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Atari 50: Celebrating Atari’s 50th Anniversary

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Celebrating Atari’s 50th anniversary!

The brand Atari has been around since 1972, making 2022 it’s 50th year in existence. Atari’s history is long and rich (some may say, sordid) with plenty of owners taking the helm, some for the good of Atari, some not.

The current Atari is a far cry from the Atari from the 70s and early 80s, but we’ll spare you the details on how we feel about the contemporary Atari, after all, this post is to celebrate their 50th anniversary! If however you do want to delve deep into the history of Atari, check out Marty Goldberg & Curt Vendel’s book, Atari Inc. Business Is Fun (read our review here).

For now, let’s all raise a glass to Atari in celebration of its 50th anniversary!



Missile Command: Recharged – It’s a Blast

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Atari’s seminal 1980s arcade classic, Missile Command, has now been Recharged and is ready for blasting on your favourite iOS and Android device!

Missile Command has been one of our favourite games to play due to its compelling simplicity and very visceral and satisfying gameplay – aim at the falling missiles, fire and destroy, it doesn’t get better or simpler than that.

Missile Command: Recharged is actually quite well (re)done with beautiful neon visuals paired with cool electronic music that Jeff Minter would be quite proud of. The game also has power-ups, upgrades, and an augmented reality feature, making this game quite a blast (pun intended).

The current Atari cops a lot of stick for milking their original IP, including from us, but this free to play game (with a one time purchase to remove the ads) is a pleasant surprise – it is really well done.

If you want a (free) Missile Command game for your smart device, then you can’t go wrong with Missile Command: Recharged. Get it now!

 

Atari Mini Arcades

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Whoa, two brand new Atari Mini Arcades (featuring 5 classic Atari games each) have been announced!

These officially licensed Atari mini-arcades, including a Pong inspired cabinet with paddles and 2 player support, will launch this coming September.

Each mini-arcade will feature a 2.8″ colour screen, 5 officially licensed Atari games, speaker and 3.5mm headphone output. The units will be powered by 4 AA batteries (totally old school) or a micro-USB cable. Both mini-arcades will be presented in a collectable gift box. Pricing for each unit has been set at £24.99 / €29.99 (no word on US or AU pricing or availability as of yet – we will keep posted). Pre-orders for these Atari mini-arcade system are currently available via Amazon UK.

The Atari Pong Mini Arcade includes a unique Atari inspired paddle system and 2 player support, with the following built-in games: Pong ®, Breakout ®, Circus Atari ®, Off The Wall and Super Breakout ®.

The Atari Mini Arcade features removable arcade style joystick and D-pad controls, with the following five built-in games: Centipede ®, Adventure, Sprint Master, Warlords ®, and Yars’ Revenge ®.

image source: Blaze Entertainment

We are definitely keen to try out these Atari Mini Arcade systems, so stay tuned! Once we get our hands on these, we’ll report back with our thoughts. Game on peeps!