Interesting Video About ET and the Video Game Crash of '83

[LeeJ07]

I just found this video on Youtube, and it's very well made and informative. Thought you guys might appreciate seeing it.

 

[chas10e]

neat video & well made IMO, thanks for sharing Lee

[Scott Stilphen]

Lost of sources listed, but the video unfortunately contains several recycled unfounded rumors (ex: 3.5 million E.T. carts returned to stores and buried? lol  no...).  But then again, when your sources are sites like Wikipedia and Atarimuseum, I suppose this is to be expected.

[greenween]

It was a good little watch. I knew I would get pissed over the E.T. hate/blame. I think video games have gone beyond the point of a true "crash" happening again. It could be a good thing if it does though. Just my opinion.

[LeeJ07]

It was a good little watch. I knew I would get pissed over the E.T. hate/blame. I think video games have gone beyond the point of a true "crash" happening again. It could be a good thing if it does though. Just my opinion.

I actually thought the video did a rather good job of dismissing the tall tales of E.T. being the only factor that caused the crash.

E.T. wasn't the cause, but it was undoubtedly a symptom of the troubled waters ahead, and a sign that not all was well in the house that Atari built.

[Atari 5200 Guy]

Interesting video. I will say that there are a lot of games today across multiple platforms and operating systems. However most of those games are in a digital download format and only a small percentage of those games seem to be in physical form. The saturation seems to be in the digital copies as there are a LOT of "me too" games. Most are free but it's still too many in a market that is repeating what Atari learned in the first crash. Whether or not a crash will happen is yet to be seen but should be expected. I also doesn't help the market when publishers like Steam hold sells where games are marked down in a similar fashion as brick and mortar stores did during the '83 crash.