+x=usr(1536) Posted May 30, 2018 Share Posted May 30, 2018 Are the Pi Zeros obtainable now? I tried for months, they'd sell out in seconds. If you're willing to bump up to the $10 model, Zero Ws are widely available. Having had both, I'd recommend the W - on-board WiFi means that you don't have to clog up the one USB port with a hub just to get it networked. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flojomojo Posted May 30, 2018 Share Posted May 30, 2018 And yet only a total of 4200 or so consoles have been ordered with over 1300 backers opting not to receive any perks at all. Something is off here. Perhaps some of them just flipped in a token amount just to receive backer-only updates? It's still very early in their campaign. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bojay1997 Posted May 30, 2018 Share Posted May 30, 2018 Perhaps some of them just flipped in a token amount just to receive backer-only updates? It's still very early in their campaign. That's an awful lot of people looking for campaign information if that's the case. People do this on Kickstarter where there is a specific tier usually for $1 or something, but I've never seen them do it on Indiegogo. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+x=usr(1536) Posted May 30, 2018 Share Posted May 30, 2018 What I think we're seeing is the rush for the early adopter packages along with some interest in the controllers. The rest may just be oar-in-the-water backers looking to contribute at a lower level and/or simply have access to backer-only progress updates. What will be interesting to watch is where funding sits at the close of the campaign. My memory may be off on this, but I seem to recall Atari SA mentioning that they were aiming for $5 million in order to reach production. $1.7 million is quite a bit short of that, but it's only the first day. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
82-T/A Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 I was seriously considering buying one... I mean, I was dead-set on buying one. Now I'm not so sure. I didn't realize that what they were doing was a "Kickstarter," and that's kind of turned me off to it. I totally don't mind at all plunking down $200 bucks for a Vader VCS; however, I don't like the prospect that it could just be going to someone who's not going to produce, and then I'm out $200 bucks. Not to mention, the shipment date isn't until July 2019. I think I'm kind of over it... I'm sorry Atari. This launch was handled very poorly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andromeda Stardust Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 They can keep their console. All I want is the slick looking joystick. If they have a low priced "controller only" teir, that's what I'll be backing. At this time I have zero interest in the actual console. I ordered a classic joystick during my 10 o'clock break today at work. Paid US $33 with shipping fees. I have no idea if it will have analog capability or just a really nice 8-way. If it's a really nice feeling 8-way, I plan on gutting the PCB and modding it for wired use with a vintage console. The LEDs can light up off the 5V VCC connection. My email confirmation did not come in until an hour and a half after my order was placed. Fortunately no duplicate orders like some people were alluding to. And what's with all these people coming out of the woodworks clamoring for these new Atari? I wish them well, and certainly seems to be making more progress than the unnamed Coleco console that was heavily publicized a couple years back. Second coming of Atari, or Ouya? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andromeda Stardust Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 Hmm. The closest Micro Center is 30 miles from me. I should get there someday About 200 miles for me, in the next state, Dallas Tx is the closest one. Don't cheap out on the Pis. Pi3 is worth the extra money. I don't think the zero handles emulatyors well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zonie Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 (edited) $300 for the woodgrain and one retro controller that looks cool but may suck? No. $250 for that with BOTH controllers, yeah, I might pop for that. too much up in the air on this thing still to Drop $350 on it. I'm interested in the two controller deal for $60. Anyone know if they will be compatible with PC/MAC or are they proprietary? Edited May 31, 2018 by Zonie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andromeda Stardust Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 $300 for the woodgrain and one retro controller that looks cool but may suck? No. $250 for that with BOTH controllers, yeah, I might pop for that. too much up in the air on this thing still to Drop $350 on it. I'm interested in the two controller deal for $60. Anyone know if they will be compatible with PC/MAC or are they proprietary? I have no idea if they will be wireless, USB, or DB-9. Here's hoping I can add a DB-9 port on the back of it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flojomojo Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 They say Bluetooth and USB. Not sure why anyone would choose the "modern" controller over a proven PS4 or Xbone controller, but it seems the branding is felt deeply by some people. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StopDrop&Retro Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 And yet only a total of 4200 or so consoles have been ordered with over 1300 backers opting not to receive any perks at all. Something is off here. I agree. It does feel very off. It has almost no presence on social media, unless I'm visiting the wrong places. Hardly anyone is discussing it on Twitter. The subreddit has 159 members. And for the gaming news sites I follow it only got a passing mention on one of them. On every forum I visit the response is always lukewarm. They have a high number of followers on Facebook, but relatively few of them comment or hit like on their posts. I think something's up. It could be Indiegogo messing with the numbers. We know a lot of people were charged several times for one pledge. It could be Indiegogo correcting the pledges behind the scenes but never reducing the funding figure. A similar thing happened with Fig. Psychonauts 2 "raised" a lot of investor backing but when I looked up their SEC filings at the beginning of the year I saw they only recovered a fraction of those pledges. Their numbers are still uncorrected though. Maybe we're missing something and it'll take some time for the truth to wiggle its way out. But one thing I'm happy for is that I waited before making a video. Other people asked me to make one during the lead up, which was a shitshow for sure, but I feel that a couple youtubers have egg on their face now. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mckafka99 Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 $300 for the woodgrain and one retro controller that looks cool but may suck? No. $250 for that with BOTH controllers, yeah, I might pop for that. too much up in the air on this thing still to Drop $350 on it. I'm interested in the two controller deal for $60. Anyone know if they will be compatible with PC/MAC or are they proprietary? Ditto this. I was disappointed to see the bundle price levels. I may spring for the controllers though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glimglam Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 And yet only a total of 4200 or so consoles have been ordered with over 1300 backers opting not to receive any perks at all. Something is off here. I agree. It does feel very off. There was a "Secret Perk" one can unlock on the page via a promo email they sent out about a day before the campaign went live, that lets you "reserve" a unit at that early bird price for a (slightly) longer time. Clicking through it would enable access to it; it's completely hidden from view, otherwise, but the money and backers are still counted toward the grand total of course. As of this writing, just shy of 1400 people have bought into it, so, if you count the other Early Bird perk, then a little over 1,600 people have bought into the Onyx version. The only real difference between this and the regular Early Bird is that the Early Bird offer that's visible on that page expires on the 4th of June, while the "secret perk" doesn't expire until the 6th. A whole 48 extra hours to contemplate making a poor financial decision. Shame that they didn't offer any "all-in" packages with the early-bird price. I'm probably just going to take the controllers and leave it at that. I want that sleek-looking joystick, durnit. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zzip Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 Holy cow... for those who haven't been following the Indiegogo pre-order campaign, in the first day the VCS blew past it's $100,000 funding goal and has racked up a whopping 1.7 million dollars in funding already! "Nobody would be interested in such a thing", they said... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BiffsGamingVideos Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 (edited) The biggest indigogo campaigns of alll time from april 2018 (however this is not official) https://crowdfundingblog.com/most-successful-crowdfunding-projects/ After a 24 hour day 1, the VCSII would be ranked #24 with just over $2 million in sales. Wikipedia (and we know they are never wrong about anything) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_highest_funded_crowdfunding_projects would place this at #104 all time amonst all sites (including kickstarter) (#1 "filecoin" pulled in $257 million) The occulus rift is #92 at $2.4 million Also, there were a tons of issues on the indiegogo site. It charged people 2-3-4-5-6 times and the site even went down for a while. Atari claims there campaign took down indiegogo (whatever). They issued a statement that they would correct the issues but may take a few days. So who really knows? Edited May 31, 2018 by BiffsGamingVideos 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlaysWithWolves Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 "Nobody would be interested in such a thing", they said... The question was always, "Why would anyone be interested in such a thing over existing options you can buy today?" An answer, by the way, was never given here. It seems it boils down to: "Because Atari!" or "Because it looks sexy!" 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BiffsGamingVideos Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 The question was always, "Why would anyone be interested in such a thing over existing options you can buy today?" An answer, by the way, was never given here. It seems it boils down to: "Because Atari!" or "Because it looks sexy!" Why would someone play twice the amount for an Imac verses a Windows PC? Or buy a iPhone verses a better Android? or buy an Iraq or Iran? The Apple logo! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Loguidice Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 "Nobody would be interested in such a thing", they said... It's all about keeping things in perspective, really. Crowdfunding always sounds more impressive than it really is. Consider that Ouya ended up with around 63,000 backers on Kickstarter and then couldn't sustain a business once it hit retail. The Atari VCS could easily hit the same numbers (or even a littler better) with its combination of consoles and controllers, but that doesn't mean much once it hits retail. This again is the relatively easy part, and perhaps the easiest. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Loguidice Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 Why would someone play twice the amount for an Imac verses a Windows PC? Or buy a iPhone verses a better Android? or buy an Iraq or Iran? The Apple logo! I disagree. I buy an iPhone because it does more of the things I want to do better/easier than an equivalent Android device. And while I don't care for MacOS in comparison to Windows, there's a case to be made for the total package that you get with Macintosh computers. Neither the iPhone or MacOS machines are generally underpowered in comparison to the available competition like the Atari VCS will be in comparison to its competition in a year+. I do however agree with your point that the Atari logo does count for a lot, particularly with a certain segment of people. If the VCS didn't have that logo, I'm sure we'd see vastly less interest than this has gotten. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexkeaton Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 (edited) The question was always, "Why would anyone be interested in such a thing over existing options you can buy today?" An answer, by the way, was never given here. It seems it boils down to: "Because Atari!" or "Because it looks sexy!" You can have said the same thing for the Nintendo Switch before it came out. They published a console which was not even compatible to the existing major consoles. The PS4 and the Xbox even existed already a few years plus they came out with enhanced models like the PS4 Pro. Does the argument of only one exclusive Game (Zelda) count that it sold Millions of consoles? Same with the NES Mini. The market was full of other Emulation Consoles to play the old NES Games. With the Rasperyy Pie for example you have the chance to play ALL the NES Games instead of only 30. The SNES Mini even had only a laughable 21 Games compared to ALL Games which are possible with other Emulation Consoles. The Consumers have their own behaviour and i still cant find a reason for their behaviour. My guess is that the people are hungry for new things and they cant satisfy themselves anymore. They are always on the look for more and for the next thing. The Gamers waited a year for the SNES Mini to come out and at the same day the SNES Mini came out the people were talking about a possible Nintendo 64 Mini. Edited May 31, 2018 by alexkeaton 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlaysWithWolves Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 Why would someone play twice the amount for an Imac verses a Windows PC? Or buy a iPhone verses a better Android? or buy an Iraq or Iran? The Apple logo! So, "Because Atari!". Though,like Bill, I disagree with your Apple point. A lot of professionals have been in that ecosystem for years because it works well. That's why when Apple makes a misstep, they hear about it. EDIT: Removed answer to alexkeaton, since Bill L. wrote it better. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Loguidice Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 You can have said the same thing for the Nintendo Switch before it came out. They published a console which was not even compatible to the existing major consoles. The PS4 and the Xbox even existed already a few years plus they came out with enhanced models like the PS4 Pro. Does the argument of only one exclusive Game (Zelda) count that it sold Millions of consoles? Same with the NES Mini. The market was full of other Emulation Consoles to play the old NES Games. With the Rasperyy Pie for example you have the chance to play ALL the NES Games instead of only 30. The SNES Mini even had only a laughable 21 Games compared to ALL Games which are possible with other Emulation Consoles. The Consumers have their own behaviour and i still cant find a reason for their behaviour. Sorry, none of this makes sense. The Switch literally offered a hybrid console and portable experience in a way that past attempts, like the Wii U and Vita, failed to do properly for one reason or another. The NES Mini was a slam dunk concept that was literally just waiting for Nintendo to give the go-ahead for. It was inexpensive and offered an official way to play significant NES titles in a TV game form factor. Same with the SNES Mini and same with the inevitable Game Boy and N64 Minis. The Atari VCS offers...? Less for more money? No particular hook? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zzip Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 The question was always, "Why would anyone be interested in such a thing over existing options you can buy today?" An answer, by the way, was never given here. It seems it boils down to: "Because Atari!" or "Because it looks sexy!" No it was more like "I don't want this, therefore nobody does" "Because it looks sexy!" Don't underestimate that factor. It worked for Apple, didn't it? Yes Atari has a retro-coolness factor that they are capitalizing on. So what? As long as they deliver in the end. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zzip Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 I disagree. I buy an iPhone because it does more of the things I want to do better/easier than an equivalent Android device. And while I don't care for MacOS in comparison to Windows, there's a case to be made for the total package that you get with Macintosh computers. Neither the iPhone or MacOS machines are generally underpowered in comparison to the available competition like the Atari VCS will be in comparison to its competition in a year+. I do however agree with your point that the Atari logo does count for a lot, particularly with a certain segment of people. If the VCS didn't have that logo, I'm sure we'd see vastly less interest than this has gotten. And I find everything is harder and more expensive to accomplish on iOS than it is on Android. That just means we are consumers with different priorities. So likewise just because you don't see the attraction of AtariVCS doesn't mean there won't be others who do 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlaysWithWolves Posted May 31, 2018 Share Posted May 31, 2018 No it was more like "I don't want this, therefore nobody does" Outright mischaracterization. It was almost always about what the product could do that other products couldn't already do (like XBOX/PS4) or about Atari's ability to actually produce a console (Coleco pt 2?). Don't underestimate that factor. It worked for Apple, didn't it? Yes Atari has a retro-coolness factor that they are capitalizing on. So what? As long as they deliver in the end. You guys stop affirming what I already said! You'll make my head even bigger than before. Unfortunately, no one ever gave a practical reason to by the AVCS. At least, not based on things we knew at the time. Anyone can wishcast. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Like us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
AtariAge on Instagram
Watch us on YouTube
Chat on Discord
Recommended Posts