10 Atari Games that caused the Crash of 1984.

[j_factor]

Wow, I really supposed you're no older than 10. My bad.

You must spread some Reputation before giving it to Barone again.

[NeoZeedeater]

Best case scenario, if all US C64 buyers were only getting it to play videogames, and if the C64 took no sales away from other computers (which are both astronomically doubtful), then the C64 market was still <50% of what the console market had been prior to the crash, and 30% odd of the subsequent NES market.

Gaming in general did have a decline in sales (although I'm not sure I trust any sales figures). The casuals caught up in the Pac-Man/Donkey Kong craze probably didn't buy many C64s a couple years later. Still, a decline is much different than the supposedly killed off industry many people think happened. And if the NES phenomenon didn't happen, C64 sales would likely have continued stronger longer.

Also, from a game playing perspective things we're better than ever in 1984 given the sheer quantity and variety on these computers. I'm sure there weren't many million copy sellers but disk based games were also less risky and less expensive to produce. Companies didn't seem very phased by piracy and I'm guessing it's because the profit on the sold copies was high.

[Thenewguy]

Gaming in general did have a decline in sales (although I'm not sure I trust any sales figures).

Gamevet found a video on the 64 a while back which backed up this ballpark, a Commodore representative stated there were 7-8 million C64s in the US as of 1988.

NES on the other hand sold 7 million in the US in 1988 alone

And if the NES phenomenon didn't happen, C64 sales would likely have continued stronger longer.

If the C64 was a mainstream mass-market gaming success story in the US, and US gaming was healthy in the mid 80s, and the average Joe saw no difference between playing games on console's, or computers, then I don't see how the NES would've become a phenomenon in the first place.

C64 had a head-start, C64 had the install base, C64 had a huge game library, Commodore is an American brand etc

The US had a head-start on the rest of the world in game development, had huge numbers of people for the purposes of playtesting + the slow polishing of game mechanics, and had a ton of cash and a good environment for starting up businesses. The US should've been leading the world in game development, instead they were trailing by a mile, there were very few big companies, and the big companies which were there had been formed prior to the crash. There was just no see-able growth in the US taking place in the mid 80s. In one of my old magazines Electronic Arts stated matter of factly that European sales were essentially what was keeping them going at the time. Everything points to the sales figures being very much correct (ie over 50% of the gaming market in the US went down the tubes and many people simply bought up a lot of discounted 2600 games for a few years)

If the US industry had been healthy, US companies would've played through these NES games and then ripped them off and ported their ideas to computer games, this did not happen, there are very few US platform games and action-adventure games produced on C64 in the late 80s.

If the US industry was healthy, why do 90% of US historians wrongly attribute the creation of many gameplay mechanics to NES games?

Virtually everything I've read, or heard Americans say when they talk about the 80s lead me to believe the country was generally in the dark ages during the mid 80s, for every Gamevet, J_Factor, or NeoZeedeater talking about computer games there are, like 10 Americans who have no knowledge of 80s computer games, no nostalgia for 80s computer games, and no interest in 80s computer games, people go on about how the NES saved the industry, how Nintendo created half the game genre's out there etc etc.

[sheath]

If you ask people who are supporters of Nintendo's narrative history when they got into gaming you will, in my experience, find they got their NES after 1989 and inherited some other Nintendo console later on. Most people who played game consoles or Arcade games in the 80s were casual gamers who don't care about gaming history in the slightest. Numerically they also don't matter compared to what the Industry has become.

[NeoZeedeater]

If the US industry was healthy, why do 90% of US historians wrongly attribute the creation of many gameplay mechanics to NES games?

Who are these supposed historians? Guys under 30 working for 1up or IGN? These are generally people that started gaming with the NES, not ones that remember the mid '80s let alone anything earlier.

There has been a notable increase in Nintendo-centric views of history in recent times (you previously mentioned that happening in the UK among younger gamers as well). The Genesis was big success in NA but the mainstream media today acts like it barely existed when talking about old games. The 2600 is remembered less and less every year that passes but doesn't mean it wasn't successful for its time.

Virtually everything I've read, or heard Americans say when they talk about the 80s lead me to believe the country was generally in the dark ages during the mid 80s, for every Gamevet, J_Factor, or NeoZeedeater talking about computer games there are, like 10 Americans who have no knowledge of 80s computer games, no nostalgia for 80s computer games, and no interest in 80s computer games, people go on about how the NES saved the industry, how Nintendo created half the game genre's out there etc etc.

Similar to what sheath was saying, the majority of gamers talking on message boards aren't old enough to remember that time period. They started with the NES or later and generally don't care about looking back further.

There's no doubt the NES was a phenomenon much bigger than anything in home gaming before it. No one's disputing that. A lot of gamers had it as their first system. I'm just arguing that gaming wasn't dead in the mid '80s here. It wasn't in a growth period but it wasn't some ultra niche thing like pinball had become either. You didn't have to go to specialty stores to find video games. Pretty much any mall had multiple stores where you could buy new releases, not to mention find them in the still common arcades.

*edit - In defense of IGN, they have had some good articles by freelancers. "Revising History: The Crash of '83" counteracts a lot of myths. http://ca.ign.com/articles/2008/12/1...h-of-83?page=1

It was written by Frogacuda. He's registered at Sega 16 but hasn't posted in a while.

[goldenband]

It was very bad for consoles in the mid-1980s, though (and yes, I did live through the period), at least in the United States. It's illuminating to read some of the issues of Electronic Games that span that time, especially as it attempted to transition to Computer Entertainment (and croaked after a few issues).

It wasn't merely a period of non-growth, but a massive contraction caused by typical "bubble" phenomena. And it definitely hit the arcades as well. Check out p. 41 of the May 1985 Computer Entertainment for one roughly-contemporary discussion of events (and, while you're at it, check out pp. 58-59 for one of my favorite video game reviews of all time).

[Thenewguy]

you previously mentioned that happening in the UK among younger gamers as well

I attribute a lot of that to US influence and the internet tbh.

Though admittedly a lot of it simply has to do with the fact that Nintendo are still a force to be reckoned with in the industry, have their own dedicated format magazines, and have been actively promoting their back-catalogue with endeavors like the VC.

In defense of IGN, they have had some good articles by freelancers. "Revising History: The Crash of '83" counteracts a lot of myths. http://ca.ign.com/articles/2008/12/1...h-of-83?page=1

It was written by Frogacuda. He's registered at Sega 16 but hasn't posted in a while.

Its OK, but there's a lot of misinformation.

• The computer market did not takeover from the console market, this is simply a fact, the sales figures do not even remotely back up this claim, C64 sold 2 million in 1983, >500,000 of these sales were likely at the expense of other computers, a large amount of these 2 million buyers would've been getting them for reasons other than videogames, all other budget home computers were declining simultaneously with the consoles etc, etc.
• Atari was not the only hardware manufacturer having trouble, Colecovision's sales in 1982 were very, very good, they then nosedived in no time flat.
• The 5200 was not a "moderate" improvement over the 2600, the 5200 can very easily handle scrolling games.

The general point is correct though, the crash was caused by Atari mismanaging the situation, and resting on their laurels. Atari needed to be pushing people away from the 2600 and towards the 5200 earlier, and they needed to show people that the next gen offered something new and exciting.

It wasn't merely a period of non-growth, but a massive contraction caused by typical "bubble" phenomena. And it definitely hit the arcades as well. Check out p. 41 of the May 1985 Computer Entertainment for one roughly-contemporary discussion of events (and, while you're at it, check out pp. 58-59 for one of my favorite video game reviews of all time).

Ooooh, awesome, that's my favourite US magazine.

This is a good quote already in regards to US arcades

[tz101]

Virtually everything I've read, or heard Americans say when they talk about the 80s lead me to believe the country was generally in the dark ages during the mid 80s

If you did not live here, then it is purely conjecture. I started gaming on the VCS in 1980 and vividly recall the entire 80's gaming scene. Arcades never took a hit, as far as I could tell. I remember walking into Aladdin's Castle at the local mall anywhere from 1984 to 1986 and they always had the latest games, and the place was usually nicely busy with patrons. What does 'dark ages' mean? At some point around 1985 Colecovision and Intellivision game/console sales receded, but Atari was still strong from every sign I saw. Once Nintendo and Sega released their consoles on US soil in the mid 80's, it was like nothing had ever missed a beat.

If you ask people who are supporters of Nintendo's narrative history when they got into gaming you will, in my experience, find they got their NES after 1989 and inherited some other Nintendo console later on. Most people who played game consoles or Arcade games in the 80s were casual gamers who don't care about gaming history in the slightest. Numerically they also don't matter compared to what the Industry has become.

Huh? Define 'casual gamers'. Also, please elaborate on how 80's gamers don't matter compared to what the industry has become.

You didn't have to go to specialty stores to find video games. Pretty much any mall had multiple stores where you could buy new releases, not to mention find them in the still common arcades.

Agreed. Where was 'the crash' to be found? Maybe in the financials of the earlier major players, but there never was a dearth of good games to be found, and the arcades never felt the effects as far as I could tell.

[sheath]

Huh? Define 'casual gamers'. Also, please elaborate on how 80's gamers don't matter compared to what the industry has become.

Casual as in they played to "unwind" or for amusement and never really considered it a hobby. And by "they" I mean most people who have ever bought game consoles and games up until maybe, and just maybe, the current generation. 80s gamers are far less likely to be talking about 80s games as a general habit today as 90s gamers, but that doesn't make the majority of 90s gamers less casual in any way there are just more of them.

It's also possible that we really do live in the era of the man child and no good thing has happened.

[Thenewguy]

If you did not live here, then it is purely conjecture.

Conjecture is guesswork, conjecture is not an opinion based on piles and piles of evidence.

Living in an area is not very useful, all it tells you about is what things were like in your small part of the country amongst your limited local social groups. For all you know Indiana could've been one of the only areas in the US not affected by the crash.

I've mentioned this before, in all the time I've been on the net I've got barely anything useful from these "I was there" accounts, they're virtually always worthless. I've been told the NES was huge in the UK and outsold everything else, I've been told the SMS was the biggest selling games machine, the Atari ST, C64 etc, in fact I would say that by 1st hand accounts, somehow every single machine out there managed to outsell every other machine in the UK.

[gamevet]

Its OK, but there's a lot of misinformation.


The computer market did not takeover from the console market, this is simply a fact, the sales figures do not even remotely back up this claim, C64 sold 2 million in 1983, >500,000 of these sales were likely at the expense of other computers, a large amount of these 2 million buyers would've been getting them for reasons other than videogames, all other budget home computers were declining simultaneously with the consoles etc, etc.

You're excluding sales of the Apple IIe computers as well as the Atari 800 XL from the list. Looking back at the magazines that were advertising the computer games at the time; The screenshots always had the C64 and Apple IIe versions of those games. There were a lot of games that were shared with the Atari computers as well, and games like Archon originated on that computer.

The Atari 400/800, TRS-80, Ti-99, Vic-20 and other early 80's computers were on the decline, but it was not so for the C-64 and Apple IIe. The C-64 was the leader, but there were other home computers in the mix, including the start of the IBM clones with the Tandy 1000.

Atari was not the only hardware manufacturer having trouble, Colecovision's sales in 1982 were very, very good, they then nosedived in no time flat.

If you look back at what Atari, Coleco and Mattel were doing with those consoles, they were trying to add devices to turn them into home computers, because they knew where the market was heading.

The 5200 was not a "moderate" improvement over the 2600, the 5200 can very easily handle scrolling games.

Atari really didn't show enough games to support the idea that it was a better option. They released the console with Centipede, Pac-Man and Pole Position. These were already past their prime when they were released on the console.

The general point is correct though, the crash was caused by Atari mismanaging the situation, and resting on their laurels. Atari needed to be pushing people away from the 2600 and towards the 5200 earlier, and they needed to show people that the next gen offered something new and exciting.

The popularity of the 2600 at the time of the 5200's release, did not help the situation. And with the growth of home computers, the console market couldn't compete with the onslaught of cheap floppy disk games that were being offered on the 8-bit home computers. Atari pretty much priced themselves out of the computer market, with their more expensive Atari 400/800 computers and with the delays of their more cost effective XL, they were beat out by Commodore.

Gamevet found a video on the 64 a while back which backed up this ballpark, a Commodore representative stated there were 7-8 million C64s in the US as of 1988.

NES on the other hand sold 7 million in the US in 1988 alone

We're not talking about 1988. We're talking about the gaming market from 1982 to 1986. The NES was not an instant success in North America and stores like Federated had their floors filled with computers like the Atari ST, Amiga and C-64 in 1986.

If the C64 was a mainstream mass-market gaming success story in the US, and US gaming was healthy in the mid 80s, and the average Joe saw no difference between playing games on console's, or computers, then I don't see how the NES would've become a phenomenon in the first place.

That's pretty simple. The introduction of vs. Super Mario in the arcades, launched the popularity of the title for the NES. The first time I'd seen the NES in a store, it had Duck Hunt and Rob the Robot. I thought it was okay, but nothing worth getting excited about. After I'd played vs. Super Mario Bros. in the local pizza joint, I was hooked.

C64 had a head-start, C64 had the install base, C64 had a huge game library, Commodore is an American brand etc

Do you really expect a 6 year old computer to last as long in North America, as it did in Europe; Especially when the IBM PC clones were starting to establish a userbase?

The US had a head-start on the rest of the world in game development, had huge numbers of people for the purposes of playtesting + the slow polishing of game mechanics, and had a ton of cash and a good environment for starting up businesses. The US should've been leading the world in game development, instead they were trailing by a mile, there were very few big companies, and the big companies which were there had been formed prior to the crash. There was just no see-able growth in the US taking place in the mid 80s. In one of my old magazines Electronic Arts stated matter of factly that European sales were essentially what was keeping them going at the time. Everything points to the sales figures being very much correct (ie over 50% of the gaming market in the US went down the tubes and many people simply bought up a lot of discounted 2600 games for a few years)

You have no idea what it was like. I walked into Toys R' Us in Phoenix, back in 1986. They had at least 75 feet of aisle space dedicated to C-64 software. The NES section was not that big at that time.

You would see C-64 games in book stores within the a mall. I had a dedicated C-64 game store within a mile of my apartment in 1986. I had bought a replacement C-64 power-supply at that very same store.

If the US industry had been healthy, US companies would've played through these NES games and then ripped them off and ported their ideas to computer games, this did not happen, there are very few US platform games and action-adventure games produced on C64 in the late 80s.

EA was importing games that were made in Europe for the C-64. The other American companies that survived the console crash or started in the mid-80s' were Activision, SSI, Brodurbund, Epyx, Lucasfilm Games, LLamasoft, Datasoft, Atarisoft and Accolade.

A lot of the early titles on the NES were published by these companies. Most of them moved on to the IBM PC and Amiga, since their style of games wasn't the same as those of a console.

If the US industry was healthy, why do 90% of US historians wrongly attribute the creation of many gameplay mechanics to NES games?

Because most of the people still writing in the industry are pretty young. The founding fathers of gaming publications are dying off. Bill Kunkel died in 2011.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Kunkel_(gaming)

Virtually everything I've read, or heard Americans say when they talk about the 80s lead me to believe the country was generally in the dark ages during the mid 80s, for every Gamevet, J_Factor, or NeoZeedeater talking about computer games there are, like 10 Americans who have no knowledge of 80s computer games, no nostalgia for 80s computer games, and no interest in 80s computer games, people go on about how the NES saved the industry, how Nintendo created half the game genre's out there etc etc.

Just how old are these people you've been talking to?

I run into old C-64 users all of the time.

[Zz Badnusty]

Atari really didn't show enough games to support the idea that it was a better option. They released the console with Centipede, Pac-Man and Pole Position. These were already past their prime when they were released on the console.

And then much of what was promised for the 5200 took forever to show up on the market place or was generally nowhere to be found.
We were all psyched on the possibility to play with a trackball at home, especially for Centipede. But despite searching for the trackball at every store we ever went to, I never saw one for sale.
The original console design supported 4 controllers yet additional controllers were very difficult to find in stores.
Advertised games took forever to show up, or never did. I don't think I ever saw a 2600 adapter for sale in a store either.
The dual controller holder package with Space Dungeon was difficult to find in stores.
Atari just plainly blew it.

[j_factor]

If the C64 was a mainstream mass-market gaming success story in the US, and US gaming was healthy in the mid 80s, and the average Joe saw no difference between playing games on console's, or computers, then I don't see how the NES would've become a phenomenon in the first place.

C64 had a head-start, C64 had the install base, C64 had a huge game library, Commodore is an American brand etc

I don't think anyone is claiming that the US gaming market was "healthy" at the time. But your line of reasoning here makes no sense -- how does any new system become successful? Except for the 2600, for every system in history, something else had a head start, had the install base, and the large library. (And no one cares if it's an American brand.) Replace C64 with Genesis in that last sentence and you could apply it to the SNES.

The US had a head-start on the rest of the world in game development, had huge numbers of people for the purposes of playtesting + the slow polishing of game mechanics, and had a ton of cash and a good environment for starting up businesses. The US should've been leading the world in game development, instead they were trailing by a mile,

I have to strongly disagree here. The US was not trailing: Pitfall II, Rescue on Fractulus, Gauntlet, Ultima III & IV, Rogue, Lode Runner, Questron, Marble Madness, Archon, The Bard's Tale, Impossible Mission, Wizardry III, Seven Cities of Gold, Ballblazer, Summer Games, H.E.R.O., King's Quest, The Ancient Art of War, Paperboy, M.U.L.E., Karateka, Raid on Bungeling Bay, the "Construction Set" series... all pretty significant/innovative titles, and you might have even heard of a few of them. This was also the only period when American games were popular in Japan. Whenever a Japanese publication like Famitsu does a top 100 (or 200 or whatever) games of all time list, the only American-developed games on the list are always computer games from around 1983-85.

there were very few big companies, and the big companies which were there had been formed prior to the crash.

Well, of course. This is almost a tautology. In order to be big, usually a company would have to have been around for a little while. Any company that was around a little while as of during/immediately after the crash was formed prior to the crash.

There was just no see-able growth in the US taking place in the mid 80s.

Of course there was no growth -- there was a contraction.

If the US industry had been healthy, US companies would've played through these NES games and then ripped them off and ported their ideas to computer games, this did not happen, there are very few US platform games and action-adventure games produced on C64 in the late 80s.

Usually the reverse was happening, computer games were seen as more "advanced", and the NES was getting ports of computer (or arcade) games that were several years old. And American companies were more focused on other genres. There aren't that many US platform games produced on NES either.

If the US industry was healthy, why do 90% of US historians wrongly attribute the creation of many gameplay mechanics to NES games?

People are stupid and give Nintendo credit for just about everything. It doesn't matter if the earlier game deserving credit was on a computer, arcade machine, or a non-Nintendo console. They downplay (or outright ignore) arcades, Atari, Coleco, Intellivision, all computers including DOS/Windows PC, even Genesis. I've even seen PSX getting downplayed in favor of N64 sometimes, ludicrous as that is.

[Cross]

Giving the fact the nes was around a year old in 1986 i aint shocked there was only a small stock to pick from. its not like now a days where video games are super common. I got my nes around 1986, 1987(maybe 88) so that puts me around 5-6 years old. I do recall going into toys R us as a kid but i don't ever recall seeing anything for C64 or any of the computers you listed. I don't even know anyone in the real world who had a C64 let alone even talk about one. I do recall the little flipping things where you took paper out of for the game wanted tho, do they still even do that?

[gamevet]

Giving the fact the nes was around a year old in 1986 i aint shocked there was only a small stock to pick from. its not like now a days where video games are super common. I got my nes around 1986, 1987(maybe 88) so that puts me around 5-6 years old. I do recall going into toys R us as a kid but i don't ever recall seeing anything for C64 or any of the computers you listed. I don't even know anyone in the real world who had a C64 let alone even talk about one. I do recall the little flipping things where you took paper out of for the game wanted tho, do they still even do that?

I wouldn't expect someone that was 5 or 6 years old to remember seeing anything but what they were looking for in a Toys R' Us aisle. I remember seeing Kee Games Tank at the local roller rink @ 1975, and it didn't dawn on my 7 year old mind what exactly it was. I had no idea it was something special.

I know that the NES was not an overnight sensation in 1986 and that the C-64 was still doing okay at that time. I'd seen old Vectrex games sitting on the bottom of the shelves at that TRU, with ulta-cheap discount prices, but I didn't have the system, so I didn't buy them. Oh, if I'd only known that I could have sold them for a pretty penny today.

Here's a 1986 commercial from Toys R' Us.



These jackwagons got a lot of facts wrong, but they do a pretty decent job of representing what the C-64 meant during its time.