22 replies to this topic

[kevincal]

great upload on youtube

[GKC]

kevincal, on Tue Jan 18, 2011 2:17 PM, said:

great upload on youtube

I jumped around a bit on the vid but great find thanks for sharing. That was the first time I had seen that commercail for the Jag at the beginning of the vid. That was pretty good, would have made me want to look into the Jag back in the day. Had anyone else never seen that commercial before?

"our advertising program is going to be the largest in Atari's history"...... So what happened?

[Jag_Slave]

Wonderful stuff! No one would have known that Atari was on its way out! Cool that they included the Catbox and small developer interviews.

[CD-i]

Jack tramiel is what happened

[The_Laird]

CD-i, on Wed Jan 19, 2011 2:53 AM, said:

Jack tramiel is what happened

Jack wasn't in charge then, Sam was

[Eltigro]

Nice vid! I watched most of it actually. For real!

But it does raise a question for me, why did the name change from Ultra Vortex to Ultra Vortek?

[CD-i]

The_Laird, on Wed Jan 19, 2011 5:57 AM, said:

CD-i, on Wed Jan 19, 2011 2:53 AM, said:

Jack tramiel is what happened

Jack wasn't in charge then, Sam was

Yes, at e3 Sam was in charge and they announced a big advertising campaign. Shortly after e3 Sam got a heart attack and Jack took over. Instead of doing a huge advertising campaign he cancelled projects and prepared Ataris fusion with jts.

[The_Laird]

Oh sorry I see what you mean now, my bad!

[MAYAman]

LOL so awesome, I was at this show working for VGA magazine. I had a demo of the VR with our publisher and the Tramiels. I still remember Jack saying that the VR was on track for a release sometime in the near future.

Anyway, this was a really great show for Atari, even though it was overshadowed by the big players. The Virtuality setups were amazingly fun. To bad some super rich billionaire Atari fan doesn't fun a full Jaguar dev team and produces the VR.

[sheath]

Nice vid, I look forward to watching all of the gameplay segments. It reminds me of the Scavenger 32X demo that off-hand I think was at that same expo.

To the Ultra Vortex/Vortek question, knowing nothing of Ultra VortekI would speculate that the SNES Vortex game from 1994 had a patent of some sort on the Vortex name.

[Jag_Slave]

I was around 13 when this show was happening. I really wish I could have attended

[Silverspoon]

That was a pretty good vid.

[save2600]

Eltigro, on Wed Jan 19, 2011 7:08 PM, said:

But it does raise a question for me, why did the name change from Ultra Vortex to Ultra Vortek?

...cause that would have tipped the public off to where they were taking Atari during those time... to a vortex

[marigul]

hmm guess I will have to watch this car wreck and see if I'm in it...

[kevincal]

marigul, on Wed Feb 23, 2011 11:15 PM, said:

hmm guess I will have to watch this car wreck and see if I'm in it...

tell us what you did on the Jag.

[Jag_Slave]

Would have loved to have met the guys who made those games! And dying for a chance to play with the VR helmet.

[marigul]

kevincal, on Thu Feb 24, 2011 1:33 PM, said:

marigul, on Wed Feb 23, 2011 11:15 PM, said:

hmm guess I will have to watch this car wreck and see if I'm in it...

tell us what you did on the Jag.

I know I went to that 1st E3, but can't remember whether it was w/ Atari or not...

Either way I worked on "classics" like
Bubsy
Barkley Basektball
Brett Hull Hockey
Supercross/Motorcross
Baldies
Cybermorph
Lynx Lemmings
Jimmy Conners Tennis
Beach Volleyball
Raiden
Dino Dudes
A little bit on avp
Mindripper

probably some other stuff I can't remember...I was a tester, producer, designer,etc.

[kevincal]

marigul, on Fri Feb 25, 2011 12:25 PM, said:

kevincal, on Thu Feb 24, 2011 1:33 PM, said:

marigul, on Wed Feb 23, 2011 11:15 PM, said:

hmm guess I will have to watch this car wreck and see if I'm in it...

tell us what you did on the Jag.

I know I went to that 1st E3, but can't remember whether it was w/ Atari or not...

Either way I worked on "classics" like
Bubsy
Barkley Basektball
Brett Hull Hockey
Supercross/Motorcross
Baldies
Cybermorph
Lynx Lemmings
Jimmy Conners Tennis
Beach Volleyball
Raiden
Dino Dudes
A little bit on avp
Mindripper

probably some other stuff I can't remember...I was a tester, producer, designer,etc.

Sweet! We have a Bubsy fanatic here at these forums, he absolutely loves the game and made some great youtube videos of a playthrough. Most everyone else though finds the game extremely difficult because of the 1 hit kill.

Barkley Basketball for the Jag is actually available for sale on the net even though it was never officially released. Same deal with Brett Hull Hockey.


Supercross, almost everyone hates the game because of the reall low framerate but I actually like it cus I used to race motocross. I made a playthough video of it on youtube.

Baldies has some fans but isnt a very well known game. I peronsally could never figure it out myself but im not much of a cerebral gamer.

Cybermorph, I really love this game. Seems like half the people who play it dont like it cus its a huge and somewhat difficult game while the rest of us really like it. I actually like it more than Battlemorph. Just something about it.

Raiden on the Jag is great, pretty much everyone likes it.

Dino Dudes has many fans. funny game.

AvP everyone knows about.

dont know much about Mindripper but found this http://www.cyberroac...ml/mindripp.htm

[marigul]

Good general comments...

In general most of the games were tough due to the following factors:
-Many games developed in the UK, where the coders were raised on super tough "psygnosis" style games.
-Games were tuned by testers who played the games 12 hours + a day, thus we though they were too easy
-Some of the coders were champion level arcade gamers

RE: Bubsy honestly I don't remember Bubsy being that hard (but see comments above), plus a game made around the theme of fairy tales, obviously should have been easier

Mindripper doomed to fail, but hey I got to go to Bulgaria and see the set of the movie.

While hindsite is 20/20, the whole was great experience and intro to the industry, but obviously everything was doomed to fail, but glad to see the community and some people that still enjoy the product.

kevincal, on Fri Feb 25, 2011 1:54 PM, said:

marigul, on Fri Feb 25, 2011 12:25 PM, said:

kevincal, on Thu Feb 24, 2011 1:33 PM, said:

marigul, on Wed Feb 23, 2011 11:15 PM, said:

hmm guess I will have to watch this car wreck and see if I'm in it...

tell us what you did on the Jag.

I know I went to that 1st E3, but can't remember whether it was w/ Atari or not...

Either way I worked on "classics" like
Bubsy
Barkley Basektball
Brett Hull Hockey
Supercross/Motorcross
Baldies
Cybermorph
Lynx Lemmings
Jimmy Conners Tennis
Beach Volleyball
Raiden
Dino Dudes
A little bit on avp
Mindripper

probably some other stuff I can't remember...I was a tester, producer, designer,etc.

Sweet! We have a Bubsy fanatic here at these forums, he absolutely loves the game and made some great youtube videos of a playthrough. Most everyone else though finds the game extremely difficult because of the 1 hit kill.

Barkley Basketball for the Jag is actually available for sale on the net even though it was never officially released. Same deal with Brett Hull Hockey.


Supercross, almost everyone hates the game because of the reall low framerate but I actually like it cus I used to race motocross. I made a playthough video of it on youtube.

Baldies has some fans but isnt a very well known game. I peronsally could never figure it out myself but im not much of a cerebral gamer.

Cybermorph, I really love this game. Seems like half the people who play it dont like it cus its a huge and somewhat difficult game while the rest of us really like it. I actually like it more than Battlemorph. Just something about it.

Raiden on the Jag is great, pretty much everyone likes it.

Dino Dudes has many fans. funny game.

AvP everyone knows about.

dont know much about Mindripper but found this http://www.cyberroac...ml/mindripp.htm

[kevincal]

marigul, on Fri Feb 25, 2011 7:03 PM, said:

Good general comments...

In general most of the games were tough due to the following factors:
-Many games developed in the UK, where the coders were raised on super tough "psygnosis" style games.
-Games were tuned by testers who played the games 12 hours + a day, thus we though they were too easy
-Some of the coders were champion level arcade gamers

RE: Bubsy honestly I don't remember Bubsy being that hard (but see comments above), plus a game made around the theme of fairy tales, obviously should have been easier

Mindripper doomed to fail, but hey I got to go to Bulgaria and see the set of the movie.

While hindsite is 20/20, the whole was great experience and intro to the industry, but obviously everything was doomed to fail, but glad to see the community and some people that still enjoy the product.

Ah that figures! Professional gamers as testers = games hard as nails for the average gamer ! Bulgaria huh, that would be fun. Ya the Jag seems to be more and more popular as time goes on.

[kool kitty89]

CD-i, on Thu Jan 20, 2011 6:36 AM, said:

The_Laird, on Wed Jan 19, 2011 5:57 AM, said:

CD-i, on Wed Jan 19, 2011 2:53 AM, said:

Jack tramiel is what happened

Jack wasn't in charge then, Sam was

Yes, at e3 Sam was in charge and they announced a big advertising campaign. Shortly after e3 Sam got a heart attack and Jack took over. Instead of doing a huge advertising campaign he cancelled projects and prepared Ataris fusion with jts.

Nah, I think the Sam comment was almost right on. It's come up many times since this old thread, but Marty's quote summarized it rather well: http://www.atariage....12#entry1823912


That, and this on Jaguar era spending vs revenue. http://www.atariage....59#entry2126059 (granted, the successful 1993 hype facilitated in Atari securing loans/investment capital that kept them going in the short run -and helped them win ongoing litigation- but the very fact they were in such a bad position in 1993 is the real issue -and problems that continued under the Jaguar, albeit exacerbated by Atari's already weak position compared to Atari Corp's late 80s)
Aside from the impact of that hype that the focus on the Jag facilitated, you could argue that keeping the Computers and Lynx going would have been healthier business-wise in general at the time. (the Lynx was still selling -and was more popular than the Game Gear in some European regions- plus it had room for a 3rd model with further consolidation/cost reduction and the advent of acceptable quality reflective -non backlit- color LCD screens in the mid 90s would push that even more on top of a critical reduction in battery life -something Sega totally missed out on with the Game Gear, and computers were more or less dead in the US, but not in Europe -in hindsight, CBM's collapse opened a gap as well prior to PCs really taking over in Europe)
Hmm, actually, lack of emphasis on Europe was one of the critical failings of the jaguar as well: Europe dropped from the test market in '93, delays in introducing it to Europe in '94, and chronic shortages in general with the US apparently getting priority in supply -in stark contrast to what happened with the ST in the late 80s. (given their position in 1993, Europe was the only place they had a chance in hell of having any sort of decent/stable long-term market position, let alone the much greater feasibility of viral marketing due to the denser populations and stronger magazine culture -and where a huge chunk of developer talent resided at the time, especially if Japan was off the table)






Anyway, interesting video, I need to check the jag forums more often.


Also interesting to note the substantial events going on at that same show with Sega's ill-fated early release of the Saturn and Sony's showstopping "299" announcement.

Edited by kool kitty89, Mon Feb 28, 2011 5:12 PM.

[Jagman]

interesting interview at the end there with Hyper Image Productions... also Jeremy had one killer unibrow there

[Clint Thompson]

That was fantastic! I had no idea Hover Hunter was going to be supporting the VR, news to me. I know they mentioned the networking was done but I remember digging around and there was nothing under the networking. Nada, zilch. Guessing just another version. Also, I didn't realize Battlesphere was so... sexual lol. Too bad the game is so scarce (which doesn't make sense in reality) I've never had a real chance to play it aside from the 15 minutes at Jagfest 2k1.

We need more vids like this to surface! That was heart warming