Atari is dying?

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/thew...vert&om_clk=newlyadded&tag=newlyadded;title;1

It seems that Atari will have to close its bussiness.

AFAIK it's only Atari US that's in deep trouble. Personally I wouldn't 'worry' too much, worst thing it could happen would be for them to sell the Dragonballz license.

Inforgames was in deep end before the namechange...they released crap like moo3..and then changed their name to atari to try to get a new cleaner image that has broader recognition. Too bad you cant fix stuff simply by calling it with different name.

Atari's financial woes are pretty serious at this point. And if their partner Infogrames is not going to be able to bail them out as they have in the past, the only alternative seems to be for them to sell off assets, cut staff and budget and/or go belly up. My hope is that they sell the single most valuable thing they own--the D&D license-to someone that actually wants to make computer games with it. To me. Atari is a sad case of non-gamers trying to make money off something they have no real understanding of and alienating customer after customer. But that's just me.

magerette said:

To me. Atari is a sad case of non-gamers trying to make money off something they have no real understanding of and alienating customer after customer. But that's just me.

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No, it's not...

Übereil

Is this news? It's been going on for the last 10+ years.

A licence garage sale could result in interesting new development projects. Master of Magic II is long, long, long overdue.

MudsAnimalFriend said:

A licence garage sale could result in interesting new development projects. Master of Magic II is long, long, long overdue.

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Hear! Hear! Bring back MOM!

I wasn't aware that Atari owned the ghost of Microprose. I thought 2K had all that library (Pirates and Civ4 were both 2K releases).

Didn't Take 2 bought those two along with Firaxis a while back?

As for Atari dying - absolutely expected it and good riddance. Though they are one of the few remaining major publisher that actually publish RPGs that really have some degree RP quality to them.

I thought Sid Meier got his checks from 2K while Firaxis was Brian Reynolds. Or did Take 2 try to put the two wunderkinds back together?

magerette said:

To me. Atari is a sad case of non-gamers trying to make money off something they have no real understanding of and alienating customer after customer. But that's just me.

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Actually, I have a similar, yet not so harsh feeling about EA, with the only difference that they still are able to squeeze enough money out of franchises until they bury them.

Ubereil said:

No, it's not...

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What he, said.

Civilization 3 Play the World comes to mind right about now. Civ fans may be the most loyal fans in all of PC gamedom, and they ripped 'em off, plain and simple.

I'm not entirely sure they could sell the D&D license. Their rights expire soon and I'm hearing they may be behind in payments anyway -- but I haven't checked the validity of this.

I'm not a fan of Atari but I would say they have shown (a little) more interest in RPGs than most major publishers, so be careful what you wish for...

Dhruin said:

I'm not entirely sure they could sell the D&D license. Their rights expire soon and I'm hearing they may be behind in payments anyway -- but I haven't checked the validity of this.

I'm not a fan of Atari but I would say they have shown (a little) more interest in RPGs than most major publishers, so be careful what you wish for...

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I have to agree with you there. I don't think they are a cold bunch of non-gamers either, just a little clueless sometimes. Just look at the list of titles they put out and the absence of console games.

I'm certainly not against the company but they could something to improve their public relations. Hiring a person or team to do that would cost a few 100 thousand that they don't have.

Its not like there's a dirth of publishers anymore. If they go who's left, especially as the man says, who's interested in RPGs? EA? MS? Ubisoft? Strategy First?

Lucky Day said:

Its not like there's a dirth of publishers anymore. If they go who's left, especially as the man says, who's interested in RPGs? EA? MS? Ubisoft? Strategy First?

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Another brick in the wall .... err ... mosaic stone into the tendency towards smaller companies ?

Wouldn't it be wonderful if they gave the ToEE source code to the folks at Co8 as a parting gift?

I don't particularly like Atari either, but compared to EA, they rock!! At least they support RPG's if not always to the extent we'd like them to!!

According to their US site, they have 8 PC "RPG" titles in their current line-up of 76 PC games. They are Dawn of Magic, Silverfall, Swashbucklers, Demonstone and Once Upon a Knight plus 7 NWN titles, D&D Online, and The Witcher.

Of those, realistically speaking only NWN and The Witcher are traditional cRPGs. You can toss in D&D Online if you think it rates--I haven't played it.

NWN and D&D Online are the only ones using the D&D license. (Demonstone also if that's D&D, and they also publish D&D Tactics for handhelds) I don't see this as a terribly high current level of support for RPGs, or a serious attempt to create new games with that license, but it is true that they have published some noteworthy titles in the genre over the years.

I don't see their list of games as a whole to be one based on any knowledge of what a good game might be. To me it reads like a list of titles that marketing people thought would sell--X number of sports games, X number of actiony games, X number of Deer Hunter games, etc.. Frankly, the loss of many of the non-rpg titles would go unnoticed by any serious gamer, IMO. However, it may be as good or better a track record than the other big guys.

In all fairness, I did think they made a good move by picking up a lot of smaller European studio titles from 1C for publication and distribution, like Fantasy Wars.

And they did publish The Witcher, so I'll quit ragging on them. For now.

BTW for some reason neither Gothic nor ToEE appears in their current lineup. For why??? Did they just stop producing them?

I just hope they don't take the D&D license down permanently with their sinking shi*.

But (!) instead, sell it to the most likely candidate to do true justice to D&D by making Baldur's Gate 3, in genuine, CLASSIC, CRPG fashion.

Hmmmm, now who are the candidates...