#atari inc

The news of Atari’s brand new console, the Ataribox, came out last week during E3 — I briefly mentioned it during my E3 round-up, but it’s obviously worthy of more detailed coverage. I mean, it’s a new console by Atari! The originators! Them folks who did the Pong machines, the heavy sixer 2600’s with all the wood panelling, and all of that good stuff — it doesn’t get much more retro than that.…

Curt Vendel, Atari historian and founder of the Atari History Museum has passed away on 30 August at the age of 53.

Vendel’s passion for Atari began in his teenage years, when he collected games, engineering logs, schematics, drawings, and technical materials from former Atari employees. He was also known to have dug through the dumpsters at Atari’s California properties in search of discarded…

For many years, it was assumed that the remaining prizes in Atari, Inc.’s Swordquest contests - Waterworld, Airworld, and the Swordquest Championship - were taken by Jack Tramiel and put in his house. Popular theory is Tramiel took the Swordquest grand prize - the Sword of Ultimate Scorcery, which was a sword with a gold handle encrusted with jewels and a blade of pure silver - and hung it over his fireplace.

Not so, according to Atari historial Curt Vendel:

Franklin Mint were the owners of the prizes, when Warner sold Atari, the prizes were not part of the sale.  They reverted back to Franklin Mint and were melted and reused into other items.

Review: Alone in the Dark (iOS)

Alone in the Dark (iPad, iPhone) Developed by Kung-Fu Factory and Published by Atari Inc. Release Date: August 31st, 2014 (iOS), April 16th, 2013 (Japan)

Twenty-two years ago a little game called Alone in the Darkreleased. Claiming to be an Ambient Survival Horror Game, it was the grandfather of the now well-known genre. It was published under Infogrames’ short-lived Virtual Dreams label, meant…