One thing unusual has been happening at Atari lately: Underneath CEO Wade Rosen, who’s held that place since April 2021, Atari has overseen some good re-imaginings of its previous titles, culminating in a fiftieth anniversary recreation smooshing collectively components of the corporate’s historical past that was fairly nice.
Atari has now introduced by way of press launch it is acquired “greater than 100 PC and console titles from the Nineteen Eighties and Nineteen Nineties.” The video games appear to be principally from the again catalogues of three publishers: Accolade, Infogrames and Microprose. Included amongst them are video games from the Bubsy the Bobcat collection, Hardball, Demolition Racer, and the 1942: Pacific Air Conflict, F-117A, and F-14 air fight collection. Following the acquisition Atari goes to look to re-release sure of those titles, promote merch, and most significantly “create new video games primarily based on the IP.”
“This can be a deep catalog that features groundbreaking and award-winning titles from Accolade, Infogrames and Microprose,” stated Atari CEO Wade Rosen. “Many of those titles are part of Atari historical past, and followers can look ahead to seeing many of those video games re-released in bodily and digital codecs, and in some instances, even ported to fashionable consoles.”
As a part of the deal Atari’s additionally acquired the Accolade and GTI manufacturers, the previous of which specifically makes me quite nostalgic: Accolade was an enormous participant in video games publishing till it went down in 2000. This follows sizzling on the heels of final month’s announcement of the acquisition of the (to this point wonderful) Nightdive Studios, which might pretty be known as a retro specialist studio, and the acquisition of the traditional Berzerk recreation.
“There’s been quite a lot of disappointment with Atari for a very long time, and me saying that issues are going to be completely different is not going to vary that,” stated Rosen in a latest interview with Axios (opens in new tab). “I simply ask that individuals simply proceed to observe what we do and simply let the actions of the corporate within the coming years hopefully converse for themselves.”
For the primary time in a long time, the fashionable type of the corporate (the unique Atari being long-defunct) is definitely producing some first rate merchandise. It is not all been incredible: The corporate’s reborn VCS {hardware} seems to be the half, however is fairly underpowered for what you are paying. The curiosity in NFTs and the blockchain stays sturdy, with the corporate having an entire division devoted to those applied sciences. However as somebody who’s watched Atari stumble by way of numerous zombie phases the place it appeared extra like a t-shirt firm than the gaming big it as soon as was, for the primary time in endlessly it seems like Atari has one thing to supply, notably with retro video games.
I am undecided that what the world wants proper now could be a Bubsy 3D re-release, thoughts you, nevertheless it seems to be like Atari’s latest give attention to re-releasing traditional titles in appropriately good situation will proceed, and that may solely be a superb factor. This can be a firm with an unimaginable heritage (and one which goes far past its Seventies heyday) and, whereas it is unlikely to be competing on the high once more anytime quickly, a video games business with a powerful Atari can be all of the richer for it.