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Video Game crash of 1983
Haze:
There seem to be 2 ways of looking at this.
As mentioned, you could be talking about the arcade games, too many new titles being pumped out on expensive one-off boards, at high cost to operators, not making enough money to cover costs and be able to buy more machines, that's one way to look at it. Secondly there was the home market.
When people talk about crash the most common stories which come to mind aren't the arcade ones, but the home software, the x copies of ET which went unsold.
If you look at it purely from the perspective of the games you'd probably be sat there wondering 'what crash?' There's no real discernible dip in output (of arcade games) at any point in the 80s, or 90s, sure there were some games which were rough around the edges, but there must have still been enough demand.
For the home markets, yes, there were a lot of awful games produced early on, but there were awful games produced later too, not much has changed. The whole ET situation is bizzare, because the blame for the crash often gets pinned on cheap startups wanting to make a quick buck out of games and flooding the market with crap. ET was a first party Atari game, likewise the terrible port of Pacman yet if you look over here at something like Manic Miner (1983) and Jet Set Willy (1984) they're considered classic games but were basically the only thing ever done by that developer.
At the end of the day if you pay your guys in marketing more than your developers can deliver and leave customers and retailers feeling ripped off or otherwise cheated, then yeah, you're going to end up with a lack of trust. If retailers (and publishers) were stupid enough to believe their own marketing hype, you're going to get a crash.
So over-investing, over-hyping, under-delivering and somehow actually thinking you're doing things right while being undercut by people who do give a damn about quality is a pretty good recipe for things to go boom, although the music industry still seem to be surviving somehow and they're far worse offenders in all areas?
Haze:
yeah, I think that's probably what it was, a blip, in a relatively new industry, which sent everybody into panic but ended up being 'wisely' manipulated by some.
DaveMMR:
--- Quote from: Haze on September 01, 2012, 09:35:30 am ---As mentioned, you could be talking about the arcade games, too many new titles being pumped out on expensive one-off boards, at high cost to operators, not making enough money, and secondly the home market.
--- End quote ---
The 1983 crash was all about the home market. When Warner sold off Atari to the Tramiels, it retained the arcade division because it was pretty much the only part of the company making money. The arcades, while not at its peak and definitely on a steady decline, still had life left in them.
--- Quote ---For the home markets, yes, there were a lot of awful games produced early on, but there were awful games produced later too, not much has changed. The whole ET situation is bizzare, because the blame for the crash often gets pinned on cheap startups wanting to make a quick buck out of games and flooding the market with crap.
--- End quote ---
During the second generation, there wasn't just a bunch of crap - there was WALL-TO-WALL crap. Companies that had no business making games (Ralston-Purina?) were flooding the shelves. Then multiply that times the number of available consoles and home computers (back when you'd release a game for every single system - see the image on this page and caption for example) and you'd see how there just too much choice and too many landmines.
Why the failure of E.T. and Pacman was so high profile was because consumers were looking to Atari, a familiar name, to provide a quality product, figuring most of the other lackluster titles were just from two-bit companies anyway. But they quickly found out that Atari was rushing their games through development as well, with little concern for quality. Consumer confidence drops, carts end up in a landfill, industry crashes, Japan swoops in and takes over.
Haze:
--- Quote from: DaveMMR on September 01, 2012, 10:14:10 am ---Why the failure of E.T. and Pacman was so high profile was because consumers were looking to Atari, a familiar name, to provide a quality product, figuring most of the other lackluster titles were just from two-bit companies anyway. But they quickly found out that Atari was rushing their games through development as well, with little concern for quality. Consumer confidence drops, carts end up in a landfill, industry crashes, Japan swoops in and takes over.
--- End quote ---
but why only in the US? There was an awful lot of complete crap on the 8-bit systems here too, but most places simply had the sense not to overstock it, and the times the better known publishers did put out a stinker just ended up being soaked up and if a smaller publisher was getting consistently good reviews (at a time when reviews were *honest*) then we saw more of their games on shelves rather than having to be sold direct via mail order.
it worked, and it worked well
DaveMMR:
--- Quote from: Haze on September 01, 2012, 02:42:41 pm ---but why only in the us?
--- End quote ---
Simple. Atari, Coleco, Mattel, et al. are American companies. Video games in general were an American industry until we crashed. I'm not familiar with the European market but I am simply guessing less money was at stake. Atari lost billions - with a B.
And it was not only bad software. It was bad software Atari was NOT making money on. Anyone can and did make a cart for Atari and didn't have to give them a dime. There weren't making money on the consoles either until the 2600 jr.
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