a computer company that had a line of videogame consoles on the side. 

 

Late 80s/early 90s they saw the writing on the wall that they couldn't compete with the clone market and decided they had to get more serious about the games side, because that's where the money was.   But by that time it was too late, they lost most of their market share and mind share to Nintendo.

 

I don't deny that they didn't have lots of cash.  But where you spend the cash you have shows where your priorities are.  And that was clearly the ST line.   But you can't just show up to the videogame market and expect to win.  You have to be competitive, you have to bring the games people want to play now, not simply reissue the games people played four years ago,  That takes money.   That's why I and many others say they simply weren't serious about the games market.

 

[Leeroy ST]

10 minutes ago, zzip said:

I'm not mad that they didn't, I'm just stating the fact that they were more focused on their ST line than anything else.   They put their resources there, and everything else was minimal effort by comparison.  

 

And this is the part you keep getting wrong, there wasn't "minimal effort" they put in as much effort as they could out of what was not put in the COMPANIES LIFELINE.

 

10 minutes ago, zzip said:

I'm just saying how things went down, and the moves they made in the early days pretty much doomed the chances of any Panther or Jaguar console of having a chance, because they blew the market advantage they had in the games market.

Now you're going off in a completely different direction and making a connection that isn't there. The Panther was cancelled, the Jaguar was Atari without money and they had though their sales of 20,000, yes 20,000, may have convince people to support the platform, don't believe me? Here you go:

 

 

Lynx was the best selling Atari product not the 2600 so they could have remained in the game with better strategy but leadership changed and messed things up, 7800 had nothing to do with it. Things like Jaguar were just independent dumb decisions.

 

Quote

Lost mindshare to Nintendo

Which had nothing to do with anything. Atari couldn't produce enough console to compete against the first couple years of NES even if they wanted to, and Lynx was a later console that ended up being their second best selling with reported 5 million world wide.

 

Money and change of management are the only real issues that hampered anything gaming related Atari came out with. Again this is you being mad and finding excuses, the fact you think moves with the 7800 somehow relate to the Jaguars failure doesn't make sense. Management was trash.

 

Why would any company think "pat on the back we got em now" with 20,000 consoles?

Edited September 25, 2020 by Leeroy ST

[mr_me]

2 hours ago, Leeroy ST said:

Yet he had a bunch of software for the ST/ Weird how what you're saying and what actually happened are different.

 

There's two problems with this quote and the first will be mentioned below, the 2nd is your 300k nonsense and doesn't come from any reliable source other than some book that doesn't have a credible citation which is quoted on wikipedia.

 

 

They also confirm this later in 1987 (this is from 1986) they spend millions on marketing. Not 300k. Was it as high as Nintendo and Sega? No, also who was the company most strapped for cash and the most broke at the start of 1986? Atari. Hmmm could it be? A connection?

 

As shown above, 300k is nonsense made up number.

 

Also were developing games, so I don't know where you're pulling this crap from. Even converted a licensed game from a third party that couldn't publish on their platform early (Namco), some were delayed until 87. You seem to just be spreading fud.

 

Here's also another thing that you and other ignore for some reason and goes into the first point I mentioned above:

 

 

 

 

 

So I feel like this is where the "feelings" and "reality" conflict the most, you and zzip (made up 300k number aside) seem to mostly be claiming that somehow the amount "spent" somehow connect with how much Atari "tried" with games while ignoring all evidence showing otherwise with all the expenses and things they did.

 

But this is mostly because you refuse to admit and will continuously dismiss Atari Corp had very little cash. This is something that continues to shut off your brains and I don't know why you guys won't just let it go.

 

Of course Atari could only spend a couple million on advertising and millions more than that on production of consoles, retail deals, and cartridge creation. I wouldn't be surprised if 1986 Atari overall in all relevant categories spend over $15 million, doesn't matter, that was all they had. Nintendo was going to spend over $10 million on ads and likely close to double that on production, Sega spend 9 million on ads and maybe half that on production (Sega wasn't in much better position than Atari in software).

 

This makes perfect sense for a company that lost 14.5 million in 1985, due to reviving the 2600jr project, to revving the 5200, to starting software development, and launching the ST computer line with it's own software and they were just getting into developing first party stuff for that as well.

 

The same ST that people were skeptical and though Atari was overpromising because they didn't think Atari had the resources financially to launch the ST computers in the first place.

 

I don't know why you guys continue to believe that Atari had more money than they did or that there was some magic money tree they could have went to. If you wanted Atari to spend $9 million on ads alone you should have gotten rich and loaned the money to Atari in 1985. 

 

I mean seriously, they were already losing money on the lottery that the ST line would work. They did the best they could, if you don't like what came out of "best they could" fine, but don't lie and say, because you felt like it wasn't enough for you personally, that it meant they didn't put in any resources when they didn't have any damn money.

 

If anything the ST was lucky because of some pricing and other mistakes competitors made which made a low-cost mid-range machine look good. Amiga haven't virtually no software in comparison probably helped with that as well. If ST failed we'd probably either have nothing or Warner may have eventually sucked it up and stopped trying to sell the company, 

 

 

I wouldn't doubt that Atari Corp was involved in the development of software for their computers and more importantly I said I know they developed Atari 7800 games.  I just asked what are they?

 

Where is that article about marketing budgets from, what's the date?  If the $300,000 atari 7800 launch marketing budget is wrong that would be great.  It's not my nonsense or feelings.  But I haven't seen anything that contradicts it.  If Atari Corp spent a couple million on marketing, it could include the Atari ST and Atari 2600 jr as well.  I found the following.

 

"1986 August 18: For the first time since 1984, Atari had scheduled a return to television advertising in early September, using two new 30-second spots which had doubled sales volume during a July test in Philadelphia.  Michael Katz was Atari president-electronics entertainment division.  One of Atari's two spots was for the 7800 ($80), the other for the 2600 ($50).  The ads were set to run through the Christmas holiday. (AdWeek)"

 

Another article posted in this thread stated "advertising budget has been spent only on deeply discounted 'spot' ads".

 

It's not surprising that a new computer company developing a new computer would lose money its first year.  It could have been much worse for Atari Corp without the incone from the old atari inc accounts receivables they acquired, the cash loans from Warner, and income from the sale of product inventory they aquired from warner.  But the losses were due to an investment in developing a new 16/32-bit computer and not video games but that's exactly what would be expected from a computer company.

 

Resources were limited.  Could Atari have done more to support the Atari 7800.  As a computer company developing a new machine to compete against apple, ibm, and commodore, I suppose not.  But it's understandable.

Edited September 25, 2020 by mr_me

[zzip]

37 minutes ago, Leeroy ST said:

Which had nothing to do with anything. Atari couldn't produce enough console to compete against the first couple years of NES even if they wanted to, and Lynx was a later console that ended up being their second best selling with reported 5 million world wide.

They could if they really wanted to.  If they truly couldn't untangle the 7800 mess, then do the XEGS in 85.  It would have been more relevant then.   Or you're the one who claims they revived the 5200.    But instead by 1987 they are in the ridiculous position of having 3 consoles on the market  (or four if they actually did revive the 5200),  each with basically the same lineup of old games, meaning they are competing against themselves.    That screams "we have no strategy!".   Nintendo would have been laughing all the way to the bank.

 

They got lucky with the Lynx--  Epyx engineers designed it and sold it to them, Epyx designed some nice games for it.   I'm sure if Jack's people had set out to design a handheld and produce games for it, it would have turned out just wonderful ?

 

57 minutes ago, Leeroy ST said:

Management was trash.

Really?  You're the one who spent pages and pages arguing they did a fine job when it came to videogames.    ?

 

58 minutes ago, Leeroy ST said:

the fact you think moves with the 7800 somehow relate to the Jaguars failure doesn't make sense.

in 1984 Atari was king of videogames, Nintendo feared them, that's why they tried to make a deal to get Atari to sell NES in North America.

in 1994 Atari was the company that most people were surprised to learn still existed.

 

Something happened in that 10 year span to cause such a drastic change.  Hmm wonder what it could be?

 

Not just the 7800, but the sum total of all the moves they made in the 80s hurt the brand, and made it difficult to sell a lot of Jaguars no matter what the tech inside was.   How do you not see this?  Nintendo probably have had a system identical to Jaguar and sold 10x Atari's total run in just the first weekend.

 

[Leeroy ST]

26 minutes ago, mr_me said:

I wouldn't doubt that Atari Corp was involved in the development of software for their computers and more importantly I said I know they developed Atari 7800 games.  I just asked what are they?

 

Where is that article about marketing budgets from, what's the date?  If the $300,000 atari 7800 launch marketing budget is wrong that would be great.  It's not my nonsense or feelings.  But I haven't seen anything that contradicts it.  If Atari Corp spent a couple million on marketing, it could include the Atari ST and Atari 2600 jr as well. 

The article clearly specifies video games consoles in relation to competitors in that space so not the ST, which they would have had to spend a lot more than "low millions" to work they lost close too ten times that in the home computer space.

 

27 minutes ago, mr_me said:

Resources were limited.  Could Atari have done more to support the Atari 7800.  As a computer company developing a new machine to compete against apple, ibm, and commodore, I suppose not.  

Which is why I say they did the best they could with what they had

 

24 minutes ago, zzip said:

They could if they really wanted to.  If they truly couldn't untangle the 7800 mess, then do the XEGS in 85.  It would have been more relevant then.  

 

XEGS was weaker than 7800, XE also only just came out so an immediate consolization wouldn't make sense at the same time. Then you have the separate issue of how many units they could produce with the money they had and then they would have to find out how much marketing they had.Company just didn't have the money.

 

26 minutes ago, zzip said:

They could if they really wanted to.  If they truly couldn't untangle the 7800 mess, then do the XEGS in 85.  It would have been more relevant then.   Or you're the one who claims they revived the 5200.    But instead by 1987 they are in the ridiculous position of having 3 consoles on the market  (or four if they actually did revive the 5200),  each with basically the same lineup of old games, meaning they are competing against themselves.

 

This only really applies to the 2600 and 7800 when looking more and more into it, and has been mentioned by others on this board, it seems clear that the 2600 cannibalized 7800 sales although by how much is unknown since the 7800 had another separate issue with low production numbers which had nothing to do with the 2600. The other machines didn't have a strong enough market presence to be an issue outside the first few months of the XEGS where it sold out it's shipment and did well a bit after but that may have just been old 8-bit fans happy they finally got a console that represents them with controllers that work lol.

 

28 minutes ago, zzip said:

Really?  You're the one who spent pages and pages arguing they did a fine job when it came to videogames.    ?

 

 

 

I don't know why you think Atari from 85-92 is the same Atari from 92-96 because they aren't and we have been arguing about the former.

 

29 minutes ago, zzip said:

in 1994 Atari was the company that most people were surprised to learn still existed.

 

If you ignore millions in in 2600, 7800, and ST sales sure but that's really just not true.

 

30 minutes ago, zzip said:

Something happened in that 10 year span to cause such a drastic change.  Hmm wonder what it could be?

 

Multiple management changes with company leaders having conflicting visions. If the team that launched the Lynx still had control over it, it would have been a much bigger success than Jaguar Atari cutting it off the market cutting it's sales short than deciding that oops we made a mistake keep it until 95 but spend no money on marketing. You are trying to say past decisions impacted future ones when they are independent decisions by an independent group of idiots.

 

7800 set a platform for Atari to grow off of as did the ST, after the change Atari's computer marketshare evaporated, they discontinued all systems that brought in easy revenue, and they cut the Lynx's momentum to focus on a console they could only ship 20,000 units of during it's test run.

 

33 minutes ago, zzip said:

Not just the 7800, but the sum total of all the moves they made in the 80s hurt the brand, 

 

Actually Atari as a brand rebounded in the 80's and kept growing and expanding which is why the Lynx and Panther even existed. You are taking independent decisions and saying that they were due to unrelated people form years earlier who had a completely different vision that actually worked and didn't send the company into bankruptcy unlike in 1996.

 

Like I said you are letting the feelings crack your judgement, there's no relations to a growing 7800 platform that started with no money and eventually sold close to 2 million units in the US and maybe 3 overall, along with significant market share for computers, and dumb decisions by people that were not or barely involved with the former.

 

[Hwlngmad]

Atari Corp. was focused on computers, and trying to sink Commodore while they were at it.  While Atari Corp. did have some semblance of a home video game interest, it was a clear second fiddle to what they were trying to do with computers.  Michael Katz and others that have been interviewed have corroborated as such.  That being said, I think Atari Corp. did give it the 'old college try' with home video games with the Atari 2600 Jr., 7800, and XEGS.  However, by the time they tried to latch firmly onto the video game gravy train with the Atari Jaguar, it was too little too late as they simply didn't have the resources and/or clout to really push the Jaguar hard, which is sad because I think it was a pretty good system.  But, then again, many a good system have not met with the success it should have had. 

[mr_me]

2 hours ago, Leeroy ST said:

The article clearly specifies video games consoles in relation to competitors in that space so not the ST, which they would have had to spend a lot more than "low millions" to work they lost close too ten times that in the home computer space.

The losses were in 1985, likely due to hardware development costs of their 16/32-bit computer.  Atar Corp was profitable in 1986.

 

The article seems to be about video games, but there's nothing to indicate that the planned atari marketing budget reported is specific to the atari 7800 rather than the company's marketing budget for the year.  It's also what is planned to be spent, you said you have confirmation on that marketing spending later.  Can we see it?

 

I'll add that in the Michael Katz antic audio interview he talked about a project that Tramiel pulled the plug on at the last minute because he didn't want to commit the money on marketing and manufacturing.  He also said that they had a difficult time getting independent developers because they were afraid there wasn't going to be marketing behind it.  He also mentioned that those were fair concerns.  More important than marketing, he also said for "a game system to succeed it has to have the best software".  Successful or not, video game companies create their own games.  What video games did atari corp create in the 1980s?

Edited September 25, 2020 by mr_me

[OldSchoolRetroGamer]