Why did Atari ditch the 5200?

[DracIsBack]

He did no such thing, he wasn't around. Jack had "retired" from his position around '88 and left Sam at the helm. Sam was the Jaguar, unless you're mixing it up when Jack came back at the end of things after Sam's heart attack?

 

It is entirely possible that I'm missing up my Tramiels.

 

 

How would you know what docs Curt's shared with me?

 

I don't know what he shared with you specifically. I do know the spreadsheet that was shared some time ago with the overall community which detailed the development budgets for Jaguar games. I remember looking at it and being quite surprised myself. Can't remember if it was Curt's or Karl Hellar's. Either way it detailed production budgets for games like Highlander, Highlander II etc

 

whose main failure was because of the high cost of its color LCD.

 

Cost was one: I remember the price going up twice between when it was announced. First it was $149, then $169 then hit at $179 due to the screen cost.

 

According to Leonard, their view was it all came down the LCD cost. They couldn't get it down to a price to compete price wise like they wanted to, and that lead to not being able to attract the developers. Hence they sued the LCD supplier for not being able to deliver on the projected cost.

 

An initial gating factor, definitely. It caused them to be late initially too ... giving GameBoy the Christmas 1989 season.

 

However, suppose they did get the cost down? The other issues still had to be addressed.

[Gunstar]

Well, it is a fact that the CV pounded the 5200 in sales. Otherwise, again, why would Atari have dropped it when it was finally getting somewhere? This would only have destroyed any consumer faith in Atari. In the post-1984 era, they apparently did this with their computers, too. But the 5200? Even someone as cynical as I am just can't believe anyone is that idiotic.

 

Simple. Jack bought the company and he wanted to make computers to squash Commodore. He didn't want to make game systems. He only went back to game systems when he realized he could never compete with the asia PC market.

 

Allan

This is all true, but it wasn't just a decision based on choice, you forget to mention the video game crash of 1984 which was the reason the entire industry crumbled, all except for Atari, which barely survived only becuase it was the Juggernuat of the era. But, even Time Warner, who owned it, thought the era of the video game console was over, and why they sold it to Jack in the first place. And Jack, coming from a computer only company, thought the future was also in computers, and not consoles. If not for the video game crash, the 5200 would not have been dropped, and the 7800 would have been released as scheduled, and Atari over the next dozen years...well, the sky was the limit. Jack wouldn't have owned it and Time Warner would have retained Atari. The Commodore Amiga, would have been the Atari "Amiga" game console as the next gen after the 7800, and possibly also still Atari's flagship in it's computer division too. The current console market, and possibly even the PC market, would be a very different looking place today.

Edited June 29, 2008 by Gunstar

[Retro Rogue]

This is all true, but it wasn't just a decision based on choice, you forget to mention the video game crash of 1984 which was the reason the entire industry crumbled, all except for Atari, which barely survived only becuase it was the Juggernuat of the era.

 

It didn't survive, that was the point of the split. Atari Inc. ceased to exist, and the home division properties were sold to Jack's TTL (Tremel Technology Ltd.) which reformed as Atari Corp.

 

 

But, even Time Warner, who owned it,

 

There was no Time Warner at the time, just Warner Communications.

 

thought the era of the video game console was over, and why they sold it to Jack in the first place.

 

They sold it because they needed to financially, not because of an era being "over". In 1982, Atari was producing more than half of Warner's $4 billion in revenues and over 65 percent of its profits. The problems in Atari actually started that year (coming to a head in August), and they did their best to hide it. Warner even looked for a partner for Atari over Winter '82-'83 to offset the problems, but couldn't find one. By the second quarter of 1983, Atari had lost $310.5 million, and I believe at one point in '83 they were loosing a million a day. So by the Spring of '83, Warner was already looking for someone to buy the company outright. That finally happened over a year later with Tramiel, and even then they retained a large portion of stock in the new Atari Corp. company to try and recoup. Atari had been 80% of the video game industry when the problems started, and when 80% of the industry starts having severe financial problems, the other 20% are going to start having them as well - hence the rest of the market starting to crash because of Atari's problems. Atari's problems were self-inflicted, and not because the market caused them - they caused the market.

 

 

And Jack, coming from a computer only company, thought the future was also in computers, and not consoles.

 

Yes, much of the industry was thinking this way at the time and the shift was towards computer games from '84 through '86 (until the NES revived the console industry). Bob Whitehead mentioned that as one of the reasons him and Alan Miller left Activision to start Accolade - wanting to capitalize on the growing computer game market.

 

 

The Commodore Amiga, would have been the Atari "Amiga" game console as the next gen after the 7800,

 

No, Commodore had paid back the loan already, releasing them from the contract. They didn't want to work with Atari in the first place, came to them begrudgingly for the loan that past Fall ('83), and then started actively seeking other investors that Spring. Finally settling on Commodore, they paid back the loan before the split. Had nothing to do with the crash or Atari's split. They were out of the picture already regardless.

 

and possibly also still Atari's flagship in it's computer division too.

 

Atari most likely would have gone with their own 68000 machines already fully prototyped (Sierra/Gaza). The irony is that when Tramiel bought Atari Consumer, he had no idea about the Sierra/Gaza projects (nor anything about the Amiga contract), and he would have had 2 already fully developed 68000 machines to go instead of finishing the design Shiraz had ripped off from his time at Commodore.

Edited June 29, 2008 by wgungfu

[Retro Rogue]

According to Leonard, their view was it all came down the LCD cost. They couldn't get it down to a price to compete price wise like they wanted to, and that lead to not being able to attract the developers. Hence they sued the LCD supplier for not being able to deliver on the projected cost.

 

An initial gating factor, definitely. It caused them to be late initially too ... giving GameBoy the Christmas 1989 season.

 

 

I'm not talking about initial cost, I'm talking about in the long run. The cost of the LCD's was supposed to go down after the first two years I believe, and it never did. He specifically mentioned them seeking to drop the price (i.e. lower the price of the item already on the market, not first being launched) to compete with the GameBoy, which had been dominating the market by that time at $89.95. I believe this was supposed to be in regards to the redesigned Lynx II (that they had planned to use these lower cost LCD's for) to drop the price point below the GameBoy's, rather then the $99 for a bare system that they wound up dropping it to. The supplier never came through and they sued them. They (Sam and Leonard) believed they could have been much more competitive having a cheaper system, and in full color (same formula Jack had used at Commodore for the C64, and had used for the ST vs. Mac during the early days of the ST) and in turn lure more developers for a larger game library. They may have been right, but we'll never know.

Edited June 29, 2008 by wgungfu

[akator]

Looking back to when I was a kid, the Atari 5200 had bad timing. My family was tired of the 2600 , we had an Apple II, and if the 5200 had been available in 1983 we would have gotten that. At the time we ended up with a ColecoVision, and I was a happy clam.

 

In late 1984 I wanted a 5200, but because we had a CV I had to buy the 5200 with my money. I had the cash saved, but when my parents drove me to the closest retailers I was out of luck. There were tons of 5200 games, but no 5200 systems. We tried to get a 5200 for months until my father was tired of driving me. I ended up with more CV games and some CV expansions instead of a 5200.

 

I've read a lot of the 5200 history, but I have no explanation for what I experienced. In my area there was a shortage of 5200 hardware for purchase. I don't know why this happened, but at the time it worked out for Coleco and Apple because that's where I spent my money instead of with Atari.

[slampam]

Retailers hated the 5200 box. Huge! So few were kept in stock. This meant loss of sells to CV if one couldn’t find one. Hence the real reason behind the 5200 Jr. Sure, a smaller board and cutting out the unused expansion port saved pennies, but the smaller box was the goal. Where I got mine, at Service Merchandise, they never had a box on display.

 

http://www.atarihq.com/museum/5200/5100.html

 

http://www.atarimuseum.com/videogames/cons.../5100/5100.html

Edited July 23, 2008 by slampam

[segasaturn]

Because of the video game crash.

[classics]

I think Atari's biggest mistake with the 5200 was being cheap. After investing such a huge amount in the design of the console and its controllers, they cheaped out and shipped it with 16k of ram.

 

If they had just shipped it with 48k of ram the number of titles available to be published on the 5200 could have grown much faster.

 

Some companies like Lucasfilm did re-work thier larger titles like Ballblazer to run in 16k of RAM, but there were thousands of titles that just never could have worked, or would have required such a major rework that it wasn't worth the trouble.

 

Steve

[CV Gus]

To sum it up: sheer stupidity and a lack of understanding of 5200 (or any console) fans.

 

I've said this before and I'll say it again, as someone who was there at the time:

 

1) Atari introduced the 5200 AFTER the CV. So, it was late in 1982. They announced that they were going to dump it in early/early-mid 1984.

Think about it this way: you buy a Playstation 2. It is NOT backwards compatable with the Playstation 1. So, you essentially are trusting Sony to support the P2. After less than 18 months, they tell you that they are going to abandon it in favor of a Playstation 3, tough luck on you. How would YOU feel about Sony, esp. if the 3 is not that much better than the 2, and most of the games were found on the 2 anyway? AND most of those weren't really much better anyway?

 

2) The 5200 never equalled the sales of the CV. You'd have to be both moronic and insane to dump a system that is finally really getting up some steam. Granted, then, that Atari was disappointed with 5200 sales. Were they expecting sales that reflected the immense success of the 2600? Times were different by then, and the CV's equivalent did not exist in 1978..

But is the answer to shaft 5200 owners and move up to a not-much better than the CV system (as Opcode, Matt Patrol, and others have proven)? No- you make better games for the 5200, like Millipede and Super Pac-Man were. Tempest. Others. The problem is technonerd thinking; people are less concerned with ohsupercoolnewTECHNOLOGY than being shafted by a company that thinks it can support a system for less than 18 months and then tell its customers "o.k., now WE are saying YOU must forget about the 5200 and move up to a 7800!"

 

3) To this day I have 1984 video game magazines commenting on the letters (this was before "e-mail" in any sense of the word today, mind you) they received from angry 5200 fans. They felt betrayed and abandoned.

 

 

 

Look- you keep the existing system until it is clearly outclassed by the arcade scene (or other). Then, and only then, you must introduce a system that is VERY superior to the existing one. The leap from 5200 to 7800 was more like a hop. Nintendo did this with the NES.

 

It's 1984. You have a 5200, and a number of games for it. Oh, lookee at what the 7800 has to offer:

 

Robotron: 2084. Actually, the sound, explosions, and border are better on the 5200. The 7800 has the color green and smoother action, but it's not really much better, overall.

 

Ms. Pac-Man. If you have the 5200 version, is there really a need to get the 7800 version?

 

Centipede. Especially if you have the Trak-Ball, the 5200 version is better. Much more "like the arcade."

 

Food Fight. What, the CV or 5200 couldn't have done this? Looks almost like an Activision 2600 game.

 

Galaga. The CV version of Galaxian implies that it could've done nearly as good a job. Actually, that game is better...

 

Xevious. Again, the 5200 prototype does indicate that...

 

While the 7800 did have advantages, to be sure, it wasn't enough. I've rather grown to like the 5200 I found at a townwide garage sale circa 1997. It should have not been dumped the way it was in 1984.

 

As for the 7800- they would have eventually had to have released it, but its abilities should then have been expanded for the later time. So it would have been MUCH better than the 5200.

Edited July 22, 2008 by CV Gus

[ymike673]

Wonder what would have happened if Atari had stayed with the 5200 a little longer. Coleco stopped make the CV to concentrate on the Adam Computer which was a disaster. Had Atari not abandoned the 5200 maybe sales would have been higher once CV production was halted.

[Math You]

They really should have made the 5200 compatible with the 800. It would have been a great way of increasing the number of Atari 800 users.

[Atari2008]

I agree that Atari should have stuck with the 5200 a bit longer and have waited till it was time for the 7800 (and a much more powerful one at that). Having recently acquired a 5200, I can see how it was a bigger leap from the 2600, than the 7800 was from the 5200. But I guess that Atari saw the 5200 as a failure and wanted a fresh start with the 7800, and I can see that perspective as well. I mean it seems like Atari wasn't in a very good place in 83/84, so they were probably looking for the next hit like the 2600, and it seems that the 5200 wasn't delivering. I still think that the solution should've been to stick with the 5200 rather than switch gears but oh well.

 

Also, I'm wondering, since Atari was still supporting the 2600 and the 2600 still had some awesome titles at the time, how many Atari gamers just stuck with the 2600 as opposed to upgrade? Also, I'm thinking it didn't help that the 2600/5200 shared many games in common. I think more unique titles that displayed the 5200's capabilities would've helped.

[ymike673]

I wonder why Atari thought the 7800 would sell. I was very upset when Atari pulled the plug on the 5200 and I was not going to risk being burned again by buying another Atari system that could be dropped after a year or so. Atari at least should have found a way for the 7800 to play 5200 as well as 2600 games.

Of course if Atari had made the 5200 compatable with the 2600 from the beginning and threw all their energies into the 5200 instead of still promoting the 2600 maybe things would have turned out differently.

Edited July 22, 2008 by ymike673

[Mot]

I wonder why Atari thought the 7800 would sell. I was very upset when Atari pulled the plug on the 5200 and I was not going to risk being burned again by buying another Atari system that could be dropped after a year or so. Atari at least should have found a way for the 7800 to play 5200 as well as 2600 games.

Of course if Atari had made the 5200 compatible with the 2600 from the beginning and threw all their energies into the 5200 instead of still promoting the 2600 maybe things would have turned out differently.

 

I think people should listen to the

GCC's creation of the 7800!

 

Atari was changing big time! Warner to Jack and Jack said computer's only!

 

The 7800 was more of a "Hay we have these things sitting around, let's sell um!".

 

or just listen to the speech.

[Math You]

I think people should listen to the

GCC's creation of the 7800!

or just listen to the speech.

Great link

 

Tia-Maria, eh!

[DracIsBack]

2) The 5200 never equalled the sales of the CV.

 

Unless people have NPD data for either system from the time, this is kind of a pointless discussion. There's a lot of stats for old consoles on the net that are kind of suspect ... and often misquoted, misunderstood.

 

3) To this day I have 1984 video game magazines commenting on the letters (this was before "e-mail" in any sense of the word today, mind you) they received from angry 5200 fans. They felt betrayed and abandoned.

 

Which they should have been. 1982-4 is not a long time. Kind of a mirror of the Sega Dreamcast really.

 

 

It's 1984. You have a 5200, and a number of games for it. Oh, lookee at what the 7800 has to offer:

 

 

LOL - I really wouldn't worry about how the 5200 was fleased. The 7800 replaced it was was fleased even more. The 5200 was dumped quickly, which sucks. The 7800 had all the life and most of the potential sucked out of it by Jack Tramiel. (listen to the link below) who wanted to make a buck.

 

Galaga. The CV version of Galaxian implies that it could've done nearly as good a job. Actually, that game is better...

 

So let's flip this the other way. You have a Colecovision version of - say Alien Brigade, Midnight Mutants or Sirius? Commando? Scrapyard Dog? Basketbrawl? Plutos? Tower Toppler?

[Atari2008]

So let's flip this the other way. You have a Colecovision version of - say Alien Brigade, Midnight Mutants or Sirius? Commando? Scrapyard Dog? Basketbrawl? Plutos? Tower Toppler?

 

Have to agree there, I'm not much of a 7800 fan but I'm pretty confident there's no way any of those above mentioned games could be done on a CV or 5200 for that matter.

Edited July 23, 2008 by Atari2008

[CV Gus]

No, the CV does not have those games- although it does have Lord of the Dungeon*, which blows the doors off of Midnight Mutants. And back then it did have Alcazar, and gateway to Apshai.

 

Front Line is close to Commando.

 

Sirius? How about Cosmic Avenger and Zaxxon?

 

And did the 7800 have Fortune Builder, Turbo, Pitstop, Oil's Well, Pepper 2, Bump `N Jump, etc.?

 

True, the 7800 has those games, but you're overlooking the point of "in tune." Midnight Mutants was released when the 7800 was a lost cause and we were entering the 16-Bit era anyway. The vast majority of games for the 7800 were either already old and available for earlier systems (Ms. Pac Man, Robotron: 2084, etc.), or, in the case of Commando and Double Dragon, available for other systems with a much better selection, including then-relevant games.

 

I also doubt that the CV and 5200 could not have done versions of those games that would just about equal those of the 7800. You can see that Joust for the CV, had it been completed, would easily have matched the 7800 version. Likewise Dig Dug. And even the pre-programmable systems (such as the Unisonic) had light gun games, so could the CV and 5200, if someone had decided to do it. And they would have at least almost equalled the 7800 ones (heck, as well as the NES ones...).

 

You have to remember that, when deciding to "move up," your average gamer wants at least three things:

 

1) A selection of arcade games and genres relevant to THAT TIME. How well would the CV have done if the only games it offered were good translations of games that did not go past 1978?

 

2) Obvious technological improvement. Very much so, since arcade games were advancing quickly. The 7800 was good, but again, with skilled programming for either the CV or 5200, could not those two systems have stood up at leats as well to the NES? Look at Opcode games.

 

3) Trustworthiness and competence. Abandoning the 5200 so quickly and bumbling around by the Tramiels did not inspire much confidence.

 

No, Atari was doomed in 1984. After that, with the Tramiels, it was like watching a cartoon character frantically flapping his arms to avoid falling off a cliff, but you know he'll go down any second.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* Sirius is relatively recent, too. For the 7800.

[DracIsBack]

No, the CV does not have those games- although it does have Lord of the Dungeon*, which blows the doors off of Midnight Mutants.

 

Well, you, in your personal subjective opinion, think think it does. :-)

 

And did the 7800 have Fortune Builder, Turbo, Pitstop, Oil's Well, Pepper 2, Bump `N Jump, etc.?

 

Nope, but that wasn't the point I was making. Absolutely, the Coleco had awesome games - many, many more classics than the 7800. Frankly, I felt the same about the 5200. I just had trouble with the "it's hardly better than ____ technically" argument. Unless you want to point me to a Colecovision game with graphics like ALIEN BRIGADE. :-) And I get the points you are making about the games coming later. That said, it was still the 7800. The Coleco could indeed do JOUST. Show me it doing SIRIUS. Show me it moving 100 objects at a time. Show me a game where its displaying 25 onscreen colors. Heck, since this is a 5200 forum, show me the Coleco doing Ballblazer as well as the 5200 or 7800?

 

Opcode did do awesome things. But, many of those games still show the Coleco's limits. And, many of them (IIRC) required enhancement modules to run, didn't they? I remember thinking "Hey neat - the Coleco is doing Castlevania". Then I saw it needed a 128K memory module or something to run.

 

 

Abandoning the 5200 so quickly and bumbling around by the Tramiels did not inspire much confidence.

 

Warner abandoned the 5200, not Jack. It was already discontinued when he took over.

Edited July 23, 2008 by DracIsBack

[Rik]

Quote,Now, why would Atari risk angering its customers by abandoning the 5200 after just less than 1 1/2 years.

 

For the same reason they angered Atari fans by putting existing inferior crappy sound hardware in the 7800,that and numerous other things as well. Atari,judging from the stuff they did,didnt care much about the customers.They cared about saving money and making a profit,no matter what that took to achieve,even though they often failed at that too.It was such a greedy cash grab back then,everyone jumping on the bandwagon to get a piece of the profit pie.And really,who F@#$kin cares what the beancounters say,do you enjoy the 5200?thats all that counts.Maybe it was a faliure financially to Atari,but it was a winner to me,the customer,IMO.

Edited July 24, 2008 by Rik

[DracIsBack]

For the same reason they angered Atari fans by putting existing inferior crappy sound hardware in the 7800,that and numerous other things as well. Atari,judging from the stuff they did,didnt care much about the customers.

 

The sound on the 7800 was a byproduct of customer listening and also cost-cutting. Remember, people were up in arms that the 5200 couldn't play 2600 games. So, "compatibility with the 2600" was a primary design goal of the 7800. To achieve that though, they needed to include 2600 hardware in the system. As a result of the added cost of this, they chinced on casing and having a POKEY or other chip drive the sound in order to offset having the 2600 hardware.

 

Also - if they were all about cost cutting, they wouldn't have been losing $2 million a day. At that point, cost cutting was about necessity.

Edited July 24, 2008 by DracIsBack

[ymike673]

Have to admit that if the 7800 adapter for the 5200 had been produced I would have bought it.

[Rik]

For the same reason they angered Atari fans by putting existing inferior crappy sound hardware in the 7800,that and numerous other things as well. Atari,judging from the stuff they did,didnt care much about the customers.

 

The sound on the 7800 was a byproduct of customer listening and also cost-cutting. Remember, people were up in arms that the 5200 couldn't play 2600 games. So, "compatibility with the 2600" was a primary design goal of the 7800. To achieve that though, they needed to include 2600 hardware in the system. As a result of the added cost of this, they chinced on casing and having a POKEY or other chip drive the sound in order to offset having the 2600 hardware.

 

Also - if they were all about cost cutting, they wouldn't have been losing $2 million a day. At that point, cost cutting was about necessity.

Yeah,i know what you mean,but why bother building a supposed superior console,dubbed as the 5200's successor if you're going to use existing inferior hardware,i mean the 5200 has better sound than the 7800.Plus who didnt have a 2600?If one wanted to play their 2600 games,it wouldnt have been so much work to get out the 2600 console wouldnt it?I dont think making the 7800, 2600 compatable was such a 100% smart move.I'll admit,its handy as hell to have the 7800 2600 compatible,by i could've lived without it,thats what the 2600 console is for!Im no Marketing expert,this is just my opinion.There's reasons why Atari did the things they did like mentioned above,valid or not, i wish they did things differently ,know what i mean?And giving the 7800 good sound is the 1 thing i wish they did do regardless.

Edited July 24, 2008 by Rik

[DracIsBack]

And giving the 7800 good sound is the 1 thing i wish they did do regardless.

 

They did have a strategy for this, but it was killed by Jack Tramiel. The plan was to offer a low-cost sound chip named GUMBY in the cartridge that would offset the issue of not having it on the system itself. When Jack came on board, Gumby was killed (along with all other 7800 projects). The chances of Jack agreeing to anything in a 7800 cart (memory, storage space, POKEY chips, batteries) was low. It happened but it was activitely discouraged.

Edited July 24, 2008 by DracIsBack

[flowmotion]

Just caught up with this thread, so bump.

 

To the question of why Atari ended production of the 5200 in 1984 (and Coleco ended production of the CV), keep in mind that major retailers had decided that they wanted nothing to do with video games. Sears, Penny's, Target, K-Mart, and so on all had huge firesales where they sold off their back inventory of consoles and cartridges for pennies on the dollar. Atari couldn't have paid them to stock a 5200 or 7800 in 1985.

 

Afterward, video game systems were only available in smaller toy stores and mom&pop computer shops. So while it's technically true that the Adam 'replaced' the ColecoVision, the reality is that the Adam had about 1/100th of the retail presence, as did later Atari efforts like the 7800 and XEGS. Even Nintendo had a lot of trouble getting retail space (some people have hypothesized that the ROB robot was to make the system look more like a 'toy' than a game console). It wasn't until the Jaguar that Atari finally got back into the big box stores.

 

As to which system sold better, CV or 5200, I'd be curious if anyone digs up some real numbers.