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"I foresee that Atari will be back with their own portable media player; ..."

How about this: Atari comes back, and failing to have learned from ET, yet again makes too many copies of a crappy game rushed to market?

I mean, my God, it's not even the same people, and they're doing the same stupid things over again.

Forgive me if wrong, wasn't Amiga cursed by the BladeRunner curse? Are these the same thing?

No. You must mistake it with Atari. In "Blade Runner", we see many advertisings of companies really existing in the early 1980's, and indeed most of them went into dire troubles in mid and late 1980's. First of all, Coca-Cola entered the whole mess of the "new Coke", that even the company itself calls now "marketing infamy. And that's an euphemism, actually. Then there was Bell (antitrusted just after the theatrical release of Blade Runner), Pan Am and Atari. However, the curse seems now to be extinct. Atari returned now in big style, Coca-Cola is no longer in trouble, and even Pan Am returned (in a way). There was also one excemption from this curse - TDK (a huge TDK advertising is a backrop to the death of Roy Batty in the BR's finale grande).

Since I have a Powerbook as my newest computer, and my PC is vastly out of date and unable to play this game, I'm stuck watching the trailer, for the time being. Also, I'm a big fan of Halo, so this might sound a little biased, but when you watch the trailer from the website, there seem to be many, (too many?) similarities with Halo, especially with the vehicles. I guess a tank is a tank and the basic design doesn't vary too much, but I swear they licensed the Warthog from Bungie because it looks nearly identical. The flying vehicles also look very similar to those used in Halo. And the snowy canyon used for the vehicle scene in the trailer, looks just like "Assault on the Control Room" & "Two Betrayals". I suspect the vehicle modes is one of the new types of battle. Otherwise, it looks like good-ol', fast-paced mayhem that'll give your computer, your broadband, and your trigger finger a workout.
Amigori

. . . my Taco gave to me FIVE GOLDEN RINGS,
four penis birds,
three fresh men,
two bubble tubs,
and a cartridge from Atari!

It comes with a version of Maya PLE made to just work with UT2003 and it's dev tools

Make you own characters and levels.

Not entirely free but you get the full game as well.

http://www.us.atari.com/games/unreal_tournament_20 03_pc/

This has also happened to Atari. A 'classic' name used by Infogrames to buy more brand recognition.

The company formerly known as Infogrames realised they were TEH SUCK and bought up the Atari name to use in the US. The old Atari we used to know has been dead for quite a while.

I think I finished that game 3 times before I even played any other RPG. It's still here on my hard drive. Such a great game. Someone else responsible for Torment has also recently left Black Isle (I cannot find the news item I read saying so), thus maybe there can be a sequel. Infogrames has the D&D license right now, and they are backing Troika's Temple of Elemental Evil. That's a good sign for something in the vein of Torment. It's too bad TORN got cancelled.

Also, I have to second the Knights of the Old Republic recommendation made by another poster. There are some similarities between the overriding stories in the two games. Also, Jennifer Hale (Fall-From-Grace) is in it! Woo!

Too bad Vhailor isn't there. Not the actor, but Vhailor.

Ravi

What is that, some sorta ripoff?

hey also created many PS2/gamecube/xbox titles

Err.. you sure you're not thinking of the Atari brand name being used by Infogrames?

Has anyone noticed their logo is on the NeverWinter Nights box?

That's the other Atari, now owned by Infogrames. (Previously owned by Hasbro, and a few purchases before that, were busy making the Atari ST, TT & Falcon line of 16- and 32-bit computers, and the Lynx handheld and Jaguar home consoles.)

I'll indulge your offtopic request.

Atari is owned by Infogrames of France.

I'm not positive, but I think that is effectively a completely different company, all of the management has been changed.

Below is a summary of some information from the Infogrames corporate site, listed above.

Infogrames Entertainment Acquisition History
Year: Company Acquired, Region (Activity)
* 1996: Ocean Software, United Kingdom (Publishing)
* 1997: Philips Media, Netherlands (Distribution)
* 1998: ABS Multimedia, Portugal (Distribution)
* 1998: Arcadia, Spain (Distribution)
* 1998: Gremlin, United Kingdom (Development and Publishing)
* 1998: Game City, Switzerland (Distribution)
* 1998: Psygnosis, France (Development)
* 1999: Accolade, United States (Development and Publishing)
* 1999: Beam Software, Autsralia (Development)
* 1999: Ozisoft, Australia (Distribution)
* 1999: GT Interactive, United States (Development/Publishing/Distribution)
* 1999: Den-O-Tech, Canada (Development)
* 2000: Hasbro Interactive, United States (Publishing)
* 2000: Paradigm Entertainment, United States (Development)
* 2002: Shiny Entertainment, United States (Development)
* 2002: Eden Studios, France (Development)

Q: Through its acquisition of Hasbro Interactive in 2001, Infogrames Entertainment became the owner of the Atari brand. What plans do you have for the Atari brand?


A: Atari is perhaps the most illustrious name in the interactive game industry and we are thrilled to have it as part of the Infogrames family. We want to be true to the innovation that marked Atari's launch 20 years ago. With that in mind, we are re-inventing Atari for a new generation. Our inaugural titles, Splashdown, MXRider and Transworld Surf, all of which will launch in November 2001, capture the qualities we believe will define the re-invented Atari. They are innovative, unique, exhilarating, breakthrough, and genre defining games. You can expect to see a great deal more from us regarding Atari in the months ahead.

The saddest example of late is Infogrames trying to ride the name recognition of Atari of all things! WTF? LOL

Atari is one of the developers working on Test Drive, Unreal Tournament 2003, VRally3, Godzilla, Terminator, Splashdown, Transworld Surf, MX Rider, Neverwinter Nights, and Stuntman.

It's sad to see Atari's legacy being abused by
yet another company who just lives on Atari's
fame.

Articles I've read (one in PC Gamer, i think ... that is the UK one, not the US one) on infogrames buying the atari name have said that they intend to use the Atari name to distribute some of their higher quality *new* games.

This sounded interesting to me. In fact someone hinted that over time Infogrames would like to end up using the Atari brand for everything (although I take that story with a pinch of salt, considering the Infogrames name is pretty well respected anyway, and to get rid of it would be pointless).

In fact, looking at www.atari.com I see new games for the PS2. Granted, I haven't heard much at all of these games, but I'm sure Infogrames have a master plan, and are testing the water first before they jump into the waters with the Atari label on a big games.

Although the company we once knew as Atari is long gone, they do still exist, and several games have been released recently on various platforms under the Atari brand. The company's assets (mainly the name and rights to various Atari properties) have been passed around several times over the years, from JTS to Hasbro and now Infogrames.

Sadly the only example you quoted is still in business so I think you might want to go back to your sources on this one...

Perhaps you could post a link to one of these articles you mention and we could find out what was really said.

For a long time, Psion had the handheld market sewn-up. Sure, it had competitors like Casio and Atari (remember the Portfolio anyone?) but no one who really had a well-rounded, well-supported product with either a software- or user-base to match.

But the one area the Psion was weak in was connectivity. Out of the box, you could not connect a Psion to a PC or a Mac, which meant all those names, numbers and address had to be entered manually. Eventually, the company released connectivity kits that allowed users to exchange data between their devices and their PCs. But at £50/$80 or so, these weren't exactly great value for money.

Then US Robotics came along with the Pilot, which, after various model revisions and name changes, became the Palm. Now, fuctionwise, this new handheld didn't do anything that any other handheld could do - to-do list, calendar, calculator, contacts, notes. But what it did do was connect to and exchange data with PCs very easily. At the touch of a button no less, out of the box

Meanwhile, Psion happily trundled on ignoring the fact that the market had changed and that users now expected PC connectivity at no extra cost. Rather than bundling the necessary cable and software (cost to them perhaps £10/$15), they carried on with the same business model.

Now when you have a monopoly (or near monopoly) you can ignore the market like this and just do what you want. When you don't, you have to watch the rest of the herd and, sometimes, follow them.

Psion didn't, sales dropped, the Symbian alliance lifeboat sank, and the rest is history.

They do have a new Space Invaders game. Atari's games were bought by Hasbro Interactive. You can play a shocked version of Centipede on their web site, as well as check out the new Space Invaders, Asteroids and Frogger 1 and 2. Your welcome.

Other posters have commented that this seems a bit paranoid, what with the evidence and all. 2600 is claiming that the FBI doesn't have the real Mafiaboy.
Well, I claim that they're not the real 2600! We've been paying attention to a fake! Through subtle manipulation over an extended period of time, "2600" has usurped the rightful entity behind the name!
The true 2600 is, and always has been, here

FYI, "Atari" has nothing to do with this. "Atari" (ie, the people who made the Jaguar) are now part of Hasbro Interactive. See?

Also, in case you didn't know, the other Atari, "Atari Games" is still alive and kicking. It has been for, what, 15 years maybe? See here.

(They did Gauntlet, Road Blasters, Tetris (arcade), S.T.U.N. Runner, Area 51, SF Rush, and tons others.) (I had a chance to work there a few years ago, too... but picked my girlfriend over Silicon Valley.)