By “Atari” in this case I essentially mean Infogrames, the company that wore the name like a Leatherface skin suit since 2001, after buying Hasbro Interactive, but also after they went bankrupt and became a full-on zombie holding company. (I believe they owned both “Atari Inc” and “Atari Interactive.”) They had at least been making games under the name until they went under in 2013, after which it was reduced to holding companies inside other holding companies, a handful of actual workers just licensing out names. It was just layers of skin suits with nothing inside them at that point.
I think in the last couple years they might have gotten some funding with which to actually do something, though.
Ha, yeah. I laughed when I saw those “Atari is planning on building hotels!” headlines, because a) there ain’t no “Atari,” b) they ain’t building shit, and c) whoever is licensing the name ain’t building shit either. But hey, “Atari Inc./Interactive” made a few bucks so some scammers/clueless would-be hoteliers could use the name “Atari” for a while to try to raise money*, and it was probably a big win for the holding company, relative to what they had been getting.
*(Actually braving the defunct website, I wonder if the whole thing was actually just a ploy to sell t-shirts and hoodies.)
When I say that “Atari” might have gotten some funding with which to actually do something, I mean all those bullshit licensing deals might have added up to enough money to expand out their operations to hire up to a dozen employees (to be more actively involved in picking licensing deals). Or not.
Almost all of the original models have that same wood grain, yeah. On the Sears exclusive version it looks more like a fake burled walnut finish instead, and there was an all-black one, but those were exceptions.
Considering the new company is releasing a working modernized 2600 machine and has actually been making reissued (and a couple brand new/unreleased) carts for it, I’d say they are doing Ok with the brand. Skin suit or not. Ha.
Which I’m assuming means it will stretch all the rudimentary shapes into something even more unrecognizable?
My hand is cramping just looking at that 2600-style joystick. Hopefully it will be better made since the originals were most definitely not known for their durability (although they weren’t as fragile as the 5200’s joystick). They also suck if you’re left handed.
ETA: Now the Tac-2 — that was a thing of beauty and built like a tank.
But are they actually doing this? There have been a number of “Atari” consoles in recent years, all of which were actually made through licensing deals by third parties.
I don’t know how they are being manufactured but check out the website. I’ve ordered two of the new games for my old system (that haven’t arrived yet) Atari 2600+ – Atari®
Looking into it, it does appear to be another licensing deal, with an actual game company. Which was part of my point about the company just being a skin suit worn by a (nested) series of holding companies - they don’t actually make anything anymore, all they can do is try to make revenue off stuff (the actual) Atari made in the '70s and '80s.* (And even that is limited - certain rights got sold off to other companies. Their remaining rights are extremely limited.) In this case, a wildly overpriced simulation of something that hasn’t been exciting in 40 years. (My nostalgia for the original 2600 is pretty limited, granted, but I have zero interest in these. I know I’d have no desire to play any 2600 game for more than 30 seconds - been there, done that; we’ve had 40 years of clones and free web remakes of all their best games, so I long ago tired of even playing better, evolved versions of those old games.)
*The worst example was Atari’s recent “publishing” deals for developers interested in “working with their IPs” - developers could fund and make a game themselves and “Atari” would take a percentage of the revenue. All for the “rights” to make a game that had nothing in common with anything Atari produced except, quite literally, the name. (Because that’s the only bit that’s still usable. Most of the value of Atari’s holdings are just names and looks.) The idea that a random holding company is preventing anyone from making a game called, for instance, “Haunted House” is more than a little ridiculous.
