Video 61
-
Posts
8,514 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
143
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Blogs
Gallery
Store
Events
Downloads
Posts posted by Video 61
-
-
On 8/31/2020 at 4:02 PM, Justin said:
time flies, because on atari.io, we are having fun!
THANK YOU JUSTIN!!!!
lance
www.atarisales.com
- HDN, socrates63 and Sabertooth
-
3
-
On 8/25/2020 at 10:58 AM, Justin said:
From what @Video 61 says, it sounds like Froggo had announced Pyromania and Night of the Ninja for the Atari 7800 and were taking orders for them from vendors. I'm willing to bet development began on these games and progressed enough for them to start taking orders.
hi justin,
yes they had four games announced. but relying on the atari market, to shaky.
activision told me all of their 7800 stuff sold well, and that included absolutes stuff. they even had a few titles where they had to reorder, i think one was title match pro wrestling.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
On 8/24/2020 at 10:28 PM, nosweargamer said:
,
I'm curious now. What are some 7800 games that did not sell well?
Also, outside of California Games, can you think of any other 7800 titles announced, but never came out and never had a prototype that surfaced?
Thanks!
hi noswear,
cracked did not sell well at all, same with jinx. cracked should have used a light gun, and jinx paddles, but paddles are not very usable in 7800 mode. i have pitfighter, and gato that never were released, to bad on gato, what was there looked great!
but there were many announced, and nothing has ever surfaced, like the tank game on the box. i think it all boiled down to jacks business practices.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
2 minutes ago, RickR said:
Great topic.
I'm a first gen American. My parents immigrated in the early '60's, and I grew up in a mostly non-English speaking household. I will tell you this much -- ANY chance to sample what the "American" kids loved was always a blessed treasure to me. I distinctly remember trying all those kind of things for the first time. Orange Soda, PB&J sandwiches, ice cream bars, etc. I would usually never let on that I'd never had such things, but I'll bet my raised eyebrows gave me away. I'd be at a birthday party or whatever, and something like that would come out. Orange soda? Yes, please! Root beer? OMG, that was the best thing I ever tasted. Root beer float? Lil' RickR's head explodes!
Orange soda rocks, and I will still drink it today if it's offered to me.
hi rickr,
awesome. try this root beer if you can. its from my neck of the woods, so you would have to have it shipped,
this is also liquid gold. i know a bar that sells more of this, than beer.
lance
www.atarisales.com
- RickR, Justin and socrates63
-
3
-
48 minutes ago, Justin said:
Who else loves orange soda? I was in Cub Scouts in elementary school and the parents of one of the other guys in our troop owned a McDonald's franchise. It was cool because every time we had a big event, they'd sponsor our troop with a big Gott cooler of orange pop. It was the big orange cooler you see on construction sites with the nozzle and paper cups. We always called orange pop "Bug Juice" growing up. Anyone else have fun memories of this drink or enjoy it today?
hi justin,
its actually orange cream soda is on of my favoritie pops.
boylans orange cream soda is to die for, goose island is not bad. i have not tried virgils yet. but they have cane sugar, so i only imbibe rarely.
so far no orange cream soda in the stevia pop world yet, there is virgils orange which is ok, but its not a cream soda. virgils zero cram soda is very good, i consider it liquid gold.
lance
www.atarisales.com
- socrates63 and Justin
-
2
-
21 hours ago, Justin said:
Dave Needle, co-creator of the Atari Lynx:
hi everyone,
i can attest 100% to this. you wanna know why all of a sudden there were no new lynx games for over 6 months, then you got some schlock game like robo sqaush which was quickly thrown together to plug that 6 month hole, because jack screwed epyx big time, and epyx instead of handing the games over to atari who had them at their mercy for a few thousand dollars, tossed them, according to legend, 25 lynx games almost finished. i had been told that repeatedly by atari employees. i even had a letter for john scruch saying to jack, he knew they could make money on those games.
he also never said anything about gary.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
1 hour ago, Justin said:
That's interesting. All the more proof there was pent up demand for new Atari 7800 games during the Lynx era. Super Asteroids & Missile Command would've made a cool 7800 cartridge. Chip's Challenge, Road Blasters, so many others. At least they gave us Scrapyard Dog. Thanks for the history Lance!
hi justin,
BINGO!
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
19 hours ago, Justin said:
Not Froggo games.
Bingo. 1990.
It's own time was 1984. Continued development ceased beyond that point. Keyboard, Track-Ball, High Score Cartridge and other peripherals canceled. No advanced audio developed for cartridges. No extra RAM, no new coprocessors or graphics chips for more advanced games to come later in the system's lifespan the way Nintendo did with the NES to continue its life. Monochrome cartridge labels. No music. Nickel-and-diming all the coolness out of every cartridge just to save a few pennies. Atari XEGS released in 1987 to compete against the Atari 7800 and sell off warehouses worth of Atari 8-Bit overstock. Jack Tramiel didn't care about the 7800.
Additionally I would argue that Froggo 7800 games for 1990 were sub-par compared to other 7800 games for 1984.
hi justin,
true, they were. but, a small operation did them. so what was jacks excuse? also, i completely sold out of the froggo 7800 games repeatedly. they sold as well as double dragon and rampage for me.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
9 hours ago, nosweargamer said:
Ballblazer, Commando, Ikari Warriors, Alien Brigade, Ninja Golf, Midnight Mutants, Xenophobe, Tomcat F-14, Desert Falcon, Mean 18 Ultimate Golf and Pete Rose Baseball on the 7800 could go toe-to-toe with similar games on the NES. Of course, some of those were late releases.
And of course, the older arcade titles, like Food Fight, Ms. Pac-Man, Xevious, Robotron & Joust could also compete with similar older ports on the NES.
The 7800 was held back by lack of 3rd party support, an out of date system sound chip and a lack of more NES style games. The 7800 had enough under the hood to compete with the NES with the right support. Most NES games were handheld by teams of programmers, many of whom learned how to get the most out of the system with companies who would spend extra money for more memory and sometimes even special chips. Most 7800 games were contracted to a single programmer on the cheap. Just imagine if the same teams that made NES games invested just as much into 7800 games.
Support is huge. The Atari 2600 was able to out sell systems like the Intellivision, despite having less horsepower. The Sega Master system, which in many ways was superior to the NES hardware-wise, was fighting with the 7800 for a very distant 2nd place behind the NES.
Nintendo has made an art out of the this. Their systems are often not as powerful as the competition, but they still stay competitive.
hi noswear,
you forgot super skateboardin, and tomcat f-14. i sold the living daylights out of those games. they were fun to.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
15 hours ago, Atari 5200 Guy said:
It is a shame Froggo didn't buy a standard 7800 and try to make controller options for it. He could have made decent money from doing so. I never seen any of Froggo's 7800 games. Has any one here ever seen one?
hi 5200 guy,
i used to carry them, tank command and water ski. hard but fun games.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
-
-
2 hours ago, Justin said:
Hi @Video 61,To be clear, are you saying Froggo products were officially licensed? Froggo’s Atari games were very much like Activision's, with their own packaging and cartridge design, as opposed to say a game like Donkey Kong or Mario Bros., Nintendo properties published by Atari under an officially licensed agreement.
Likewise, I don’t see that Froggo’s NES controller was licensed by Nintendo. No “Seal of Quality” there!
It would’ve been nice to see Froggo release Atari 7800 compatible versions of their NES controllers for Atari players. Even unlicensed versions would’ve been A real treat.
hi justin,
i meant if froggo had licensed their controllers to atari.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
5 hours ago, Justin said:
That's funny because I always loved the 7800's packaging. Nice silver boxes, almost in line with the Silver/Red Atari 2600 boxes like the style used with E.T. LOVED that, it was so classic, so iconic. Aside from the black and white cartridge labels used on most of the best games, I was happy with the 7800 packaging and presentation.
hi justin,
but the labels on the carts, that dull grey silver on many of them. they finally got some color to them later on. and activisions artwork on their packaging was superior.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
On 8/18/2020 at 11:38 PM, Justin said:
Here's the kicker: Froggo developed games for the Atari 7800 and were BASED IN SUNNYVALE, and they made controllers for the NES without changing up the cord and releasing an Atari 2600/7800 variant. Are you serious? Could've used the same case design, the same plastics, mostly the same internals, just changed up the wiring and given us a wonderful D-Pad controller for the 7800. The "cordless remote" one on the left would've been a dream. Generations of Atari 7800 players would still be enjoying these today, seeking them out on eBay and paying a hefty price. They would've owned the 7800 aftermarket. That's incredibly frustrating.
hi justin,
jack would have had to pay froggo for a license. to costly. and jack always micromanged the manufacturing process, in hopes of finding a supplier that was in financial trouble, which would have given jack leverage to offer the supplier a take it, or leave it payment. he did this all of the time.
jack watched the business sections of papers like a hawk, always on the lookout for suppliers of atari that fell into trouble. that type of mentality left so many with bad tastes in their mouths, so that who would trust them, who would support them its like being shackled to a cannibal.
in asia mention jack t. and atari, you might not get out alive in many places. but he always treated me decently.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
On 8/19/2020 at 8:25 AM, nosweargamer said:
Actually Atari Corp made a bunch of 7800 systems after selling the warehouse stock. It sold better than many people give them credit for, it's just that the NES really dominated the market (some reports indicate over 1 million 7800 systems sold, some years outselling the Sega Master System in the US). Actually finding an original 7800 made by WB Atari is pretty hard to do. So despite what the T's said about the evils of gaming, they had no problem making and selling video games.
I will say 3rd party support was rare outside of the NES due to the way Nintendo contracts worked. The 7800 had about the same amount of 3rd party support as the Master System in the US. With that being said, just imagine what could've been if the T's encourage 3rd party support.
And yes, the 7800 was a very capable machine, outside of the internal sound chip. Just look at Ballblazer versus the Famicom version, or Alien Brigade versus Operation Wolf.
hi nosweargamer,
now this came from atari themselves, is it true, i do not know because jack was a master at moving merchandise around the world to evade taxes, but i was told the 7800 sold ten million units when atari quit counting them.
way more than enough to attract third party developers, if atari themselves had only supported the machine properly, they could have given nintendo a run for their money.
i was sent a letter one time from atari stating the release dates on up and coming 7800 games, many were never released, hardly any that were released, were even close to the release date, what was released later on i found were cut down in size.
i called them one time because i was getting such pressure from customers over the 7800 version of california games which was listed in that letter. i was told by atari that there is a 2600 version, like duh! i carried that from day one, i was told that atari had decided that the 2600 version was good enough, even though they had announced a 7800 version. again, you can't make this stuff up.
lance
www.atarisales.com
- Gianna, Sabertooth and nosweargamer
-
1
-
2
-
On 8/18/2020 at 11:02 PM, Atari 5200 Guy said:
Whaaaaa? Froggo made NES controllers? How'd I miss those? I never seen those anywhere I shopped frequently.
I bet Nintendo treated you a lot nicer than Atari did from the sounds of it. "Games are Evil?" Blasphemy. They aren't evil. Evil is in the eye of the beholder and how they see the world. Just because you don't like something doesn't mean it's evil. I never understand that about some people. To each their own I guess.
I remember seeing a Computer Chronicles episode where Jack was interviewed about the ST computer and he kept saying how it was better than the PC, and how he was trying to keep the Asian market out of America. If you have the "best" computer why would you send your customers to get a PC? Also, if you are trying to keep Asians stuff out of America then why did you hire them to make your products? Makes absolutely no sense at all. And while I'm at it...if you believe video games are evil then WHY DID YOU BUY A VIDEO GAME/COMPUTER COMPANY?!? Makes no da*m sense. Maybe I should have bought it if it was that easy to get a hold of. Geez...at least it would have been owned by some one who LOVED video games.
hi 5200 guy,
and when i went to work for the nintendo distributor, i found out how deep into making nintendo games jack had become. i knew a programmer at tengen, jack would come in a yell like crazy at the programmers because games were not being developed fast enough.
at the same time telling atari distributors, venders and customers, that they could not get any games to release, nintendo had them all tied up, pure rubbish.
its hard to understand this thinking, except everything was based on price. there was no other thought process. while nintendo games were selling for 70-90 dollars because of the huge demand on certain titles, atari was trying to sell their own games cheap, so as to attract buyers.
but with so few titles, and bare bones advertising and uninspiring packaging, that to failed.
except the packaging of the XEGM and carts. i used to talk to other atari people back in those days, and i would always ask, why such attractive packaging for the XEGS stuff, and bland for the 7800? no one ever said why.
then of course they quit supporting it before it hardly got off of the ground. and many titles had sold out, or were almost sold out. its almost like they did not want to support a machine where the stuff sold to well, it might require that they had to make second orders of games, to costly.
i know retail store managers like that. if the product sells to much, they quite carrying it, in their eyes they view labor to costly, to restock shelves full of merchandize that constantly sells out making them all sorts of money. they are very happy with well stocked shelves of stuff that sell slowly.
no wonder america is in trouble.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
On 8/18/2020 at 3:24 PM, nosweargamer said:
Thanks Lance! 👍 That's probably the best info I ever heard about Froggo. Funny thing about the T's: Thinking games are evil while at the same time hiring people to make and sell them, and also treating a third parties so poorly. Maybe that's why there was a lack of third parties for the late 80s 2600, 7800, Lynx and Jaguar. I suppose I could create a conspiracy theory that they did this on purpose to scare away other companies so that they were they only ones making money off of their systems. 😁
So Froggo was basically a one man operation that quietly closed up shop, probably when the business was on the decline. I wonder if he left while owing people money or paid-for products. This might also explain why his never went public about who he is or what he did, like many other game programmers have done. It also makes me wonder if there were prototypes of Pyromania and Night of the Ninja. Water Ski & Tank Command, while not must-have games, where actually pretty solid for original 7800 titles.
I never realize Froggo made controllers for the NES. I wonder if they did anything else I'm unaware of.
hi nosweargamer,
cool, you found pics. thanks. yes why did jack buy atari. because he came from a era where hardware made money. that era was short lived, by 1980 it was over. he never figured it out.
the froggo guy could have found gold, if only atari had spent a little on advertising on t.v. jack cut so many corners making stuff ever cheaper in the hopes of making money off of hardware, that in the end stuff got so cheap, that it was hurting them, not helping.
yet nintendo was flooding the market with games, and only redesigned the NES towards the end of its life cycle. they made a bundle off of the nes because of games.
lance
www.atarisales.com
- nosweargamer, Justin and Gianna
-
3
-
21 hours ago, nosweargamer said:
Nice find, but it's so hard to find out what is really true about Froggo. Searching on AA, I found one user who said Sam Tramiel ran it! Then there's another guy who said he wrote and article that included this tidbit:
"Sam Tramiel, son of Atari owner Jack Tramiel, once intentionally left the Chairman of Froggo Games to sit in the lobby of Atari headquarters for almost six hours on one occasion in 1988. Having scheduled an appointment to meet with Tramiel, the Froggo chief executive showed up in a timely manor to discuss the development of new games for the Atari 7800 and checked in with the receptionist at the front desk. Tramiel allegedly told his secretary "Tell him I'm busy. He's going to be waiting a long time." The gentleman was even denied a glass of water after waiting several hours to meet with Tramiel. By the time he made it in to meet with Sam, it was late in the day and sources report that he only spent fifteen minutes listening to Tramiel list numerous reasons why the 7800 was not a viable system to produce for, and how it was morally wrong to make video games, before eventually being dismissed by Tramiel, and heading on home for the evening."So far I have heard that Froggo was recruited by Atari, Froggo was ignored by Atari, and Sam Tramiel owned Froggo. I wish I could nail down something concrete.
hi,
this i can attest to. i was told the same thing by an Atari employee about the Froggo guy. also, i too got a two hour lecture from one of the Tramiels on the evils of video games. also the Froggo guy was kind of a one man operation. when i called, no one hardly ever answered, it would just ring and ring. and when someone answered, it was always the Froggo guy. Froggo was making controllers for the NES at that time also.
the Froggo guy called me one time to let me know that my orders for Pyromania and Night of the Ninja for the Atari 7800 were about to be filled. two weeks later i called when they did not arrive, the phone was disconnected.
once Atari told me that if i wanted new games, go to work for Nintendo. in fact, they gave me a name, and i worked for a Nintendo distributor for 6 months. the distributor was waiting for me, knew my name ahead of time.
later on i found out Atari was programming games for the NES. i found that out when i bought a bunch of hard drives out of the Atari office. SNK's Ikari Warriors and Millipede were on one of the hard drives, i have the NES source codes for the games.
then when i complained that a lack of modern productivity software and disk storage was hurting their 8-bit sales. many people are unaware that the 130 XE was favored by many authors, they told me to tell them to buy a PC.
folks you can't make this stuff up about the Tramiels. it's a wonder they lasted as they did.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
1 hour ago, RickR said:
This is one of my all-time favorite games. Mostly due to the simple controls that let you do so much and the realistic movements of the players.
I grew up with the 8-bit/C64 versions. Once I finally discovered the 7800, this became my favorite 7800 game. It's got the same gameplay and controls, but it plays a bit faster and looks better. A+ game on both, with a slight edge to the 7800.
hi rickr,
awesome over view.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
2 hours ago, TrekMD said:
I've never played the XL/XE version but, comparing the videos, the 7800 version does have more color and detailed sprites.
hi trekmd,
it sure looks like a more filled out game to me also. my kids used to play the 7800 version all of the time. i played the xe version mostly.
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
hi everyone,
a great poster reminded me in another thread about one on one basketball version on the 7800, vs. the XEGS, both versions are good, but the XE version looks like a apple port to me, still fun, but lacks color and a good back round.
but the 7800 version looks to be a complete rewrite as the poster suggested, very colorful, great back rounds, fun to play. i am also going to include the atari 2600 version of basketball, it really is the basis in my opinion for one on one basketball.
the 7800 version,
XEGS version,
thanks,
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
On 7/23/2020 at 10:21 PM, theclaw1982 said:
Just received my copy! While I only played it for a few minutes/3 or 4 holes (kinda busy, just was excited to try it), it is pretty fun and conveys the mini golf experience. I will maybe post again after putting some time in this weekend, but I enjoy it already! Good job guys!
hi the claw1982,
thank you very much!!!!
lance
www.atarisales.com
-
On 7/23/2020 at 11:07 PM, Justin said:
In a way this reminds me of the Pokémon games that were so popular on Game Boy. They'd release two versions of the same game on the same system (Game Boy) at the same time. "Pokémon Red" and "Pokémon Blue". They'd change it up enough with different characters etc. that they'd be different enough, so that you'd have to "catch 'em all"
hi justin,
yep, its like using two fishing poles with different bait. you might hook one fish, if you are lucky, you hook two fish.
lance
www.atarisales.com
Hi from Winnipeg, Canada
in Introduce Yourself!
Posted
hi,
welcome aboard.
i used to sell to a major atari dealer in winnipeg, forgot their name, its been 30 years since i spoke with them. i doubt they are still around. but one time they told me that they sold atari falcon computers to your tax authorities, so maybe they are still around?
lance
www.atarisales.com