I’d never even heard of George Plimpton before he did those Intellivision commercials back in 1980, but afterward, I knew him as “Intellivision Guy”. Apparently he wrote books and newspaper articles, but for me, he was the one always trying to convince me that playing baseball on the Intellivision was the closest you could get to the real thing.
If Intellivision had come out before the Atari, it might have been a contest, but like, I think, all or almost all of the “console wars”, there was no doubt who was winning. The Intellivision had a number pad controller and somewhat higher resolution while the Atari had the wrist-numbing joystick and very blocky graphics, but the Atari was the one the kids wanted.
A company called Infogrames bought the Atari intellectual property a few years back, changed their name to Atari and started selling merch and NFTs. They also attempted to mine nostalgia with a re-imagining of their original Atari 2600 VCS, a Linux box that could play games inspired by the classics. They doubled down again with a newer machine that could also play the original game cartridges.
Meanwhile, ten time Guinness World Book of Records video game music composer Tommy Tallarico announced plans to resurrect the Intellivision in the same way — a console that vaguely resembles the original, games inspired by the originals, and with a twist that all the games would be “family friendly”. The expectation would be that the entire family would gather around the Amico and play, I guess, video baseball.
All that’s come to nothing. The Amico may never come out. Tommy Tallarico isn’t with Intellivision anymore. Vultures are circling.
Did someone say vultures?
The company that owns the Atari brand bought out the Intellivision brand yesterday, and the wording about brands is significant, in that the-company-commonly-known-as-Atari just bought the Intellivision name and the right to remake certain OG Intellivision games. Their first product?
They didn’t buy the Amico stuff, which now probably has to sever their ties to the Intellivision brand, severing the last shred of nostalgia they had left. Now, it’s a console that can play mobile-style games, much like legendarily unlucky crowdsourced console, Ouya.
I have to admit that I have bought some Atari merch. I have their messenger bag, which I use to cart my laptop and other stuff to and from work on my bike. It works and looks cool. I have the Atari 400 mini, that was not actually an Atari product, but instead just licensed the name and games from Atari. I passed on the other Atari stuff, but, I guess it’s nice that it’s out there.
I’m never forgiving them for those NFTs, though.
