How many ways have YOU played Atari? Special thanks to the collaboration of Kieren, The Laird: The Laird's Lair YT Channel - tinyurl.com/34e5h88f Extra special thanks to the KZfaqrs from whom I used clips to illustrate the Atari/Coleco legal misconception. I want to be clear on how much I appreciate these channels. For the larger channels that appear, I've been a longtime watcher of their material and used them as direct sources to build my game history knowledge. And for the smaller channels, while most of them were new to me when I made this video, I find their presence on KZfaq to be invaluable to game history researchers. As one who understands his limits, and knowing I don't have the resources to obtain every hardware system, and while big retro game channels can be fantastic for delivering chunks of game history, I've found that often, I've relied on these smaller channels doing videos on their game consoles, as they do them more as unboxing/reviews, showing lots of minor details like showing them being hooked up, and these are amazingly helpful when you analyze and focus on small details like I do, so to all the small KZfaqrs, a special thank you for that: Check out these great KZfaqrs' channels: Abort, Retry, Fail - tinyurl.com/7vezszp8 Adam Koralik - tinyurl.com/nzbctph6 Atari Leaf - tinyurl.com/ncw38x3s Gamester81 - tinyurl.com/hkc49kdu GAMETIMEwithKyle - tinyurl.com/y9zm98ez Retro Rewind - tinyurl.com/mv3tem69 Gaming Historian - tinyurl.com/22r45pvd Additional KZfaqrs: ArcadeUSA, Retro Games Fan, Cinemassacre (Angry Video Game Nerd), World of Longplays (Yushira) Some Atari box art images from AtariBoxed.com UPDATES/CORRECTIONS/CLARIFICATIONS & ADDITIONAL THOUGHTS: CONFIRMATION #1: I've discovered a new source that indicates that it was indeed VLSA who supplied Intellivision with the copy of the TIA chip, from an article on the blog Silicon Underground. It goes into a lot of technical detail that I did not, and throuroghly discusses the Cardco Cardaptor and the Game Loader atari clone add-ons for the Commodore VIC-20. You can check it out, here: dfarq.homeip.net/atari-2600-emulator-for-the-vic-20/ #1 CORRECTION: The Atari 7800 was initially planned to release a year after the Atari Jr., but the Jr. was delayed a year; both were released in 1986. I regret the error. Moments later, I mention that the 7800's backward compatibility to "decade old hardware" was of less value; despite the fact that it was actually 1986, this was still accurate. Please let me know in the comments below about any more errors or omissions so I can update this as needed. CORRECTION #2: While several sources claim the 2600 "light sixer" 1978 model was light due to less RF shielding, it appears that is wrong - the 2600 had some other changes, including a thinner plastic shell (the original was prone to warping); the RF shielding was in fact reduced for the the 1980 revision to the 4-switch model. But it appears the weight reduction for the "Light Sixer" was indeed primarily from changes in the console shell, not the RF shielding. #3 CLARIFICATION - 5:12 - I say Sears discontinued the Tele-Games brand - that was referring to the games. The hardware, the consoles, were still labeled with the Tele-Games branding. #4 CLARIFICATION - I say in the video that the Sears Video Arcade (Atari 2800) controllers were "essentially a 5200 controller minus the keypad" - I intended this in regards to the overall shape and joystick/button placement (previously I said it was "modeled" after then 5200 controllers), but "essentially" could imply the joystick worked the same, but of course the 5200 controller was an analog stick, whereas the VA/2800 controller was not, it was similar to a regular 2600 stick, shaped like the 5200 and with the spinner built into the stick like the 5200. #4 - CLARIFICATION: I said Ultravision's Condor Attack was a poor imitation of "Atari's Phoenix"; I should've clarified Atari's port of Phoenix, licensed from the arcade original. Ultravision's game more closely resembles Atari's port than the arcade version, however how I phrased that might mistakenly lead some to think I was saying Atari 'created' Phoenix. Also, much thanks to all you viewers for not slamming me for my strange pronunciation of "Condor Attack" as "Conder Attack" - not sure what was going #5 - CLARIFICATION: At 18:01 I mentioned that the Atari 5200 was the first time a company released a second console; I was speaking in terms of 2nd generation/cartridge-based consoles, because the topic was about backward compatibility. Thus, I wasn't taking into account 1st generation consoles, as without cartridges, there was nothing with which to be backwards compatible. However I didn't specify that, and of course there were some console manufacturers that produced multiple consoles in the 1st/2nd generations, including Magnavox, Atari, and Coleco. But, as these were 'dedicated' consoles and not cartridge-based, they really couldn't be backward compatible, so I didn't think to specify the distinction. I should've done so for clarity! #6 - CLARIFICATION - At 19:33, I talk about the two competing Atari 5200 hardware designs, one which had backwards compatibility built-in, but was dropped "for some unknown reason"; while we certainly don't know for sure, it has been suggested that it was most likely due to higher cost, which is also most likely to be true. #7 - CLARIFICATION: In the video, I characterize the Atari vs. Coleco and Atari vs. Activision legal cases as Atari having won the former, and lost the latter. Since both of these cases were settled out of court, there is a bit of subjectivity to that - if both parties "agreed", it can be less clear which party got more of what they wanted. With Atari vs. Coleco - Coleco suggested there were no proprietary parts they copied; however, there were custom chips. Whether Atari could've won or not, Coleco was wrong on that, and did have to pay royalties to Atari. Atari also appears to not have been threatened by the clone hardware, so it appears that they didn't feel it necessary to stop Coleco from making them at all (another possibility was they could've been worried about that causing anti-trust concerns). So while they both won - Coleco got to sell it's clone systems, and Atari got royalties, so it's a little bit of a gray area; however, the misconception is that Coleco "won" and that is demonstrably false. Their claim that no custom chips were used was false, and they were forced to pay royalties and might have lost altogether had Atari pressed the case. With Activision, it's quite different - Atari president Ray Kassar was FURIOUS with the Activision founders leaving Atari to be a competitor. He definitely wanted to stomp Activision into the ground and bar them from producing Atari games. This time it was Atari that was overstating things - the cartridges had no proprietary parts. Atari's charge of stealing corporate secrets was a harder sell in court, and while Activision also had to pay royalties, it was a small price to pay to fend off Atari and create the third-party game industry. Feel free to tell me what you think in the comments below! @8 - CLARIFICATION/UPDATE: At 14:00 I mention the Canadian Coleco Gemini being bundled with both Donkey Kong AND Mouse Trap. Viewer Steve Herold commented below that his Coleco Gemini 1983 Christmas gift here in America indeed also had both Donkey Kong and Mouse Trap, so it wasn't just a thing for the Canadian release. Thanks for chiming in, Steve! #9 - CLARIFICATION: I mention that the Video Arcade II / Atari 2800 was designed for the Japanese market, based on other sources, but it has been suggested that they came out simultaneously or that the Sears Video Arcade II was actually the original design - this may be true, but I haven't seen any verification of it - if you have any, please let me know below or on Twitter: @4cade1 Additional thoughts: #1 - "Sears did mention the Video Arcade's VCS game compatibility in promotional materials" - I wish I'd been more specific, because on second thought, I could only find that in later promotional materials; it appears when their version of the Atari first hit stores, they really did appear to be 100% presenting the VA as their own console in promotional materials, though it's understood generally that it was likely the sales associates in Sears's electronics department probably were pretty upfront that it played Atari games. By the time Atari's own branded version of the console was putting up sales of a million consoles a year, and when Atari had established a strong brand from national advertising campaigns, it appears that's when Sears began to mention in promos and print ads that the VA was VCS compatible.

Love how you showed up all those "journalists" that didn't do the level of research you did. Kudos Sir, you truly deserve the moniker of Hero Journalist.

As you say, Atari and Sears were business partners. In the early days Sears gave Atari the funding they needed when Bushnell oversold the number of Pong consoles they could manufacture. Pretty smart move for both parties.

Something else everyone gets wrong is about the video game crash in 83. The crash was only in North America. Europe and Japan were just fine. Also, the NES “saved” the gaming industry only in North America. The master system dominated in Europe and the sales number for the NES were abysmal. But we always hear about the crash effecting all of gaming and how the NES saved the entire industry. Nope. Only here.

You've got some of the stuff on the legal side wrong. Activision did not win against Atari, they settled, where Activision had to pay the settlement. You did say a settlement but you also said "won" which is two different things in a legal setting. The patent they were fighting was a design patent, primarily how the plastic and whatnot fit into the system. The amount they had to pay was deliberately undisclosed. The Gemini as a concept actually predates the Colecovision. As Robert Schenck - the lead engineer on Colecovision - told me, their original concept on getting into the cartridge game market was just to be a software supplier for the VCS. They wanted to create the clone console as their way into the market. I presume getting the cost of the video input down to be competitive was the reason they delayed it, or potentially they just wanted more people to buy the Colecovision. The "off the shelf parts" thing is probably just a misunderstanding that - if you could get a clone TIA elsewhere then it must be readily available. Of course only a few companies actually did proper reverse engineering to supply them. By all accounts, Coleco actually did have properly protected parts, but I think they too were running into the Activision patent issue. Intellivision most certainly did not have the license protection because they too were sued. Prior to the System Changer they were starting to release games under their M Network brand for the VCS, meaning they had already circumvented the software end. A few other things: As to why the compatibility was dropped in what would become the 5200, it's simply because - unlike in later consoles - you couldn't cheaply emulate a last generation chip. They would have had to include a TIA on top of the ANTIC and POKEY chips already in the console which would have made it even more expensive than the ludicrous $300 it launched for. The *real* question is why did they make it so Atari 8-bit computer software had to be rebuilt from scratch despite using the same technology? That would have saved them the many development headaches they ran into. The Video Arcade II redesign was pretty much simultaneous with the 2800 release in Japan. The 7800 was out in 1986. At least you didn't say they had a market test in 1984 ;) Atari didn't create Phoenix. That's a whole story in itself. The Colecovision wasn't based on the MSX, it's the other way around. At least, purportedly. It came out before Spectravideo, but all of these were based on actual off-the-shelf chips. --- I do appreciate this video a lot for not dilly dallying on the edges of each console specifications and all that. Really getting to the route of that matter and what this ecosystem (however brief) looked like and what the benefits were to consumers. Keep up the good work!

Me: "Mom, can we get an NES?" Mom: "We already have an NES at home." NES at home: The Atari Jr. in my closet that gets little to no use.

Really enjoyed the video - very well produced. One minor additional point about the ColecoVision Expansion Module #1 (12:24). Not only did it use power and the video output from the ColecoVision console, but it also used the clock signal. There isn't a crystal oscillator in the expansion module.

19:38 that "Other" reason was because the 5200 was based on Atari's existing 8bit Personal Computer line, the Atari 800 and 400. All games for the 5200 came from the Atari 8bit computers, and were compatible both-ways, at least as far as the software code was with very little changes (mostly to do with controllers). This allowed the 5200 to have an existing library of games, but this console had a LOT of other issues that made it fail, since the Video game crash had occurred due to the influx of crappy games for the 2600, not the 5200 or any other console.

Very informative video and very well put together. Love hearing about random stuff like this. Thanks for taking the time to put this out, and thanks for using a clip from me! Was cool to see.

Good video, I've watched about a billion retro game videos and it's rare I stumble upon a new creator and actually make it through their video before forgetting about them all together. Subscription earned.👍

The ‘unnecessary’ RF shielding, contained within the heavy sixer, was actually necessary, in order to satisfy the FCC. Nice video btw! I love it when someone does their homework, and debunks Atari related myths!

i got a Gemini for Christmas ‘83 (we already had an Intellivision.) Mine here in US also came with both Donkey Kong and Mouse Trap. Loved the controller.

That last portable console reminds me of some of the crazy electronics that J.C. Whitney used to offer in the '80s in their catalogs for the Van/RV market. I think they even offered an in-dash stereo that had a tiny TV built in....

Ahh, had a Sears VCS when I was young. Then later that broke and to replace it my folks got a Gemini. I loved that controler myself. I was 7 when the crash happened and all I saw was that all the games got cheep... good times.

That is a very great exemple that you NEVER old enough to play video-games... I never know about that things, even that i know a lot about ATARI itself... Great video, dude!

Awesome Video & Compilation w/ Laird.

Thanks for this. I actually fired up my Gemini the other day. We got it long ago after our original 2600 died.

That's huge advert with a massive wall of CRTS I wonder if it was real I can't imagine the time and effort it must have went into to actually making it. 😮😮😮😮😮

The Milton Bradley Voice Commander was based on hardware released for the TI-99/4A as the MBX system (itself based on a Milton Bradly gaming console that never made it to market). It included an advanced analog joystick, keypad, speech-synthesizer and headset microphone. It did get a small library of exclusive titles, But only 3-required the add-on - two being early-learning edu-tainment titles, and a final total library of only 10 cartridges) giving it a questionable value as an add-on for TI users. It was overwhelmingly a novelty item, but Championship Baseball was among the better baseball simulations on any system at the time. When it was supported, the voice command worked VERY well and the MBX library would have scaled-down well to the 2600. It would seem that Milton Bradley was finding ways to market the console they failed to bring to market themselves, by re-designing it as a 3rd party add on for other gaming and computer consoles (TI being a long-time partner, Atari having an enormous installed user-base). As happened to nearly everyone in that decade, it was too little too late. Parker Bros & Milton Bradley were both established gaming companies, who leaped boldly into electronic gaming, both talking uncharacteristic risks in the name of fututre relevance in an industry that was being re-defined as screen-based. Their efforts during this period would make for an intriguing story. (I'm not even sure what happened to them, and they dominated my youth.) Laird's Lair is certainly among the best KZfaq vintage-tech channels out there. He often features curiosities I've never heard of - and having been the ultimate nerd in the late-70's to mid-80's, I had settled into the false belief, that I'd seen 'em all. His game/system comparisons are outstanding, 'Twas a pleasure to see him included here.

with all the modern-day "retro" accessories being developed, I wouldn't be surprised to see someone developing that Atari cartridge adapter for the VIC-20 or C64 *now*.

There is still an old rumor floating around that Coleco had also made an Intellivision Adapter as well for the Colecovision 2400. Had Coleco not made the fateful decision to release the Adam instead of the Super Games Module, the gaming landscape might have been a bit different. Having Atari 2600/Intellivision/Super Games Module would have given Coleco the largest single console library in existence!! The Coleco was and still is impressive in it's abilities. Also, there is still a widely unknown trick you can do with an Atari 2600 and a cassette/ram expansion cartridge called the "Starpath Supercharger". If you can find a legal copy of the "Stella got a brain" CD ROM, you can plug a portable CD player to your Starpath, and load the legal roms from the CD to the Atari 2600 and play all the available games. Works great for a dirty, roundabout way to make the Atari a multigame console.

Awesome Video Jason! Keep up the great work!

Bring back wood paneling for consoles!! Haha. Your production value keeps getting better, and I like the new set background.

This video is what got me to subscribe. Well presented topic, and excellent analysis.

All together a good video, but I do take issue with the claim that Atari with the 5200 was the first brand to come out with a second console. While the original Magnavox Odyssey was a very weak console, I'd still say it was a console for the Magnavox Odyssey 2 to be a second console from the same brand when it was released in the late 70s, before the 5200 releasing in the early 80s.

Great video,keep up the good work. Greetings from Croatia 🤙👊

Wicked thought out and educational video bro. This was awesome.

Why does this video only have 2600 views? This is EXCELLENT. I grew up with Atari (2600, 800, 800XL, 520ST), and I didn't know 90% of what's in this video.

Yep, the Atari VCS family jewel was the Tia Jay Miner was genius behind the Tia and chips in the a8 and Amiga

I lived through this era and this video is quite accurate. Well researched. Well written. Well done.

Hyper-interesting! I'm 61, so I was around in the day. Awesome times, and we knew it then, too. I subscribed immediately.

You blew my mind on the colecovision lawsuit!

Wow!!! Great Video!!! Good Job!!

No mention of Kee Games, or is that maybe the subject of another video? Nonetheless, great work! The algorithm just showed me your channel today and you've earned a new sub on the strength of this video. Thanks.

You got my sub Single best second gen console documentary I've seen to date, especially for the pre 1985 era. Imo, console generations should be based on tech and console capabilities, not the years it was produced. By the tech measure, the Colecovision ought to be a 3rd gen console, and the 5200. To demonstrate how inconsistent the Console Generations are categorized in Wikipedia, the Xegs is classed a 3rd gen along the NES and SMS, but the 5200 is classed as 2nd gen with identical capabilities as the xegs, identical hardware GPU, CPU, very minor address changes only in software. The 7800 is called 3rd gen, and while its Maria GPU is superior to the GPU in the 5209/Xegs, the 5200/xegs sound chip is superior to the 7800. Again, best console documentary of the 78-88 period

Thanks for showing the commercial for the 2600 Jr. I was in 7th grade at the time. I remember that ad playing every day during the airing of The Transformers, which my mom taped for me. Weird thing is I don't recall any Nintendo commercials at the time. I wasn't aware of the NES until over a year later.

Me and a friend when we was kids built one on vero board that is the stuth with holes in it and copper strips that you had to solder. It could play uk and us with change of cristal switching. No rf direct video out to a cctv monotor.

I remember those Columbia House "buy 10 tapes for $1" ads. I got so many free tapes using the name Richard Cranial.

In Brazil, due to restrictions on imported products in the 80s, there were several Atari clones manufactured in Brazil by national companies. There was the original Atari VCS on the market, but it was more expensive due to government taxes

I'm really shocked how many people get the Coleco/Atari lawsuit story wrong! I really did think that fact was better known. Just one minor point though, the Atari 7800 test market in California and New York under Warner took place in 1984. The full North American release under Tramiel Atari was in 1986, alongside the 2600 Jr., with the European release in 1987. You deserve a lot more subs, excellent video.

The best atari video on youtube. great work.

Footnote: The Tele-games brand did get two exclusive game steeplechase and Stellar track. Of the two I only likes stellar track... once you figure it out.

Your cartoon of the Activision hand shake just realised that the Activision logo is a subtle blend of Atari & Colecovision. Oof

Information dump in a good way. Well done!

So informative, a definitive video for Atari 2600

I did quite enjoy this video, Sega had a similar thing going on with some of their CD consoles, JVC and Hitachi released their own versions of Sega consoles at various times, and some of those even looked physically the same!!

Did you know that the brand name Gemini was the corporate name of the game controller development partner with Atari. When Coleco decided to buy Gemini it was to get the rights to Atari compatible game controllers. Since Coleco owned the name of Gemini they chose to make their separate game console under the name of Gemini.

First time in a while the algorithm gave me a channel I somehow haven’t heard of that’s actually good! This was a great watch! I’m surprised Gaming Historian of all channels got this wrong. One of the things I always thought hurt Atari too was that the majority of the games on their follow up consoles were just retreads of the same games available on the VCS and elsewhere. Also, would love to see someone to do a deep dive on the Cardapter! I’m sure someone young that worked there at the time could be tracked down that might know the story of what happened. Irc, didn’t the Vic-20 draw graphics using something like ascii?

I grew up with the VCS. Loved it until Coleco came along. I just jumped to the Atari 800xl, and that lasted until the NES. Great times. Plus they are still in boxes in my attic

Sears got the Atari because they were the only company that would sell the Atari Pong console. Rebranding was part of the deal. I actually just scored a Gemini. I was so excited to find it, and got an excellent deal.

Outstanding video!

I used to own a 2600 clone with "256" games and didn't even realize it was a clone until 15 years later!

If you look at most of the advertisements in old computer magazines from that era, it seems that almost three quarters of the "New Hardware" adds were vaporware.

As a 50 something… I remember the colecovision add on, and the intellivision add on.

Great video thank's👍

Well researched and informative video, new subscriber here :)

I remember the story of Atari losing the court case with Coleco around the time of the actual expansion modules release, so its a story with a long history.

What a wild time. Imagine today, Microsoft coming out with an "XBOX V" that played PS5 games.

Slight correction about the Paddle Controllers on the Gemini: A pair of them was included with every Atari VCS, so including combo paddle/joystick controllers with the Gemini was only a slight savings.

This was awesome ✌️

6:52...that ET Rider thing is the stuff of nightmares.

Do you buy a second console for all of the exclusives? The answer is almost always "yes." I learned this at a very young age when I was first introduced to gaming back in 1986 with the Nes and Master System. I have never stopped...

I'm surprised that no third party companies tried to create an adapter for the NES.

Thanks for the video. Now I feel like playing Atari!

It may have been black and white and only 16x16 pixels, but the Microvision had a screen.

Thx for this sir! 😁

I wonder if the Columbia House games were off-the-shelf Atari games, or specially made. CH had the practice of licensing and copying the cassettes it offered, often with poorer quality than the off-the-shelf versions. Eventually, they were shipping so many cartridge's that they were just straight up bootlegging them, without going through the process of licensing the material. The record companies and artists were seeing NO royalties on the sales through CH.

My mom had a Sears Tele-games growing up. She always thought it was a knock off, and not an actual Atari 2600.

I'm not sure how the other KZfaqrs got it wrong. I'd always thought it was an out of court settlement of some kind. That belief only increased once I became a law student and did some IP law. I was aware that the Coleco Expansion Module used a reverse-engineered TIA so have no idea how anyone could think they had used off-the-shelf parts or that Coleco could win such a case. I know you don't want to hammer them too hard but this is just sloppy from them. Out of curiosity, I asked Chat GPT to see what it said. It got it right, meaning that the information was out there. As for the 5200. Wouldn't have been a simple job to make it backward compatible. They'd have to drop in the TIA somewhere and likely disable GTIA/Antic and the audio output from Pokey. But it was full of design flaws. We never got them over here in the UK, although I remember seeing them in mail order catalogues, so there seemed to be a plan to release them here. Quite simply, with just a couple of changes, they could have massively improved the chances of success of that console. The first was obviously to make it backward compatible with the 400/800. Moving the memory map around was one of the dumbest decisions any company ever made. If they wanted to make it more proprietary, to differentiate it from the computers, they could have, as they did, release different sized cartridges. That could have been used as a way of not just increasing revenue but to remove games that needed a keyboard from the library. The second thing they could have done was create expanded joystick ports that still mapped to the same memory locations. It would allow them to develop the more complex controllers that they did and, with a simple splitter, also allow them to plug in two existing single-button joysticks to the one joystick port. Atari had some great ideas but others were incredibly stupid.

atari 7800 in 1987 was a dinosaur! Mega drive was just around the corner, master system has been around for 2 years and famicom for 4 years.... Sure the US got all the consoles a bit later than Japan but atari looked like some primitive ameba compared to master system, at best comparable to the very early famicom games but by that time famicom games have become much more advanced.

I was pretty confused when I got a box of 2600 games from the USA and some had that telegames branding, I thought at first they were just bootlegs.

Lol in the early 90s. I bought the atari 2600 version of donkey kong for 25 cents lol

I'm not sure the "off the shelf parts" is a valid legal argument at all. It's not the parts that make the product, it's the product itself and proprietary firmware, if any. Maybe an argument could be made for the cartridge slot connector.

1) Well, having 7 different systems competing for the same consumers and store shelves is precisely the reason why the video game crash happened. 2) It is actually happened and is happening again with the abundance of famiclones in the market.

I always wanted a ColecoVision but my parents said no because I had an VCS I got in 77.

Not surprising the real profit on a console is from the games not the console. Clones were just more customers for Atari to sell games to.

having your cells displayed like that may lead to line fading as well as discoleration.

LMAO THE SUPER CUT OF KZfaqRS BEING WRONG

I know I'm a year late to the party, but I just watched this video this morning and thought it was excellent. Thank you for pointing out the that Coleco didn't win that lawsuit - I've been saying that for years (when it comes up), and have been told I'm wrong/crazy. I still might be crazy, but at least I'm not wrong... Heheheheh

I still have my Coleco and expansion module.

At one point I had this clone Funvision 31:15 in had only 6 build in games and I remember only one this condor

Ha! You are just the second person I've ever met who has that PotA Caesar bust. Still have all the discs in his back? 🙈🙉🙊

My parents bought me an Atari 7800 from Big Lots for $5. They had 2 huge gaylord boxes full of them with games for $1 each. I may have owned a NES at the time, but I was able to own about 20 games for it compared to the 3 NES games that we could afford. Lots of good memories and fun.

23:11 They can't even get voice recognition to work worth a shit now. No way in hell it would have worked 40 years ago.

That atari 5200 vcs expansion sucks too as it has it’s own builtin controller ports and it only uses the atari 5200 power line input and composite video line input ,not only that but the 4 port model even required a composite video line input mod as well to make it work,BUT even then it’s still just cross fake compatible,just like all other albeit unofficial atari vcs adaptors for other systems, it only makes the atari 5200 look more clunky then it already is,BUT i guess atari did this in an last desperate ditch attempt to save their 5200 from it’s grace,atari should,ve make their 5200 straight compatible with their vcs games right out of the box like they did with their atari 7800,but they didn’t🙁

Wouldn't it be cool if someone could use the information from the bought Atari papers about incorporating the Coleco vision compatibility and turn it into reality? Without FPGA or emulation of course...

Since we are talking historical accuracy in this video (and your notes about the Atari vs. Coleco myth are on point) we should talk about the term "video game crash" too. While the market had an implosion in the United States, there was no such similar effect in Europe or Japan, where home consoles and software continued to sell briskly. Calling what happened the "video game crash" inaccurately implies that only what happened in the United States matters and that we should just ignore everything else.

You've got me wondering about if VTL/VLSI ever got any legal consideration or action from Atari. But as you pointed out, Atari may just have seen that this meant more cartridge sales.

I'm guessing the Video Arcade II joysticks also had something to do with the design of the later 7800 joysticks?

This man knows his history

I always thought the Intellivision never got enough credit. I was lucky to have divorced parents lol so i had all the consoles at one point and i liked the Intellivision more than all the others. That was until the NES came out that i was lucky enough to be in the first test area in the US and got it super early. Needless to say i was a popular kid well at least my video games were lol

The gaming industry was fine and thriving in 1983. The North American video game crash only affected America.

Imagine if current systems had clones

I remember seeing those Atari Jr's in like Kaybee in late 80's for like cheap. I just wonder why would anyone still buy a atari!

It's kind of like what Microsoft is doing. They have their flagship console/s (XBSX, XBSS) all while they port Cuphead and Minecraft to other systems.

Gemini fan here. Controllers too

Nothing about the Protecto Enterprises Atari Game Loader for VIC-20?

it's a bit like the windows PC multiplicity

Oh boy, you haven't touched the unholy unofficial market (and rightfully so). Mostly consoles coming off of china and flooded fairs and flea markets in most European (and mostly Balkan) countries. I have a RAMBO GAME that it's essentially an Atari VCS with a multicart stuck inside with mostly hacked Atari and Activision games. You could change them by flicking one of the switches and also, you could stick a cartridge in there and get that game going. Unofficial cartridges were a hellscape too. Multicarts with weird switches, sometimes would fry your console. Some other times they had copies of those sleazy games so minors who were fiddling with the games would unearth some infamous games like Bachelorette and Custer's Revenge on different hacked versions with things ADDED to them. It really was quite a moment in the videogame space back then. 😂

colecovision wasn't based on MSX it was out on the market a year before "the standard" was released ... it was not uncommon for arcade machines to use a Z80 and a TI TMS VDP chip which ended up in the MSX standard, and its fairly trivial to port software to and from, but its by happenstance not based on. Also you got your point across about the coleco winning thing, to the point its like dude move on, its the second longest segment of the video with mostly obscure decade old video clips .... train dun left a long time ago