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Atari Panther: The Extinct Cat

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In 1988 Atari Corporation’s Jack Tramiel ordered work to begin on the successor to the Atari 7800 and XEGS. Work quickly begun on the Panther and Jaguar consoles – yes, the Jaguar! The Atari Panther was being developed by Flare Technology (Flare One and Konix Multisystem) and was scheduled for release in 1991, directly competing with Nintendo’s SNES and Sega’s Mega Drive.

The Panther platform was going to be a mash up of the Atari ST and Transputer “Blossom” video card, once again blurring the lines of “is it 16 or 32-bit?”. For the record, the Motorola 68000 CPU was going to run at 16MHz (compared to the Mega Drive’s 8MHz and the SNES’ 12MHz) which was going to be paired with a 32-bit graphics card running at a whopping 32MHz! On paper, Atari was doing their math(s) right!

As the Panther and Jaguar were being developed in parallel, Atari Corp. started favouring the Jaguar as it was progressing quickly and presented far more impressive and superior technology. Atari eventually decided to scrap the Panther and forge ahead with their 64-bit console. The cancellation of the Panther meant that Atari had no hardware presence in the home console market between the discontinuation of the Atari 7800 in 1992 and the launch of their Jaguar in 1993. This gap weakened the Atari brand and likely contributed to the failure of the Jaguar console.

The cancellation of the Panther was poor timing, which in retrospect Atari wishes they had pursued it to market, as it would have given both the SNES and Mega Drive one hell of a fight!

The Atari Panther blueprint!

Looking good – front, back with nice sides!

The press release that got us drooling!

image source: Atari-Explorer via Wayback Machine

 

Line Defense: The Mobile Arcade Game That Blends The Past With The Future

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Whoa, this newfangled arcade game Line Defense (Ed: not Defence!) melds the playing mechanics from two classic Atari games, Missile Command and Breakout. Line Defense was released almost a year ago (August 2016), so if you haven’t picked it up, then grab your Android or iOS device and hit download immediately. Oh yeah, did we mention that Line Defense is free? Well, what are you waiting for – go and get it and play it!

As massive fans of Missile Command and Breakout, we can say that the Legal Radiation game dev team have definitely blended the past with the future. For those of you that want to know the main features before you dive in, here is what Line Defense will deliver:

  • Simple one finger swipe control
  • Unique bonuses, power-ups, bosses & Motherships
  • Collect crystals and get special upgrades for your line (cannons, radar, shield power etc.)
  • 20 colourful maps & a challenging hardcore mode
  • Unique Mini Games for extra fun
  • Amazing original soundtrack with dynamic in-game music.
  • Easy to play – no tutorial needed!
  • Includes 50+ achievements
  • Gamecenter Leaderboards Support


source: Legal Radiation Team

 

Atari Lynx: The Games That Never Were

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The Atari Lynx was and still is a great handheld. Imagine if Atari had McWill’s LCD mod back then, they may have given the Sega Game Gear and possibly the Game Boy a run for their money (Ed: OK, perhaps not the Game Boy)!

If you were into arcade style games, then the Atari Lynx was your platform of choice. With games like Double Dragon, Klax, A.P.B., Battlezone 2000, Rygar, Hard Drivin’, Joust, Xybots, Paperboy and the awesome Rampage, Robotron and S.T.U.N. Runner, the Lynx was not short on quality action titles. Actually, we could have added a laundry list of other games, but we thought you’d get the picture with a subset of titles.

During the commercial lifespan of the Atari Lynx, there were a roster of big name titles that never saw the light of day. We could only imagine the impact these games may have had on the commercial viability of the Lynx! Just in case you were wondering, here are a few of the cancelled games from 1992 that we reckon could have catapulted the Lynx on the path to success:

Rolling Thunder

Vindicators

Geoduel

720°

Cabal

There were quite a few other cancelled games, but we thought we’d limit the list to ensure that we didn’t enrage you all. Actually, quite a few cancelled games did make it out when Hasbro, the owners of the Atari properties at the time, released the rights to develop for the system to the public domain, but that was well after the Lynx was considered dead (Ed: we did appreciate Alien vs Predator and Raiden)!

Ah, the beautiful Lynx, if only you were given a proper and fair chance by your creator!

 



Atari Flashback 7 Console Giveaway Winners

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Our Atari Flashback 7 console giveaway was a huge success! We were inundated with heaps of drool-worthy retro entries, making picking the winners all that more difficult!

We congratulate the winners, Tim Barnett and Daniel Cook for their great retro photo entries. Hope both Tim and Daniel enjoy their Atari Flashback 7 console prize!

If you want to see the other awesome retro pic entries, head on over here.

Winner 1: Tim Barnett:
“This blanket took 400 squares and 5 months for my wife to crochet. That’s retro love!”

Winner 2: Daniel Cook
“The summer of 89/90 – the greatest summer of my life. Where me and my bro would stay up all night spending hours and hours on my newly acquired and much loved Commodore 64. Ahhhh… retro gaming heaven”

“Meanwhile back in the 80s…where a young boy (with his tragic retro haircut) would dream of killing rapidly descending aliens in his sleep” – Daniel Cook

Thanks to our great friends at Five Star Games for supplying the Atari Flashback 7 console prizes!

 

WIN: Atari Flashback 7 Classic Gaming Consoles

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Attention peeps: We are giving away 2 x ATARI FLASHBACK® 7 CLASSIC GAMING CONSOLES!

Yep, you read that right, our good friends at Five Star Games have provided us two brand new Atari Flashback® 7 classic gaming consoles to giveaway to our awesome audience!

For your chance to win, head over to our Facebook giveaway and post your most retro gaming related photo in the comments section!

So what are you waiting for, go and snap your most retro gaming related pic and enter the giveaway for your chance to snag a cool console!

If you don’t know what the Atari Flashback® 7 classic game console is, then here is what you need to know:

The console features 101 built-in Atari 2600 games. These games include Frogger and Space Invaders™, along with all-time Atari 2600 classics like Asteroids®, Centipede™, Jungle Hunt, Missile Command®, and Pong, among many more. The console includes two wireless controllers, styled like the Atari 2600 originals, and two legacy (DB9) controller ports for optional wired joysticks or paddles for that nostalgic hit!

image source: Five Star Games

 

Atari To Make New Gaming Hardware

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There is nothing more exciting than hearing that one of your favourite video gaming companies from your childhood is about to launch new hardware!

We know that the new Atari is nothing like the old, but hearing that they are teaming up with Gameband to create a new wearable gaming product, we did let out a little squee! With lots of teaser tweets (see below), we are anxiously awaiting further news on this new Atari product that lets you play Atari classic games in a whole new way! We’ll update this post as more news comes to hand.

Just an interesting tidbit – according to the Gameband website, they are launching their Terraria and Atari Edition products via Kickstarter on February 8.

image source: Atari

 

Atari ST Gaming: The AtariCrypt Magazine

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Atari ST fans rejoice! We finally have an exclusive magazine we can all drool over (and tease our Amiga friends with)!

The ST Army Of Two, Steve Gregory & Darren Doyle (aka: Ataricrypt) have joined forces to bring us a very special Christmas gift for 2016: the ‘AtariCrypt Collection Volume One’ magazine – packed with 70 pages of awesomely curated Atari ST content!

This “FREE” digital magazine can be downloaded from the AtariCrypt site. Although the mag is free, there is the (voluntary) option to reward Steve and Darren for their hard work in bringing us this brill mag!

source: AtariCrypt

 

Press Play On Tape: Atari’s 8-Bit Legacy

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pressplayontape18The tape is rewound, the counter set to zero, and that means only one thing: it’s time to Press Play on Tape! This month, Alex, Daz and Aaron are joined by Aleks ‘Serby’ Svetislav from Weird and Retro to take a look back at Atari’s 8-bit computer range. Alex runs us through Atari’s lineup, spanning from the Atari 400 to the ST-inspired 130XE, before handing over the Serby to discuss his beloved XE Games System!

After picking Llamasoft as publisher of choice for this month, the crew discuss the many weird and wonderful games they’ve given us over the years. The group also discovers that Jeff Minter’s games were responsible for them getting the Atari Jaguar, Nuon and the PS Vita!

On a more subdued note, it’s with great sadness that this episode sees co-hosts Alex and Darren leave the Press Play On Tape podcast. Both have made the difficult decision to step down from regular hosting duties in order to focus on other projects. The show will go on, but they both will be missed.

Thanks for listening and hope you enjoy this month’s episode!

This episode of Press Play On Tape along with all previous podcasts can be found on Podbean and also iTunes – we’d love it if you gave us a review while you’re there. It all helps!

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blahjediAaron Clement
Tassie based retro gaming guy. Father of 3 and married to the very tolerant Kellie Clement. Coffee powered!

Follow Aaron Clement on Twitter and Instagram

 

 

 

Atari Gets Connected In The Home

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Atari_Sigfox_IoT_TitleAny time Atari is in the news, we can’t help but get excited or at least our ears prick up at the mention of the once-behemoth of the video gaming industry.

This time round Atari isn’t bringing a new gaming console to the market, but they are teaming up with Internet of Things (IoT) communication specialist Sigfox to develop a set of new products for the connected home with plans to cover everything from your own safety to that of your cats and dogs. At this point in time, the product categories will include home, pets, lifestyle and safety. Product development is set to kick off this year, with more information coming in the near future. Stay tuned!

source: gizmag

 

Ben Heck’s Portable Atari 2600

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Atari 2600 featured 2In this episode of The Ben Heck Show, Ben makes an awesome hand-held Atari 2600 by pulling apart the original chips and wiring the entire circuit manually, 3D printing a custom case, and adding a screen and rechargeable battery – wow! Check out the video to see just how he did it.

Atari 2600 3

Atari 2600 2

Atari 2600 4

Atari 2600 1

Source: The Ben Heck Show via Technabob

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msausretrogamerMs. ausretrogamer
Co-founder, editor and writer at ausretrogamer – The Australian Retro Gamer E-Zine. Lover of science fiction, fashion, books, movies and TV. Player of games, old and new.

Follow Ms. ausretrogamer on Twitter