Intellivision Amico’s trademark changed to ‘abandoned’

[zapzapzac]

3 hours ago, phoenixdownita said:

I hope "his brother" is not an investor ... at any rate "pointing the finger" at AA (or "most of you") is really uncalled for ... I like AA (and that is why I keep renewing year after year at the full price [no discount even if I could] ) and yes one day maybe we will get to know the how/why it went down the way it did (I am sure human nature has a part and many of the reasons about "going with it" have to do with good-faith/good-intentions and not on wanton disrespect/conspiracy).

 

 

I came off real harsh everyone. Tone was angrier than it should have been. I apologize. To a point-- Tommy literally road away with tens of thousands of dollars he pillaged here off your rose tinted glasses to continue his scams.

AA does not exist in an insular vacuum though. The encouragement from the community of nostalgia bait scams here affects the retro game community at large, even if you want to bury your head in the sand and act like this is a tiny unheard of oasis. It bleeds out into the rest of retro gaming spaces. I realize the collective here did not ask to be the spokesman of the entire hobby I'm guessing, but please realize the collective has that power.

Also. Harping on my brother not making a post, etc. We had a 30 second conversation along the lines of "I saw a headline about this new Intellivison console-- did you hear about it? I might pre-order one." "Podcast I'm listening to thinks it sounds kinda scammy" somewhere in like 2019, maybe 2020. That's it. Never said he had cancer or anything weird. Y'all don't have siblings? These situations happen. So again, thanks to those that were critical consumers.
 

[Matt_B]

3 hours ago, GoldLeader said:

My theory here is that like Coleco and Atari before them,  they wanted the connection and especially around here it would have been good for sales;  They thought they would be the one to do it right, though,  and not drag the name through the mud...(Unfortunately it worked out about the same).

Just imagine how well something from Atari, Coleco or Intellivision could sell if it was actually good. ?

[mr_me]

9 hours ago, Matt_B said:

...

As for Amico, I'd maintain that they're basically doing code-in-box releases with added technobabble and gimmickry. Expect the worst and you won't be disappointed.

The rfid cards are reusable so it's not the same as others' code-in-box.  Technically it could be done so transfers work without servers, doesn't look like it in this case.  Servers could go down sooner rather than later but obviously that wasn't the idea when they came up with these things.  There is an extra cost so part of the value to some is as a collectable.  No reason to expect more than what it is.

 

8 hours ago, Rev said:

Then why was all the promo and interviews showing and talking about Mattel Intv and mentioning having several Mattel members on the team. 
 

Making a direct connection to original console and it being a continuation of it. 
 

 

They can try and make that connection but just saying it doesn't really mean anything.  They didn't buy Mattel Electronics they bought the name of an old videogame system and a library of classic Intellivision games.  Mattel Electronics had a couple hundred people working on video games software and hardware, they all went on to do other things when the company closed nearly forty years ago.

 

The Intellivision name and classic game properties do mean something, how much is debatable.  Unlike Coleco Holdings, for example, Intellivision Entertainment bought that IP and have every right to use the old IP how they want.  Some Intellivision fans like what they're doing, others don't.  Some don't like change but that's their problem.

 

[Rev]

Amico and Mattel Intellivision are not connected in any way! 
 

 

[jerseystyle]

3 hours ago, zapzapzac said:

I came off real harsh everyone. Tone was angrier than it should have been. I apologize. To a point-- Tommy literally road away with tens of thousands of dollars he pillaged here off your rose tinted glasses to continue his scams.

 

Who is the “you” and “your” that you keep insulting? AA is a website hosting an online forum mostly populated by random dudes in their 40s. It isn’t the Illuminati. Who the hell has the emotional bandwidth to be angry at a retro web forum? 

Almost everyone in this thread has spent years being skeptical of the Amico so your choice of language and venue makes even less sense. Maybe instead of victim shaming you should reserve your hostility for TT and IE.
 

Did you just come here to yell into the void at random people? You seem like you’d be fun at parties.

[1980gamer]

6 hours ago, roots.genoa said:

Here's a quick theory:

 

Maybe because Tommy was not interviewed by any 'real' journalist, reporter, or columnist? Afaik he has only been talking to a 'curated' selection of very, very small YouTubers. And YouTubers mostly make money (at least when they do) through sponsored content, which means they may not be completely objective (unless the sponsor has nothing to do with the subject, which is the case for the CUPodcast for instance). The closest thing to a journalist Tommy encountered was TonyTGD, and I really doubt he has a press card (not that it's needed to be a good journalist tbh). There was also the 'interview' at Nintendo Life, but it was more a guest editorial than anything else, Tommy's right of reply presented as an interview rather than a single wall of text.

 

When Pat and Ian started to say unpleasant things about Tommy and the Amico, Tommy did not ask to be interviewed by them, he invited them to try the Amico in his home, which is something a good journalist would not accept anyway.

Certainly a lot of interviews toss softballs and not grenades.

But many gaming magazines have covered TT over the years and nothing I have seen add an asterisk and footnote.

 

Granted I don't read a lot of them.  Mostly Retro related.  But he has ruffled many feathers, so I am certain if anything was out there, we would know here!

 

[1980gamer]

37 minutes ago, Rev said:

Amico and Mattel Intellivision are not connected in any way! 
 

 

Of course they are connected, TT owns Intellivision Entertainment.

But outside of us, who knows what Amico is?  I didn't even know who TT was before he bought Intellivision.  

 

I am an Intellivision Fan.  So I knew shortly after he acquired Intellivision.

 

Actually, not many outside of AA know Intellivision from the glory days.

 

Kids in school would be trading Atari carts and I was left out mostly.  I had 2 people through 5th-8th grade I could trade games with.

After consoles were $40 and games were $.99 I got a 2600 and a bunch of games and 2 of my friends got Intellivision and some games.

 

1 of them kept getting games though 89.  So we would still play some intellivision from time to time.  But I had moved on to computer stuff mostly.

Then 1995-96 a lot of emulation was going on.  I figure I would try to play some Intellivision stuff and found IntellivisionLives.  

 

It was great, as I had moved to Wisconsin and didn't know my way around yet.  So on week nights I could read over all the history etc.

Then explore on the weekends.  It lit the nostalgia bug.  I found local game stores that had old consoles and games and started putting a collection back together.

 

Intellivision for me has only fond memories.  So, nothing can change that.

 

It is like Tom Brady.  He played 20 great years in New England.  No matter where he goes or how many times he beats the Pats.  It will not change what he gave Pats fans.

 

Though we did have to suffer a year with Cam.  You can relate!   Seems like a nice enough guy.  I just didn't want him to be the Pats QB!

 

Edited August 8, 2022 by 1980gamer

[Razzie.P]

14 hours ago, Rowsdower70 said:

I'm trying to remember what the exact wording was, let me see if I can find the message. 

Yeah, like others seem to be, I'm curious to see how that played out. Like, why did he feel it should be sent to him?  How'd he respond when you said "no?"   (assuming you said no)

 

 

11 hours ago, Cebus Capucinis said:

Regarding mr_me, I think he provides a good sanity check on a lot of things, even if I or others disagree with a lot of it.

 

It's always good to have differing opinions and a robust discussion, even with some of our jibes and fun poking. I can't speak for anyone else but I certainly don't mean any ill will in my joking around, and he does make some good points from time to time.

Same here

 

 

3 hours ago, zapzapzac said:

I apologize. To a point-- Tommy literally road away with tens of thousands of dollars he pillaged here off your rose tinted glasses to continue his scams.


Also. Harping on my brother not making a post, etc. 
 

Who knows, maybe they'll come out and say "we apologize.  to a point -- " and it'll be ok.

 

 

Unless they've all been deleted or something, I see a total of 0 posts "harping on your brother not make a post."   One (me) asked why more people like you didn't chime in, since you were asking why we didn't chime in.  And another saying "I hope his brother isn't an investor."  Maybe you're using the same math to calculate "harping" that TT uses to calculate his accolades  ?

 

 

 

 

48 minutes ago, jerseystyle said:

Who is the “you” and “your” that you keep insulting? AA is a website hosting an online forum mostly populated by random dudes in their 40s. It isn’t the Illuminati. Who the hell has the emotional bandwidth to be angry at a retro web forum? 

Almost everyone in this thread has spent years being skeptical of the Amico so your choice of language and venue makes even less sense. Maybe instead of victim shaming you should reserve your hostility for TT and IE.
 

Did you just come here to yell into the void at random people? You seem like you’d be fun at parties.

They mean YOU!  And me... but mostly you, I'm sure.  ?

 

I think you got it right with the "yell at random people" thing.  We see that occasionally around here.  Probably would be better served to find a pro-Amico discussion somewhere to preach at those users (I guess those exist on Reddit/Facebook/etc) than to come here where we're mostly bitching and griping and saying "you" should be ashamed for not bitching and griping.

[digdugnate]

Never give up! Never surrender!

[Rev]

11 minutes ago, digdugnate said:

Never give up! Never surrender!

 

 

[Lost Monkey]

Assuming Atari Age is a hive mind is such a hive mind thing to do...

[Razzie.P]

19 minutes ago, digdugnate said:

Never give up! Never surrender!

 

7 minutes ago, Rev said:

 

 

 

 

 

[godslabrat]

12 hours ago, Albert said:

Hundreds of people were not banned from that thread, that's just ridiculous.  You've obviously come here with quite the bias against AtariAge and the community here, wasting no time at all going on the attack with your very first posts.  Why are you here?  If you want to discuss the Amico, fine, but please do so without making blanket statements about the members and the site that are simply not true.

 

 ..Al

Sure, let’s talk about the Amico.

The Amico is, quite simply, a scam.  By “scam”, I mean the people in charge of it took money for investments and pre-orders that they knew would not be fulfilled in the time frame specified.  All evidence, and I mean literally 100% ALL of the evidence, available, indicates there was no way the original 10/10/2020 release date could have been met, and this was known in 2019.  Like every grifter console released, all they ever had was a shell, and hastily scrambled to put the insides together after the money was raised—this is not even disputed.

What does seem to be in dispute is how this forum enabled this grift, and allowed Tommy Tallarico’s outright lies to stand without scrutiny.  It is unacceptable that this would be the standard allowed here—this is the same forum that took down the Coleco Chameleon.  However, for whatever reason, Tommy’s scam was allowed to have its own free-reigning thread (which lasted years) and people were banned for asking questions he didn’t like, for posting images he didn’t approve of, or not “reading the room” correctly.

 

Want to say I’m wrong?  It’s going to do more than saying “Oh, that totally didn’t happen” or “Yeah, it wasn’t modded quite right.”  No, what AtariAge needs to do is be transparent about what really happened.  That means, at bare minimum, the following three things:

 

1)The Amico subforum should be returned to visibility, including all hidden posts.  Readers need to see the discourse and decide for themselves if the banned posters truly deserved to be banned.

 

2)A full list of all banned posters should be given, along with what mod banned them and why.  Readers need to be able to see if the reasons given match the allegedly bannable posts.

 

3)All of Tommy Tallarico’s DM communication with AA Staff should be posted.   Readers need to be able to judge for themselves what established the relationship between Tommy and AtariAge.

 

I don’t think this is what you want to see on AtariAge.  If that’s the case, join the club.  Maybe you now feel what the rest of us have felt watching AtariAge be transformed from “seasoned perspectives on the entire gaming hobby” to “Tommy Tallarico’s primary source for handjobs”.  I think it’s clear to everyone that AtariAge is no longer what it once was, the only question is, do you care enough to fix it, or will you just forever ignore Tommy Tallarico’s stain on this website?

 

See you in the funny papers.

 

 

[wolfy62]

Hey guys,

I'm sorry but the Forum migration is going to shut down this thread for a day or so.

I sure hope everyone has something else to do during that time.

Thanks,and sorry for the inconvenience. ?

[digdugnate]

2 minutes ago, wolfy62 said:

Hey guys,

I'm sorry but the Forum migration is going to shut down this thread for a day or so.

I sure hope everyone has something else to do during that time.

Thanks,and sorry for the inconvenience. ?

I'm good, I have a case of Hot Pockets in mom's freezer AND Reddit. 

[crade]

7 minutes ago, wolfy62 said:

Hey guys,

I'm sorry but the Forum migration is going to shut down this thread for a day or so.

I sure hope everyone has something else to do during that time.

Thanks,and sorry for the inconvenience. ?

How dare they infringe on my Free Speech Rights^TM?

[Rev]

16 minutes ago, wolfy62 said:

Hey guys,

I'm sorry but the Forum migration is going to shut down this thread for a day or so.

I sure hope everyone has something else to do during that time.

Thanks,and sorry for the inconvenience. ?

If we was all playing Amico this thread wouldnt exist. 
 

And if it wasnt for this hater thread, Amico would exist. 
 

 

[Rev]

The Amico game balancing stuff was something I personally didnt like.  Thats the Karma thing?    
 

Hopefully if Amico releases, the game balancing idea is removed when the Value Engineering happens. 

[PlaysWithWolves]

2 hours ago, jerseystyle said:

Who is the “you” and “your” that you keep insulting? AA is a website hosting an online forum mostly populated by random dudes in their 40s. It isn’t the Illuminati. Who the hell has the emotional bandwidth to be angry at a retro web forum? 

Almost everyone in this thread has spent years being skeptical of the Amico so your choice of language and venue makes even less sense. Maybe instead of victim shaming you should reserve your hostility for TT and IE.
 

Did you just come here to yell into the void at random people? You seem like you’d be fun at parties.

Hey, there was an overzealous fan of Tommy's who was also a mod that was overly-protective of him.  He'd also have an interesting (to be polite) way of viewing one's words in a way different than intended. I can understand if they wanted to keep Tommy's main thread a "safe space" for him, but it bled into other threads where people tried to have an honest discussion about Amico. Other fans would come in and literally get the thread shut down instead of simply ignoring it. Tommy himself couldn't stay out and despite some other mods threatening to thread-ban him, it never happened. His posts that got deleted were arguably a bad look and could easily be interpreted as once again protecting him (from himself).

I'm not saying both sides did it perfectly--I, myself, went too far in my righteous indignation (mostly toward that moderator) a few times. I'm just saying that the skepticism was mostly off AtariAge and there was a reason for it not being here like it was for RetroVGS and Chameleon and some other crowdfunded products.  The turn was so sharp it felt like a record scratch.  I think in a statement Albert even admitted things could've been handled better. 

[roots.genoa]

7 hours ago, GoldLeader said:

When a man lies, he murders some part of the world.

Would you lie
Would you lie
Would you lie, next to me
'Cause I'm outta control
I can't let go
Would you lie, next to me

 

Oh sorry, I think it was actually another lie. ?

 

2 hours ago, 1980gamer said:

But many gaming magazines have covered TT over the years and nothing I have seen add an asterisk and footnote.

Indeed. The problem is there are not a lot of good journalists in the video game realm to begin with. First, video game journalists are more 'critics' (rather reviewers) than reporters, as in the movie and music journalism for instance. We've seen good reporting in recent years about the work conditions in the video game industry for instance, but it's quite new. Video game journalism in the 90s was a complete joke. Just teens being overpaid to play games and write crap. ?

 

18 minutes ago, digdugnate said:

I'm good, I have a case of Hot Pockets in mom's freezer AND Reddit. 

Nice. I've prepared dozens of tabs of YouTube videos about the Amico so I can post mean comments all day. ? Now I'm working on my accents: "the Amico is a scàm, dude"

[Rowsdower70]

2 hours ago, Razzie.P said:

Yeah, like others seem to be, I'm curious to see how that played out. Like, why did he feel it should be sent to him?  How'd he respond when you said "no?"   (assuming you said no)

 

 

 

I can't find the conversation, sadly.   But I do remember I ended up giving him the organizer's email address if he wanted to request a copy of the tiny trophy.  

I did find this picture for context, showing the business cards that really tied the room together.
 

[rayik]

22 minutes ago, Rowsdower70 said:

I can't find the conversation, sadly.   But I do remember I ended up giving him the organizer's email address if he wanted to request a copy of the tiny trophy.  

I did find this picture for context, showing the business cards that really tied the room together.
 

Are the business cards the things you can’t really tell what they are in the black holder?  

[Razzie.P]

21 minutes ago, rayik said:

Are the business cards the things you can’t really tell what they are in the black holder?  

If so, it makes more sense now.  They do appear to be holding down that paper, so yeah, pretty important, it seems.

[mr_me]

2 hours ago, godslabrat said:

Sure, let’s talk about the Amico.

The Amico is, quite simply, a scam.  By “scam”, I mean the people in charge of it took money for investments and pre-orders that they knew would not be fulfilled in the time frame specified.  All evidence, and I mean literally 100% ALL of the evidence, available, indicates there was no way the original 10/10/2020 release date could have been met, and this was known in 2019.  Like every grifter console released, all they ever had was a shell, and hastily scrambled to put the insides together after the money was raised—this is not even disputed.

...

The Republic investment campaign closed in April 2021.  So investors had plenty of time to cancel their investment and have their money returned, after hearing about a delay that was being discussed as early as spring 2020.

 

Intellivision Entertainment was issuing preorder refund requests through 2021 and into 2022.  So those with preorders could also get their $100 deposit back well after the release was delayed.

 

At E3 2019 they not only had a prototype but also a library of games that people played at the conference.  That's almost two years before the Republic investment campaign closed.

 

And the founding partners and company directors have more of their own money invested than anyone else.

Edited August 8, 2022 by mr_me

[IMBerzerk]

3 hours ago, 1980gamer said:

Of course they are connected, TT owns Intellivision Entertainment.

But outside of us, who knows what Amico is?  I didn't even know who TT was before he bought Intellivision.  

 

I am an Intellivision Fan.  So I knew shortly after he acquired Intellivision.

 

Actually, not many outside of AA know Intellivision from the glory days.

 

Kids in school would be trading Atari carts and I was left out mostly.  I had 2 people through 5th-8th grade I could trade games with.

After consoles were $40 and games were $.99 I got a 2600 and a bunch of games and 2 of my friends got Intellivision and some games.

 

1 of them kept getting games though 89.  So we would still play some intellivision from time to time.  But I had moved on to computer stuff mostly.

Then 1995-96 a lot of emulation was going on.  I figure I would try to play some Intellivision stuff and found IntellivisionLives.  

 

It was great, as I had moved to Wisconsin and didn't know my way around yet.  So on week nights I could read over all the history etc.

Then explore on the weekends.  It lit the nostalgia bug.  I found local game stores that had old consoles and games and started putting a collection back together.

 

Intellivision for me has only fond memories.  So, nothing can change that.

 

It is like Tom Brady.  He played 20 great years in New England.  No matter where he goes or how many times he beats the Pats.  It will not change what he gave Pats fans.

 

Though we did have to suffer a year with Cam.  You can relate!   Seems like a nice enough guy.  I just didn't want him to be the Pats QB!

 

Nicely sums up how many of us feel about owning an Intellivision growing up and this whole Amico thing played out.

 

When I got my Commodore 64 in 1985, my father gave away my Sears SVA figuring I'd never play it anyway.  But in 1988 during my first year of college, I had a chance to by a new Super Pro unit when I was in Toys R Us.  I decided not to because I was saving for an Amiga 500.  I thought to myself, "what's the point of owning another one now... they're in the past.  The games are old, and look like crap compared to an Amiga 500."  I eventually sold the C64 to a friend, bought an Amiga, then got into PC's.

 

In 1996 I bought my first Intellivision on eBay (when it was good) and from there, Intellivision Lives.. on and on.   Seems like yesterday.